Elements

Alongside the standard five elements, Frontier introduces combination elements, which always inflict the damage of both elements simultaneously. The visible element upon striking a monster will correspond to the element that the hitzone is weakest to. For instance, if you wield a weapon with and hit a hitzone that is vulnerable to , you would deal and damage, but only the damage visual effects would be displayed.

Combo elements function as if you have two to three elements, but at a percentage of your elemental value. For visual effects, the element that deals the most damage will take precedence. The heatblade alternates the effect.

With Transcendence bursts, there is a hierarchy on which elements take precedence first. The order is > > > > .

Negative elemental hitzones will still apply their raw penalty if the 'wrong' element is involved. Possessing the armor skill will force all elements to use the weapon's modifier.

Combo Elements

Damage

Elemental damage functions independently of motion values. The key factors affecting it are the weapon's elemental value, the number of hits per attack, weapon sharpness, and the monster's elemental weaknesses. The size of the motion value, whether 16 or 220, does not affect elemental damage; it’s calculated based on a single hit. This means that a fully charged attack will deal the same elemental damage as a quick swipe from the if their elemental values are identical.

If your goal is to maximize elemental damage, focus on using the correct element and consistently hitting the appropriate hitbox for that element. You can check our Damage Calculator

for this.

Although motion values typically don't impact elemental damage, the Storm Style is an exception with a 140% elemental modifier on its three thrust attacks. However, this doesn't automatically make it the best choice for damage output, as there are more ways to boost raw damage compared to elemental damage. Refer to our Style Rank page

for more information about weapon styles.