Special Ammo Types Underwhelming?

[terrormask]

In my game so far I have dragon rounds and the poison rounds. I am about midway through the campaign I would assume. The special ammo types in this game feel incredibly underwhelming, except for AP rounds for a pistol based sniper. For instance the burning damage from the dragon rounds is about 1 tick a turn, same goes for the poison.

I want to try and give these things another chance but it seems like there are numerous other items that are more worthy of an inventory slot.

[Roderick]

I think they have random based timers. Poison went out twice the next round it was injected. But sometimes it lasted several rounds, providing nice aim mali. ^^

But yeah, things like blueprint-rounds, armor piercing and the ones increasing your aim are way better.

[Flodge]

Talon rounds (+crit %) are absolutely awesome on rangers.
AP rounds are great.
Tracer rounds basically gives you a scope (I love this AND a scope on my gunnery spec grenadier).

Poison and dragon are very meh in comparison - mostly because they rely on you leaving an enemy alive for more than a turn, which is generally a bad tactic.

[Ofan]

They are as equally useful for their debuffs as they are their damage tick. A sharpshooter with dragon rounds and a plasma pistol and that shoot at all enemies in sight pistol skill can basically one shot a pod on its own if the targets are fleshy, also differing effects stack so if you have poison and dragon you can pretty much gurantee killing anything with 2hp left at the start of its next turn, very very useful depending on playstyle.

My preference is bluescreen; worth their weight in gold, moreso as you can buld them

[c.a.smith_100]

Both poision and buring have aditional effects see:
http://gaming.stackexchange.com/questions/254775/whats-the-difference-between-the-burning-poisoned-and-disoriented-statu

Talons are awesome on flankers (+20% crit chance).
Tracers are handy on squad sight sniper builds (counteracts squad sight penalty) and low aim troops.

Overall they tend to act like a force multiplier, they make the good better.

[glenn3e]

Poison has a significant debuff to AIM that makes it very worth it. I think its something like 40% reduction.

[GramboStorm]

Dragon rounds are awesome, as being burnt basically shuts a unit off unless they get lucky with shooting or are really close and flanking.

[Eggy]

I put tracer ammo on my Holo Targeting Heavy.
Dragon and Viper work great early game and are good on a pistolier.
End game, you cant leave stuff alive for another turn in case it only gets a small tick.
Talon on a shotgun ranger turns them into a killing machine.
Bluescreen on at least one squadie end game, idealy 2.
AP ammo was the only one I didnt use much.

[PzAbt SilentFear]

I have to say im not terribly impresed by the Dragon ammo..

That been said i love the AP and the Poison ammo.
AP makes the gunslinger into a very potent force on the field. It can melt Sectopods in no time.
Tracers are also quite good if you can get them early on. Making even rookies have a better chence to hit - and they are good choice for Grendaiers that dont have Personal Stimpaks whit + acc.
Poison is not bad on gunslingers as well - as poision imposed movement and accuracy penalty on targets. So its quite nice to spank a gatekeepr few times and prevent him from hitting you.

[PHJF]

DOT ticks before the enemy has a chance to act... I've left plenty of enemies alive to burn and/or melt to death at the start of their round.

[Tyrendian89]

I like them all for different things. Poison/Dragon are best for soldiers that have multiple shots, ideally able to spread them around - don't forget they also give you +1 damage, and fire shuts down most abilities which is pretty awesome many a time. Tracers are nice for people that you want to land their shots to trigger effects - there was this one Specialist that rolled Rupture at Corporal rank from the AWC... Talon are very nice for Shotgun Rangers, AP are generic damage boosters against some of the tougher targets, useless against Archons and Codexes though, and a Sharpshooter (especially gunslinger) or Ranger (with rapid fire) with Bluescreen melts any and all Robotics.

[Mashpit]

Dragon and viper rounds also deal +1 damage against fleshy targets, even if the DoT doesn't apply. The burn debuff makes enemies unable to use their special moves (THIS INCLUDES MELEE FOR CHRYSSALIDS, BERSERKERS AND FACELESS) and deals a pretty hefty 1-3 damage per turn for 2 turns along with a chance to proc panic. Poison debuff deals a -30 to aim and -5 to mobility (which pretty much halves the mobility for most enemies), 1hp per turn, and can last up to 5 turns. In comparison:

Disorient lasts for 2 turns, deals -20 to aim, -6 to mobility and -30 to will.
Acid burn seems to be the same as burn.

Tracers are amazing for grenadiers/squadsight Snipers/OW specialists. More aim is never bad, innit?
Talon is life for any flavor of ranger.
AP is awesome for... anyone, honestly. Guys that shoot the same guy a lot in the same turn (gunslinger, rapidfire ranger, chainshot grenadier, guardian specialist) benefit the most from it. I personally think that there's little reason to use bluescreen rounds if you have a steady supply of AP rounds.

[Ofan]

Originally posted by Mashpit:

Dragon and viper rounds also deal +1 damage against fleshy targets, even if the DoT doesn't apply. The burn debuff makes enemies unable to use their special moves (THIS INCLUDES MELEE FOR CHRYSSALIDS, BERSERKERS AND FACELESS) and deals a pretty hefty 1-3 damage per turn for 2 turns along with a chance to proc panic. Poison debuff deals a -30 to aim and -5 to mobility (which pretty much halves the mobility for most enemies), 1hp per turn, and can last up to 5 turns. In comparison:

Disorient lasts for 2 turns, deals -20 to aim, -6 to mobility and -30 to will.
Acid burn seems to be the same as burn.

Tracers are amazing for grenadiers/squadsight Snipers/OW specialists. More aim is never bad, innit?
Talon is life for any flavor of ranger.
AP is awesome for... anyone, honestly. Guys that shoot a lot in the same turn (killzone/serial sniper, gunslinger, rapidfire ranger, chainshot grenadier, guardian specialist) benefit the most from it. I personally think that there's little reason to use bluescreen rounds if you have a steady supply of AP rounds.

Blue screen rounds are great for lol hacking a bot you decide you arent going to kill as they mess up their hacking defenses meaning its really easy to get yourslef a sectopod to joyride around in. Good times

[terrormask]

Originally posted by PHJF:

DOT ticks before the enemy has a chance to act... I've left plenty of enemies alive to burn and/or melt to death at the start of their round.

Yah but each tick only does 1 point of damage. I have had plenty of times where I attack a Archon (new floater) and stack poison status and burning status on him with special rounds. Next turn, it is always 1 point for poison and 1 point f or burning. It never deviates for me, so the damge is quite terrible.

[Tyrendian89]

Originally posted by Mashpit:

AP is awesome for... anyone, honestly. Guys that shoot the same guy a lot in the same turn (gunslinger, rapidfire ranger, chainshot grenadier, guardian specialist) benefit the most from it. I personally think that there's little reason to use bluescreen rounds if you have a steady supply of AP rounds.

hmmm... Bluescreen are better against Mechs (both varieties), Turrets, Sectopods and Andromedon shells (*cough*) and also make the target easier to hack which can be nice, while AP win against closed Gatekeepers (which is really the kind you want to kill quickly...), Andromedons (non-mechanical, duh), Berserkers (I only saw two of those through my entire campaign though for some reason...) and Shieldbearers, and marginally help against all the things with 1 armour that float around like Mutons and Cryssalids - but against anything that's fleshy and has 2 or less armour, you might as well use Dragon/Poison since that will do as much or more. And besides, shredding armour isn't all that difficult with a good Grenadier, and once you've done that AP falls off hard.

[Gamefever]

Originally posted by PerfectBlue:

Originally posted by PHJF:

DOT ticks before the enemy has a chance to act... I've left plenty of enemies alive to burn and/or melt to death at the start of their round.

Yah but each tick only does 1 point of damage. I have had plenty of times where I attack a Archon (new floater) and stack poison status and burning status on him with special rounds. Next turn, it is always 1 point for poison and 1 point f or burning. It never deviates for me, so the damge is quite terrible.

Huh?

I've seen burning deal 5 points.

Ussually it seemed to be at least 2.

Anyway, its not like we get a chioce on ammo....I tend to look at it like this, am I going to benefit from bringing another grenade on this character?
If I would be better off with a nade than thats what I give them.