Talk:Synapse/@comment-183.171.174.148-20131106085149/@comment-8610408-20131119115926

^ Exactly. Taking off the AP mod is like saying "I don't actually want to kill armored enemies, just waste ammo trying."

There are three mods that and standard on *every* primary and secondary build: base damage, multishot (once the mod drops on you), and armor pierce. No ranked build, regardless of faction, should be without those three mods. From there you branch out, depending on taste, but for the most part: crit builds on weps with high base crit values, and elemental/faction builds for those without.

As far as AP not having any faction bonus, not true. The most common Grineer units have a 1.5x AP damage multiplier to all parts of their body, and the most common Corpus units have a 2x AP damage mulitplier to their heads.

In case you are still wondering, from the Armor Piercing page here:

"Armor Piercing Damage is one of four elemental[1] damage mods that can be added to weapons. Additionally, it is one of four damage types that typically ignores armor (including Serrated Blade, Poison, and Physics Impact).  As such, it is the most effective elemental[1] mod in terms of damage, as only light Infested units have a 0.5 multiplier for this damage type.

[1] Elemental damage is used here to mean that the damage is added as additional damage instead of increasing base damage."

Now, the big question is "how will this be affected once Armor/Damage 2.0 rolls out?" I don't think much will change, tho I did hear something about there being some sort of intended conflict between AP and Puncture mods. This remains to be seen.