How Does Montana's Heat Gen To Self Damage Work?

Battleborn Montana
#1

Ok, so I find most people no matter what they spec take the shoot through over heating thing, for good reason given montana’s only flaw is that he has to stop shooting at certain points to cool off ;p (early levels anyway >~>)

But i recently got montana’s lvl 12 Cooling Barrels mutation and I became curious about heat generation works in relation to how much he damages himself while overheated

The reason for this is I REALLY want to somehow make a pve montana build for Fire that is self sustaining, as in He can keep shooting while overheated while gaining as much health as he’s losing, but that seems impossible despite all my experimentation, I got montana’s lore gear, the -33% heat gen mutation, Bliss Beast plate for health gen and resistance, And Oath of the sustained for some good health regen.

But nothing seems to sustain him, i was getting 21 health regen a second with full heat but still ticked down.
According to my estimates it seems lowing heat generation does not slow down how much you take damage and I’d need to be regening between 40-50 health if I wanted to even out damage taken from the overheat.

But how does overheat damage work exactly?

It would seem heat gen doesn’t slow it down, and if it’s proportional to each bullet fired then attack speed is montana’s worst enemy for sustainment.

I’ve come to believe montana’s overheat damage is some external thing that stacks behind the scenes.
Each time you shoot while the gun is overheated you refresh an effect that sets montana on fire for a half second or so, so as you shoot you just keep refreshing that half second of burning damage.
Meaning there’s no way to combat burning and my dream of a self sustaining fire montana is doomed unless there’s a gear that gives some absurd amount of health regen >~>…

And before anyone says, I know Cold is superior, particularly in pvp.
I know I coudl Easily make a near invinsible cold build for montana that deals a Ton of damage and can basically shoot forever without consequence.

I just really wanted a fire montana, because tbh fire seems So much more worthless than cold (once again, even more so in pvp) even with the nerf to how slow works it’s still better.

idk, it probably shouldn’t change, or maybe it should, idk im not a montana expert, as i said i just unlocked his lvl 12 mutation and tried it out, and in a game like BB any change could change the dynamic of the game entirly.

Anyone have any tips for a self sustaining fire montana or maybe clear up what I think about how overheat works?

#2

I actually ran a similar build for awhile in PvE, using the self damage to help finish his last lore challenge. Blue Eldrid health regen w/ additional after 3 minutes, Blissbeast, Hot-Blooded, Pain-2-Gain for extra durability, max HP at level 3… It did the job for long enough, especially if you’re getting crits with that damage.

I don’t think it’s possible to sustain the self damage 100% without some external healer, but I think that’s fair. Max heat is like a 50% damage buff, so being able to keep that up 24/7 without a real weakness would be pretty rough to deal with. ‘Feeling The Burn’ lets you keep shooting for long enough to finish what you need to before getting out, but with this PvE build you can keep it up for more than long enough & carry pretty damn hard till the MX. Elites & Brutes decide you’re just going to die today & start raining grenades on you XD.

I agree ‘Barrel Cooling’ is an awesome mutation, but I find it works better for low-heat builds. As far as I know it only affects how fast you reach max heat, so if you plan to build around high-heat DPS it may be better to just run with Ice Age and keep the damage resist up longer for when you need it. You want to reach max heat ASAP, so slowing that down means less damage. Overall, great build!

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#3

I got 700k damage before I gave up and got bored lol, but a friend told me we could to it super fast by dying from spikes and immediately getting revived. (On The Sentinel ;p)
(you take a full 10K damage each time)

Also, fun fact you can survive a spike trap if you activate mansformation >~>
It’s cause the trap isn’t “insta death”, it deals 10k damage, and montana has like 80-90% damage res in his ult, so thats fun XD

And yeah I figured, but I’m working on a high heat ice build where I’m always on edge of overheating but barely stay out of it with all the heat gen minus’s and ice cooling.
It’s the only “Never stop shooting” build i can make that works lol.

Still working on gear load out, tried Veil Manipulator but its pretty meh.
(I have Montana’s Legendary and Symbiotic gauntlet, but i need some other really good gear, I have a few ideas but im unsure, this is a pve build btw, my pvp build would just throw a zero cost shard gen in)

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#4

Theory crafting because I’m not 100% sure how a couple items work.

Blue Regen item for 11.2 health/s

Blissbeast Skull Plate grants DR + more DR when taking damage from the front (does firestorm come from the front? lol), as well as 4.2 more regen.

15.4 health/s … and 5.6-11.2% DR

Lastly, Vyn’s Quiver. Reload speed affects cooldown time (faster reload = faster cooldown).

4.2 more health and “On reload, gain up to +4.20 Health Regeneration per Second based on bullets left in the magazine.”

I don’t know if that last bit applies (I’ll try to test it when I get home).

Regardless, from gear, 19.6 health/s with a potential to get…
23.8 + 11.2% DR and reload speed.

~shrug~

9 More regen from the hot-blooded talent and a bunch of innate DR from Montana’s kit (take icy resolve?) COULD be enough to do it.

#5

alright. I have a couple items that aren’t max roll, but…

I managed to get up to 29.7 health/s or something.
Rare Regen item, DR + health regen under 50%, Vyn’s Quiver (1 point from perfect)

During Firestorm, I think that I was gaining health (with the DR), but it was very little. I think Mansformation had a similar effect.

With that said, it did take me a LONG time to run my health down. I think that using Lifeleech Brooch or Oath of the Sustained (or both) would round you over the top.

#6

Does increased reload speed really effect cooldown? O3o

but yeah im testingf out a few things i have perfect rollls vyns and oath of the sustained, so im gonna see hwo that runs

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#7

yea, someone said recoil slows down heat buildup, but I don’t believe it. I keep meaning to test it, but forget.

OH! And Vyn’s quiver doesn’t activate for Montana, in my testing.

#8

yeah im testing it now, but i have a better idea.
Since you’d only get 4.2 regen from vyns quiver and nothing else i think Mini-Singularity Launcher would work well
Ignoring the “recoil effecting Heat” thing, you get 4.2 health regen And you slow enemies every 10 seconds on top of that.
I’m gonna be exploring some other things…
Best regen gear i can find, idk what right now though tbh lol
thinking MSL but unsure

Edit:
Oh also in my testing above with vyns quiver i had similar results to you, Very slowly losing health and with the +25% damage res mutation firestorm was breaking even

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#9

Recoil reduction definitely does not affect heat buildup. I’ve tested it.

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#10

That’s what I thought. Thanks for the check. I don’t know why the person said that.

#11

I tested it out and I didn’t see any change to overheat damage by modifiers to attack damage, attack speed, or heat buildup (e.g. Barrel Cooling). At level 10 anyway overheat damage just seems to be a flat 60 per second or so.

#12

Well, there is definitely a small amount of recoil on the minigun. If you just fire away, it will slowly drift up.

I assume recoil reduction makes it slower.