Extra Damage from Laser Guided

Borderlands: The Pre-Sequel Wilhelm the Enforcer
#1

Yesterday, I was stabbing some torks to conserve ammo and noticed a high multiplier coming from Laser Guided. To investigate further, I recorded the damage I was doing:

4160 -base melee damage (level 56)
7799 -with Laser Guided (187.5% or 1.5 * 1.25)
6239 -with bladed weapon (150%)
11699 -LG and blade (281% or 1.875 * 1.5)

As you can see, Laser Guided is giving an extra 1.5x multiplier on top of its stated 25% damage increase. This also applies to Power Fist.

35271 -base Power Fist damage (848% of base melee)
66133 -with LG (187.5%)
99200 -LG and blade (281% or 1.875 * 1.5)
1041K -PF, LG, and blade on frozen enemy (2951% or 1.875 * 1.5 * 3 * 3.5)

While I was testing this, I noticed that Wolf’s damage was also being multiplied more than expected. I mainly saw 3 values here, one being an unknown effect (no Rolling Thunder).

7800 -base Wolf damage (level 56, +30% Fire Support)
8580 -unknown, no LG (110%)
14624 -with Laser Guided (187.5% or 1.25 * 1.5)

So whatever this is also applies to Wolf, giving him a large damage boost.

I also tested gun damage, and got the expected 25%.

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#2

I always thought the Unknown Effect was Wolf landing his own version of a Critical.

#3

It Is a Spec Mult IIRC, so it multiplies all of your bonuses by 1.25 too.

#4

All the bonuses here are multiplicative, represented by the * symbol. Laser Guided gets extra damage even when there are no other multipliers, and the extra multiplier does not change as more effects are added.

I also found some old tests I did in normal mode which did not have this extra multiplier, so I tested Power Fist damage in each difficulty:

43484 -base damage in all modes (level 58)
54354 -with Laser Guided in normal and TVHM (125%)
81531 -with LG in UVHM (187.5% or 1.25 * 1.5)

The extra multiplier appears to be a UVHM bonus. I got similar results with Wolf, although base damage was acting strange:

16535 -base damage in normal
20668 -with Laser Guided in normal (125% of normal base)
16026 -base in TVHM
20032 -with LG in TVHM (125% of TVHM base)
9616 -base in UVHM
18029 -with LG in UVHM (187.5% of UVHM base)

Wolf’s damage also appears to depend on enemy level, which could explain the 110% unknown effect.

#5

ooor it’s a static boost to garbage damage in UVHM

Edit: Ya so u misinterpreted what I said, you said laser guided was special always at the beginning, but it’s actually only adding a bonus to ability damage that would otherwise do garbage damage in UVHM.

#6

If the boost was static, it would have shown up in the base damage. The 1.5x multiplier has only been observed when Laser Guided is active in UVHM.

Base Power Fist damage was the same in all three modes, and base melee is consistent with
20 * 1.1^(player level)

#7

I did some more testing yesterday, and found the UVHM multiplier on gun damage, grenade damage, splash, DOT, and the Systems Purge Oz kit.

In other words, Laser Guided is acting like slag, multiplying all damage by 1.875

Can anyone else confirm this? Just think what it could mean in co-op…

#8

Oh before you said GD was the same, so its just Laser Guided got buffed for UVHM

#9

What is the difference between ability damage and garbage damage in layman’s terms?

A heavy “pet mode” Wilhelm is probably the only/best way to play Wilhelm in coop.

#10

The ability damage is from things like rocket fist, wolf, the backpack laser whatnot.

It appears they buffed Laser Guided for UVHM for some reason, rather than buffing all of these skills (that need the LG boost to do comparable damage in uvhm)

#11

So 6 to 1, half a dozen to the other if I read you correctly.

But by doing this they have made laser guided even more essential.

If I read you correctly.

But by doing this they have made laser guided even more essential. I have not specked vengeance cannon for a long time. It seems more of a distraction than any kind of damage potential.

If it had any kind of pop at all it would be a great skill.

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#12

Kinda awkward that they made his other abilities worse by loading LG. Kinda also screws over those rolling thunder ppl too a little bit.

#13

I find that Power Fist and Wolf both do great damage in UVHM (The Vengeance Cannon does suck though).
But how does it screw over Rolling Thunder users?

#14

well as opposed to increasing wolf’s damage they increase the buff to LG so wolf’s missing out on damage (there’s also edge cases where wolf only does increased damage to targeted ppl but he aggros onto LG ppl so it’s not as big a deal).

#15

I don’t think Wolf is missing out, if anything he gets more stacks of Rolling Thunder from the weaker painted enemies. Also, if you’re trying to stack RT, you will always have LG available, so this is almost a passive 50% buff for that play-style.

If this hurts anything, it would be Overcharge. LG is now a larger DPS boost that can stay active forever, and you need to disable LG to get more Overcharge.

As for VC, a skill that is boosted by gun damage, grenade damage, elemental damage, LG, rate of fire boosts, and amp damage can be good with the right set-up.

#16

VC gets grenade damage?

Also I know it’s pretty much an exploit but it can also get glitch effects which is entertaining.

#17

Its not an exploit. The VC is probably considered a laser gun by the game code, like how Krieg’s buzzaxe was a pistol. That’s why its affected by all of Wilhelm’s skills, plus gear like the 3DDie and Bulwark. If it gets boosts from all those sources, there is no reason why it can’t get glitch effects too.

#18

I’m aware of that, but it clearly isn’t something that was intended by the devs (or was it?). It’s basically the same concept behind the Grog, Evil Smasher etc. and while I wouldn’t call it a full on glitch there’s still a sense of illegitimacy to it, like with Pimp/Flakker swapping.

#19

If its coded as a gun, and VC get guns bonuses, how is it not intended? Is it just supposed to have some diffferent fire rate or damage or whatever while the glitch is active? There isn’t any proof this wasn’t intended. At worst, its like Sal’s offhand bonus; maybe having unintended consequences, but unintended in of itself.

#20

The buzz axe is coded as a gun but I doubt throwing 6 axes at once was intended at all, ditto with this. Sure there’s no proof that it wasn’t intended, but there isn’t really any proof that it was intended either, even with the incendiary laser classification.