Viral and Corrosive

[(PSN)TFSion]

So, I've been playing to the point where fashionframe is all that really matters anymore, but I still struggle with choosing viral or corrosive. With me leaning towards viral more than normal with a lot of builds, such as my Arca Plasmor and AkMagnus being viral. But I'd like some advice on when one is more beneficial than the other in builds, such as a Broken War build or any build tbh. Any advice or links to other posts would be appreciated 🙂

Also I don't build around CP groups and have diversity with my builds, but am still open to advice 🙂

Edited May 12, 2018 by (PS4)TFSion

[catastrophy]

Honestly - I have no idea. And that's because my understanding of enemy armour scaling is basically nil. From experience I know that viral might still be halving HP when I play Saryn at high level but I don't feel it really.

And as for corrosive I don't feel it neither and I believe that is due to my gear not really optimised to strip armour. At the time I might have stripped armour there is usually someone else who kills the target with a better setup. I have no idea how many corrosive procs it takes to reduce armour significantly, but putting together from what I've heard it is probably something to do with a dedicated build on a set of certain weapons aka you need quite a lot of procs and vs high level you want them fast - just my ignorant opinion here.

Be it lack of mods, poor choice of weapons or frame, constant underestimation of armour scaling - high level enemies are just beefy as hell. So I basically have the same problem like you. Reading upon the recent change ideas to Saryn my impression is that this viral-corrosive issue is controversial among players, too.

[(XBOX)KickedOdin996]

I used to run corrosive and stayed away from viral, HOWEVER, I've found that viral gets the job done. Even against armored enemies. My max ranked Hek puts out just over 1,000 dmg with viral and even against levels 25-40 it takes 1-2 shots. There's no forma on my Hek either. If you arent too sure you could alway combo your loadout. Use a primary with viral then have your melee as corrosive. 

[hooperinius]

Early on in the game, up to sorties, corrosive is probably more useful. Once you get corrosive projection aura then slash/viral combo becomes quite good against high level grineer, as long as everyone in you group uses it.

Corrosive is still useful against some infested but I like straight slash for that.

[(PSN)CoolD2108]

Viral+slash.

[Ryim_Drykeon]

Keep in mind that Viral halves (50%) enemy health for 6 seconds. After that 6 seconds, the enemy's current health effectively doubles (but not past max if the enemy was being healed under the viral proc). [Example: Enemy has 500 health. Viral halves to 250. Enemy takes another 50 damage to 200. Proc ends after 6 seconds. Enemy health becomes 400] So Viral necessitates a very high amount of procs to keep it active, or killing the enemy quickly to gain the advantages. Saryn's Spores did this (even with only a 10% proc chance) due to the high number of spores and thus chances to proc. Higher status chance being best. Bear in mind you can only half an enemy's health once, so repeated procs only extend the duration of lowered health (6 second duration after last proc), they do not continue to cut in in half. So, a lower RoF weapon can be just as useful.

Corrosive takes 25% of the current armor per proc. Note: This is diminishing returns, not additive. You do not get 100% armor reduction after 4 procs. Again, high RoF and high status can still strip armor fairly quickly, though after 20-25 procs, the gains are negligible. This is very good with shotguns as each pellet has a chance to proc and remove it's 25% of armor in one shot, especially if combined with muti-shot

For Critical based weapons, other types of status are (generally) better off. Such as Blast, Electric, or Cold for their chance of stun/stagger effects as well as damage.

I personally run with a mix of Corrosive/Blast on my weapon loadouts, but I play Saryn a lot, so I have Viral going most times as well. With the new changes coming to Saryn, I will probably swap the Corrosive on my weapons to Viral. Though I may wind up taking something else if her #4 procs Viral sufficiently. Regardless, I will definitely not be running with a CP mod if using Saryn after the changes, heh.

At lower levels (under level 50ish), both Viral and Corrosive will not be seen as doing much (the enemies will jsut be dying too fast to really make a difference). Though I think Viral will edge out. At higher levels (with enemy armor scaling), I feel Corrosive is the better way to go (mostly since it's a permanent reduction verses a temporary one). Which is why most "end game" players run with CP currently.

[(PSN)Voidkraken]

My take on the question is this:  Assuming the weapons in question are both high/good status chance:
- Corrosive seems to be most effective on a high status chance weapon which also has a high rate of fire, allowing for a lot of corrosive procs to go off in a short time.  Corrosive needs to be applied many times to effectively strip or even remove armour, hence it being desirable to proc it lots of times to have effect.  Conversely, one or two corrosive procs triggered by a lower ROF weapon will have much less noticeable an effect

- Viral seems to be more useful on lower rate of fire weapons for the same reasons, you don't fire often enough for corrosive effects to accumulate and make a difference, but Viral only needs to be "in effect" to reduce the target health while you kill it, so as long as the effect procs on your lower ROF weapon, you see a benefit.

The only other factor to keep in mind is of course damage resistances - sometimes you may find an enemy is better to hit with the specific damage type because you'll inflict more damage, even if the proc effect isn't relevant/useful.  This becomes more relevant where status procs have no effect (most bosses), or on weapons which lack a good status chance to expect a status to proc in the first place, but is always worth considering.

So generally speaking, I'd go with Corrosive if you shoot lots of bullets, and Viral if not. Slash pairs especially well with Viral on high base damage weapons too (since the high base damage makes for more damage per tick that bypasses shields, and the Viral ensures they have less health before death during the slash proc duration).

[(PSN)IIMessatsuII]

My line of thinking is

High RoF/High Status weapons want to run Corrosive, as they can proc corrosive frequently and consistently enough to benefit from stripping armor. 

 

Low Status weapons want Viral, since a single viral proc will have a rather large impact.

 

Of course, this isn't the end all be all sentiment - if you're in a team of 4 all running corrosive Projection, then yeah, you'll wanna use something besides corrosive.

[Xzorn]

There's really no generalized choice in damage types. It depends on the weapon, the frame, the faction and the level range.

 

Vs Grineer Armored

• Status Primaries / Secondaries: Corrosive + Slash, Corrosive + Heat, Corrosive + Blast, Non-Status Hunter's Munitions
• Status Melee: Corrosive + Heat, Corrosive, Viral + Slash, Pure Slash, Non-Status Shattering Impact

Vs Grineer Unarmored

• Status Primaries / Secondaries: Gas / Slash, Non-Status Viral / Viral + Heat
• Status Melee Gas + Slash, Non-Status Viral + Slash

Vs Corpus

• Status Primaries Gas + Electric, Slash, Non-Status Primaries Viral w/ Primed Cryo Rounds,  Pure Toxic
• Status Secondaries Gas, Slash, Non-Status Primaries Viral + Heat w/ Primed Heated Charge, Pure Toxic
• Status Melee, Gas + Electric, Viral + Slash, Non-Status Pure Toxic

Vs Infested

• Pretty much just Corrosive + Slash and Radiation for CC, Status Gas is o-k.

This is optimal damage types against factions compared to enemy scaling.  As I mentioned it can change based on level range and even if you have Primed mods or not. Viral + Heat Vs Corpus on non-status Secondaries for instance is because of the overall damage boost Primed Heated Charge gives and that Health scaled faster than shields, It's not as good an option without Primed Heated Charge.

Viral and Corrosive are powerful Status effects and when you can combine both; you have a very difficult to beat composition. ie Synapse. Zenistar disc.

 

Edited May 12, 2018 by Xzorn

[DatDarkOne]

9 hours ago, (PS4)CoolD2108 said:

Viral+slash.

Viral+slash is good.  Would you believe that slash+gas is better against groups.  Well, that is when using Condition Overload for both.  This is mostly because of the AoE having already primed the enemies for Condition Overload. 

I was originally surprised at this also when I first tested.  

[(PSN)CoolD2108]

vor 3 Stunden schrieb DatDarkOne:

Viral+slash is good.  Would you believe that slash+gas is better against groups.  Well, that is when using Condition Overload for both.  This is mostly because of the AoE having already primed the enemies for Condition Overload. 

I was originally surprised at this also when I first tested.  

Not at all suprising tho i prefer viral due to the nature of the status.

When both physical and elemental status are present then physical has 4x higher odds to procc over the elemental one so you'll be proccing a lot more slash then gas. Viral takes better advantage of that.

Edited May 13, 2018 by (PS4)CoolD2108

[DatDarkOne]

19 minutes ago, (PS4)CoolD2108 said:

Not at all tho i prefer viral due to the nature of the status.

When both physical and elemental status are present then physical has 4x higher odds to procc over the elemental one so you'll be proccing a lot more slash then gas. Viral takes better advantage of that.

This is true.  Especially against a single target.  

Just for reference: I was using the Venka Prime and Glaive Prime when I was doing the testing.  I really think it had something to do with how Condition Overload interacts with the toxin ticks, combo counter, and then there was also the stealth aspect.  The later I only used specifically to see if the changes to stealth melee were major or minor.  

It's really interesting what you find by experimenting.  I will admit that I like the synergy aspects of the AoE more than anything else since I use Healing Return.  

[(PSN)CoolD2108]

vor 8 Minuten schrieb DatDarkOne:

This is true.  Especially against a single target.  

Just for reference: I was using the Venka Prime and Glaive Prime when I was doing the testing.  I really think it had something to do with how Condition Overload interacts with the toxin ticks, combo counter, and then there was also the stealth aspect.  The later I only used specifically to see if the changes to stealth melee were major or minor.  

It's really interesting what you find by experimenting.  I will admit that I like the synergy aspects of the AoE more than anything else since I use Healing Return.  

Both are quite possible too especially when playing zaws. The plague zaw that has been avaiable on PC just recently (and currently is on consoles) with its Viral base allows for eather Viral+Gas or Viral+Blast what's plently interresting too. The elemental base paired with a build that tends more towards the gas part pretty much maximises the Aoe segment of the weapon while providing Viral proccs too. 

Really looking forward to the saryn rework btw, her kit will allow for viral, toxic and corrosive, what gives plently room for CO to do its magic 🙂

[DatDarkOne]

7 hours ago, (PS4)CoolD2108 said:

Both are quite possible too especially when playing zaws. The plague zaw that has been avaiable on PC just recently (and currently is on consoles) with its Viral base allows for eather Viral+Gas or Viral+Blast what's plently interresting too. The elemental base paired with a build that tends more towards the gas part pretty much maximises the Aoe segment of the weapon while providing Viral proccs too. 

Really looking forward to the saryn rework btw, her kit will allow for viral, toxic and corrosive, what gives plently room for CO to do its magic 🙂

Oh man.  That would be my dream combo to have.  Slash+viral+gas.  As you more than likely know, that is quite hard to combination.  😅 

That Saryn is or will be one of the few frames that can do it makes her rather powerful.  I would probably use her more if I didn't like Ivara and Mag so much.  Saryn can be a melee beast with the right setup.  The proposed changes to her will just make that even better.