HOPE 01 Weapons Tier List

Steam’s weapon pitch for HOPE 01 is four stats: rate of fire, muzzle velocity, reload time, and penetration. There are 70+ guns to find and test. This page ranks those stats and the roles they create. It does not invent a complete named S-tier list that will be wrong after the next fabric patch. Compare the card in your fabricator to the roles below, then print accordingly.

The video on this page is a long extraction session useful for seeing how often people swap guns they cannot feed. Pair it with Early Loadouts before you melt military fabrics, and with Gadgets because a dark room makes every DPS number fake.

The four stats, decoded

Rate of fire. How fast the gun spends the mag you dragged. High RoF is comfort in short dodge windows and panic close range. It is also how you discover you only loaded one mag. High RoF without spare mags is C-tier in disguise.

Muzzle velocity. How the shot travels through those long Hab Cluster halls. Low velocity on a Bureau corridor means you lead silhouettes like a throw. High velocity is what makes a modest RoF feel “accurate” in 2D space.

Reload time. In HOPE 01 this includes the inventory truth: mags are physical. A gun that reloads quickly on the card still needs a filled mag in the grid. If the body wants frequent mag swaps, you must pre-load in the hideout. See Controls.

Penetration. The stat people skip. If a target does not flinch, or if two enemies line up on a stair, penetration is the difference between a plan and a dry click. Bosses and denser Early Access enemies will punish “pellet” guns that only look good on unarmoured hallway trash.

A gun that is S on one stat and F on the mag economy is not S. Rank the worst of the four plus reprint cost.

HOPE 01 extraction gameplay — guns and loadouts in the Hab Cluster

Role tiers (Early Access)

S — workhorse scanned bodies

Criteria: you have the blueprint, print cost does not empty military fabrics, ammo type is common, mag size lets you dodge between bursts, at least one of velocity or penetration is honest.

Typical shapes: compact pistols and controlled automatics you actually extracted twice. They look boring in a 70-gun roster and they pay the rent. If you cannot name which of the four stats yours is good at, it is not S yet — it is a stranger.

A — fight specialists

High penetration for Boss Fights and armoured silhouettes. High velocity for Hab Rail halls. These are the guns you print after food and a spare mag. They may eat rarer ammo (heavy-round mags show up in footage). If you cannot reprint the mag, the gun is not A, it is a museum piece.

B — situational platforms

Huge bodies, odd RoF spikes, weapons that occupy too much tetris. Fine when you are farming a known extract and the bag is otherwise empty. Bad when you still need space for medical fabrics. If picking it up forces you to drop bricks, it just failed the only test that matters.

C — unscanned floor legends

Beautiful, unnamed, blue-dotted. The Fabricator has not learned them. Their job is to reach stash, not to kill a boss tonight. Equipping your only C as a primary is how highlight clips end in a wipe screen.

F — bag traps

Empty mags seated as if they were full. Guns whose ammo you do not carry. Military-fabric sinks you cannot replace. Anything that made you miss Manorial Extract because you were admiring the model. F is not “low DPS.” F is “this item prevented an extract.”

Ammo and magazines

Treat mags as weapons. A heavy-round magazine compatible with a platform you do not own is loot for later, not a holster item. Scan it (once per type), stash it, print it when the body exists. Dragging the wrong ammo onto the mag is a silence that feels like a bug. It is not.

Print priority:

1. Mags for the S-tier body on your back.
2. One stack of the matching loose ammo.
3. The body reprint.
4. A specialist mag for an A-tier you actually scanned.

Do not print three gun bodies and zero mags. The Loadout Checklist exists to stop that.

Matching guns to Cluster rooms

• Dark medical close range. RoF and dodge matter; velocity less so. You will melee (Space) more than you want. Light is the real weapon — Gadgets.
• Bureau halls. Muzzle velocity and not standing still. Penetration if the hall stacks bodies.
• Hab Rail platforms. You need something you can fire while moving onto a timer. Compact beats bulky.
• Boss rooms. Penetration and a pre-loaded spare mag. High RoF is optional; a dry high-RoF gun is a melee weapon with extra steps.

Routes for those rooms: Hab Cluster Map. Extract discipline: How to Extract.

How to evaluate a floor drop in five seconds

1. Blue? Bag it if it fits.
2. Same ammo as your current S gun? Interesting.
3. Better on the stat you are actually missing (you just bounced off armour → want penetration)? Interesting.
4. Bigger than the hole in your grid? Leave it.
5. Would you print this tomorrow at the current fabric cost? If no, it is a scan objective, not a swap.

Early Access caveat

More guns are planned. Fabric amounts are a stated tuning target. A weapon that is S today because it is cheap can be B after a patch. Rank roles and stats, write the name in your own notes, and re-check Updates Hub after balance passes.

Melee is always the backup: knife on left click when that is the held tool, Space for the dedicated melee attack. It is not on the gun card and it will save a raid when the mag is a liar.

When the roster in your fabricator is ten bodies deep, you are allowed to have favourites. Until then, print the workhorse, extract it, and let the Beginner Walkthrough keep you out of trophy hunting.