Example of a shock elemental weapon.
Shock weapons crackle with electricity and are very effective against shielded targets.
Main Games
Borderlands
Effectiveness
Shock attacks inflict 50% additional damage against all shields. Against unshielded flesh or armor, they suffer a 10% damage penalty.
Shock bullets crack with electricity when they impact. When a shock weapon's effect triggers, high damage is dealt to the enemy's shield and they gain the Electrocute status effect, taking additional shock damage over time. If an enemy dies to shock damage, his face burns away and reveals his skull and part of his brain, then his head explodes.
Notes
- Barrels which are blue in color contain shock and explode and release large blue electric bolts when destroyed.
- Shock weapons are extremely effective against the Guardians found in Eridian Promontory, Larva Crab Worms and Craw Maggots.
- If used properly, shock artifacts can be very useful on action skills such as Bloodwing, and can take down the enemy's shields so traditional weapons can take down enemy flesh.
- Shock is useless against zombies of all sorts. In fact, Tankensteins are actually healed by electrical damage.
- The Elemental effect also seems to stun/slow opponents as well as having a very large radius of effect, thus can be used to great effect against rakk. One shot with a high-damage weapon to the middle of the flock can take out the whole flock, even with the non-ideal element matching.
- Roland and Lilith each have a class mod tuned to enhancing shock damage, shock elemental effect chance, and shock resistance.
- Where fire and corrosive DoT deal medium damage over a long period of time, shock DoT tends to deal extremely high damage concentrated in a very short timespan.
- Because shock damage is weak against unshielded enemies, and because most shields can be depleted in two or three shots, shock weapons are generally not useful against anything other than Eridians or the other very scarce bosses with powerful shields.
Borderlands 2
Effectiveness
| Flesh | Shield | Armor | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Normal mode | 100% | 200% | 100% |
| TVHM | 100% | 250% | 100% |
Notes
- Unlike in Borderlands, shock attacks suffer no penalty against unshielded flesh or armor, making shock a more versatile element in Borderlands 2.
Borderlands 3
Effectiveness
| Flesh | Shield | Armor | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Normal mode | 80% | 200% | 80% |
| TVHM | 65% | 250% | 65% |
Notes
- Shock attacks will leave an electrical charge if it hits a body of water. This creates an area of effect with shock damage for a short period of time.
- Vehicles affected by shock damage over time will short-circuit momentarily, leaving them unable to drive or turn for several seconds. Vehicle weapons still function normally.
- Enemies who die to shock damage may perform a unique animation of them comically spazzing out before dying. Their bodies then fade away into ashes.
Borderlands 4
Effectiveness
Shock weapons deal extra damage to shields and reduced damage to flesh and armor. At higher difficulties resistances and weaknesses are both increased.
| Shock effectiveness in Borderlands 4 | |||
|---|---|---|---|
| Flesh | Shield | Armor | |
| Easy | 90% | 120% | 90% |
| Normal | 75% | 150% | 75% |
| Hard | 50% | 175% | 50% |
Spin-Off Games
Tiny Tina's Wonderlands
In Tiny Tina's Wonderlands, shock damage is renamed lightning.
Effectiveness
Lightning damage effectiveness varies based on both enemy health type and the current difficulty setting.
| Flesh | Ward | Armor | Bone | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Relaxed | 95% | 175% | 90% | 95% |
| Balanced | 80% | |||
| Intense | 70% |
See Also
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