Elemental Mods

[(XBOX)Kangagang]

So I've been trying to get better at modding and I recently read something that said slash, puncture, etc. mods are useless and to just focus on elemental mods. However, Should I focus on One element per weapon or try to spread it out as much as I can?

[Kuestenjung]

Slash, puncture and impact ( short IPS ) mods aren´t useless, but they are inferior to elemental mods, escpecially if you only have the 60% mods and not the 120% ones.

For the start, you can never go wrong with radiation ( which combines fire and shock ) or corrosive ( shock and poison ).

[lukinu_u]

That's not always true.
The reason elemetal mods are "better" is because both types of mods apply differently, elemental one apply to the total weapon damages while physical ones apply the said damage type.

I will explain :
Let imagine you have a weapon with 10 slash, 10 impact, 10 puncture for a total of 30 damages.

• Adding a +50% heat damage mod will be +50% of the base total damages as heat, so 10 slash, 10 impact, 10 puncture, (10+10+10)*0.5=15 heat for a total of 45 damages.
• Adding a +50% slash damage mod will be +50% of the base slash damages so 10*(1+0.5)=15 slash, 10 impact, 10 puncture for a total of 35 damages.

But anyways, I think in most of case, you shouldn't rely on getting as much damages as you can but trying to get the status effect you want and work around them.
For example, if you have great status chances with high proportion of slash/gas/corrosive, don't put more elemental mods even if it will directly increase you damage output, because the spread of status may not be beneficial.

Edited November 26, 2018 by lukinu_u

[taiiat]

(IPS Mods aren't technically useless, but that they're basically only useful for Elemental Resistance Sorties or to increase the Slash weight of a Weapon that isn't already Slash weighted for the purposes of getting a lot of Slash Status)

anyways, two Elementals to make a combined Damage Type is the starting point generally - use the Damage Type the Enemies you're fighting are weak to. that's pretty much all there is to it.
though in cases where you can have an odd number of Elementals, you get more complicated choices. Toxin is overall the best single Elemental (garbage vs Infested but relatively good vs everything else), and for 3 Elemental Situations that can be focusing on an alternate Health Type to get good overall TTK or reinforcing your existing Damage Type more, or going for a large generic Damage Type that isn't great but you get a lot of for still a lot of Damage in the end (tl;dr Primed Elemental Mods), Et Cetera.

and then after Damage, there are Status Effect optimizations - you may choose an Elemental Damage Type because of the Status Effect it brings, and not the raw Damage it will contribute.