Everybody has played a video game in which they tried to do everything well and ended up doing nothing at all. There's a natural worry that this is what will become of the Fire Storm Pyromancer in Outriders whose skills seem to be some kind of a blend between weapon damage, Anomaly Power, tanking, and lifesteal. The good news is that instead of doing none of these things well, it does them all with a top-level flourish.
No, this build will not get the occasional stun effects like the Ash Breaker. No, this build will not put up the ridiculous numbers of the Tempest. But the Fire Storm rejects the concept that any build in Outriders can live in a vacuum. These other glass cannon builds have shown to struggle at higher Apocalypse Tiers, while the Fire Storm, when designed correctly, has been the latest selection of the experts, especially when soloing against the game's toughest boss fights.
Updated on July 5th, 2022 by Hodey Johns: Many will look at the new endgame content, new weapons, and additional talent trees and already get a sense of how the builds have updated since Worldslayer. But this is only a fraction of the equation. The new foes and bosses employ different moves and tactics. These types of targets should not be a second-hand consideration. This build has been updated to account for the new opponents, giving players the skills and gear that best counters anything Worldslayer has to throw at them.
Class Points
Node | Points | Effect Per Point |
Magma Golem | 5 | +10% Max Health |
Unquenchable | 3 | +6% Skill Leech |
Armor Melting | 1 | +30% Armor Piercing against Marked targets |
Sidearm Adept | 1 | +12% Sidearm Weapon Damage |
Mark Of The Anomaly | 1 | +10% Weapon Damage against Marked targets |
Assault Master | 1 | +20% Assault Rifle Damage and +20% Assault Rifle Drop Rate |
Meltdown | 1 | +20% Burn Damage |
Gifted | 1 | +5% Weapon Damage and +5% Anomaly Power |
Distant Flame | 1 | +2.5% Anomaly Power per Magma Golem node |
All Guns Blazing | 1 | +20% Weapon Damage for 7 seconds after using any Skill |
Anomalous Lava | 1 | +45% Armor for 10 seconds after using an Ignite Skill |
Fuel For The Embers | 1 | +100% Skill Leech when under 30% Health |
Trial By Fire | 1 | +15% Damage against targets with Burn |
Magma Elemental | 1 | +45% Armor Piercing and +45% Resistance Piercing for 10 seconds after using an Ignite Skill |
Experienced players can reliably tell whether the class build will be one of the best or one of the worst by looking no further than the nodes selected. The Fire Storm Pyromancer can easily become obsolete by trying to dip heavily into either of the side trees. This means that the player is trying to favor either physical damage or Anomaly Power. The Ash Breaker and Tempest already have those paths locked up and any Fire Storm build that leans into those will be making a second-class version of them.
By mixing Anomaly Power and Firepower, players will be able to do a good amount of damage in all phases of the game. Notably, this build skips out on cooldown reduction since F.A.S.E.R. Beam already has a 10 seconds cooldown to keep the buffs up. And not much armor or resistance is needed to tank since lifesteal is the primary tanking mechanism at play.
Pax Points
Node | Effect |
Coming In Hot | Deal 15% more damage to enemies above 80% health and 30% more damage to enemies below 30% health |
Ashen Regalia | Killing marked enemies increases damage mitigation by 7% for 6 seconds, stacks up to 3 times |
Hot Streak | Critical shots increase weapon damage by 6%, the bonus lasts for 4 seconds and stacks up to 5 times |
Carbon Ammo | Increase magazine size by 200% |
Bullet Frenzy | Shots with assault weapons increase weapon damage by 3%, the effect lasts until the Pyromancer stops shooting |
Since this build uses Volcanic Rounds, anything that boosts magazine size is going to be worth huge investments. A 200% increased size is borderline absurd and the Fire Storm will take full advantage of it.
The Pyromancer is an unorthodox choice for tanking and needs some help to bridge the gap with other more traditional tanks. Leeching health helps, but the rest of the gap can be bridged by Ashen Regalia. This should be active for most of the game, a 21% straight-up damage reduction makes the class feel more like a Devastator.
Ascension Points
- Most important nodes: Skill Leech, Weapon Leech
- Most important category: Endurance
The nature of Ascension points is that every class and build, given the time to farm, can max out every node. So this build only provides an accurate starting point for gamers. After that, the rest of these points have more to do with luxury than necessity.
The Fire Storm needs to split focus between damage sources, both weapons and skills, but fire and foremost the Fire Storm prioritizes survival. So be sure to grab those leech skills. Since the build needs a little bit of everything, the Ascension points help the Pyromancer more than the other classes.
Skill Selection
F.A.S.E.R. Beam | Creates a beam of fire that deals damage, interrupts, and inflicts Burn. |
Ash Blast | Deal damage and inflict Ash in a large area around the Pyromancer. |
Volcanic Rounds | Inflicts Burn upon enemies near where the Pyromancer fires. Shots ignore armor and pierce targets. Lasts until the magazine is empty. |
It's important to select an Ignite skill that can be cast once every ten seconds or less. This will keep Magma Elemental refreshed, giving the Fire Storm a bonus of 45% to each armor-piercing and resistance piercing. By default, F.A.S.E.R. Beam becomes the best selection for the build because of its natural ten-second cooldown.
Games like Outriders understand that the fun of the game is the balance between skills and shooting, a balance that the Fire Storm perfectly encapsulated. To enable this, pick up Ash Blast so that enemies are stacked up for Volcanic Rounds, which pierce through groups for unparalleled damage.
Weapon & Mods
Weapon | Voodoo Matchmaker |
Mod 1 | Ultimate Damage Link |
Mod 2 | Strings Of Gauss |
Mod 3 | Weightlessness |
With plenty of skills to apply Burn, this frees up mods to focus on damage instead of debuff application. The Voodoo Matchmaker is an easy sell for the Fire Storm, with a mod, Ultimate Damage Link, that binds groups of enemies together and deals damage to all of them.
For the second mod, replace it with Strings Of Gauss to do even more group damage. The big knock against Strings Of Gauss is that it needs to hit multiple enemies to be effective. Volcanic Rounds pierce and turn this into a non-issue. Weapon Leech is different than Skill Leech, so the player will still have to mix skills in with their shooting, but this gun makes for a nice balance of both worlds.
Armor & Mods
Head | Torturer’s Mask |
Mod 1 | Death Sentence |
Mod 2 | Armor Melting |
Torso | Torturer’s Vest |
Mod 1 | Susceptibility |
Mod 2 | Radiation Flames |
Legs | Torturer’s Waistcloth |
Mod 1 | Ashes and Leeches |
Mod 2 | Extra Mag |
Hands | Torturer’s Gloves |
Mod 1 | Volcanic Armor |
Mod 2 | Extinguisher |
Feet | Torturer’s Footgear |
Mod 1 | Lava Shots |
Mod 2 | Empowerment |
Volcanic Rounds is itself a skill that symbolizes the balance between Firepower and Anomaly Power. The legendary Torturer set triples the size around each bullet fired from Volcanic Rounds, which plays right into the Fire Storm's Hands.
All but two of the mods on the Torturer's set apply to either Volcanic Rounds or Ash Blast. For one extra spot, sub in Volcanic Armor to reduce all damage against the player by 65% while F.A.S.E.R. Beam is active, which should be 100% of the time. Lava Shots should take the other spot, providing players with a 50% weapon damage boost for a few seconds after Volcanic Rounds expires.
Outriders is available now for PC, PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5, Xbox One, and Xbox Series X/S.