Viral Damage

[purple_cabbage]

Hi,

I'm trying to get an understanding of how viral damage works. For "organic?" flesh based enemies, does the damage actually bypass shields/armour?

Thx.

[MrJxt]

Only toxin damage bypass shields.

 

Only finisher damage bypass armor and possibly shields (need confirmation).

 

Think of it this way.

 

All grineer humanoid units have cloned flesh modifier, which increases viral damage taken by 75%. However, since grineer units have armor (yellow health bars) they take reduced damage from all sources except for finisher damage. If you have 4 players with the corrosive projection aura then all armor is removed from all enemies, which means the +75% viral modifier is always active.

 

All corpus humanoids have flesh modifier that increases viral damage taken by 50%. Since they have shields, the +50% viral modifier will not be active until their shields are depleted.

 

Basically, when shields are up, shield modifiers are active. When shields are depleted, shield modifiers become inactive and flesh/robotic modifiers become active.

Edited November 22, 2015 by MrJxt

[xlraistlx]

does the damage actually bypass shields/armour?

No.

There exist only instance of damage that bypasses the armor mitigation, which is Finished damage. Toxic damage will bypass the shields and directly damages health, but it does still receive damage mitigation via armor.

[Darzk]

Damage types in the 'Flesh' category get the bonus damage, but are fully mitigated by armor. So Viral gets +75% against Grineer (except rollers).

Damage types in the 'Armor' catgories (specifically Ferrite and Alloy) get both the bonus damage, and that amount of armor ignore. So for example, Corrosive damage gets +75% damage against Ferrite armored enemies, and also ignores 75% of Ferrite armor, but gets no bonuses against Alloy.

 

Finisher damage is the only type that ignores armor completely - it is commonly seen from bleed procs, counter-finisher attacks, and certain abilities (Bladestorm and Tentacle Swarm come to mind, think Energy Vampire's damage is Finisher too).

[(PSN)robotwars7]

it should also be worth noting that Viral procs can Half an enemies' health.

[purple_cabbage]

Cool. Thanks folks! I was toying with my grineer loadouts and I never really paid attn to viral damage. Clearly is worth looking into.

[Darzk]

Cool. Thanks folks! I was toying with my grineer loadouts and I never really paid attn to viral damage. Clearly is worth looking into.

Not *really*, because of that full armor mitigation. The partial armor penetration from Corrosive and Radiation will provide the majority of your damage.

 

The +75% from Viral is roughly equivalent to the +25% from Toxin or Cold, against that armor type, and is far inferior to the 75% from Corrosive/Rad.

 

The only time to use Viral against armored enemies is when you have room left over after installing Radiation. Otherwise, Corrosive, C+Cold, Rad, Rad+Toxin.

[Zachatoo]

Viral is kinda situational (as seen above). If you're going to run viral, you should have some way to completely remove enemy armor, either through abilities, mods, or a combination of both.

Example: You have a full squad, each person uses Corrosive Projection as their aura mod. 4 corrosive projections completely removed enemy armor throughout the entire map, making viral a very attractive damage type.

Keep in mind that some abilities can strip enemy armor, allowing some warframes to go solo and completely remove enemy armor. One I can think of is Trinity with the Abating Link augment. Just pop on some power strength mods and you can have the 3 closest enemies to you have zero armor.

Another thing to note, think of viral procs as a x2 damage multiplier. By halving the enemies health, you only have to do half the amount of damage needed normally, exactly as if you dealt double damage. This is the proc, not the damage type, so having a decent status chance helps proc viral significantly.

TLDR: Consider viral when you are able to strip enemy armor or the enemy has no armor to begin with.