Is Rifle Amp As Terribly Bad As I Think It Is?

[Darzk]

From what I can tell / have been told, it stacks additively with Serration.

 

So with a max serration its ~+10% damage.

And with max serration and Heavy Caliber its ~+6.3% damage.

 

In comparison, Corrosive Projection can be as much as ~+30% non-ap damage against armored targets.

 

Which with max serration is ~+80% rifle damage (as in added to serration)

and with max serr and HC is ~+130% rifle damage (added to serration)

 

So why wouldn't I forma to a (-) polarity?

 

The one situation its better is when using a armor piercing weapon and only an armor piercing mod. And all your teammates are too. And no one is using any abilities that dont ignore armor. And neither is your sentinels.

[DiBBz]

honestly rifle amp is not viable at all to me , it see no use in it in the max DMG or crit builds i do

[kamimegurine]

From what I can tell / have been told, it stacks additively with Serration.

 

So with a max serration its ~+10% damage.

And with max serration and Heavy Caliber its ~+6.3% damage.

 

 

Everything you know is wrong... even serration lv0 is 15% more dmg

Max serration is 165% more dmg...

Try to think again your mats.

[Vaskadar]

Could have sworn it was multiplicative, and can be stacked with other Rifle Amps...

 

27% x 4 = 108%

 

It got a +170% buff from before, when it was just 10%.

 

I should be able to do a quick test on mercury or something with and without rifle amp.

Edited October 21, 2013 by Vaskadar

[Darzk]

Just checked - it stacks additively with Serration for sure.

 

So it might be +108% rifle damage, but its just an increase of going from 430% to 538%, or ~+25% damage.

Edited October 22, 2013 by Darzk

[Vaskadar]

Still, it's better to fit it in a V polarity than say... steel charge.

[Darzk]

I dunno, really, is having those 9 extra mod points really worth taking along a pretty terrible aura? Remember, its not just you who doesnt benefit, but your teammates as well.

[rohver]

Gawd...the math! Me brains hurt :(

[Blazer-X]

For what its worth, I believe someone has calculated Corrosive Projection, and the damage return isn't that awesome either.

 

Still, Rifle Amp is the best mod for V aura polarities if you need the extra mod space. Its not like ANY of the auras aside from Energy Siphon are particularly game-breaking in the first place. Might as well as spend that extra 9 mod slots upgrading your best ability to be better at what it does.

[PlebbyMilliner]

Your idea of how Corrosive Projection works is also wrong.

 

It reduces armor by 30%. But the damage through armor is calculated as 100/(ARMOR+100).

 

As an example, let's say that an enemy has 100 armor.  Normal damage = 100/(100+100) = 50%. With Corrosive projection = 100/(70+100) = 58.8%

 

Now how about a Grinner Bombard at level 100 with 348 armor. Normal damage = 100/(348+100) = 22%. With Corrosive projection = 100/(243+100) = 29.1%

 

So realistically, it makes the raw damage of your weapon 9% higher through the armor for normal levels of enemies.

 

 

In general, Rifle Amp is good for RIFLES, BOWS, SNIPERS as it will effect damage against unarmored and shields better. But in the case of shotguns, Corrosive Projection is better since Rifle Amp doesn't work with shotguns.

Edited October 22, 2013 by PlebbyMilliner

[Senser]

So corrosive projection is a lot better. You have to correlate the damage without aura to the damage with aura:

- At 100 armor, that means cp gives you +17,6% damage

- At 348 armor, cp gives you +32,3% damage

 

Plus, serration will be increased by this amount, too, making it even stronger.

Edited October 22, 2013 by Senser

[Blazer-X]

So corrosive projection is a lot better. You have to correlate the damage without aura to the damage with aura:

- At 100 armor, that means cp gives you +17,6% damage

- At 348 armor, cp gives you +32,3% damage

 

Plus, serration will be increased by this amount, too, making it even stronger.

Yes and no. One of the "issues" with corrosive projection is that most people tend to already use innate armor ignoring weapons or focus on armor piercing mods. While this technically doesn't make corrosive projection any less effective, in practice, your damage will not go up as high against heavily armor enemies because a good portion of it (especially for innate armor piercing weapons) is in armor ignoring damage already.

 

So if you happened to be using a Armor Ignore Crit Build with your primary (Snipetron Vandal, Lanka, Bows), it might be a better idea to just stick with Rifle Amp, because you get next to nothing with armor reduction.

[Helljack84]

I always assumed it would boost my total damage (-armor) but it seems rifle amp is much less effective than I imagined.

So assuming I'm not running around on mercury CP will vastly outperform RA for grineer/ancients (for non AI weapons)?

What happens if I use 4x corrosive projection?

[Darzk]

So if you happened to be using a Armor Ignore Crit Build with your primary (Snipetron Vandal, Lanka, Bows), it might be a better idea to just stick with Rifle Amp, because you get next to nothing with armor reduction.

 

Except all your teammates would have to be using that kind of build too, and your sentinel, and no one uses any damaging powers that don't ignore armor (Molecular Prime explosions, for example), and no one uses pistols.

 

 

What happens if I use 4x corrosive projection?

Then either a) Enemies have no armor, as intended

or b) the universe explodes - you start doing really weird damage numbers, some mobs instantly die, some become invincible - its buggy as hell

Edited October 22, 2013 by Darzk

[Trainer772]

Supposedly, 4x corrosives makes them virtually invincible because their armor goes negative and it breaks it.

[Darzk]

Your idea of how Corrosive Projection works is also wrong.

 

It reduces armor by 30%. But the damage through armor is calculated as 100/(ARMOR+100).

 

As an example, let's say that an enemy has 100 armor.  Normal damage = 100/(100+100) = 50%. With Corrosive projection = 100/(70+100) = 58.8%

So you go from dealing 50% damage to 58.8%, an increase of ~17.5%

 

Now how about a Grinner Bombard at level 100 with 348 armor. Normal damage = 100/(348+100) = 22%. With Corrosive projection = 100/(243+100) = 29.1%

 

Again, an increase to 29.1% from 22% is a proportional increase of ~32.3%

 

 

It doesn't effect the piercing hit damage, which is only 60% of your rifle damage anyways. It doesn't effect shields, because they have no armor.

 

Hrm. Using the lvl 100 Grineer Bombard example; if you're using a bullet weapon with just AP and Cold equipped (etc Soma) and you're seeing an increase of 7.1% from the cold and bullet damage, would be an increase of 7.1% of bullet and 4.3% of cold, or ~11.4% damage increase overall.

 

Still, Rifle Amp with Serration is only ~7-10% damage increase.

 

I think its safe to say so long as you have 1 non-AP mod equipped on a non-AI weapon CP is better than Rifle Amp. If the weapon completely ignores armor then obviously RA is better, and if you just have Cryo Rounds equipped RA is better.

 

But that of course completely ignores the fact that CP effects more than just rifle damage - etc your sentinel, your abilities, your pistol and melee, and all that for your teammates as well.