Widowmaker TX Tech-1

The Widowmaker TX Tech-1 is a weapon in Deus Ex: Mankind Divided.

Overview
The Widowmaker TX Tech-1 is a derivative of the original Widowmaker TX, boasting higher versatility overall at the cost of slightly lowered damage.

However, the shotgun without modifications is a very poor weapon, possessing a small magazine, a wide pellet spread, and reduced damage to pretty much all targets, due to the ammo used. It's one of a handful of weapons that can't have the reload speed boosted with upgrades, so your only option is cyber weapon affinity. Without this aug, the shotgun is incredibly tedious to reload, especially dry. The enemies in mankind divided are smart enough to count your shots, and will charge in when you're spending nine years reloading your shotgun, and you conveniently forgot Aria's advice to always bring a backup.

However, employed proper, this is a very powerful weapon, with essentially limitless ammunition. Everybody from hoodlums to spec ops use this weapon, so shotgun shells are always available, and many riot cops carry 5, 10, or 15 shells on them as well.

First, we must cover the basics. This weapon requires that you be close to the enemy. Even though the max range is 25, the pellet spread and damage drop off means you'll do nothing at that range. This means if you want to use the shotgun, and use it well, you need to build Adam for tanking with augs like rhino armor, the boosted HP bar, and faster health regen. If you're brave, you can go straight for the focus enhancer, fire off two or three triple shot bursts, and hopefully kill everybody who wasn't taking cover when you triggered bullet time. However, this isn't enough, because the shotgun has huge recoil, the bloom is immense, and it's a shotgun so pellets are involved. On top of that, the reload is incredibly long. All this means, to use the shotgun well, you must max out Adam's weapon usage augs. It's also a good idea to put a laser sight on the shotgun. Rather easier to know where your gun is pointing if you can look at a red dot, compared to the screen sized circle, yes?

So it's expensive to use well, but since it's so commonplace, even if you don't like it, you're gonna find yourself making use of it at some point. Properly employed and upgraded, it has the second highest DPS in the game, outdamaging special snowflake guns like the lancer by a mile, and the 'winner' is the machine pistol. Its status as winning the DPS award is more theoretical, than practical.

As for damage and handling, it's a beast, even without any upgrades or support systems. Every trigger pull fires 8 pellets in a quake 2 shotgun-styled pattern, which is to say it's okay, but it could be better. With the laser, you'll know where the pellets are going, which is crucial. A metro cop can survive many partial hits, but 7 pellets connecting with his stomach or crotch kills him instantly, as will all 8 if they hit him anywhere. Even the rightly feared and quite annoying riot cops can't stand up well to this gun, being capable of taking two body hits before dying, which is why they primarily use it themselves, with expert precision, and no regard for civilians.

Against less armored opponents, a half hit tends to inspire retreat, but a half hit on Adam himself also tends to have the same effect on the player, as they realize they're down about 60% HP, and that was only 4 or 5 pellets. Shotguns tend to come in large groups, and these large groups of shotguns more often than not hold chokepoints, the approach of which has caused a great many players to see the game over screen. To overcome massed shotguns, use terror tactics to break their morale, or find an alternate entrance that you can make some noise from, then when they're all pointing their guns towards that entrance, stroll in the normal way and murder them all.

Not only is each buckshot shell very powerful, but the shotgun has a rather expensive upgrade that lets it fire in three round bursts, which pretty much kills anything short of exo-suits and augs with titan active. Since you're spitting three times the pellets, that's three times the targets you can shred, making this a multi-purpose upgrade, and just like autofire on the pistol, you want it, and it makes everything better. Magazine capacity upgrades and rate of fire should be prioritized over damage upgrades. The damage is hardcore enough to begin with, and the base ammo's damage reduction to everything makes damage upgrades not really worth it until much later, when you're fighting shadow ops and riot police almost exclusively, and those extra points of damage are the diference between one shot kills, or getting hit by something nasty in retaliation.

The shotgun is the only specialist weapon that can mount a silencer, which you'd equip not because of noise reduction, but because it gives tighter pellet spread, and lower recoil. The tradeoff is a straight 30 less damage, or 3.75 less damage per pellet, but you'll be hitting with more, so the damage cut isn't as bad as it looks.

It bears repeating, the shotgun is never obsolete, and the only faction that don't use it is the Jinn. Is it worth buying every strongman and weapon handling aug in the game to use one of the more powerful guns in mankind divided? I say it depends on what you have in mind.

As all specialist weapons, the shotgun has many requirements to be good, or it'll remain mediocre and underwhelming. As so many other weapons, it has the token EMP ammo, which is rather worthless for a gun that simply destroys all that stands before its wielder.

Devastator

 * Fully-automatic drum-fed variant. Only loads Armor Piercing shells, which are available in very limited quantities.
 * The Devastator has a maximum range of 35 meters.
 * The reload time is quite significant, but it's uncommon to have enough ammo, or enough enemies, for that matter, to where you must consider a reload.
 * Locations:
 * Purchasable from Mikael Mendel's shop starting from the second visit to Prague.
 * During the third visit to Prague (martial law), a Devastator can be found in the police station.
 * During M15: Securing the Convention Centre, a Devastator can be found in the CSO's weapons locker.
 * The Devastator may be traded for one of Nada Birak's special stocks.

Tips

 * The standard Tech-1 can accept a silencer, making it a good option for stealth if the player is not concerned with maintaining a Pacifist playthrough.
 * Fully-upgraded, the standard Tech-1 outperforms the Devastator in terms of fire rate (if the trigger is clicked repeatedly), potential DPS (with burst fire) and recoil. However the Devastator has the advantage of effective range, magazine size and potential damage-per-shot due to its AP bucks.
 * Unlike what's claimed by the description, the Devastator will only load AP buckshots, so one must refrain from selling or dismantling that type of ammo if they intend to use the weapon.
 * Due to its limited modification options, the Devastator is a great candidate for unlocking the Ruthless Efficiency achievement.

Trivia

 * The Widowmaker TX Tech-1 was based on the SRM Arms M1208 but not loaded to full capacity.
 * The idea behind the Devastator seems to have been inspired by the, with the most distinctive features being the weapon's big 32-round drum magazine (the largest drum size of the AA-12) and exclusive automatic operation.
 * The Devastator's concept art in the Deus Ex: Mankind Divided Mini-art book depicts it simply as a drum magazine mod for the standard Widowmaker rather than a standalone weapon.

Renders
Дробовик Widowmaker ТХ Tech-1