DPShot drop from Shock Sniper Rifle II to Thunderbolt Sniper Rifle? Am I missing something?

[Kung Fu Taco]

First off yes I'm aware of the opinion that the non-sniper rifles are better; personally I still like the sniper rifles cause I like some distance between the creatures that want to kill me and targeting lasers are cool.

Specifically my favorite mid-game weapon is the Shock Sniper Rifle II, that speed reduction debuff is a Godsend when you're dealing with Threshers and Makos.

So I get to the endgame looking forward to upgrading to the Shock Sniper Rifle Mk3 and instead it shows me the Thunderbolt Sniper Rifle which seems to me like a downgrade. I didn't follow through with the upgrade cause it seems like a waste.

Shock Sniper Rifle II: 65 dmg per shot, %100 chance of a 10 second half speed debuff.

Thunderbolt S. Rifle: 50 dmg per shot, 45% dmg to nearby creatures, 0.35 seconds stun 45% speed decrease.

15 damage LESS per shot? Also is the stun effect duration a typo? 45% speed decrease permanent or 35 seconds long? Is there some other effect I don't know about?

And yes finally I know the Thunderbolt spreads to other targets but I don't want that. The whole point of a Sniper Rifle is a inflicts a ton of damage on a single target with very few shots.

[joshua.selvan]

I haven't gotten around to testing it yet but based on the behaviour of the lightning harpoon tip, I think that the chain lightning effect hits your main target before jumping to the next one - meaning that even though the damage listed for the sniper rifle is lower, you actually hit your main target twice with each hit.

Will check it properly eventually, its just such a resource loss to dive with a weapon instead of a net gun or dart gun :/

Edit: The lightning effect does indeed cause the gun to hit the main target twice per hit but only if the lightning has at least 1 other fish to jump to. So if there is at least 1 other fish for the chain to effect the lightning sniper rifle does nearly double the listed damage (50) to the mean target but only 50 damage if it is a solo target.