Metal Blaster

The Metal Blaster is a unique AER9 laser rifle added to Fallout 3 with the add-on The Pitt.

Characteristics

 * It is repaired with the standard AER9 laser rifle or the Wazer Wifle.
 * It deals considerably more damage than the normal AER9 laser rifle.
 * It lacks the precision of a standard laser rifle, making it less effective for long-range attacks.
 * The spread remains consistently tight when firing outside of V.A.T.S. mode; however, when firing within V.A.T.S. mode, a registered "miss" will make the spread much wider than it is outside of V.A.T.S. mode (though some beams may still connect with the target, doing slight damage). Because of this and the single critical/shot limitation of V.A.T.S., this weapon is far more effective outside of V.A.T.S.
 * The 55 base damage is split between each of the nine beams, but outside of V.A.T.S. each beam can cause a separate critical hit, doing +27 damage per beam. Furthermore, a sneak attack critical automatically scores critical hits with all beams. The combination of a sneak attack and the Better Criticals perk will result in 839 total damage.
 * The Metal Blaster can fire 455 cells, or about 19 full batteries, before breaking. That's 631 fewer cells than a regular laser rifle.

Variants

 * Laser rifle - Standard laser rifle.
 * Wazer Wifle - This unique variant of the AER9 has higher damage and durability, as well as a larger magazine. It is obtained from Biwwy in Little Lamplight for five hundred caps or free with the Child at Heart perk.
 * Tri-beam laser rifle - The Tri-beam laser rifle is a variant of the AER9 that fires three high-powered beams per shot - similar to the Metal Blaster - though it does require three microfusion cells every time the trigger is pulled. This weapon is not unique, dropped from super mutant overlords and is not repairable with anything but other Tri-beam laser rifles. It was first made available in Broken Steel.


 * A "demo" version of the laser rifle is included in Fallout 3, presumably left from the game's E3 demo. It does one point less damage per shot and less than half the critical damage than the standard variant, but has a much higher critical chance percentage. It is not used anywhere in the game and is only accessible through the use of console commands.

Location
It can be obtained in the Pitt by bringing Everett 50 steel ingots.

Related quests

 * Mill Worker

Behind the scenes
The Metal Blaster is the second item in two-part reference to Mad Max: Beyond Thunderdome. Two characters, Master and Blaster, correspond to the Metal master armor and the Metal Blaster, respectively. Raider blastmaster armor also exists in Fallout 3.

Sounds
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