Singularity Grenades: are they broken?

Borderlands 3 Borderlands 3 General Discussion
#1

So I haven’t used singularity grenades a lot. In the past I have typically used the CMT or Generator Tran-fusion. However, with nades in a bad spot I was considering other ways to make nades more useful. The 25% weapon damage OGT is always good. I was hoping the singularity effect might be good for crowd control and grouping mobs together to easily kill with the OGT bonus.

I remember using them at times in the past and even in BL2 and they would pull enemies in for a few seconds into a clump. However, the singularity nade I’m using now doesn’t seem to do anything. It’s a Singularity Firestorm and the Firestorm effect works but there is no singularity effect at all. Has anyone else noticed this?

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#2

Singularity nades, and the sirens action skill augment that has the same effect, are in fact useless. They don’t have any reach at all unless you find one with two singularity parts on a grenade, or boost the singularity of her action skill augment with the skill that boosts it by 100%.
Even when you do manage to suck someone up In it, they don’t suck directly to it. They will orbit the singularity instead of being sucked into it, which is useless for Amaras phaseslam.

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#3

That’s pretty lame. When did this start? Has it always been like this in BL3? I know they didn’t work like that in BL2.

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#4

It’s always been that way & unfortunately with all the other bugs this one looks like it will fall through the cracks.

#5

I still find them useful for crowd control, especially the Quasar. It’s pretty funny when I use one on my clone and drone Zane, enemies are literally being flung all over the place, sometimes right off the map.

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#6

Yeah singularity pull is only 1 sec with a single instance, needs to be extended but the throwing effect on mobs can be funny. Same effect makes the Plaguebearer a hoot to use.

#7

Im glad im.not alone with this… Singularity needs to be longer and pull from further. Its too short and if homingnit just makes ppl fly around.

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#8

Except mine isn’t even doing that. It literally does nothing. I can throw the nade directly at an enemy and it never leaves it’s feet or changes direction or anything. Nothing.

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#9

In BL2 they worked perfectly. Was quite disappointed with how they work in BL3. The singularity effect needs to last longer (I would day 5 seconds), and not just toss the enemies around.
In BL2 they would clump the enemies together in a predictable way so you could focus fire on the group. In BL3 they are not even close :frowning:

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#10

Singularity grenades not useful? Nonsense. I’ve been using almost nothing but singularity grenades since the game came out, and I’ve been happy with them. Every now and then I’ll try a non-singularity grenade, desparate for some variety, but I’m always disappointed by how much less useful they are. I’m always amazed that anyone bothers to use anything other than singularity grenades, especially given that grenades don’t do much damage in higher mayhem levels.

A word of advice though: use the Quasar. As others have said, singularity grenades seem to have less reach than in BL2 in general. But, for whatever reason, the Quasar seems to perform better than the rest, and does a great job at crowd control. A close contender is also Whispering Ice (quest reward from Aurelia - I hope I can get a lvl 57 one from Earl with the upcoming patch).

Blue/purple singularity grenades don’t seem to do anywhere near as much, and neither do non-Quasar legendaries that have a singularity modifier (eg. firestorm, fish slap, etc.). But you can’t go wrong with a quasar - the sticky variety is especially good, I find.

Also, be smart about how you throw them. If you’re expecting to just lob one anywhere and find 15 enemies stacked in a tower on top of each other 2 seconds later, you’re probably expecting too much. But get in the habit of throwing out 2 or 3 in slightly different places and/or timed slightly apart, and you’ll soon become a crowd-control master. :slight_smile:

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#11

Ok, saying this…

Then saying this…

is a bit nonsensical. You are basically supporting the idea that singularity grenades are not useful unless you use the one specific one that seems to work. It sounds to me like they are broken except in 1 or 2 specific exceptions. Like I mentioned in the OP…the Firestorm I have doesn’t just have “less reach” it literally does nothing even when thrown directly at an enemy. Seems broken.

That being said… I haven’t used a Quasar much but I’ll be keeping a look out for singularity Quasar to try it out.

#12

Singularity grenades are a godsend especially if you can find one with the Regen grenade annoint!

Also singularity grenades can last longer, you just have to find it with more than one singularity roll. Like the one I have has two singularity rolls so it makes the pull last for 1.5 secs.

I’ve seen one with three that lasts for a full 2 seconds but only on Pangolin and I don’t like rubber grenades.

I’m sure you can find a Vladof grenade mod 3 rolls on it but it’s just extremely rare.

#13

I have a fish grenade with a double singularity, but it’s useless. The singularity doesn’t trigger until the grenade explodes, which is usually dozens of feet away from the action because of the horrible bouncing ability. It’s worse than other “bounce” grenades because those usually fire off elemental/bullets/explosions/split/MIRV/clone.

The fish grenade was a cool idea, horribly implemented. It should have been able to roll with standard grenade abilities. As it, it’s useless, even as a way to regen ammo. I can hit more enemies/get more ammo from slamming near them, even without a launchpad version of the cutpurse. Perhaps if it had the Quasar singularity pull, it might be useful. But yeah, don’t bother with the fish, skip most singularities, unless it’s a Quasar.

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#14

I think the main problem is…the rubberized grenade is just terrible. WTF do you want a grenade that bounces around aimlessly? Funny? Maybe for about 2 seconds…then it’s useless. That grenade would have been 100x better with any other grenade prefix.

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#15

A simple fix, since they are probably willing to die on that rubberized hill, is just increase the radius. 142 is terrible for something that’s unpredictable. That’s like Fastball area, and no one uses that either. If the radius was tripled, or even doubled, it would be more viable. On characters who can throw grenades, I’m lucky to get one enemy. For some reason the grenade seems to bounce away from mobs, even before hitting anything.

It’s even worse on Zane when using SNTNL. I usually see it bouncing off the map or into a wall.

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#16

They’ve been a meme in Borderlands since its inception. It’s just one of those things.

The Fastball is supposed to be about precise aim though the reward is clearly lacking in BL3. It was a beast in BL2 (after they fixed it).

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#17

Well sh**, that’s good to know. I have the same Fish Slap that I haven’t tested but figured it might be useful with the double grenade roll. smh @ gearbox

#18

If it were a sticky, it would be good. But the rubberized ruins it for me. Perhaps others are more successful with using grenades (I know I get a bit of pin-envy when I watch Moze-streamers just casually tossing grenade after grenade with high accuracy while constantly firing). But it as you know, combat is fast and enemies rarely stand still, at least not the ones I want to pin down with a singularity. So with the bouncing, it often just misses the target, bounces away, then fires off the singularity. It makes for a pretty show at night, but that’s about it.

Also the small blast radius seems to effect the singularity, as I seem to only get the target it hits, pulled in, even if others are near by. Not like most singularity grenades. Sticky with a larger radius (even with reduced damage) would make it viable for Cutpurse users without Launch Pad.

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#19

I’m playing Zane as clone+drone and giving them homing quasars is as funny as it is impossible to keep aim on something :sweat_smile:
Enemies flying left and right to ridiculous heights.

#20

I also much preferred how the singularity effect worked in BL2 and TPS.

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