I cannot help but feel like Radiation is the weakest of the elements right now. I very much could be wrong on this. However I think at best it is the least noticeable element. I get that the idea is that it would be really effective against groups of enemies, which BL3 has a great approach of higher difficulty=more enemies, rather than bullet sponge single enemies. However, along with more enemies the enemy combat AI was updated. Since many enemies seek different cover or creatures simply take a moment to move sideways in relation to the player in order to attack from different angles, enemies dont mindlessly bunch up as much as they did in BL2. So even if you infect an enemy with radiation, the aura often does not do much to the other enemies. Even if enemies are grouped together I never really notice if one radiation aura is doing much, since I am spray and praying in the group anyways. Most of the time I prefer fire in these situations. I may be misreading the situation, but I feel like fire has better DOT in general. Even the radiation explosions after death does not seem to do that much additional damage. Maybe 2-3 bullets worth of damage it seams like to me. In BL2 I could get a seance of what element was good when. Fire against red health, shock against shields, corrosive against armor, slag best fit multiplayer against high HP enemies. The same rules for fire shock and corrosive still work, Cryo is effective against most mob type enemies, but radiation I am struggling to find a fitting place. Sure, radiation against groups of enemies on paper, however since radiation offers no additional damage bonus, only a damage reduction against armor, and most enemies are red health only, fire seems to completely dominate in this situation. Maybe this is already considered, as I see a lot of radiation element damage and rarely any fire damage. But I feel like all elements should have a clear advantage, and I just feel like anytime you would like radiation, you would notice fire damage much more.
If I was to offer a balance change idea, this would be it. Radiation dealing +10% to red health and/or radiation aura damage affecting red health through shields. Say 1 shot of radiation type with a 10% chance of radiation DOT hits an enemy with shields and health, the shot itself does only base damage against the shield, but if the DOT triggers, the red health takes damage instead of the shield. In this case, fire is still the best against red health, shock is still the best against shields, but radiation would hit a kind of middle ground. Great for people who dont want to think about the elemental damage at all.
