The Alternate Nailgun (also known as the Sawblade Launcher) is the alternate from of the Nailgun. It can be unlocked in 4-4: CLAIR DE SOLEIL after finding a secret indicated in an earlier level. It is the second alternate weapon players can find in the game.
Primary Fire
The Sawblade Launcher shoots out saws that do more damage than nails and will pierce through enemies and ricochet off of walls, but has a much slower fire rate.
The durability of saws will be slightly reduced if they bounce off terrain, potentially reducing their potential maximum hits.
Saws can be punched with the Feedbacker to double their damage per tick until the saw contacts a wall or enters a magnet's orbit.
Weapon Location
The Sawblade Launcher can be found in 4-4: Clair de Soleil, with its location hinted at in 4-3: A Shot in the Dark after defeating the Mysterious Druid Knight (& Owl). In 4-4: Clair de Soleil, after the first jump pad, there is a closed door with a partly open door to the right of it. The partly open door shows a glimpse into the Chamber of the Feline and the Rodent, which has a pool of water as well as a blue skull. Shoot the water with the Electric Railcannon and the closed door will open, giving you access to the weapon.
Pros and Cons
Pros:
- Higher damage per shot.
- Shots pierce enemies.
- Shots ricochet off of walls.
- Saws circle around magnets, damaging nearby enemies.
- Overheat Saws can create traps that cover long distances.
Cons:
- Lower DPS without piercing.
- Saws orbit around magnetized enemies, unable to hit the enemy with the magnet stuck in them.
- No form of Overheat Storage if using Overheat Saw.
Strategy
The Sawblade Launcher is much more suited to placing traps rather than directly firing at enemies compared to the Nailgun, As such, using the Sawblade Launcher primarily consists of finding fairly open areas where the saws will be able to catch enemies. If the area is particularly large, saws can cover a greater radius if fired far from the magnet in order to increase the size of their initial orbit.
Saws have a high damage per second if they're able to connect multiple times, which can be used to deal large amounts of damage to bosses or strong enemies quickly if baited into the saws. Bosses with cutscenes are naturally a prime opportunity to lay down saws.
With good aim, saw-punching can maximize the damage output of individual saws. In particular, a punched full-heat Overheat Saw will instantly kill Schisms, and will continue to do so until it runs out of durability, contacts a wall, or enters a magnet's orbit.
Attaching a magnet to Hideous Masses during their upright form and firing sawblades can kill them outright, or at least damage them heavily. It is due to their large size causing the saw blades to hit their tail.
Although Malicious Faces usually avoid Sawtraps due to being airborne, magnets can be placed on nearby walls in order to hit them.
For large opponents such as Flesh Prison, Corpse of King Minos, Leviathan, and even Sisyphean Insurrectionist(due to it's attack animations warping it's hitbox) simply placing a magnet on them allows orbiting saws to hit them due to their size rendering them within the magnet's orbit.
Trivia
- The saws can be Parried to be redirected. This has no damage boost on its own, but deals extra +NAILBOMBED damage.
- Unlike the Slab Revolver, the Sawblade Launcher has an actual name.
- It is also a much more drastic change on the weapon, as the Alternate Revolver merely increased power at the cost of fire-rate, while the Sawblade Launcher outright changes the base weapon's projectiles.
- When the Sawblade Launcher was initially introduced in early access patch 10a, saws had no magnet weight and the Overheat variant could be tap-fired for little heat penalty, quickly resulting in Minos Prime being killed in a fraction of a second by tap-firing Overheat over the duration of the cutscene. The strategy was quickly dubbed 'Sawcon'. This was fixed in 10b, which also fixed silver saws increasing in damage off fodder corpses and the Overheat variant's alternate fire not breaking if it never hits a wall.
| ATTRACTOR SAWBLADE LAUNCHER
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| Primary Fire
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| Damage
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0.75x3
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| - Duration
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| Cooldown
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2 seconds per saw (20 seconds)
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| Alternate Fire
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| Duration
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12 seconds
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| Cooldown
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0.35 seconds
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| Damage Modifiers
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| Terminal Info
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| Obtained in
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| 4-4
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The Attractor variant will fire out a maximum of three magnets that can attract nails and saws. Whereas nails will simply head directly towards the magnet, saws will instead curve around magnet, stabilizing in an orbit at slightly less than a dash's distance away. This makes sawtraps incredibly powerful due to having much more range than a nailtrap, taking full advantage of the sawblade launcher's much higher damage output compared to the nailgun.
The initial size of a saw's orbit around a magnet depends on how horizontally far the saw is when connecting to the magnet; the further the saw is, the larger its initial orbit will be.
The primary fire of the Attractor fires out special silver saws that do more damage than regular saws, have more durability and deal more damage to weak husks, but there is a limited supply. Compared to silver nails (of which a maximum of 100 can be held), you can only hold a maximum of 10 silver saws, regenerating at the rate of 1 saw per 2 seconds. A silver saw can hit up to three enemies, with each piercing also increasing in damage by 50% multiplicatively with each fodder husk it hits. A silver saw can bounce up to 16 before being destroyed.
Magnets have a capacity of 75 nails before exploding prematurely. Attractor variant Sawblades take up 5 nails of space, Overheat and JumpStart variant sawblades take up 2.5, and Overheat charged sawblades and chainsaws take up 15.
The Attractor variant has the same damage bonus against weak husks as its Nailgun equivalent, making it extremely effective at picking off Strays, who will instantly die to silver saws, and to a certain extent, Soldiers, who take 3 silver saws to kill.
| OVERHEAT SAWBLADE LAUNCHER
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| Primary Fire
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| Damage
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0.6x2/1
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| - Duration
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| Cooldown
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N/A
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| Alternate Fire
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| Damage
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1x21
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| Duration
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a fuckton of bounces
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| Cooldown
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8 seconds
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| Damage Modifiers
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| Terminal Info
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| Obtained in
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| 4-4
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The Overheat variant fires out regular saws with less damage, less durability, and no extra damage on weak husks, but there is no ammo capacity. Each shot builds up heat, and as heat accumulates the weapon will fire less durable saws with decreasing accuracy, starting with 11 wall counces at 0 heat, with 4 wall bounces maximum at maximum heat. Firing the Attractor variant and JumpStart with connected cable will also instantly build full heat. There is only one heatsink available compared to the Overheat Nailgun's two heatsinks. These sawblades have piercing capabilities only when the heat is below 50%.
The alternate fire will launch an Overheated Saw with more damage and extremely high durability that will ignite enemies. The more heat accumulated, the more it will multi-hit an enemy upon contact. At near-max heat, it will multi-hit an enemy 3 times. It will also ricochet perpendicular to walls rather than at an angle (for example, hitting a flat floor will bounce it directly upwards). This can be used in closed-in areas to cause constant damage across a straight line or a certain point. This can also trap hallways, due to bouncing perpendicularly.
| JUMPSTART SAWBLADE LAUNCHER
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| Primary Fire
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| Damage
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0.6
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| - Duration
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| Cooldown
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N/A
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| Alternate Fire
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| Damage
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10
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| Duration
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5s
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| Cooldown
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4-5s (Unsure)
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| Damage Modifiers
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| N/A
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| Terminal Info
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Press ALT Fire to attach a cable that slowly charges a powerful electric shock.
Attached cables persist when switching weapons.
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| Obtained in
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| 4-4
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The Jumpstart variant fires out regular saws at a constant rate. Saws fired by the Jumpstart variant do not pierce enemies. They also can bounce only 4 times on a wall before being destroyed.
The alternate fire shoots a cable that is identical to the standard Jumpstart nailgun. When this cable is connected to an enemy, the firing speed of the primary doubles.
If the connected enemy is hit by a sawblade from any version of the weapon, the time needed to "charge" the enemy decreases by 1 second.
Once the charge reaches its maximum (5 seconds if not struck by any sawblades) or the enemy is killed with any nails or saws, the enemy will detonate, causing additional damage to the target and any nearby enemies while also awarding the +CONDUCTOR style bonus.
Because any type of saw reduces the charge time, sawtraps can be setup to instantly trigger the electrical shock.
The electrical shock can travel between enemies if the connected enemy is killed, making hordes of Filth easy to deal with. Additionally, you can shoot magnets onto the floor or into an enemy and the electrical shock will bounce off the saw and become more powerful. This also works with coins, believe it or not. When more powerful, it'll bounce to more people and deal them the same damage they would've gotten if they were directly hit by the electricity. (15 directly, 2 with no magnets, 5 with one magnet, 8 with two magnets, and 11 with three magnets. Untested with coins.) Remember: you have to kill the connected enemy for the electricity to travel to others unless there is a close magnet or coin. No matter how.
If done right, this weapon can deal more than 35 damage at a time. This can be achieved by shooting the cable into someone and quickly setting up a normal silver saw Attractor sawtrap.
The jumpstart will detonate quickly, and you'd do massive damage.
