KF2 Support Perk Guide: Shotguns, Skills and Loadouts

A detailed Support guide for Killing Floor 2 with weapon stats, perk bonuses, skill reasoning and loadouts for several situations. It treats the Support as the "big ZED nightmare": a perk with highly effective close-range shotguns, high weight capacity and a backpack full of ammo and armor for the team. Perk overview pages: Support and Support levels.

Perk weapons

The SG 500 pump-action.

Weapon	Weight	Price	Damage	Magazine / reserve
SG 500	5	200	140 (20 x 7 pellets)	8 / 56
Double-Barrel (Boomstick)	4	650	300 per barrel (25 x 12)	2 / 46
HZ12 Multi-Action	5	750	200 (20 x 10)	16 / 80
M4 Combat Shotgun	8	1100	210 (30 x 7)	7 / 64
AA-12	10	1500	140 (20 x 7)	20 / 120
Frag Grenade	-	-	200 explosion, 50 per shard, radius 9 m, 2 s fuse	max 5

• SG 500: the starting gun, perfect for trash (one shot, one kill) but with a small magazine, slow fire rate and expensive ammo. Missing shots means little dosh and slow upgrades.
• Double-Barrel: the highest damage of any shotgun at low price and weight, a quality-for-price champion often seen on other perks. Hard to handle because of wide spread and low capacity. Its alt-fire shoots both barrels together; against a Scrake, aim at the head. It takes only 2 carefully placed alternate shots to decapitate a Scrake on HoE at level 25 with the right skills, and the alt-fire recoil can be used to jump away.

The Double-Barrel shotgun.

• HZ12 Multi-Action: a large magazine (16) and higher damage than the SG 500 and Medic 301 shotgun, ideal for small and medium ZEDs, at Tier 2 price and manageable weight. You must pump it after every 2 shots, so it is slower than the AA-12 and weaker in burst than the Double-Barrel, so you will not solo large ZEDs with it; recoil and spread are high.

The HZ12 Multi-Action.

• M4 Combat Shotgun: like an upgraded SG 500 with more damage per pellet and faster semi-auto fire, but weight 8 pushes out the Double-Barrel and it is inferior to the Double-Barrel (nearly half the price) and the AA-12 (only 400 dosh more). It got a 20% damage buff, but you can already solo big ZEDs on 6-player HoE more easily with the AA-12. At level 15 you can carry it more easily.
• AA-12: the best shotgun in the game: same damage per shot as the SG 500 but a large magazine and insane fire rate, destroying big ZEDs. It has auto and semi-auto modes with the same rate; the author prefers semi-auto for placement, though full auto is workable with recoil control.
• Frag Grenade: less explosive damage and a longer fuse than the Commando's HE, but a bigger radius and about a dozen piercing shards that bounce. Use on groups in closed areas; it can hurt or kill you at close range. Never throw it at a Fleshpound that is not raging, since all 5 grenades will not kill a 6-player HoE Fleshpound.

Multi-perk weapons

These give XP for the perk you are using, not the weapon's original perk.

Weapon	Weight	Price	Damage	Magazine / reserve
VLAD-1000 Nailgun	6	600	210 (30 x 7)	42 / 336
Incendiary Trench Gun	5	650	243 (27 x 9) plus afterburn	6 / 57
HMTech-301 Medic Shotgun	6	1100	120 (20 x 6)	10 / 80

• Nailgun: large magazine, cheap ammo, switches between single nail and a 7-nail shotgun mode. The single nail penetrates greatly and can decapitate multiple trash ZEDs; the shotgun mode stumbles Husks and other mediums. Nails ricochet in small rooms. Same damage as the M4 at lower price and weight, so a "better M4 than the M4", but not for big ZEDs.
• Incendiary Trench Gun: more damage per pellet than the SG 500, with afterburn (70% of initial damage every 0.5 s over 2.7 s per shot) that panics ZEDs more than kills them. Lowest magazine of all shotguns, so take Tactical Reload. Useful against Scrakes: a panicked ZED cannot attack but wanders randomly, which also makes headshots harder.
• Medic Shotgun (301): less damage but better healing than Field Medic Tier 1 and 2, with huge stumble power, low recoil and small spread, so it can help decapitate a Scrake. Dart recharge 4.8 s per dart, capacity 2.5. Perfect for a boss wave.

XP and skills

You earn XP by killing with Support weapons and by welding doors. Passive bonuses: welding proficiency 3% per level (75% at 25), shotgun damage 1% per level (25%), shotgun penetration 20% per level (500%), ammo 1% per level (25%), strength +1 weight per level (+5 slots), the ammo backpack (teammates get ammo once per wave), and door repair.

• Level 5: High Capacity Magazines (+50% magazine, but not for the Double-Barrel) or Tactical Reload. Take Tactical Reload early and if you use the Double-Barrel or Trench Gun.
• Level 10: Fortitude (+50% health) or Salvo (+30% damage). Always take Salvo; without it a Scrake needs 3 Double-Barrel alt-fires instead of 2.
• Level 15: Armor Piercing Shot or Tight Choke (-50% spread). Armor Piercing early for trash; Tight Choke on Suicidal and Hell on Earth to focus pellets on big ZED heads.
• Level 20: Resupply Pack (teammates restore 30% ammo and 20% armor once per wave; you carry 20% more ammo) or Concussion Rounds (+150% stumble power, advanced). Trick: take Resupply, buy weapons, ammo, armor and grenades, drop the weapons, switch to Concussion Rounds, and pick the weapons back up. Drop before switching or the max ammo resets.
• Level 25 (Zed-Time only): Penetrator or Barrage (near real-time firing, great with High Capacity Mags and the AA-12).

Recommended loadouts

• Standard Support: skills High Capacity/Tactical Reload, Salvo, Tight Choke, Resupply Pack, Barrage. Weapons: AA-12, Double-Barrel, Trench Gun or HZ12, HMTech-101 Pistol. Buy the Double-Barrel first, not the Trench Gun or HZ12; you need a big ZED dealer early and the SG 500 handles trash. Use Trench Gun/HZ12 on trash and ranged mediums, Double-Barrel on close mediums and Scrakes, AA-12 on Fleshpounds.
• Nails professional: the same skills with AA-12, Double-Barrel and Nailgun. No weight left for a Medic pistol.
• Solo: Tactical Reload, Salvo, Tight Choke, Concussion Rounds, Barrage with M4, Double-Barrel, Katana, C4 and Desert Eagle. In solo, trash and medium ZED numbers are the real threat, and an alt-fire Double-Barrel shot can decapitate a Scrake in 1 hit and a Fleshpound in 2. Salvo gave the author better results than Fortitude.
• Boss: High Capacity, Salvo, Tight Choke, Resupply Pack, Barrage with AA-12, Double-Barrel and HMTech-301. Spam the AA-12 and use the Double-Barrel jump shot to escape if the boss aggros you. Solo boss: Tactical Reload, Fortitude, Tight Choke, Concussion Rounds, Barrage with AA-12, Double-Barrel and Katana (parry).
• Levels 0-9: AA-12 plus HZ12, Trench Gun or Nailgun, optionally the 101 Pistol; or AA-12 with the Double-Barrel and 101 Pistol to learn the key weapons. Take the 101 pistol as soon as weight allows. Level 10-19: AA-12, HZ12 or Trench Gun, and the 101 pistol.