PREFACE
PFCs have "45" points to spend in their vendor roundstart, in truth they only have 3 points , each items costing fifteen points (save for certain items which costs 10 but none of them are worth buying right now).
This guide aims to tell you which items are recommended to buy with said points and which ones aren't worth it.
KITS (All kits costs 45 points unless stated otherwise, meaning you'd have to go to cargo to get additional gear due to running out of points afterwards.)
-COMBAT TECHNICIAN SUPPORT KIT:
Disappointing niche, the pamphlet gives you 1 construction and engineering skill, what this skill lets you do is build metal cades, and repair metal/plasteel/walls/folding cades with blowtorch which can then be refilled on the welderpack.
The set of tools are mostly used for repairing cades (blowtorch) or dismantling/moving them (screwdriver, wrench, crowbar), the only thing the wirecutters is good for is to cut barbed wires/fences.
Insulated gloves lets you open shocked doors without getting shocked, but other than that it has less armor than regular marine gloves which already has little to none anyway.
The folding barricade is as tough as sandbags and cannot be climbed over, it is a direct upgrade over metal cades and you can store it on your back (not recommended) or just carry it on hand and place it down on the FOB.
Lastly, the heavy machinegun, the main reason anyone takes this kit.
You can place it down and then use a screwdriver on it to make it usable.
After that, you can drag the machine gun's sprite into your character while standing next to it to fire with it, CTRL+Click the sprite while manning it to toggle between burst/single fire, I recommend single fire since you're not really going to hit much with burst anyway. The big deal about the machine gun is that it does decent damage against ANY xenos on account of its AP ammo, and it has 700 shots before needing to be reloaded with an MG drum, which are kind of rare and hard to get, but you'll hardly run out of ammo for it unless you deliberately waste it too often.
The HMG can also be stored on your back while dismantled. To dismantle it, use a screwdriver on a finished emplacement, you can also rotate it with a wrench, and repair it with a blowtorch.
Another thing you can do with this kit is using a miniflamer and refilling it with the welderpack, just don't forget an extinguisher.
Very underwhelming in practice on account of being immobile and high bullet damage/accuracy falloff which makes it useless for shooting distant things.
-FIRST RESPONSE MEDICAL SUPPORT KIT:
Recommended, the skill lets you use the SensorHUD to see who's injured, instant injector use, and faster health analyzer use too.
Kit comes with two (3 uses each) tramadol (painkillers), two (3 uses each) bicaridine (brute damage heal), two (3 uses each) kelotane (burn damage heal), and an emergency (30 kelo, 30 bicard, 20 oxycodone (SUPER PAINKILLER), don't overdose with this) injector inside a injector pouch, analyzer, and an advanced trauma/burn kits in the responder pouch along with splints, don't bother with the advanced kits, you'll only get immediate healing of 3 damage in addition to enabling 0.1 damage regeneration which is identical to gauze/ointment.
In summary, the kit gives you drugs that allows you to heal yourself or someone else quickly without a medic, but not from uncommon injuries such as organ, oxygen, or toxin damage.
-FRONTLINE M40 GRENADIER KIT:
Meh, contains a grenade belt (holds eight grenades, starts with 2 HIDPs, 3 HEDPs), and explosive pouch (holds three grenades).
Loading the grenades into an UGL is very much recommended, you would also need to be very careful with the grenades as FF with them can be very lethal.
Saying that, HE grenades are also very good at clearing sticky resin and structures, even better than using flamethrowers loaded with regular napalm.
HIDP is good for stopping a push dead in its track whether it's the xenos or marine pushes so be very mindful in using them, they also barely do any damage to anything set on fire other than marines.
I seriously recommend throwing away the belt and pouch and just storing the grenades inside your backwear or somewhere. You're only buying this kit for the nades, nothing else.
You can also blow up xeno tunnels with three HEDP grenades.
-L42A SNIPER KIT (30 POINTS):
Meh, good for defense purposes but the contents are on cargo without buying this kit anyway. Contains 1 L42A rifle (with stock already attached), 1 S8 scope, 1 suppressor, 1 extended barrel, and 2 L42 AP mags.
Damagewise the L42 does not have falloff from shooting longer ranges and more damage than the M41 so xenos getting hit with AP from these would feel it, but with regenerating health and just the fact that you're shooting them in the distance means you're not chasing them means that they'll very easily heal off said wounds while you run out of ammo.
I also do not recommend attaching the extended barrel or suppressor on the L42 with this kit, the carbine is already accurate enough without either of them while being zoomed, just don't take the stock off.
There's also the fact that most areas in the maps are dark, meaning that you won't actually see much through the scope. and that you still can't shoot through other marines with a normal scope, unlike with the smartscope.
So yeah, you would have to bring flares to lit up the place to use the scope and then said flares would get melted and not to mention you still can't shoot through other marines.
-M240 PYROTECHNICIAN SUPPORT KIT:
Good to niche, comes with a backpack fueltank (350u of napalm), three incinerator tank (one of them preloaded on the flamer), one gel fuel tank, and a mini extinguisher.
The flamethrower is nice to have for defense and or clearing resin/jungle vines, always carry the extinguisher with it and get an extra one if you feel like it from a marinemed.
You can wear a pistol/revolver or SMG holster on the belt, the former also stores six magazines/speedloader along with the pistol/revolver if you're not gonna carry two guns.
The incinerator tank can be refilled and stored (up to 3 tanks) on the backpack tank with napalm which does more damage and lasts longer than welder fuel.
With this kit, your job would be to burn sticky resin and block off flanks or start slow pushes by making lines of what is basically cover against xeno melee. Extinguish the flames if you're using napalm to burn resin on crowded areas so you don't block marine movement, or lit a xeno on fire and then chase them with your actual gun.
The gel fuel, only burns for 1-3 seconds while having range up to 6 tiles, this means that you can use them in offense for burning resin without blocking pushes.
The damage from gel fuel on the other hand is very low, even against other marines, so don't expect to actually kill with it.
You can also refill the empty gel tank with regular napalm once you used it up, it still keeps the 200u capacity.
Chances are you can find someone that took this kit planetside and loot them instead. But in case you want them before first drop or think that you won't find one, this kit exists.
Flames also ignore xeno armour, making it also one of the few weapons that can reliably deal with crushers and thus cements them as very good defensive weapon until ravagers and the queen shows up which are fireproof.
One thing you can do with this kit is leaving the pyro backpack somewhere you can go back to for refills and storing the tanks themselves in your satchel along with other items such as splints instead of wearing the backpack, or just carry a second gun.
-PERSONAL SELF DEFENSE KIT:
Bad, contains an VP78 (already loaded) which is a pistol that can burst with five magazines (14 ammo each) for it for a total of six magazines along with a pistol holster and RDS+Laser Sight.
The VP78 itself shoots like the revolver except without heavy ammo and is totally not worth 45 points. Even the Mod88 is better than this.
-VETERAN KIT (30 POINTS):
Meh to niche, the MK1 pulse rifle (already loaded) has a lot more limited things you can attach to it such as not being able to attach rail scopes or not being able to use AP ammo at all and mostly inferior stat to MK2.
The 95 ammo magazines (total of six in the kit) means that you can shoot without worry about ammo and unlike the HPR, doesn't slow you down much, each burst also fires four bullets.
Very space efficient but at the cost of limiting your attachment loadout, still takes rail lights though which is rather important.
Once you run out of MK1 magazines you have the option of either refilling the empty ones, looting other people that also took this kit, or just switching to a regular MK2 pulse rifle.
Also comes with a large magazine pouch and masterkey along with a miniflamer in the kit, I recommend stripping an regular M41's UGL instead and loading it with HEDPs though, and you can buy an motion detector for your belt or suit storage with the spare point.
ATTACHMENTS
-ANGLED GRIP: Cargo has these by the dozen. They might run out due to its popularity with its pretty much lack of downside. Increases weapon size so SMGs with these do not fit on holsters.
-EXTENDED BARREL: Cargo has these by the dozen. Okay, more accuracy is nice but the only thing it lets you do is hit targets off the screen due to most guns being accurate enough without it, also costs you a little damage.
-GYRO: Cargo has these by the dozen. Bad for reducing your rate of fire by a hefty amount, also decent accuracy you can get for one handing a weapon such as SMG that can take the RoF penalty, occupies the same slot as laser.
-LASER SIGHT: Cargo has these by the dozen. Good on pistols and SMGs, otherwise worse than AG. Doesn't fit on shotguns, has no downside at all though and still lets you fit an SMG into an SMG belt unlike VG or AG.
-MASTERKEY: Cargo doesn't have a lot of these. Niche, very useful for destroying resin structures and stunning xenos. However the stun doesn't last long and the buckshot doesn't damage as much either.
-QUICKFIRE ADAPTER: The best attachment on this list, attachable to M41 and pistols, increases firerate at the cost of lowering accuracy. Just don't miss, as it's very easy to waste ammo from firing wastefully with this.
-STOCKS: Cargo doesn't have a lot of these. Can be worth points in that case, movement slowdown while wielding sucks but other than that they're quite excellent attachments, SMGs with regular stock can't fit into holster.
-RECOIL COMPENSATOR: Cargo has these by the dozen. Good, directly better than extended barrel due to also reducing recoil for shooting one handed. Can't be attached to M41s however.
-RED-DOT SIGHT: Cargo has these by the dozen. Nice to have but being able to see what and where you're shooting at with rail light is usually more important, great to use with the flashgrip.
-REFLEX SIGHT: Cargo has these by the dozen. Generally better than the RDS due to tightening burst spread for better burst damage, great to use with flashgrip.
-SUPPRESSOR: Cargo has these by the dozen. Good, more useful than extended barrel due to also tightening your burst spread but you still lose a little damage.
-VERTICAL GRIP: Cargo has these by the dozen. The accuracy is nice for M41s and SMGs, slows you down a little like stocks do but not as slow, increases weapon size so that SMGs with these does not fit on SMG belt.
-UNDERBARREL EXTINGUISHER: Cargo doesn't have a lot of these. The only people that have business using them (flamers) usually already gets them, and they are actually very niche and low in demand most of the time.
AMMUNITION
-AP MAGAZINES: Highly recommended, one of the most viable way to kill xenos outside of buckshot stun and is a very popular pick. Don't FF with these.
-EXT MAGAZINES: Meh, 50% more ammo per magazine but they're regular ammo, available from cargo.
-M44 HEAVY SPEEDLOADER: EASILY AVAILABLE FROM CARGO. Used for the revolver, has a chance to stun whoever you hit with it. It's not bad but you only get seven shots per speedloader.
GEAR
-WEBBING: Recommended, usually available from cargo, there might be none late into the round, try looting dead marines than buying them. Click on your uniform with it on hand to attach it, holds three mags or small items.
-SHOULDER HOLSTER: Extremely underwhelming. Imagine the webbing but instead of storing three items you can only store ONE pistol with no spare magazine included.
-MACHETE SCABBARD: EASILY AVAILABLE FROM CARGO. good for clearing vines on LV and clearing sticky resin, also for melee but uses up a belt/suit/back slot if you want to carry it around.
-MINI EXTINGUISHER: EASILY AVAILABLE FROM MARINEMEDS IN MEDBAY, depending on how much you expect flames and spitter acid on the round. Is a small sized item and thus quite space efficient compared to a big extinguisher and fit in more places however, pretty niche overall but really useful in those cases.
-LARGE GENERAL POUCH: Good, like webbing but goes into a pouch slot instead, better buy than webbing due to cargo not having them, but just get the free magazine pouch if you're only storing magazines in this.
-FUEL TANK POUCH: EASILY AVAILABLE FROM CARGO. Niche, if you have a flamer you either took pyro kit and store tanks on the backpack or the SL handed some out and you store them on the satchel or this.
-MOTION DETECTOR: Near irreplaceable niche, wearing this on the belt or suit storage is very much recommended than storing it. Excellent for anticipating flanks, catching stragglers, and so on.
Detects things up to 24 tiles away from you in long range mode, and only the size of your screen at short range mode.
-LARGE MAGAZINE POUCH: Highly recommended. Like the large general pouch but can only store magazines. Except, it has FOUR slots and buying them is pretty much the only way to get them.
FREE (Items that you get for free)
STANDARD EQUIPMENT:
-UNIFORM: Lets you wear belts, pouches, and M3 armour, not much to say. You also attach webbings and accessories such as patches to this, the snow variant also protects you from cold slightly.
-BOOTS: Lets you move faster than shoeless people, stores a bayonet or holdout pistol if you can find one, also has armor. Starts with bayonet stored if you get it from PFC vendor.
-HELMET: Stores two tiny and or certain small items which few shows up on the sprite as cosmetics, protects your head as much as medium armor does, also makes you practically immune to decapitation and allows command staff to watch where you are.
-GLOVES: Protects your hands, better than nothing, doesn't protect you from shocked doors.
-HEADSET: Lets you talk to your squad, and enables the squad HUD.
-MRE: Small item, contains four packs of food that you would have to unwrap to actually eat, the most space efficient food item if a bit unconvenient to eat.
ARMOR (Don't forget to turn on the shoulder lamp, it has 11x11 light radius):
-LIGHT: Slows you down less, awful against bullets and slashes.
-MEDIUM: Slows you down, has three item slots for magazines/small items while the other armors has only two, just okay against bullets, doesn't protect your hand and foot.
-HEAVY: Slows you bit more, good against bullets and explosions, not so much slashes. Reduces chance for organ damage and fractures, most xenos just slashes your hand/feet which aren't covered, so it's not that good.
BACKWEAR:
-SATCHEL: Very easy to use, just click it on the back slot while it's worn, though some people like to store guns on their backslot instead. Stores: 5 normal size items, or 7 small+1 tiny size items, or 15 tiny size items.
-BACKPACK: Awkward to use, more storage. Drag the backpack into your hand slot to take it off then switch hands and click on it to open. Stores: 7 normal size items, or 10 small+1 tiny size items, or 21 tiny size items.
Generally you should always take the backpack, just to fill up with various items and toss into the FOB and leave it there if nothing else due to everyone spawning with backwear already.
-SCABBARD: Stores variety of shotguns, not just the M37, assuming you can get your hands on said shotguns that is. Mostly obsolete due to M37 being wearable on back without this.
BELTS:
-STANDARD AMMO BELT: Holds 5 magazines, handfuls of shotgun shells, grenades, knives. Right click and switch storage drawing method to immediately take the last item you put on it.
-SHOTGUN AMMO BELT: Holds 14 handfuls of shotgun shells, click on it with shotgun shell boxes to fill it with shells quickly.
-M39 HOLSTER: Holds one M39 submachinegun, SMGs with folding stock fits on this with no need to fold it. Mostly used by people with unusual loadouts. Certain attachments that increases weapon size prevents SMG from fitting.
-KNIVES BELT: Holds 6 knives of various types, not something anyone takes on regular basis.
-PISTOL BELT: Holds one of various pistols and six magazines, can be worn on suit storage with the M3 armor or the belt. Losing your suit storage for a sidearm isn't entirely a bad idea.
-REVOLVER BELT: Holds various revolvers and six speedloaders, can be worn on suit storage with the M3 armor or the belt. Losing your suit storage for a sidearm isn't entirely a bad idea.
POUCHES:
-BAYONET SHEATH: Stores three variety of knives and bayonet, not something anyone takes on regular basis.
-DOCUMENT POUCH: Stores seven small intel items, if you're getting one of these you might as well just get the intel kits from cargo which already has one of these in it along with stuff you'll need to actually look for intel.
-FIRST AID POUCH: *The* pouch that everyone gets, the gauze and ointment does not heal much and the first-aid injector heals very slowly, but this pouch will be one of your few ways to heal yourself.
-FLARE POUCH: Only good for convenience, you can throw flares out of their packs without these but having one does help. Don't forget to bring a backpackful of flare packs to refill this constantly.
-MEDIUM GENERAL POUCH: Stores two magazines/small sized items, largely overshadowed by the large general though this one is free.
-PISTOL MAGAZINE POUCH: Stores three pistol magazines, just get the large pistol magazine pouch from cargo if you're taking this. You can also just pick the magazine pouch for literally the same functionality.
-PISTOL POUCH: Stores a sidearm. Seems neat, but isn't worth taking over other pouches due to pistols having very small magazines in the first place.
-MAGAZINE POUCH: Good, stores three magazines or any other ammo on a pouch slot for free.
MASK:
-GAS MASK: Looks cool, also allows oxygen tanks to be used.
-HEAT ABSORBENT COIF: Looks cool, discount balaclava.