Pure Slash damage vs elemental damage

[(XBOX)Bluesboy1987]

Hi,

I've been playing warframe for over 200h now and I've finally managed to get a Jagged Edge mod.
However, a few days later Bar'o Kiteer had the Buzz Kill mod.

So now I was wondering if it is any use of putting them both on a Slash Melee weapon (Broken War, Orthos prime are my go to slash weapons) or is it more interesting to only put 1 and have an elemental damage mod instead? As I don't want to give up my pressure point, primed reach, fury or crit mods, it usually comes down to this choice.

Thanks!

Bluesboy1987

[VKhaun]

Slash mods only modify slash based on slash. An elemental mod like heat damage uses ALL base damage. This means Jagged Edge isn't often useful since +90% of just slash is not going to be more damage than +90% of all base damage in heat or whatever else. Buzz Kill on the other hand, with +120%, can yield more damage on a weapon with a very high base amount of slash damage. Breaking even at about 75% base slash.

10 impact

10 puncture

80 slash (80% of base)

Buzz Kill: Adds 96 slash damage. (120% of 80 base slash.)

Molten Impact: Adds 90 heat. (90% of 100 total base damage.)

Jagged Edge: Adds 72 slash damage. (90% of 80 base slash.)

 

 

That said, elemental damage types can get much better bonuses vs enemies than physical types so 96 slash may still be worse than 90 heat... Make sure and check your target just as well as what you're swinging at it.

Edited May 13, 2016 by VKhaun

[Rambit23Z]

Physical mods MIGHT be useful 10% of the time on 1% of weapons. Elementals are almost always better.

EDIT: And slash mods do not increase bleed damage, only the chance to proc compared to other damage types.

Edited May 13, 2016 by Rambit23Z

[Airwolfen]

Slash can get 25%/50% bonus damage and 25%/50% reduction when facing some targets.
Single element is 25%/50% up, 25%/50% down.
And dual element is 25%/50%/75% up, 25%/50% down.

Dual elements are better in almost all of the cases because even with the best possible weapons, slash is still bad vs armor.

[(XBOX)Bluesboy1987]

Ok thanks for 2 very usefull and clear answers, it confirms what I was thinking.

[Demonetised]

for a crit weapon the elements probably win out, BUT with a status weapon, sticking with less amount of statuses means being able to proc the one you want ( corrosive , duh) more often than say having slash, impact, puncture, corrosive and heat so it may be better to double down on the one stat than add another element which actually reduces the effectiveness of your status proc / corrosive application.
This is because every status proc is only one of your possible effects and not all of them.
Broken-war and orthos are definitely not status though obviously and off the top of my head I cannot think of any slash status weapons which are actually viable for killing things.

Edited May 13, 2016 by T7Alpha