Honestly Borderlands 4 has over 150 legendary weapons in the base game and tbh most of them are vendor trash but the ones that are good are like really really good and after farming these things for literally hundreds of hours I kinda know which ones are worth your time and which ones you should just sell to Marcus immediately, so here's the thing knowing where to find the good ones is just as important as knowing which ones are good because grinding the wrong boss for 10 hours for a weapon that drops from a different boss is the kind of pain I wouldn't wish on anyone, anyway this guide covers the absolute best legendaries and exactly how to get them and what builds they work with and all that
S-Tier Legendary Weapons
So the Monarch is an Assault Rifle that fires in a fixed spread pattern that tightens the longer you hold the trigger and in bipod mode it doubles fire rate and accuracy and I mean honestly this thing deletes bosses faster than anything else in the game, drops from Killavolt on Mayhem 6+ and you gotta go to Lectra City on Promethea for it, basically essential for any build that benefits from sustained critical hits and tbh if you only farm one weapon in this entire game make it the Monarch And then theres the Light Show wich is a Pistol that fires 4 projectiles per shot at the cost of 2 ammo and each projectile can crit independently and ngl with the right anointment this pistol out-DPSs most launchers and thats not even an exaggeration, drops from Lasodactyl in the Obsidian Forest but you need the Director's Cut DLC for that one The Plasma Coil is an SMG that shoots a continuous plasma beam that chains to nearby enemies and the beam damage increases the longer its on target and honestly this is widely considered the best SMG in BL4 it can clear entire rooms with a single magazine, drops from the Seer in Vaulthalla and it's an Arms Race exclusive wich makes it a pain to farm but absolutely worth it, I'm not 100% sure but I think the chain damage caps at like 3 enemies but maybe it goes higher with certain anoints who knows
A-Tier Legendary Weapons
The Hellwalker is a double-barrel shotgun that plays a guitar riff with every shot and tbh that alone makes it worth using but the damage is also insane, fires 10 projectiles with fixed incendiary damage and one-shots most non-boss enemies on Mayhem 10/11 with the right build, drops from Road Dog in the Splinterlands and because it has fixed parts every Hellwalker is identical so you literally only need to farm it once wich is a blessing honestly, I love this gun so much And the Flipper is an SMG that fires 9 projectiles in a spread pattern for the cost of 1 ammo wich is already ridiculous, each projectile that hits an enemy increases damage by 2% for the next 5 seconds stacking up to 20 times and with Moze's ammo regeneration this effectively has infinite ammo, drops from Minosaur in Bloodsun Canyon and you need the Bounty of Blood DLC, I've used this on my Moze for probably 100 hours and I still haven't gotten tired of it The Backburner is a Rocket Launcher that fires a slow-moving orb that rains down mortar projectiles on enemies below and honestly it's devastating against large bosses with big hitboxes, drops from the Agonizer 9000 on Mayhem 6+ and tbh the farming route for this one is super quick once you get the hang of it
Farming Efficiency Tips
Set Mayhem to 10 or 11 first of all because Mayhem 11 is identical to Mayhem 10 but without modifiers wich means easier farming with the same loot quality and I mean why would you ever farm on Mayhem 10 when 11 exists right And you absolutely need to equip a Shlooter artifact from Vault Card 2 because it increases legendary world drop rate by 1000% for 30 seconds after each kill wich is honestly broken and essential for world-drop farming Save-quit farming is the standard method basically kill the boss save and quit reload repeat and most dedicated drops have a 10-15% drop rate on Mayhem 10/11 so expect like 7-10 kills per drop on average, sometimes you get lucky sometimes you don't and thats just how it goes you get the idea Also check the anointment because a god-roll legendary with a bad anointment is worse than a mid-tier legendary with a perfect anointment and tbh this is something I learned the hard way after wasting days farming the wrong thing, always reroll at Crazy Earl's if the base weapon is good or whatever