Deep Rock Galactic: Scout Build Guide and Tips (2024)

NOTE: Our Deep Rock Galactic: Scout Guide has been recently updated for Season 4.

Sprawling caverns teeming with a menagerie of threats, impossible biomes sprawling through infinite cave systems, an unfathomable cache of riches hidden below the surface. All this and more awaits those brave enough to traverse the living hell known as Hoxxes IV.

But who dares descend into the dark to unearth what lies below? The Scout dares. They’re the go-to dwarf if you want to go anywhere and everywhere. Whether you’re helping a teammate back to their feet, flanking an enemy to exploit their weak point, or looting every shiny thing in sight, the Scout is the dwarf for the job.

To make sure you don’t end up lost and isolated from your teammates, we’ve put together this comprehensive Scout guide. We’ll go over everything you need to know about playing the Scout in Deep Rock Galactic, from your role to the best perks, builds, and tips to help you pillage Hoxxes IV.

Let’s get started!

Role of the Scout Class

As the namesake implies, the Scout’s role in Deep Rock Galactic is to scout out valuable loot, potential threats, and pathways through the intricate cave systems of Hoxxes IV. Your grappling hook gives you unparalleled mobility compared to the other classes — letting you access all of those minerals tucked away in hard-to-reach spots.

Securing Resources & Visibility

Of course, you’ll need to find the minerals first. Thankfully, your flare gun is perfect for cutting through the darkness of the planet’s depths. Your team will actually be able to see treasures, pathways, and (most importantly) incoming threats. Make sure to always fire one out when you know a swarm of enemies is approaching, so your team can start picking them off before they reach you.

Speaking of your team, your best friend as a Scout is the Engineer (well… at least his platform gun is). Most Engineers know to place a platform when you ping an out-of-reach resource, so stick close to them and ping as needed.

Occasionally the minerals will jut out slightly from the wall, allowing you to grapple your way on top of them and mine downwards without the need for a platform. This is most common with that precious ammo-generating Nitra. Just make sure your grapple gun has recharged before you completely finish mining your foothold and start falling.

Finally, in the case where your team is unable to find something specific – whether it be something like a secondary objective, a missing cargo crate battery, or even the path forward – you’re the best dwarf for the job.

Use your grappling hook to quickly launch yourself through the caves and light up corners with your flares to find whatever it is your team is searching for. No one else can match your speed and efficiency, and given that the timer until the next swarm is always ticking, your team can’t afford to waste time.

Scout in Combat

When it comes to combat, the Scout is built for taking out priority enemies by exploiting their weakpoints. The best builds for the Scout can output some tremendous single-target damage, letting him eviscerate threats that can devastate the team.

Unfortunately, the Scout tends to struggle against hordes, as he just doesn’t have the ammo reserves needed to keep up with them. Luckily, the rest of your team should be able to step in and handle the numerous grunts.

Instead, the Scout should focus on bigger meatier threats like Praetorians and Oppressors. You can easily flank them with your grappling hook and devastate their weakpoints.

That being said, you (and the rest of your team) should still prioritize taking out high-damage foes – particularly ranged ones like the Menance and Spitters. You’ll also be a crucial asset when dealing with Rockpox-infected enemies, as precise shots to their blister weakpoints are the most efficient way to kill them.

You can also use your hook to dash around the battlefield and support your teammates — a well-placed grenade may give them the breathing room they need. If you’re feeling particularly confident, you can even get near enemies to grab their attention before kiting them with your grappling hook to relieve some pressure from your team.

In the worst case, where your team starts getting overwhelmed and downed, you’ll often be the last one standing simply because you can escape bad situations with your grappling hook. At that point, your kiting skills will be put to the test, as you’ll have to create enough space to revive a teammate before the pack chasing you catches up.

Best Scout Perks

Unlike the other classes, the Scout’s toolkit allows for more varied perks. Since you don’t really need mobility perks, you can take more utility and offense-based ones. Here are our recommendations:

Active Perks

• Hover Boots: Since a lot of the minerals you’re going for are high up on walls/ledges, you’re constantly at risk of falling to your death. This is your emergency “Not today, gravity” button. Use it to buy yourself enough time to mine out a small foothold to avoid falling.
• Heightened Senses: The greatest threat to you while scouting is getting grabbed by a Cave Leech with no one around to help you. Besides giving you a warning so you can back off, it’ll also let you break free twice per mission.
• Field Medic: As we mentioned earlier, you’re very good at kiting enemies and grappling back to revive downed allies. This perk makes it a lot easier.
• Iron Will: This one is more of an emergency “Get out of being downed in an unreachable location” perk. Though you can also use it to try and salvage a mission if your entire team gets downed.

Passive Perks

• Born Ready: Depending on which guns you bring, reloading can be problematic while you’re being chased. Thankfully, you can just run away with your grappling hook for a bit to reload.
• Deep Pockets: You’re the looter. This just means less return trips.
• Veteran Depositor: Get back to looting faster, or hunker down by Molly to take less damage.
• Sweet Tooth: Thanks to your grappling hook, you can actually reach those really impractical Red Sugar deposits to heal up! Healing more is always a plus, and this also helps you leave the easy-to-reach deposits for your teammates to use instead.

Related Reading: Best Perks Overall for Deep Rock Galactic

Scout Primary Weapons & Builds

The Scout favors fast movement and fast weapons. Use your selection of high-powered rifles to make the most of your limited ammo reserves. Pummel an enemy’s weak points without mercy, grapple out of danger, then rinse-and-repeat.

1. Deepcore GK2

The Deepcore GK2 is the Scout’s default primary weapon — a reliable automatic assault rifle that comes with steady accuracy and respectable damage, It’s not a particularly flashy weapon, but it’ll get the job done.

While it was previously considered to be a rather bad weapon due to having low damage and an insufficient ammo pool, a series of buffs and adjustments brought it up to par with its contemporaries in Season 3.

The Deepcore packs enough of a punch to kill anything, as long as you can hit their squishy weakpoints. Just don’t expect to hold off the swarm on your own with this, as you’ll quickly find yourself out of ammo.  

Build A: AI Stability Engine (Recommended)

This build is all about the overclock. It doubles down on the Scout’s preference for targeting weakpoints by drastically boosting weakpoint damage and stability of the Deepcore GK2. You’ll have to ensure your aim is more steady than ever, but you’ll be greatly rewarded for doing so.

Thanks to the aforementioned Season 3 adjustments, the overclock’s penalty to damage has been reduced and the weakpoint bonus was boosted by another 10%, making this build stronger than ever.

• [2] Supercharged Feed Mechanism — Offsets the overclock’s penalty to rate of fire.
• [2] Expanded Ammo Bags
• [2] High Capacity Magazine
• [1] Hollow-Point Bullets
• [3] Stun – Adds a 35% chance to stun on hitting weakpoints, which is exactly what this build wants. Plus, it makes it a lot easier to lock down bulkier targets.
• Overclock: AI Stability Engine — Removes all recoil and drastically reduces bullet spread. Deals 50% more damage to weak points, which more than offsets the -1 base damage.

Build B: Bullets of Mercy

The Bullets of Mercy overclock is the lynchpin of this build, granting a whopping 50% damage boost when shooting targets that are either on fire, stunned, electrocuted, frozen, or poisoned.

On your own, you’ll have to either rely on stunning enemies with weakpoint shots (via the Stun mod) or make sure your secondary weapon is capable of inflicting status effects. Luckily, neither condition is too hard to trigger, but this can be entirely circumvented depending on what weapons the rest of your team is running.

The Driller will be your best friend if you’re running this build, as all of his primary weapons apply a status effect. It’s completely viable to just follow him around and execute whatever he’s targeting.

Quite a few Engineers run the Stubby with an Electrocute build, so you can also take advantage of that. As for the Gunner, unless he’s running the Lead Storm with a Burning Hell build (enables on fire and stun), you probably won’t be able to rely on him for activating your build’s criteria.

If you choose this build, it’s best to communicate with the team prior to the mission to know which teammates you should stick with during combat. We also recommend either running the Zhukov with a Cryo Minelets build or the Boltshark with a Cryo Bolt build as your secondary (both builds are listed below).

• [2] Supercharged Feed Mechanism – Mostly a personal choice for this tier. We like faster bullets.
• [2] Expanded Ammo Bags – More ammo is severely appreciated for this weapon.
• [2] High Capacity Magazine – Offsets the overclock’s drawback.
• [1] Hollow-Point Bullets
• [3] Stun – Helps drastically with meeting the criteria to activate Bullets of Mercy.
• Overclock: Bullets of Mercy – As mentioned above, it’s what makes this build so good. Nearly all status effects will activate this (even ones that aren’t explicitly listed like radiation).

2. M1000 Classic

The M1000 Classic is a lovely semi-automatic rifle with powerful armor-piercing rounds and an alternate firing mode that basically turns it into a sniper. By holding the firing button, you’ll enter a zoomed-in Focus Mode that charges up to deal double damage with perfect accuracy at the cost of two bullets per shot.  

Unfortunately, due to the fast-paced nature of Deep Rock Galactic and the somewhat lackluster damage modifiers for Focus Mode, most players prefer using the weapon’s normal mode. Thankfully, it’s still a really good weapon that greatly rewards hitting enemy weakpoints.  

Build A: Hipster (Recommended)

Think you’re fit to be a cowboy? This build turns you into a hip-firing, weakpoint-destroying menace to the wild west of Hoxxes. Thanks to the overclock, you gain a tremendous amount of ammo (enough to actively fight off swarms) and a drastic improvement to the M1000’s accuracy.

As long as you can hit weakpoints, you’ll feel like you’re doing just as much as damage as you would with a fully charged Focus Mode shot.

• [2] Increased Caliber Rounds — Unlike most damage boosts, this one is a whopping +10 damage.
• [3] Hardened Rounds – The overclock already reduces your recoil by half, so it’s more beneficial to gain additional armor penetration for bulkier enemies.
• [2] Extended Clip
• [2] Hollow-Point Bullets
• [3] Killing Machine – If you’re the type of person to reload after every single shot (like us), you’ll love this mod.
• Overclock: Hipster — The lynchpin of this build. Makes the bullet spread small enough to feasibly rapid fire and basically doubles your ammo reserves. Yes, the base damage reduction is annoying, but largely inconsequential if you can hit weakpoints.

Build B: Electrocuting Focus Shots

If you’re still interested in the Focus Mode gameplay but want to be useful, this is the M1000 build for you. Instead of purely prioritizing damage, you’re providing crowd control via the Electrocution overclock and Fear modification working in tandem.

An interesting detail about Fear – it only wears off once an enemy has traveled a set distance. If they’re Electrocuted, they travel slower. This in turn effectively makes Fear last even longer. As the overclock makes all of your Focus Shots electrocute, all you have to do is trigger the Fear effect!

Of course that’s easier said than done, as the Precision Terror mod only triggers on weakpoint kills. Luckily, a partially charged Focus Shot to most grunts’ heads will kill them, letting you easily CC crowds of enemies with minimal effort. Due to the incredibly high fear factor generated by the mod, you can even keep elite enemies CCed with this build.

• [1] Expanded Ammo Bags
• [1] Fast-Charging Coils
• [1] Killer Focus
• [2] Hollow-Point Bullets – Offsets the overclock’s drawback and makes it easier to trigger the Precision Terror mod’s fear effect.
• [2] Precision Terror — Killing an enemy with a weakpoint shot will cause everything within 4 meters to be feared. This is a great way to keep even elite enemies under control.
• Overclock: Electrocuting Focus Shots — This grants all of your charged shots a 100% electrocute chance. The reduced Focus Shot damage is offset by mods, so it shouldn’t affect you much.

3. DRAK-25 Plasma Carbine

The DRAK-25 Plasma Carbine is the last of the Scout’s primary weapons, and honestly our personal favorite. Weaponizing pure plasma, the DRAK spews molten death at an incredibly fast rate, limited only by its heat system.

With the potential to be the Scout’s most ammo-efficient and impactful weapon, it’s many players’ go-to weapon for Deep Dives and long missions.  

On its own, the DRAK is rather similar to the Deepcore GK2, but with an even greater reliance on hitting weakpoints to do damage. It also has a rather slow projectile travel time, limiting its effectiveness at longer ranges. However, certain overclock and mod combinations drastically alter its role and performance.  

Build A: Rewiring Mod (Recommended)

This build is all about having nigh-infinite ammo by using the Rewiring Mod overclock and Manual Heat Dump mod to return a portion of the DRAK’s heat as ammo. It requires quite a bit more management than most other weapons in Deep Rock Galactic, but makes the DRAK the most ammo-efficient gun in the game while still dealing massive damage.

Instead of firing in bursts to keep the DRAK’s heat low, wait until you can justify firing the weapon non-stop until you’re at about 90% overheating. At that point, manually dump the heat by reloading to regenerate the most ammo. If done correctly every time, your starting amount of 480 ammo is effectively extended to about 1800.

• [1] High-Volume Plasma Feed — Faster overheating is fine in this build.
• [2] Increased Caliber Rounds
• [3] Hot Feet / [1] Custom Coil Alignment — Personal preference between better kiting potential or accuracy.
• [1] Overcharged PCF – Extra damage is always nice.
• [1] Manual Heat Dump — Essential for this build, as it forcibly overheats your gun. Only usable at 50% heat or higher. Always manually dump heat instead of letting the weapon cooldown naturally.
• Overclock: Rewiring Mod — The core of this build. While overheated, your gun will regenerate ammo, giving back about 70% of the current heat. Reduces your max ammo, but careful management will negate this downside.

Build B: Overtuned Particle Accelerator

For those who don’t mind getting up close and personal with enemies, this build enables you to deal ridiculous damage at the cost of all accuracy and some max ammo. It’s a very straightforward and simple build for the DRAK-25.

• [2] Heat Shield — Offsets the overclock’s heat generation.
• [1] Larger Battery — More ammo is always good, and it offset the overclock’s downside.
• [1] Custom Coil Alignment
• [1] Overcharged PCF
• [2] Thermal Feedback Loop — Helps you dump even more shots into the enemy.
• Overclock: Overtuned Particle Accelerator — Grants a whooping extra 8 damage per shot. While the drastic reduction to ammo hurts, the damage boost drastically reduces the amount of shots needed to kill anything, balancing out your ammo efficiency.

Scout Secondary Weapons & Builds  

Now onto the secondary weapons for the Scout. Each one has a drastically different role and is best used to augment or compensate the Scout’s primary weapon.

1. Jury-Rigged Boomstick

The Jury-Rigged Boomstick is a classic double-barreled shotgun and a fitting default secondary. It does exactly what you expect it to — destroy anything in close range. It’s incredibly useful for dealing with major threats, and its only real drawback is the reload time.  

As a side note, there’s no damage falloff from distance. Damage is dependent only on the number of pellets that connect with an enemy.

Build A: Jumbo Shells (Recommended)

It’s natural for gamers to see a shotgun and think it’s capable of killing anything in one shot at close range. This build aims to live up to that expectation by trading ammo for much higher damage.

Remember, the damage boost applies to each pellet, and this build fires 11–12 pellets per shot. That’s a lot of damage. That being said, since you have rather limited ammo with this build, it’s best to save the Boomstick solely for meaty large enemies or high-priority threats.

• [2] Doubled-Sized Buckshot
• [1] Double Trigger — We prefer ensuring something is dead before reloading.
• [3] High Capacity Shells
• [3] Improved Blast Wave
• [2] Fear the Boomstick – Large threats are often surrounded by smaller more numerous threats. This helps you create some space when dealing with large enemies.
• Overclock: Jumbo Shells / Stuffed Shells — Comes down to just how much damage you want per shot. If you want high-priority threats to die immediately, go with Jumbo Shells

Build B: Compact Shells

This build focuses more on improving the economy of your shotgun shells by taking out multiple common enemies with each shot and getting as many shots as possible. It’s fantastic for clearing out crowds and getting some breathing space.

• [1] Expanded Ammo Bags
• [2] Quickfire Ejector
• [2] Expanded Ammo Bags
• [1] Super Blowthrough Rounds / [3] Improved Blast Wave — Comes down to personal choice on how close you want to get to enemies and how clustered together they are.
• [2] Fear the Boomstick — Takes about two shots to send most enemies fleeing.
• Overclock: Compact Shells – More ammo is all you want for this build.

2. Zhukov NUK17

The Zhukov NUK17 is the next secondary weapon for the Scout and is perfect anyone with itchy trigger fingers. These twin machine pistols spew out bullets faster than anything else in the game. Be prepared to burn through an entire clip every time you pull the trigger.

To no one’s surprise, there’s a lot of recoil when firing these. Their damage also really falls off if you’re not hitting a weak point. While they can outperform the Boomstick in terms of damage, you’ll definitely have to put more work in on aiming.  

Thankfully, there are overclocks that radically transform these guns’ playstyle and make them much more forgiving and fun.  

Build A: Embedded Detonators (Recommended)

This is our personal favorite build for the Zhukov, as you basically embed tiny bombs into your enemies with each bullet. Upon reloading, they all detonate at once.

The game also helpfully places a small red exclamation point next to an enemy’s health bar when there are enough bombs in it to kill it. Just make sure you’re still aiming for weak points to increase your initial firing damage.

• [1] Expanded Ammo Bags — To offset the overclock’s downside.
• [3] Quickfire Ejector / [2] Supercharged Feed Mechanism — Depends if you want better swarm control or to kill elites faster.
• [2] Better Weight Balance — You can’t afford to miss. Direct damage also isn’t the point.
• [3] Expanded Ammo Bags
• [2] Get In, Get Out – You’ll be reloading often, so the speed boost is immensely appreciated.
• Overclock: Embedded Detonators — The lynchpin of this build. Despite the reduced ammo and direct damage, the explosions are far more efficient at killing most targets. Unfortunately, their damage is not amplified on frozen enemies, so heads up on that.

Build B: Cryo Minelets

This build turns the Zhukov into a fantastic crowd-controlling support weapon. Each shot that connects with terrain becomes a mine that arms itself after a brief second. Since you’ll be running the Blowthrough Rounds mod, all your shots through a crowd will turn the battlefield into a frozen hellscape.

While you usually won’t be freezing your first target, any subsequent enemy will find itself quickly frozen, making this fantastic for swarms. Just make sure you’re aiming slightly downwards so your bullets embed themselves in the terrain after piercing an enemy.

• [1] Expanded Ammo Bags
• [1] High Capacity Magazine — Offsets the overclock’s downside.
• [1] Increased Caliber Rounds
• [1] Blowthrough Rounds — Essential for this build. Otherwise you can’t shoot enemies and embed the cryo mines in the ground.
• [1] Conductive Bullets — Mainly if you’re pairing this with the DRAK primary.
• Overclock: Cryo Minelets — The core of this build. Besides helping to freeze enemies (causing them to take more damage for all other sources), they also do 10 cold damage per mine. The slight damage decrease is largely inconsequential.

3. Nishanka Boltshark X-80

The latest weapon to be added with Season 2 is going back to medieval times when dwarves weren’t in space yet. That’s right, you’re using a crossbow. Of course, this crossbow has a few futuristic modifications and special bolts designed to tackle the threats of Hoxxes.

The Boltshark is more about bringing utility to the field, as opposed to dealing devastating damage per shot like the Boomstick. It is an extremely customizable weapon that shines when built to specifically support your primary weapon build.

You’ll have a set of special bolts in addition to your normal ones, the type depending on which modification you take in the first row. These range from turning your enemies into explosives on death, applying pheromones to them, or embedding electric relays in them that arc between one another.

You can swap between your normal and special bolts by simply hitting the reload button. Mind your ammo, as your supply of special bolts is considerably lower than your normal ones. Resupplying at an ammo pod will separately restore 50% of both bolt types.

Additionally, your normal bolts are retrievable from the ground, but only if you miss (just approach and interact with one). This enables an interesting strategy with the Banshee Module modification (on the 5th row). The mod turns each normal bolt into a fear totem, steadily scaring away nearby enemies. As the bolts are retrievable, you can effectively provide safe havens for your team as long as your ammo reserves hold out.

While you can build the crossbow to do large bursts of damage, we find the Boomstick to be better suited for that due to the crossbow’s limited ammo capacity and greater need for careful aiming. Much like the rest of the weapons in the Scout’s kit, it shines the most when you target weakpoints.

Build A: Cryo Bolt (Recommended)

This Boltshark build is best paired with the Deepcore GK2 using a Bullets of Mercy build.

Tag a large meaty enemy with a pheromone bolt to lure everything in the surrounding area to it, then shoot a normal cryo bolt into it to freeze everything around it. This sets it up a nice ring of frozen enemies for you to easily execute with the Deepcore, as you’ll be dealing triple damage from the frozen modifier and an additional 50% damage from the Bullets of Mercy overclock.

• [1] Pheromone Dart – Essential for luring enemies together to mass freeze them.
• [2] Increased Quiver Capacity – Gives more chances to freeze enemies
• [1] Stabilizing Arm Brace – Switching bolts quickly is necessary to capitalize on this build.
• [1] Battle Frenzy – The other option is useless, as the overclock prevents bolt retrieval.
• [1] Potent Special Bolts
• Overclock: Cryo Bolt – The lynchpin of this build. Grants all your normal bolts an aura of frost. While the freeze won’t be instant, it’ll take only a few seconds to freeze everything in the area. Just note that it prevents bolt retrieval.

Build B: Quick Fire

This Boltshark build is best paired with the DRAK-25 Plasma Carbine using an Overtuned Particle Accelerator build.

As our DRAK is built to be a close-range monster, this build makes it so that the Boltshark can reliably deal with anything outside of the DRAK’s short range. Thanks to the Quick Fire overclock, your bolts have laser-like precision. You’ll be able to snipe far-off foes with normal bolts and deal with groups of enemies with your special chemical bolts.

Plus, since your DRAK build is capable of electrocuting enemies, you can take advantage of the Magnetic Shafts mod on the Boltshark to deal massive damage to anything that survives an onslaught from the DRAK.

• [2] Chemical Explosion – Poisons enemies and causes them to explode if they die while afflicted.
• [1] Broadhead Bolts – Lets you snipe most far-off enemies in one shot.
• [1] Stabilizing Arm Brace – Swap bolts faster and pump more into electrocuted enemies.
• [1] Battle Frenzy – Even more mobility.
• [2] Magnetic Shafts – Lets you execute bulkier targets that survive the DRAK.
• Overclock: Quick Fire – Lets you swap bolts even quicker and ensures your bolts have no drop-off.

Scout Equipment & Builds

The Scout’s equipment is all about improving traversal and utility. You’ll be using your equipment more than any other class, so make sure you know all the ins-and-outs to look like a pro!

Grappling Hook & Build

The grappling hook is the Scout’s calling card. This baby attaches to virtually any surface known to dwarf and reels you in at breakneck speeds. Use it to get around to any location that it can possibly reach. Loot treasure, get to your friends, fling yourself into hordes of angry bugs and panic!  

Note: you cannot mine and grapple at the same time. However, if you’re fast enough (or if you have the Hover Boots perk), you can mine out a foothold before you start plummeting.

You also don’t have to fully commit to a grapple. Simply let go of the trigger at any time to end the grapple early and use the momentum to slingshot yourself. You can even grapple something a second before hitting the ground and let go immediately to break your fall.

Just make sure the hook actually connects with something before letting go, or you’ll be left waiting for a recharge and probably falling to your doom. If you’re grappling towards the ground, wait until you come to a full stop or you’ll experience inertia first hand.

There’s a decent chance you’ll use the grappling hook more than your actual weapons on a mission, so get plenty of practice in to avoid looking like a green-beard to your team.  

Build A: Spider-Scout

While you can build the grappling hook to whatever playstyle you prefer, we personally recommend focusing on reducing its recharge time. Few things feel as bad as misjudging your foothold, falling, and hitting the ground a second before it’s available again.

Plus, a faster recharge means you can reposition more often when you’re being chased by angry bugs and other nasty enemies.

• [1] Improved Recharger
• [1] Greater Cable Stretch
• [2] Overcharged Winch — Makes it a lot easier to slingshot yourself.
• [3] Bypassed Integrity Check

Flare Gun & Build  

In the dark depths of Hoxxes, any light source is appreciated. While each team member has their personal rechargeable flares, those can only light up a small area and take an annoying amount of time to regenerate. That’s what makes your Flare Gun so valuable.  

Launch a single flare and bring fire (light) to your team like Prometheus! Just be aware the flare doesn’t last forever. Try to be tactical with your positioning to cover as much area as possible. Since the flare will stick to nearly every surface (including enemies, amusingly), we recommend aiming for the ceiling or upper walls in most cases.  

It’s especially important to keep the area lit when you’re holding a point so your team can see the enemy and start killing them before they’re all within melee range of you. As soon as your current flare burns out, swap back and launch another one. Your team will love you for it.  

Build A: The Dawn Has Arrived

This build focuses on keeping your flare burning for as long as possible, so you don’t have to constantly worry about tossing out another one. If you’re more interested in lighting up different areas more frequently, then swap to the higher ammo modifications.

• [2] Thicker Core
• [2] High Capacity Magazine — No time to reload in the middle of a swarm!
• [3] Magnesium Core

Scout Grenades

The Scout has some interesting grenades that mess with enemies in unique and debilitating ways. They all enable you to get some breathing room before counterattacking.

1. Inhibitor-Field Grenade (IFG)

The IFG is the Scout’s default and most iconic grenade. It’s all about control over damage — specifically, it slows everything hostile within its radius to an absolute crawl (75% slow) for 15s.

Even better, all enemies affected by the grenade take an additional 30% damage and are considered electrified. You have six of these to start with, so use them often to cripple and devastate any major threats.

Just make sure to aim well, as they stick to any surface and deploy immediately. Alternatively, you can use them to buy your team time to escape a hairy situation.  

2. Cryo Grenade

As you might expect from the name, the Cryo Grenade is all about freezing your enemies. Upon coming in contact with an enemy, it’ll detonate in an icy mist, freezing any nearby enemy instantly. As frozen enemies take triple damage, you can use this to devastate any foe.  

These are especially effective when a swarm of flying enemies spawn. If your aim is good, you can hit one of the fliers near the center to freeze the entire pack. Then watch them instantly plummet to their deaths.

Just note that you’re limited to carrying four at a time, and that the grenade can bounce off surfaces without detonating immediately. Also note that fire will pretty much instantly un-thaw any frozen enemy.

3. Pheromone Canister

Ever wanted to watch bugs fight each other to the death and take bets on which one will win? What do you mean, that’s illegal? This is Hoxxes! There are no planetary laws out here! Bah.

Anyway, anything hit by this grenade will be coated with pheromones that make the natives of Hoxxes attack each other. Toss this in a crowd and enjoy the mass in-fighting. It’s especially hilarious when you apply this to a major enemy like a Bulk Detonator.  

As of Season 2, the Pheromone Canisters have been massively buffed. Previously, pheromone afflicted creatures would draw the ire of only a couple enemies around them and wouldn’t fight back. Now more enemies will attack affected targets, affected creatures will attack all enemies around them, and the duration of the effect has been increased.

Sometimes enemies will even stop attacking your team to go fight each other, but don’t rely too heavily on this happening. Especially since you only have four of these on hand at a time.  

4. Voltaic Stun Sweeper

Unleash your inner Aussie with the latest grenade for the Scout. These electrified boomerangs will bounce between nearby enemies, stunning and dealing a mix of electric-melee damage to enemies.

You can carry up to a max of 8 at a time, and there’s even a chance that the boomerang will return to you – replenishing a grenade charge. They’re incredibly quick acting, so you can count on them to get you out when you’re surrounded by a crowd of enemies.

However, despite being perfectly viable, there’s nothing making the Voltaic Stun Sweeper a better choice than your other grenades. You’ll get much more long-term and immediate value from any of the other options.

The only real claim to fame the Voltaic Stun Sweeper has is its max carrying amount, The chance to get a boomerang back is really low, so it doesn’t even have that going for it. We’re hoping it gets a damage buff or something notable down the road to give it a more unique niche.

Join the High Ground!

And that’s it for our Deep Rock Galactic guide to the Scout — thanks for reading! This guide was recently updated to reflect the changes in Season 4. If there are any other tips/tricks that you think we should include in our guide, then subscribe and leave a comment below.

Rock and stone forever!