All about the Pepper Shaker
With Patch 28 (7th July 2021) a new weapon has been added to the game. The pepper shaker. I already introduced the weapon in the article about the upcoming changes to the patch. Here again separately, as there are always questions about it.
Pepper Shaker Features and Perks
The Pepper Shaker is an automatic heavy weapon with a rotating barrel. By default it is a type of "shotgun minigun", can be changed to fusion cells or plasma cartridges via mods.
The pepper shaker is tradable.
Class: Automatic, Heavy Weapon, Shotgun
In order to skill this weapon, you need the "Heavy Gunner" perk cards as well as all other common perks for heavy weapons. It is also possible to skill on shotguns. And both in parallel.
Magazine: 50 rounds
Levels: 35 / 40 / 45 / 50
Ammunition: Shotgun shells, fusion cells, or plasma cartridges
Legendary Effects: Can drop from enemies and events, and can be crafted if the plan is known.
Pepper shaker Plan
The plan only drops during the Meat Week event, but can also be traded.
The next Meat Week event will take place in 2024:
- (Between August and September) 2024: Meat week (tbc)
Legendary pepper shaker with exploding rounds
The legendary version cannot drop with exploding bullets, otherwise you could create a new explosive energy weapon yourself. Bethesda no longer wants to drop energy weapons with explosive rounds in Fallout 76. However, for a while there was a very rare chance to receive a pepper shaker with explosive rounds as a reward from the allies in the camp. (09/08/2021: No more explo: In patch 30, the ability to drop an explo version from a CAMP companion was removed.)
Pepper Shaker Mods
The mods can be purchased from Regs (Vault 79) for gold:
- Single Barrel (200 gold)
- Double Barrel (200 gold)
- Hex Barrel (200 gold)
- Gunner Sight (200 Gold)
- Fusion Magazine (200 gold)
- Plasma magazine (200 gold)
The mods are also available for Samuel (Settlers) and Mortimer (Raiders), but only with the reputation level (Ally). With regs you get them regardless of reputation.
See also: Wastelanders Plans at Raiders / Settlers listed by Vendors and Reputation / Gold Plans of all Factions
Usable Legendary Versions
The pepper shaker can be crafted legendary at the workbench. The most playable version is a quad pepper shaker. With the legendary quad effect, the magazine has 200 rounds and is easier to use with a larger magazine than with 50 rounds due to the delay in the initial rotation. Other good perks are of course a 25% higher fire rate or +25% damage when aiming, VATS effects are rather useless because the AP consumption is very high.
Good Heavy Gunner Build Addition
The pepper shaker is a good addition to any heavy weapon build. Especially when it comes to crippling. This is e.g. Useful in the "Scorched Earth" event to get the Queen to land, but also to force normal scorchbeasts to land. This works particularly well with the 2nd legendary effect “+50% limb damage” and/or the perk “Enforcer” under Agility.
See also: Fallout 76 Wiki
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