If you want overwhelming firepower, Rafa’s APOPHIS Lance skill might just be what you’re looking for. This expendable, digistructed cannon is capable of dishing out extreme amounts of damage, but before it can blow anyone’s socks off, it needs to be supported by the right skills and equipment.
The following is an APOPHIS Lance Rafa build that’s all about melting enemies with a high-intensity beam of fiery and electric doom. It is incredibly strong in the right hands, and it’s perfect for players who want a build that revolves around frequent Action Skill usage in Borderlands 4.
APOPHIS Lance Build Overview
Rafa’s APOPHIS Lance is an adaptable weapon that can deal either Shock, Corrosive, or Incendiary damage. It may seem underwhelming at first, but once players get the right skills to complement it, APOPHIS Lance becomes a very powerful nuke-type Action Skill that can melt entire health bars in one usage. You can expect the following highlights if you use this build:
- APOPHIS Lance will deal both Incendiary and Shock damage.
- Your weapons and APOPHIS Lance can critically hit without hitting weakspots.
- APOPHIS Lance has a chance to deal double damage on top of critical strikes.
- APOPHIS Lance will be on a ~16 second cooldown, and it has a chance not to consume charges when fired.
- You’ll have 100% critical hit chance against Shocked enemies.
- You get increased Status Effect Chance and Shock Chance.
- Reduced Gun Handling when using APOPHIS Lance.
Borderlands 4 Rafa APOPHIS Lance Build Skill Tree
|
Skill |
Description |
|---|---|
|
Rinse |
Increases Reload Speed. Less downtime is always good. |
|
Preparado |
Reloading increases Rafa’s Action Skill Cooldown Rate by up to 45%. Keep shooting and keep reloading to minimize APOPHIS Lance’s downtime. |
|
Sangre Por Sangre (Augment) |
When you use an APOPHIS Lance charge, Rafa gains Action Skill Cooldown Rate per charge consumed. Massively reduces your Action Skill’s cooldown just by using it. |
|
Arriba |
Kill Skill. Gain increased Ordnance Cooldown Rate when Rafa kills an enemy. This skill pairs nicely with lingering grenades. |
|
Jaque |
Gain stacks of Jaque everytime you damage enemies with a Skill. Each stack increases your Overdrive bonuses. Lose all stacks when Overdrive ends. A simple skill that makes you stronger every time you use APOPHIS Lance. |
|
Mate |
All Jaque stacks are converted to Mate stacks when Overdrive ends. Each stack of Mate increases Rafa’s Action Skill Cooldown Rate. All Mate stacks are lost once Rafa’s Action Skill is readied. This skill shaves a few precious seconds off of your skill cooldown. |
|
PROJECT: Gorgon (Capstone) |
APOPHIS Lance becomes an Incendiary laser beam that can chain between targets. This Capstone skill absolutely melts even Shielded and Incendiary-resistant enemies. |
|
Drone Defense |
Using your Ordnance spawns STRM Gliders, which absorb a portion of the damage Rafa takes. When a STRM Glider receives too much damage, it explodes, dealing Corrosive Splash Damage to nearby enemies. This boosts your survivability depending on how much you can spam your grenades. |
|
Brain Dump |
Rafa’s guns have a chance to critically strike while Overdrive is active. A comfort skill that removes the need to aim for weakspots. |
|
El Catrin |
Sliding makes Rafa’s Action Skills deal Bonus Shock Damage, and he gains bonus Critical Hit Damage. This lets you deal with Shielded enemies and even Element Eaters more efficiently with just APOPHIS Lance. |
|
Awe |
All shots fired at Shocked enemies are critical hits. Either use a Shock weapon, an underbarrel taser, grenades, or APOPHIS Lance empowered by El Catrin to use this skill. |
|
Conductivo (3/5) |
Gain increased Status Effect Chance and even more Shock Chance. |
Grab these skills in descending order if you’re trying to level up using this build. Max the skills out unless otherwise specified.
All of these skills are inside the blue People Person skill tree where APOPHIS Lance is. If you want to use skills from other trees, you’ll need to find Class Mods that have the skills you want.
Speaking of Class Mods, try fo find ones with the following skills:
- CYA (Red Tree): Restore a portion of Rafa’s shields on kill.
- Shield Barriest (Red Tree): Gain increased Shield Recharge Rate and improved Shield Regen Delay when Overdrive is active.
- Sitiar (Red Tree): Rafa gains increased Gun Damage.
- In The Zone (Green Tree): Freeze Overdrive’s duration on kill.
- Abajo (Blue Tree): When Rafa throws a grenade, he gains increased Action Skill Cooldown Rate.
- Fiesta (Blue Tree): When Rafa applies a Status Effect, his Action Skills consume no charges, nor do they consume Duration.
Specialization Skills
This build relies heavily on APOPHIS Lance as your main source of damage. Your gun shots will feel like filler attacks compared to your Action Skill. To compensate for this, we’ll be taking the following Specialization skills:
- I Am A Gun (Daredevil): Action Skills benefit from 50% of Gun Damage bonuses.
- Riddle You This (Brute): Gain stacks of Riddle You This when you deal Gun Damage. Stacks up to 50 times, and stacks are lost after not gaining new stacks after 6 seconds.
- Contamination (Killer): Your critical hits grant you bonus Status Effect Chance.
- Compounding Afflictions (Killer): Deal bonus damage based on how many Status Effects are affecting an enemy.
Recommended Items
As mentioned above, APOPHIS Lance will be your main source of damage. Still, you’ll want to bring guns that can work well together with your Action Skill. Some options to consider include:
- Anything with an Underbarrel Taser. Fire the taser at your target, then beam them with APOPHIS Lance. All your hits will count as crits.
- Jakobs and Tediore weapons. APOPHIS Lance will cooldown faster if you can maintain your Preparado stacks.
- Radiation and Corrosive weapons. More elements equals more damage via Compounding Afflictions and DoT effects.
Legendary Gear
While you don’t necessarily need to farm legendary items in order to make this build work, having the right ones can make a serious difference. Great legendaries for this build are:
- Legendary Buster Class Mod: This gives you a 25% chance to not consume APOPHIS Lance charges when you fire APOPHIS Lance.
- Standard Augmenter AF1000 Repkit: This Repkit has a very short cooldown, and it restores a ton of health over a long duration. Get one of these that has the Accelerator effect so you can get 100% more Action Skill Cooldown Rate after using it.
- The Swarm Grenade: This grenade has a very low risk of self-damage, and it deals a boatload of sustained damage to targets.
- Noisy Cricket Pistol: An Order pistol that deals massive damage with each shot. Must be reloaded with every trigger pull, making it great for maintaining Preparado stacks, and it works wonders if you get some points into the First Impression skill. However, it does a poor job at using the Riddle You This Specialization skill.
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