Early-level damage buff

What it is

An optional per-weapon damage multiplier that boosts a weapon’s damage at low levels and decays linearly to zero by a configured end level. Defined on a weapon spec as earlyLevelDamageBuff: { maxBuff, endLevel }. Used to rescue weapons whose L1 baseline reads as too weak — slow-cycle weapons whose long cooldown × small base damage barely registers in the first few minutes of a run.

Math

The buff is a multiplier applied on top of the weapon’s resolved damage (after the global damage-level curve, before horizontals). It starts at 1 + maxBuff at level 1 and decays linearly to 1.0 once the weapon reaches endLevel.

Quantity	Formula
Multiplier at level L (L ≤ endLevel)	1 + maxBuff × (endLevel − L) / (endLevel − 1)
Multiplier at level L (L ≥ endLevel)	1.0
Bonus at L1	+maxBuff × 100%
Bonus at endLevel	+0%
Decay per level	maxBuff / (endLevel − 1)

The buff is purely multiplicative on damage and does not affect fire rate, range, projectile count, or any other stat.

Relationship to the global early-level damage buff

There is also a global early-level damage buff baked into the shared damage-multiplier curve that applies to every weapon. It contributes +30% at L1, decaying −5% per level, reaching +0% at L7+.

Source	Scope	L1 bonus	Reaches +0% at
Global early buff	All weapons	+30%	L7
Per-weapon earlyLevelDamageBuff	Only weapons that opt in	maxBuff × 100%	endLevel

The per-weapon buff is additional — it multiplies on top of the already-buffed global curve, not in place of it.

Weapons that use it

Only two weapons opt into the per-weapon buff. Both are epic-rarity energy weapons whose L1 cadence is too slow to feel impactful without help.

Weapon	maxBuff	endLevel	L1 bonus	Decay per level	Decays to +0% at
Disc	1.20	10	+120%	~13.3%	L10
Sweep	1.50	7	+150%	25%	L7

Level-by-level multipliers

Level	Disc multiplier	Sweep multiplier
1	2.20×	2.50×
2	2.07×	2.25×
3	1.93×	2.00×
4	1.80×	1.75×
5	1.67×	1.50×
6	1.53×	1.25×
7	1.40×	1.00×
8	1.27×	1.00×
9	1.13×	1.00×
10+	1.00×	1.00×