Review: Lex Prime (U24.8.3)

The Lex Prime is an MR8 pistol originally introduced back in U13. It is slow firing, but packs a lot of firepower. As an "Unvaultable" Prime with Common rarity parts, it is also an ideal Prime weapon for a newer player to pursue.

Acquisition

As standard for a Prime weapon, the Lex Prime's parts and blueprints can be obtained by opening various Void Relics. The Lex Prime will not be Vaulted, so can be obtained at all times.

Stats

The Lex Prime has very solid Crit stats, which combine very well with its high base Damage to give very good damage-per-shot. It also has fairly high Status Chance, though is let down by its slow RoF and majority Puncture damage. The Lex Prime has a relatively small Mag Capacity and a frustratingly long Reload Time, resulting in a relatively low Reload Ratio of 1.67.

Augments

None.

Builds

0-Forma: 

With a single native V polarity, the Lex Prime can fit a pretty solid basic build without any Forma. Leaving off Lethal Torrent in lieu of the two 90% elementals allows you to have a very good damage-per-shot, even without the Primed Crit mods. Even with regular Target Cracker only adding a measly 60% Crit Damage, the base pistol Crit mods are absolutely worth installing, for majorly boosted firepower.

As usual for slow-firing weapons, my preferred element is Viral. It hits all types of Grineer reasonably effectively, and is generally just decent against most enemies. Though the Lex Prime has good Status Chance, its RoF is too low for a Corrosive armour strip build to be very efficient. That said, Corrosive is still the best go-to element against Infested. Against unarmoured Corpus, you have a few options. Viral is my preferred element, hitting the organics very hard once Shields are down. Pure Toxin is also very good, bypassing Shields entirely. Against armoured Corpus, who use predominantly Alloy Armour, Radiation is your best bet.

One other option you have is a Gas build with maximised Status Chance. With high base Status Chance, you can inflict Gas procs with reasonable frequency. The AoE Gas procs give you much better anti-crowd abilities than the Lex Prime has otherwise. The Toxin procs they inflict are also brutally effective against unarmoured Corpus. Do note however that direct Gas damage has very poor multipliers, and will be much less effective against most targets than any of the above elements.

Recommended Setups: Viral vs Grineer, Corrupted, Corrosive vs Infested, Viral or Toxin or Gas vs unarmoured Corpus, Radiation vs armoured Corpus

Primed Crit 2-Forma:

Two added V polarities allow you to slot in both Primed Crit mods, as well as Lethal Torrent. There is still space for one 90% elemental too, although the second elemental will have to be a 60/60. The Primed Crit mods alone give the Lex Prime an insane damage boost, Lethal Torrent is a bonus that makes follow-up shots a little faster.

With the 7 standard mods in place, you have a couple of choices left. You can choose your combination of 60/60 or 90% elementals, depending on whether you want more Status Chance or direct damage. For the last slot, there are several good options, though you'll need additional Forma to make use of that slot. I'd recommend one or two more V polarities, and a - polarity or two depending on your elemental preferences.

Augur Pact offers a low capacity, uncomplicated damage boost. Seeker is a good help against crowds, and convenient for piercing thin obstacles like Shield Lancers. Due to the Lex Prime's reasonably high recoil, Steady Hands can be quite helpful for keeping rounds on a target. (Primed) Quickdraw can be useful for alleviating the rather slow reload. Hydraulic Crosshairs offers a situational but fairly powerful damage boost. Primed Heated Charge (or another elemental) offers a significant damage boost, depending on the elements you're aiming for.

Viral + Heat is quite an effective combo against Grineer, as both elements are effective against Cloned Flesh. Heat is much less useful, but the raw damage from Primed Heated Charge is quite significant. Corrosive + Heat is a fantastic combination against Infested, hitting just about every one of their health types super-effectively. Viral + Electric is very good against unarmoured Corpus, again hitting all of their health types effectively.

Recommended Setups: see above. Also consider: Viral + Heat vs Grineer, Corrupted, Corrosive + Heat vs Infested, Viral + Electric vs unarmoured Corpus

My Builds:

My go-to build is a Viral build, as usual for low-RoF weapons. It is built to balance out raw damage with reliability of Viral procs.

These other two builds are more ordinary, focusing on raw firepower. Corrosive is intended primarily for Infested, while Radiation is best mainly against Corpus bosses.

Combat Use and Summary

With high damage-per-shot and good crit, the Lex Prime is best against few, unarmoured enemies with high health. It can put out quite good damage on such targets, especially if you can reliably land headshots. It does however fall down against most other types of targets.

Heavily armoured enemies do not particularly fear the Lex Prime. It does not have any reliable method to combat high armour. It is too slow firing for Corrosive armour strip to be efficient, and too low Slash bias for a Viral + Slash build to be reliable. As such, the Lex Prime relies mainly on raw damage, which drops off quite badly at high levels.

The Lex Prime however is especially poor against groups. It is slow firing, has a poor Reload Ratio, and lacks any innate anti-crowd mechanics. A Gas build can improve its group effectiveness, but is a little unreliable and makes it significantly worse against heavier enemies.

Despite its relatively high recoil, the Lex Prime is quite precise, making it surprisingly effective at longer ranges. Before Snipers received their big buffs, a running joke was that the best Sniper was the Lex Prime (or Tigris Prime, depending which you liked more). At the time it was among the best weapons for long range, precise shooting. Though not so true now with the Sniper buffs and newer releases, the Lex Prime remains one of the better Secondaries for longer ranged shooting.

Overall, the Lex Prime is a powerful, but heavily flawed, secondary. It has solid raw damage output, but lacks the scaling factor to handle heavily armoured enemies, and is very poor against groups. Additionally, in more recent times, a number of weapons have been introduced that outclass the Lex Prime in various ways. As such, its best role is actually just as a Prime item that is relatively easy to acquire and build. It is a solid weapon for its MR bracket, but falls behind several of today's best.

Scores

Vs Trash Mobs: 1/5 - Low RoF, poor Reload Ratio and no innate anti-crowd mechanics, the Lex Prime is quite poor against many weak enemies.
Vs Unarmoured Heavies: 3.5/5 - With high damage-per-shot and good crit, the Lex Prime is best against single enemies with a lot of health.
Vs Armoured Heavies: 2/5 - High base Puncture does help a little, but overall the Lex Prime has little in the way of reliable anti-armour capabilities. It does not have high enough Slash bias to reliably inflict Slash procs, nor does it fire fast enough to effectively strip armour with Corrosive.

Vs Variants

The MR8 Lex Prime is universally superior to the MR3 Lex. It has superior Crit Chance, RoF, Mag Capacity, Status Chance, and base Damage. However, the Lex is quite solid for an MR3 weapon, and notably can be bought for just credits directly from Market.

Comparing to the MR15 AkLex Prime, however, is a different matter. The Lex Prime has better accuracy and a shorter Reload Time, while the AkLex Prime has double Magazine Capacity and higher RoF. The AkLex Prime has overall higher DPS and is a little better against groups, while the Lex Prime is more precise and much better at longer range. The choice between the two comes more down to intended/desired role and personal preference.

Competitors

There are many other Semi-Auto secondaries in Warframe, and a fair few fit a similar hard-hitting type role as the Lex Prime. Arca Scisco, Vaykor Marelok, Vasto Prime, to name a few. Pretty much all of them have some solid niche and a tangible advantage over the Lex Prime, though not without their own weaknesses. Perhaps the two most notable such weapons I'd like to bring up are the Euphona Prime and Tombfinger Kitgun.

The Euphona Prime is among the hardest hitting secondaries currently in the game, putting the Lex Prime's damage output to shame. However, it is a projectile weapon, so has to deal with both travel time and projectile drop. It also has a much smaller magazine, and in primary fire, almost no Status Chance. Nonetheless, for pure damage output, the Euphona Prime is much stronger than the Lex Prime.

A good Tombfinger Kitgun on the other hand, is almost strictly superior to the Lex Prime. Again it is a projectile weapon, but thankfully does not have projectile drop. Most importantly however, a crit-built Tombfinger Kitgun deals vastly more damage than the Lex Prime, while also having a larger Magazine and faster reload, better status inflicting capabilities (thanks to its partial base Radiation damage), and an AoE that makes it surprisingly effective against groups. Simply put, a decent Tombfinger Kitgun puts the Lex Prime to shame in almost every aspect.

Rivens 

The Lex (Prime) has a relatively low Disposition of 2/5 (0.7). Given the family's various weaknesses, and the relative powercreep of more recent weapons, I wouldn't mind the disposition going up a little more. The above Riven was screencapped back when it was still at 1/5 (0.5).

As standard, Damage/Multishot/Crit Chance/Crit Damage are all great stats to have. An appropriate element can be helpful for saving a mod slot. Personally, I'd consider +Mag Capacity/Reload Speed to be nice stats to have. -Recoil can be helpful if you're struggling to compensate. +Punch Through is quite helpful against groups.

-Impact/Slash are both very good negatives, as the Lex Prime deals 80% Puncture. Alternatively, -Puncture allows the Lex Prime to proc Slash surprisingly frequently, to deadly effect. This does cost a lot of direct damage though, and I don't have a suitable Riven to determine if the Slash procs are worth the damage sacrifice. -Status Chance/Duration can be decent in smaller amounts. -Faction Damage to a weaker Faction (e.g. Infested) can be quite tolerable. If you find yourself firing slower than max RoF, -Fire Rate could be decent as well. -Ammo Max works well on such an ammo-efficient weapon. -Flight Speed has no effect. +Recoil is tolerable if you can handle recoil well. -Zoom is good if you use the Lex Prime primarily in close quarters, but not so much if you use it at longer range.