The point of secondaries

[Szuna]

6 hours ago, Aldain said:

I found it hard to invest in secondaries as well (mostly because orokin catalysts are like water in a desert for me apparently) and I only just recently finally took the plunge and invested in one, a Lex Prime, just because I was getting sick of only having 30 mod points to work with.

The end result I wound up with was a pistol that dealt over 1000 puncture and corrosive damage. It went from being a "I'm down" backup to a miniature sniper and capable single target deletion at most levels.

Secondaries can be powerful weapons that can supplement or cover for your primary weapon choice, while they may appear weak on the surface it is best to try out many diiferent weapons, not only for MR grinding but also to find a play style that you like and can enjoy.

If you have any secondaries like that, feel free to post them, I'm not a build expert but I can try to help with ideas and I'm sure others who would know more about them would likely come in as well.

I think that your issues solved. Check your inbox.

[(PSN)N7_Dredgen]

I guess it depends how you play, and if you have Rivens and weapons of the right disposition.  All 3 of my weapons, Primary, Secondary, Melee... they all have rivens - but for me the highest performing is the Lato Vandal at some 89k sustained DPS.... it's pretty much a no brainer to use it over my primary, it outclasses any single primary I own no matter how they're modded.  

I've always (personally) found secondaries to be more damaging to single targets, even before Rivens - however I conversely always found Primaries better dealing with weak mobs and for the likes of utility like status stacking.  

Plus let's be real here a moment - the idle animations for secondaries blow the water out of the animations for primaries 😉 

[SneakyErvin]

Another reason for secondaries is that you cant Clem properly with primaries.

[Xzorn]

Really? I find Primaries to be the weaker side.

The only Primary weapons that perform and scale well are AoE, Shoguns, Snipers and Beam weapons and snipers are hardly practical under lvl 400.

Various Pistols are just about the only single target performers outside Beam weapons and Snipers and they're very ammo efficient. What Secondaries lack are good damage AoE weapons. Staticor, Kulstar and Atomos being pretty much the list but Pistols easily hand it to Rifles ( Auto or otherwise ) so that's seems fine with me.

EDIT: Oh and Catchmoon now on the AoE list.

Edited January 8, 2019 by Xzorn

[(XBOX)Kuljack]

2 hours ago, Szuna said:

I think that your issues solved. Check your inbox.

You are a beautiful shade of humanity that I hope one day casts itself across the entire globe uniting us all for the common good of simple acts of kindness and improving lives without any purpose other than the act itself a reward.

[(XBOX)Kuljack]

1 hour ago, Xzorn said:

Really? I find Primaries to be the weaker side.

The only Primary weapons that perform and scale well are AoE, Shoguns, Snipers and Beam weapons and snipers are hardly practical under lvl 400.

Various Pistols are just about the only single target performers outside Beam weapons and Snipers and they're very ammo efficient. What Secondaries lack are good damage AoE weapons. Staticor, Kulstar and Atomos being pretty much the list but Pistols easily hand it to Rifles ( Auto or otherwise ) so that's seems fine with me.

EDIT: Oh and Catchmoon now on the AoE list.

and Angstrum

[(XBOX)DomTheKilleur]

Kitguns are nuts, and that's without a riven, give it a try if you haven't.

[(XBOX)ThermalStone]

Pistol mods are much more powerful than rifle mods with Primed Crit mods and 2 separate multishot mods.

Kulstar is the best/most fun explosive spamming gun.

Two guns for two purposes: different elements, armor stripping/damage, precision/spray and pray, passive leveling/actually killing things.

 

Edited January 8, 2019 by (XB1)ThermalStone

[DroopingPuppy]

15 hours ago, K1eranS3npai said:

Sometimes, I wonder, what is the point of a secondaries?

For damage? Most of them are weaker than primary weapons and have terrible ammo economy.  For utility? Only a handful of pistols are useful then, like the pandero, atomos, etc. And hybrid pistols like the lex would be out-classed by most primary weapons.

I'm poor and don't have much time, so I'm not sure whether I should invest in secondaries that much.

Secondaries are NOT weak, they are just not so ammo efficient.

 

With 'mandatory' mods, non-shotgun primary has +165% damage and +90% multishot(and an another +165% damage if you are not bothered pinpoint accuracy because it is a sniper rifle or something similar sort of, and/or +60% multishot if you can also add Vigilante Armaments),while secondary has +220% damage, +160% multishot and +60% fire rate.

 

As you see, while raw stats of secondary is low, it has better mod efficiency and is better at spread the bullet for short time. However its low ammo capacity halts them to use for a long time. And because the mandatory mods gives secondary the better multishot and fire rate, it is usually specialized at spamming procs(unless it is crit focused) and provide good nova damage than primary. However primary is better at long-enduring combat.

 

There are some examples, sure, such as infamous Akstiletto Prime that is even ammo efficient than many primaries, but usually such diffrence in mods stats makes the diffrence.

[DroopingPuppy]

9 hours ago, (XB1)Thy Divinity said:

Apparently the Atomos, Synoid Gammacor,  Mara Detron, Pox, etc have escaped OP's notice and been utterly pointless this entire time.

 

My sympathies. 

I have to admit that Pox is my most prefered choice for sortie level of Corpus missions - it is an anathema to Corpus who lacks armor and has lower health because of shield. Unless the penalty is Enemy Elemental Enhancement or non-secondary Only, it ensures me to kill almost anything I can face in a moment. It is also effective on the other factions, though.

[OvisCaedo]

People talk up how great it is that pistols have two primed crit mods, but... only one of them is really exceptional. you want both, but the primed crit damage mod is really only pretty normal, and it's just that the non-primed version of it sucks. Still, that's kind of a nitpick, secondaries do have really strong mods overall.

I think the thing is just that a lot of early game secondaries... kind of suck. And then there's a bunch of later ones that are crazy strong. Some have pretty poor ammo economies, but if you happen to be using a carrier sentinel, it tends to completely negate ammo as even being a factor. Especially for something like the Pox, which are very potent but supposed to have terrible ammo. carrier instead means they're very potent stunlock/armor stripping bombs with infinite ammo.

Edited January 9, 2019 by OvisCaedo

[DroopingPuppy]

Yeah, early game secondaries are sucks. It may a reason for the doubt on them.

Perhaps save for thrown daggers? Becase it has automatic trigger so at least it is easy to use. Also Furis is at least serviceable - not that good, though.

[dreadgame]

Better mods than primaries and some of them have primary weapon stats.

[Guest]

16 hours ago, (NSW)Evilpricetag said:

This actually is an amazing weapon with great build diversity and I would pick it over its primary (Flux rifle) any day. 

I stumbled on it through my mastery rushing when I got a riven.. I don't e5use the riven yet as bad rolls. 

I love explosive corrosive build great cc and great armor stripping. I drag my ferrox with just to pull enemies into a group. 

Oh lol it was my go to weapon because of the infinite ammo. I could bring it anywhere. My profile still says 50% usage with it, since I picked it up the day it appeared in clan tech and never stopped using it.

Moved over to the Gaze when kitguns came out thanks to Pax Charge, but I still like that gun.

[Williamwaitunnaing]

My kit gun can one shot most of the stuff so yeah, secondaries are strong (my kitgun is catchmoon full crit by the way) it can make more dmg than three other people shooting around with their primaries lol

Edited January 9, 2019 by Williamwaitunnaing

[Misgenesis]

Id wager secondaries would get more use (besides kitguns) if the ammo economy wasnt as broken as energy

[SirTobe]

Didn't use secondary much until kitguns arrived. They do pack a serious punch! Better than most of my primaries tbh, but I do have more primed mods for secondaries to bump up the crits. Add Pax Charge arcane to it and ammo will never be an issue. 

[Williamwaitunnaing]

1 hour ago, SirTobe said:

Didn't use secondary much until kitguns arrived. They do pack a serious punch! Better than most of my primaries tbh, but I do have more primed mods for secondaries to bump up the crits. Add Pax Charge arcane to it and ammo will never be an issue. 

I haven't tried pax charge that much. does it increase or decrease reload time?

[SirTobe]

2 hours ago, Williamwaitunnaing said:

I haven't tried pax charge that much. does it increase or decrease reload time?

Well if comparing a full recharge with a regular reload, then in most cases it seems to decrease reload time. It depends on how far you've upgraded the arcane, and which kitgun configuration you use. My arcane is rank 2 but still decrease reload time from 1.7 to 1.2 on my Catchmoon/Splat/Haymaker gun, so that's definitely an improvement in my case even if it's not maxed. But you can't really compare it like that, because you can continue shooting at any time, with whatever "bullets" you have charged, much like with archguns, so you don't even have to wait through a whole full recharge.

The big pro I was referring to however is that it offers infinite total ammo. Even if the recharge would be slightly longer than the usual reload, infinite ammo for such a powerful gun is pretty convenient, although ultimately a very expensive to build.

 

Edited January 9, 2019 by SirTobe