Breach Cutter
 Unlocked through an assignment.
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Requires Engineer  15
Purchased for:
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| “ | The Breach Cutter releases directional blasts of sonically-charged plasma powerful enough to deal with most any alien in your path. Originally a mining tool, it's now been frequency-tuned to crack open flesh and bone rather than the sediment deposits it was designed for - often with quite spectacular results! |
| — Weapon Description |
The Breach Cutter is an unlockable secondary weapon used by the Engineer. Once used as a mining tool, it has since been converted into a weapon. Batteries are loaded into the top of the weapon which fire horizontally expanding plasma blades, focused by the barrel on the front of the weapon. The Breach Cutter is among the biggest weapons in the game in terms of size.
When fired the plasma blade will expand and travel as a long purple line, then close up a second and a half later. The plasma blades deal damage for every tick they come into contact with an enemy.
The plasma blades are infinitely piercing and can cleave through as many enemies as they like, as well as passing through any terrain without damage losses, allowing the user to hit targets behind walls.
Modifications
There are five tiers of modifications and each tier has two to three upgrades. Only one modification can be equipped per tier.
| Breach Cutter Modifications | ||||||||||||
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| Mod | Effect | In Game Description | Price | |||||||||
| Tier 1 |  Prolonged Power Generation |
+1.5s Projectile Lifetime | "The projectile is able to travel for a longer period of time before collapsing" |
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 High Capacity Magazine |
+3 Magazine Size | "The good thing about clips, magazines, ammo drums, fuel tanks ...you can always get bigger variants." |
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| Tier 2 6
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 Expanded Ammo Bags |
+6 Max Ammo | "You had to give up some sandwich-storage, but your total ammo capacity is increased!" |
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 Condensed Plasma |
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"The good folk in R&D have been busy. The overall damage of your weapon is increased." |
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 Loosened Node Cohesion |
+1.5m Plasma Beam Width | "Get a significantly wider plasma line that can hit more targets at once." |
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| Tier 3 10
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 Quick Deploy |
-0.2s Plasma Expansion Delay | "The line projectile opens almost immediately and can hit multiple targets at very close range." |
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 Improved Case Ejector |
-0.6s Reload Time | "A heavily preloaded spring combined with a smaller latch shorten the time it takes to reload." |
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| Tier 4 14
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 Armor Breaking |
+200% Armor Breaking | "Greatly improves the armor breaking capabilities of the plasma beam." |
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 Disruptive Frequency Tuning |
+100% Stun Chance
+3s Stun Duration |
"The plasma beam will stun most of the denizens of Hoxxes on contact." |
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| Tier 5 18
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 Explosive Goodbye |
+Explosive Goodbye | "The projectile explodes at the end of its lifecycle when the nodes collapse damaging anything unlucky enough to be near by and leaving a residual plasma field for a short time. You can also manually trigger the explosion by pulling the trigger a second time while the projectile is in flight." |
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 Plasma Trail |
+Plasma Trail | "The beam leaves behind a residual trail of plasma that will continuously damage any enemy that gets too close." |
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Triple Split Line |
+Triple Split Line | "The plasma beam is split into 3 lines that cover a taller area making it possible to hit multiple targets at various heights." |
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Overclocks
Overclock calculations happen after modifiers.
 Breach Cutter [Expand/Collapse]
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| Overclock | Effect | In Game Description | Price | ||||||||
Light-Weight Cases
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"Bring more ammo with you and slam those cases in faster!" |
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Roll Control
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"A few tweaks to the launcher cause it to add roll to the projectile after it is ejected thus covering a larger area as it travels. Holding down the trigger as the line leaves the gun activates a remote connection which on the release of the trigger cause the line to stop rolling letting you lock its orientation." |
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Stronger Plasma Current
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"By improving the node's efficiency you can up the raw damage without too much fuss and it lasts a bit longer too!" |
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Return to Sender
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"Holding down the trigger after the line leaves the gun activates a remote connection which on the release of the trigger causes the line to change direction and move back towards the gun." |
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High Voltage Crossover
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"By passing an electric current through the plasma, the beam electrocutes anything it touches but the bulky hardware limits magazine capacity." |
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Spinning Death
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"These modified plasma nodes convert most of the forward momentum into angular momentum stretching out the beam and continuously doing damage to the immediate area where it was launched. The nodes run for a longer duration but deal less damage every second. Due to the weight both magazine and total capacity is greatly reduced." |
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Inferno
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"Turn your Breach Cutter into a tool of burning death and destruction at the cost of ammo, and armor breaking. As a bonus the extreme internal heating keeps the targets burning for an extended period." |
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Stats Breakdown
Understanding the Weapon
- Damage is the total amount of damage that is dealt over the course of one second against any enemy that is within contact of the beam.
- Damage (per tick): 11.5
- Damage type: 50% Electric / 50% Fire
- Tick interval: 0.02s
- Friendly Fire Modifier: x0.15
- Projectile Lifetime is the amount of time that the beam is able to travel before dissipating.
- Projectile velocity: 10m/s
- Creatures hit by the line have a x0.3 movement penalty.
- There is a bonus of 50 Fire damage upon first contact with a creature (does not happen when Spinning Death OC is equipped), with a x0.1 friendly fire modifier.
- The Breach Cutter's damage is unique in that while it is spread out over an Area, ignores armor, and is unaffected by the Frozen status it is still able to deal increased damage to enemy Weakpoints.
Unique Modifications
Explosive Goodbye
Explosive Goodbye causes the Breach Cutter's shots to explode at the end of their life span, dealing a maximum of 40 damage. The explosion occurs once the beam has fully retracted into its epicenter or can be manually triggered by firing again (only after 0.4s of the line leaving the weapon), which will leave a plasma field that periodically damages any enemy that comes into contact and slows them (8 Fire Damage every 0.2-0.25s, and x0.8 Movement speed).
- Damage: 40 Explosive
- Radius: 3.5m
- Maximum Damage Radius: 2.5m
- Minimum Damage: 50%
- Friendly Fire Modifier: x0.2
- Arming Delay: 0.4s
- Field Damage (per tick): 8 Fire
- Field Tick Rate: 0.2-0.25s
- Movement Speed: x0.8
- Field Duration: 4s
Plasma Trail
Plasma Trail causes the Breach Cutter's shot to temporarily leave a trail of plasma as it travels along in any direction, which will periodically damage any enemy that comes into contact.
- Damage: 5 Fire
- Interval: 0.2 - 0.3 s
- Duration: 4 seconds default duration, with an additional +0.6 seconds added only one time if any enemies either enter or leave the field.
Triple Split Line
Triple Split Line causes two extra beams to appear in parallel with every shot. Triple Split Line itself will not cause more damage to be dealt, however will increase the surface area for contact of each shot. Increased surface area means each shot can potentially deal the maximum number of damage because of how long the beam stays in contact with each creature. Increased surface area also means more contact for the shot to destroy armor.
Unique Overclocks
Roll Control
Roll Control is a Clean Overclock
Return To Sender
Return To Sender is a Balanced Overclock
This Overclock causes the beam to return to the point it has been shot from.
When you hold down the trigger, the plasma beam will emerge from the breach cutter like normal. When you release the trigger, the beam will reverse. This is very useful because you can deal twice the damage with one beam. If you want to spam fire or fire the weapon normally, you have to tap the trigger. This will cause the beam to continue its path until it breaks, like without the Overclock.
High Voltage Crossover
High Voltage Crossover is a Balanced Overclock
- Electrocution Chance: 100% (4 Electric damage every 0.25s)
- Duration: 4s
Spinning Death
Spinning Death is an Unstable Overclock
This unstable overclock causes the plasma beam to spin on its y axis.
When you shoot, the plasma beam emerges and moves at 5% of the default speed (0.5m/s instead of 10 m/s). Then the beam starts spinning around its y axis very quickly and deals moderate amounts of damage to whatever is in it. The first impact bonus damage is also reduced to 0.
Inferno
Inferno is an Unstable Overclock
Apart from doing damage, the line will also deal Heat every second, the Heat is 90% of the DPS value.
In addition to the usual 50 Fire damage on first contact with a creature, the line will deal 75 Heat.
The creatures touched by the line have a hidden DoT applied that deals 7 Heat and 7 Fire damage every 0.5 seconds for 5 seconds.
- Inferno is currently bugged and applies 140% of the damage listed on its DPS value as Fire damage.
Mastery
Each modification that is purchased advances a mastery bar by one unit.
Mastery unlocks:
- Three modifications – First Stripe Weapon Paintjob
- Seven modifications – Deepcore Weapon Paintjob
- All (12) modifications – The Company Special Weapon Paintjob
Skins
Full gallery of skins can be seen at Weapon Skins.
Gallery
Trivia
- According to the Breach Cutter's description, it was originally a mining tool used to clear sediment deposits before eventually being converted into a weapon. Mission Control remarks upon this when the weapon is unlocked, joking that Planet Hoxxes "sure does breed innovation".
- The Breach Cutter's internal name is "Line Cutter", its name and design being a reference to two weapons from the Dead Space franchise: the Plasma Cutter and the Line Gun respectively.
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This page is possibly not up to date. It was last updated for Update 34: Modest Expectations
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