Lbg - Should I Always Pick Rapid Fire Elements?

[Kenshii]

I was looking into light bowguns again for Iceborne. Haven't played it since low rank on mhw's release. I do know rapid elements are very good if matched correctly, so do I always wanna go for these?

The lbg I was looking at was Odogaron's tree. It has rapid fire normal 2s and exhaust. Just basic thunder shots tho.
Same with Anjanath's tree. Rapid fire normal 2s/pierce 2s, but basic fire.

Am only mid-way through the game by the way.

[AfLIcTeD]

What rank are you first?
If you are going elemental you are best off getting Critical Element, True Critical Element or Elemental Acceleration skills. Get the spare shot charm, highest element skill you can get, ammo up and some crit skills. WEX or Crit eye. I haven't done elemental lbg yet so I could be wrong. I guess some elemental lbg pro will correct me if I am.

[Juno Brier]

Originally posted by AfLIcTeD:

True Critical Element

It should be mentioned that True Crit Element requires 4 pieces of a very late-game armor set only normally accessible once you hit MR70 at minimum, and said set comes with the Fire Attack skill.

[Netsa]

You mostly want to use rapid fire with LBG, yeah, but you don't have to do elements necessarily. Rapid normals, pierces, and spreads do more-than-adequate damage if built properly.

Even rapid fire isn't set in stone. Deviljho's MR LBG can rapid-fire Sticky 2, but the damage on it really shines with Spread 3 if you use Spare Shot ("Razor Sharp/Spare Shot", an armor set bonus) and Ammo Up 3 ("Free Elem/Ammo Up", a somewhat rare armor skill). In fact, it could be said that lots of level 3/non-rapid shots shine with Spare Shot on LBGs.

If you want to go elemental shots, just scroll down the weapon tree and find a weapon that rapid-fires that element. Non-rapid elemental shots aren't really worth it in comparison to their rapid-fired counterparts.

Also, a couple of general tips about elemental ammo: Elemental shots pierce. They just can't hit the same zone of a monster more than once, like Pierce shots can. They also, like all bullets in the bottom section of the list, count as a type of lvl 3 ammo in terms of Free Elem/Ammo Up, so all of them need Ammo Up 3 if you want the extra bullet.

In reference to Odogaron's LBG, I've used it personally and I like it for just spamming Normal 2 (I eventually replaced it with Luna's Blaze). It has great innate affinity, reasonable damage, it's relatively easy to build, and Normal 2 leaves a lot of room open for damage buffs. Anjanath's LBG has negative affinity, and the Pierce 2 rapid has terrible reload speed by default.

Edit:
To reinforce non-elemental shots, remember that raw damage shots scale off pretty much everything and have their own damage bonus skills. There's a 2-level skill for Normal, Spread, and Pierce. Meanwhile, elements each have a 6-level skill that's quite a bit harder to fill in, and they don't scale as hard off attack bonuses since such a low percentage of their damage is physical.

Don't take this to mean that elemental shots are weak. They're just more difficult to build.

[Maiden Lightlina]

Originally posted by AfLIcTeD:

What rank are you first?
If you are going elemental you are best off getting Critical Element, True Critical Element or Elemental Acceleration skills. Get the spare shot charm, highest element skill you can get, ammo up and some crit skills. WEX or Crit eye. I haven't done elemental lbg yet so I could be wrong. I guess some elemental lbg pro will correct me if I am.

It's actually better to get the elemental charm, then base your decos around the rest, because silverlos is best set for crit element but it has bad slots. alpha version has fire attack on 3 peices, allowing you to cap without needing it, but every other element will need a charm. and even then, i'd still recommend fire charm because alpha has even worse slots.

If you can live without that extra 10% however, you can just get 2 velkahna pieces and choose another set to cover the rest.

I tend to not need spare shot all that badly with elemental LBGs, that's mainly for sticky lovers.

[Kenshii]

Originally posted by AfLIcTeD:

What rank are you first?
If you are going elemental you are best off getting Critical Element, True Critical Element or Elemental Acceleration skills. Get the spare shot charm, highest element skill you can get, ammo up and some crit skills. WEX or Crit eye. I haven't done elemental lbg yet so I could be wrong. I guess some elemental lbg pro will correct me if I am.

Think I'm MR 15? Dunno. Story wise, am at the part to hunt elder tracks. Felt like midgame to me, but I'm probably wrong.
I'm using 2 piece Velkhana for true element and slotting gems to whatever I want/need. Haven't looked at it closely, but I do try to cram free element if there's room.

Originally posted by Netsa:

In reference to Odogaron's LBG, I've used it personally and I like it for just spamming Normal 2 (I eventually replaced it with Luna's Blaze). It has great innate affinity, reasonable damage, it's relatively easy to build, and Normal 2 leaves a lot of room open for damage buffs. Anjanath's LBG has negative affinity, and the Pierce 2 rapid has terrible reload speed by default.

Thanks. Forgot about anjanath's negative affinity.


If I had to list my options out, here's my picks
Water: Coral Pukei
Ice: Velkhana
Fire: Rathalos
Thunder: Tobi or Odogaron. Or both. Seems like you can upgrade Luna's Styx, but dunno when. I can prob wait it out.

If normal element shots aren't severely lacking compared to rapid fire hits then I don't mind. But felt like rapid could do almost double the damage.

[AfLIcTeD]

What you could do until you get Silver los is get 3 pc Narga and 2 pc Vekhana. Might be better.
When looking at rapid fire, take note of the recoil. If it is higher than 3 then don't bother, the recoil will hurt you as it will leave you wide open for attack. I don't think recoil suppressors help either. Reload isn't a problem with the new evade reload.

[Kenshii]

Ah I forgot about recoil. And yeah I planned to cram 3 piece Nargacuga if it fits with everything I want/need.

I only thought about using the reload mod if it has stickies or dragon ammo. Not sure yet, haven't even touched an lbg in a while. Will try when I'm free later.

[AfLIcTeD]

That's the only real problem with elemental, it requires a huge investment requiring different elements and builds.

[Kenshii]

Originally posted by crimsonedge11:

Elemental LBG isn't a good option through the story for a number of reasons.

It requires multiple sets (more grinding), and for it to be really good, you need end game equipment. It's kinda pointless wasting too much time grinding early MR, find 1 build and run with it, IMO.

If you're looking for that magic 1 LBG build that will get you through the story, run a sticky 3 build.

You won't be able to properly optimize Elemental LBG until you can craft silver rathalos armor (MR 70+). It's also charm and deco heavy (you need multiple elemental damage 4+ decos, and for every element), and you'll need a different weapon for each element, have to augment multiple weapons, etc. It's just not viable until you're a good ways into post game.
...

You're going off topic. I'm mainly looking at rapid fire elementals compared to normal shot elementals. Are rapid fires THAT much stronger compared to normal shot elementals? From what Netsa says, yes they are. Basically, if leaning heavily on element you definitely wanna take rapid fire.

Also, I don't mind investing in different elements; I'm already doing this with sns. It only pains me a little if it requires a mantle and RNG doesn't bless me. I'm not in a rush for an end game build for a weapon I want to try for fun.

[AfLIcTeD]

Originally posted by Kenshii:

Originally posted by crimsonedge11:

Elemental LBG isn't a good option through the story for a number of reasons.

It requires multiple sets (more grinding), and for it to be really good, you need end game equipment. It's kinda pointless wasting too much time grinding early MR, find 1 build and run with it, IMO.

If you're looking for that magic 1 LBG build that will get you through the story, run a sticky 3 build.

You won't be able to properly optimize Elemental LBG until you can craft silver rathalos armor (MR 70+). It's also charm and deco heavy (you need multiple elemental damage 4+ decos, and for every element), and you'll need a different weapon for each element, have to augment multiple weapons, etc. It's just not viable until you're a good ways into post game.
...

You're going off topic. I'm mainly looking at rapid fire elementals compared to normal shot elementals. Are rapid fires THAT much stronger compared to normal shot elementals? From what Netsa says, yes they are. Basically, if leaning heavily on element you definitely wanna take rapid fire.

Also, I don't mind investing in different elements; I'm already doing this with sns. It only pains me a little if it requires a mantle and RNG doesn't bless me. I'm not in a rush for an end game build for a weapon I want to try for fun.

Most rapid fire shots fire 3 times, the first deals full damage and the second 2 deal half. But, like I said before if the recoil is too high you may get yourself killed.
High recoil on rapids is dangerous. Not only do you have to stop to shoot but it knocks you back a lot and you have to wait till you fire all 3 to move again. Plus it may knock you out of range.
So if there are no rapid fires with low recoil you would be better off with just normal shots. That's my thought on in anyway, if you can tolerate the recoil then go for it.

[thundarr21]

I used LBG a lot in the base game with element shots. But you have the option of rapid fire pierce in Iceborne as well as evade reload options. With these weapons, you don't have to worry about changing up for specific elements and ammo lasts a really long time.

Look into it, it's a lot of fun!

[Netsa]

It may be because I rarely try to get quick shots off directly before an enemy's attack, but I'm usually not killed by recoil. It's still a good point, though, because if the recoil is at "High" or above, you will completely stop moving while firing. Rapid shots take longer to fire than regular shots, so it can be deadly if you're used to LBGs regular mobility. That said, it's not like HBG doesn't exist. People fire self-rooting shots all the time without dying, you just have to know what you're using.

You don't really have to worry about the range, though, unless you're practically sniping. The range on elemental shots is huge.

[twiggy]

sticky 3 lbg is ez mode, you just need to farm narg for 3 piece set bonus and the weapon and 3/3 artilery (slugger too if you want insane ko's). it outdamages all the other ammo types and it ko's monsters so much, you dont need any crit cause sticky always crit no matter where you hit the monster

[Sery]

Originally posted by looser:

sticky 3 lbg is ez mode, you just need to farm narg for 3 piece set bonus and the weapon and 3/3 artilery (slugger too if you want insane ko's). it outdamages all the other ammo types and it ko's monsters so much

Wouldnt rapid fire sticky 2 be better tho

[Seamus]

Originally posted by SERY SANTA:

Originally posted by looser:

sticky 3 lbg is ez mode, you just need to farm narg for 3 piece set bonus and the weapon and 3/3 artilery (slugger too if you want insane ko's). it outdamages all the other ammo types and it ko's monsters so much

Wouldnt rapid fire sticky 2 be better tho

Not really, no.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W2Z_XtaT3dw