Charge blade DPS experiment (raw vs elemental)

[Ottomic]

So I've been experimenting with Charge Blades for the last couple days. After running through the story with either the Girros Nadja or the Tyrannis, I'm branching out into elemental ones. Surely enough, the internet is adamant in the fact that elemental charge blades suck♥♥♥♥♥♥

Except... they don't?

Okay, so I've run the same Vaal Hazak investigation a buncha times, so far twice with the Tyrannis 2 (Artillery 3 + Weakness Exploit 3) and twice with the Halberion (Blaze 2, Weakness exploit 3, Crit Element), and both times I've got pretty much the same numbers, which hover around the 15k damage mark per run. With the added advantage of having greater freedom of charms and equipment in general.

Now, this might be due to the way I play it, so I would like you guys to try running it a few times and posting your total DPS on the same monster running it twice, once with a pure raw build, and the other with an elemental blade. Because for me they are both pretty neck and neck in terms of damage, and I would be interested in knowing your results.

[Kashra Fall]

If you're playing elemental CB, I think you get more "Oompf" out of staying in sword and shield mode. Standard hits with proper skill set ups should crit for around or over 100 with the elemental phials doing 12-20 depending on your set up. So if you charge your shield+your sword, each swing of the sword+stab of the shield is doing an additional almost 100 total damage, totalling your Hold B, Y+B, Hold B into charge to around let's see, 52ish+15+97+15+43+15+52ish+97+15]

Roughly 416 damage before your charge is done. This damage does not take into account charging your sword which does well over 260+the elemental explosion damage, so around 300ish. Now you can do your charge move if you want to, but you don't really benefit from this outside of the intitial hit of the axe, which will both crit (Assuming you're built for this.) this will also be amped up because of the rathalos set for critical element, so the total number would be around 1000-1400 for a total combo.

Howwever, this still does not compare to the tyrannis' impressive damage, but it comes pretty close with all the bells and whistles!

[Freyon]

Non-elemental Charge Blades can benefit from the non-elemental skill, which is a huge boost (+20 Raw Atk, I think) and it works equally well against all monsters. We also prefer Raw because they tend to have Impact Phials, which deal KO damage against monsters, thus staggering easier, tiring them and even KOing them if you hit the head.

If you don't own an Elementless jewel though, I suppose elemental damage will work equally well for you.

[My Balls are Cook]

If you are only using artillery 3 + weakness 3 you are missing a lot of the potential damage of your diablos CB. At the very least you NEED an elementless jewel, though it can be further maximized with crit eye 4, attack 4, max might 2, and obviously capacity boost on top of what you have. Diablos high raw and how raw interacts with phials means it will scale the best with gear than any other CB until we get Kulve Taroth.

Don't forget that Diablos inflicts massive KO damage, which will translate to close to 1000 damage per stun extra you wouldn't have got with an elemental type blade. And skilled users will get 3+ stuns per fight thanks to the impact phials.

Of course you're going to do the same damage because Vaal Hazak has the same health. You should be measuring the average damage numbers of each individual attack you want to compare weapons. Even using lvl1 Jagras CB you will do 15000dmg to Hazak, it will just take you 30 minutes instead of 2.

If you are ever curious about which weapon has the highest DPS, just look up the TA speedrunning records. Speedrunning builds aren't the best for a casual player, but they give you an idea of what the theoretical best damage looks like.

[Ottomic]

Oh yeah, the diablos setup already had the elementless 2 jewel and capacity boost. Both times were similar, both damage numbers were similar.

Again, I'm not asking for a retread of the internet dialectic about the theoreticals. I would like people to post actual damage numbers in runs. I know what the theory looks like, it's just the practice seems to disagree with it.

[Voodoo]

My halberion pulls out higher damage on saed swing and more phial damage than my diablos with elementless.

[Madame Greya]

With CB's, if damage/DPS is your intention, high raw damage and impact phials will always be the best, objectively speaking. Nobody is saying the elemental ones are terrible, they're just not as good as impact CB's.

Now, if you suck with CB (just being honest) and don't ever exploit your impact phials for KO's and such, I could see how you might prefer elemental.. but when used right impact CB's with high raw probably have the highest DPS (albeit in bursts) in the entire game.

[Credne]

Originally posted by Voodoo:

My halberion pulls out higher damage on saed swing and more phial damage than my diablos with elementless.

Yes but;
-Impact phials have a better path, they go straight forward
-They don't care about the body part of the monster, they do full damage all the time
-They have stun status

[Ottomic]

Originally posted by Voodoo:

My halberion pulls out higher damage on saed swing and more phial damage than my diablos with elementless.

Yeah, I'm noticing too that instead of hitting a handful of times for 100-200, if you get the length of the monster it'll hit several more times for 80ish. I don't know what's the total damage of it, but it doesn't feel too dissimilar.

Originally posted by DoctorVonBuzzkill:

objectively speaking.

Objectively speaking, you'll get the bigger damage numbers in your screen. But that doesn't necessarily translate in bigger damage numbers across a hunt, from what I'm personally seeing.

[Voodoo]

Originally posted by Credne:

Originally posted by Voodoo:

My halberion pulls out higher damage on saed swing and more phial damage than my diablos with elementless.

Yes but;
-Impact phials have a better path, they go straight forward
-They don't care about the body part of the monster, they do full damage all the time
-They have stun status

But do way less damage by default and require artillery for full damage. Also stun works only if you hit the head so maybe 2 phials do ko?

[ShieldofFeep]

If he goes through the process of getting a elemental phial on a weapon vs impact, a element phial weapon if you kept the sword and shield both charged and used the shield stab where it hits multiple times along with sword strokes i think that is the best way to deal elemental damage. Raw damage is the axe form, trust me i love the cb and the axe form will knock over a monster over and over if they are weak enough.

[Kashra Fall]

Originally posted by Ottomic:

Oh yeah, the diablos setup already had the elementless 2 jewel and capacity boost. Both times were similar, both damage numbers were similar.

Again, I'm not asking for a retread of the internet dialectic about the theoreticals. I would like people to post actual damage numbers in runs. I know what the theory looks like, it's just the practice seems to disagree with it.

Well, I luckily got the final gem I needed to finish my build earlier, so I can do just that in a bit! It however won't be vs val hazaak most likely, but something quicker like diablos. The damage per hit etc and clear time will be my goal.

[Kashra Fall]

The power of the charge blade, even without SAED is quite disgusting. IT just does amazing DPS with RAW, but if you can hit that weakpoints with elemental, I think elemental has the edge without SAED. I will do more testing later, but this video was quite jaw dropping to see those damage numbers without SAED used once.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4Gz4XhvBH2w

[Voodoo]

Sure without saed, but cb without saed is like cereal without milk

[Madame Greya]

Originally posted by Kashra Fall:

The power of the charge blade, even without SAED is quite disgusting. IT just does amazing DPS with RAW, but if you can hit that weakpoints with elemental, I think elemental has the edge without SAED. I will do more testing later, but this video was quite jaw dropping to see those damage numbers without SAED used once.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4Gz4XhvBH2w

Getting 2-3 KO's in a hunt with the higher average DPS impact phails opens up massive windows for DPS which lends itself well to the CB's burst DPS nature, so elemental is objectively worse when the CB is used properly. It has been since it released in 4U, there's numbers to back this up. There's a reason speedrunners who rock CB's don't typically use elemental.

Again, not saying they're not viable, but impact / high raw is OBJECTIVELY superior when the technique is right. Also who uses CB without SAED..? That's pretty much using the weapon flat out wrong.

[Voodoo]

Originally posted by DoctorVonBuzzkill:

Originally posted by Kashra Fall:

The power of the charge blade, even without SAED is quite disgusting. IT just does amazing DPS with RAW, but if you can hit that weakpoints with elemental, I think elemental has the edge without SAED. I will do more testing later, but this video was quite jaw dropping to see those damage numbers without SAED used once.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4Gz4XhvBH2w

Getting 2-3 KO's in a hunt with the higher average DPS impact phails opens up massive windows for DPS which lends itself well to the CB's burst DPS nature, so elemental is objectively worse when the CB is used properly. It has been since it released in 4U, there's numbers to back this up. There's a reason speedrunners who rock CB's don't typically use elemental.

Again, not saying they're not viable, but impact / high raw is OBJECTIVELY superior when the technique is right. Also who uses CB without SAED..? That's pretty much using the weapon flat out wrong.

Mate hammer htiting solely head and packing 3 sluggers rarely gets 2 kos in a hunt O.o