Pages

Sunday, 19 January 2020

Review: Aksomati Prime (U27.0.11)


The Aksomati Prime is an MR12 dual Secondary, recently released alongside Baza and Ivara Primes. With a number of relatively minor buffs over the base Aksomati, it is very potent weapon, if rather ammo-hungry.


Acquisition


As standard for a Prime weapon, the Aksomati's blueprint and components can be found by opening certain Void relics.

Stats

The Aksomati Prime has a very good spread of stats. Very high Crit stats are backed up with solid Status Chance and high Slash bias. This allows it to make excellent use of a hybrid build. With a large Mag Capacity and fast Reload Time, it also has a very respectable Reload Ratio of 4.29.

The AksomatiP is a spool-up weapon, initially firing quite slowly. However, like the Tenora, it becomes more accurate once spooled-up.

Augments

None.

Builds

General Purpose 0-Forma:

Two innate V polarities and a - polarity allow quite decent builds even without Forma. Notably, you can fit in any two elemental mods alongside all the other standard mods without issue. If you're not using two 90% elementals, you can even upgrade one of the Crit mods to a Primed Crit mod.

As is the case for so many weapons, my recommended go-to elemental combo is Corrosive. The AksomatiP has high enough Status Chance and RoF that it can actually strip armour at a reasonable speed. Besides dealing with armoured enemies very well, Corrosive also has a fantastic damage multiplier against Infested heavy units, particularly Ancients. For unarmoured Corpus enemies, I'd recommend either Viral or pure Toxin. Viral hits much harder once shields are down, while Toxin bypasses shields entirely. The latter is especially good for Augmented Shield Sorties.

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

Primed Crit 1-Forma:

One added V polarity allows the use of both Primed Crit mods, while still having space for any two elemental mods. There's even a little extra space for something like Augur Pact if you stick to 60/60s.

Recommended Setups: see above.

Punch Through 2-Forma:

Another added V polarity allows the use of Seeker, for that always valuable Punch Through. From here on, it's pretty much a matter of Forma-ing until you can fit in your preferred last mods.

As shown previously, Augur Pact is always a nice mod to slot in, for a simple straight damage boost. Magnum Force is more powerful, at the cost of more capacity and some accuracy. Seeker is notably a big help against groups, as it can greatly improve ammo efficiency. As usual for a Crit Secondary, Hydraulic Crosshairs is another nice damage boost if you keep it activated. Another elemental mod can be good for increased bias, an additional element, or just more damage. Notably, it opens up combos like Viral + Electric vs Corpus, or Corrosive + Heat vs armoured enemies and Infested.

For the Exilus slot, Ammo Mutation would be my primary pick. The Aksomati Prime eats through ammo quite quickly, especially with Lethal Torrent. Besides that, Suppress can be nice for stealth gameplay (especially for Ivara), and Steady Hands is an option of the recoil troubles you.

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

My Builds

Nothing too fancy here, my default build is a Corrosive + Punch Through build. It is quite effective against most targets, though somewhat inefficient against unarmoured Corpus.
Against unarmoured Corpus, I use this Viral build instead, if I can be bothered actually switching loadouts.

Combat Use and Summary

With high Crit, high Status Chance, a good Mag Capacity, high RoF and good Reload Ratio, the Aksomati Prime is effective against just about anything. It tears through groups with ease, especially when upgraded with Punch Through, and can quite comfortably handle constant streams of enemies. With quite high Burst DPS, the AksomatiP is highly effective against unarmoured enemies with a lot of health as well.

With a significantly improved Status Chance, the AksomatiP fares reasonably well against armoured enemies. With a Corrosive build, it has a high enough RoF to readily deplete enemy armour. Naturally it still falls behind compared to dedicated Status weapons, but it is nonetheless quite effective.


The Aksomati Prime is a spool-up weapon, which is both a blessing and a curse. For a short few moments, it shoots at a much lower RoF, which can be used to help conserve ammo. Naturally however, it deals much lower DPS during this period, which can be a slight issue for tougher enemies. Like with all other spool-up weapons in Warframe, the spool-up period is based on number of rounds fired, so the increased RoF from Lethal Torrent drastically reduces this time.

Notably, although its base spread is quite wide, the AksomatiP becomes much more accurate once spooled-up. Interestingly, its recoil-per-shot also seems to reduce once spooled-up. As such, I've generally found it to be quite controllable. The AksomatiP's high RoF can result in ammo issues in longer missions.Though it has more than enough spare ammo for shorter missions, I'd recommend at least one of Ammo Case/Mutation/etc to keep it supplied for anything longer.


Overall, the Aksomati Prime is an extremely strong weapon. It kills almost any enemy with ease, and can readily mow down large groups. By far its biggest weaknesses are ammo consumption and spool-up time. One of Ammo Case/Mutation/etc is strongly recommended for any longer mission to keep it supplied with ammo. As a spool-up weapon, the AksomatiP can be a little annoying to start up, initially firing slowly and relatively inaccurately. After a short time however, it speeds up significantly and becomes much more accurate. If you're looking for an overall great Full-Auto Secondary, I'd strongly recommend the Aksomati Prime.

Scores

Vs Trash Mobs: 4.5/5 - High capacity, RoF and damage allow the Aksomati Prime to tear through groups of weaker enemies with ease. Its biggest weakness is its RoF at full spool; especially with Lethal Torrent, as it often wastes rounds due to very high RoF.
Vs Unarmoured Heavies: 4/5 - The Aksomati Prime has quite good DPS by Secondary standards, allowing it to tear through unarmoured foes quite quickly.
Vs Armoured Heavies: 4/5 - The significant increase in Status Chance has allowed the Aksomati Prime to use a surprisingly effective Corrosive Status build. Though still not as efficient as Status-focused weapons against heavy armour, it fares quite well overall.

Vs Variants

The MR12 Aksomati Prime is a strict upgrade over the base MR9 Aksomati, though by far the biggest improvement is the increase in Status Chance, at more than double. The accuracy, though stated as a loss here, is actually also an improvement as the Prime improves in accuracy in sustained fire.

All this said, the base Aksomati is still quite a powerful weapon itself. The biggest difference is the loss of Status Chance, which hurts most against armoured enemies.

Competitors

There are a number of other powerful Full-Auto Secondaries, though few (if any) can match the Aksomati Prime's overall killing power. Pretty much all other Full-Auto Dual Secondaries are more Status-focused (e.g. Prisma Twin Gremlins, Kuva Twin Stubbas), and as such none of them deal as much raw damage.

You have to look more widely to find Secondaries that can directly compete with the AksomatiP for firepower. The Pyrana Prime is much more powerful, though has minimal Status capabilities and low effective range. The Kuva Brakk is also more powerful and has even better Status capabilities, but is basically useless outside of close range. The Staticor is just an incredible Secondary overall, but uses relatively slow projectiles. Akbolto Prime is comparable in raw firepower, but falls behind for Status capabilities. It is also Semi-Auto and quite uncomfortable to use to its full potential.

Of the conventional, non-shotgun fast-firing Secondaries, Aksomati Prime deals the most direct damage, and has respectable Status capabilities to keep up against heavy armour.

Rivens

The Aksomati Prime released with a neutral 3/5 (1) Riven Disposition. I could very well see that dropping to 2/5 (~0.7), given it is quite a powerful weapon. Meanwhile, the base Aksomati has an above average 4/5 (1.25) Riven Disposition, which with the right Riven, can actually make it more powerful than the Prime.

As usual, +Damage/Multishot/Crit Chance/Crit Damage are all great stats to have. +Elemental Damage can be quite nice for boosting elemental bias, adding in extra elements, saving a mod slot, or just adding more damage. +Punch Through is a big help against groups.

-Impact/Puncture are both great negatives. Neither has a significant impact on damage output, or offer good Status procs. -Faction Damage to a weaker faction can be quite manageable. -Ammo Max is manageable if you have at least one of Ammo Case/Mutation/etc. -Projectile Speed has no impact. +Recoil can be manageable as the Aksomati Prime's recoil reduces when spooled-up. -Zoom is ideal for close-quarters combat, though the AksomatiP already has low zoom.

No comments:

Post a Comment