The two main stats for a gun are it’s speed (how many shots per second - details) and attack (how much damage per shot -details) - this is comparable across guns and what this post is about, but you also need to factor the benefit of any special features (e.g. Rifle’s Piercing, Plasma Cannon’s explosion, Looper’s Piercing and Boomerang, Gemini’s Laser link and Devastator’s Trail), as well as the size of bullet (e.g. the rifle seems to have a longer projectile which should mean a slightly higher chance of hitting a moving enemy) and speed of bullet (details).
Assuming all shots hit, we can multiply the two to calculate the Damage per Second. This is what it looks like for a Loadout Attack of 1,000, without any Gear, Bonuses and Perks:
| Gun | Damage/Shot | Shots/s | Damage/s |
|---|---|---|---|
| Smart Minigun | 380 | 4.2 | 1,596 |
| Auto Gun | 420 | 3.8 | 1,596 |
| Money Grubber | 600 | 2.4 | 1,440 (+chain shots damage if there are nearby enemies) |
| Looper | 700 | 2.3 | 1,610 (+boomerang damage if it hits on return) |
| Blaster | 1,000 | 1.6 | 1,600 |
| Plasma | 1,600 (blast damage 750) | 1 | 1,600 (+ blast damage) |
| Gemini Laser | 710/projectile; 1,420 for both; + link damage 710 |
1.2 | 852 (/projectile), 1,704 for both; (+ link damage) |
| Nuclear Lasso | 1,700 + lasso damage 35% (includes gear damage) | 0.8 | 1,360 + lasso damage |
| Laser Rifle | 2,150 | 0.7 | 1,505 |
| Devastator | 2,800 + trail damage 32% (includes gear damage) | 0.65 | 1,820 + trail damage |
Few other aspects to factor in to this:
- How the weapon interacts with Perks, Hero Passives and Gear damage (also applies to Attack from Mystery Crates)
- The Devastator leaves a trail that deals damage of 32% of a regular shot (details)
- The Nuclear Lasso makes a lasso that deals damage of 35% of a regular shot
- The Rifle pierces, so you have a head-start on Indirect Damage
- The Plasma Cannon blast affects enemies nearby, not just the enemy it hits, so there’s quite a bit of collateral damage and you can also hurt them across a wall/ice (as long as you don’t have Bouncy Walls)
- The Looper, has an even greater head-start on Indirect Damage than the rifle, and even with a single boss you could still get a 37.2% boomerang hit (depending on how much the boss and your hero are moving around)
- The Plasma Cannon looks like it’s better than the Looper, because the blast damage is always incurred while the Boomerang shot might miss, but the Plasma’s Blast only occurs once per shot (so only the base weapon damage applies for Piercing/Chain/Dividing) and the Blast damage doesn’t increase with any Gear, Bonuses and Perks (and also doesn’t reduce for Double/Triple Barrel and MultiShot)
- The Gemini Laser benefits from Piercing, Small Bouncy Walls and the laser link (which does the same damage each hit but doesn’t proc passive skills). Damage will tend to be higher with crowds (where there’s more enemies for the projectiles and link to hit) and less with bosses.
- The Money Grubber benefits from starting with Chain shots (which make shrapnel shots, and Elemental (Fire, Poison, Ice and Zap) perks more useful)