Rory Norris, Guides Writer
(Image credit: Future)
Last week I was: playing way too much Borderlands 4.
This week I’ve been: continuing to play way too much Borderlands 4 while getting to grips with the endgame.
By now, it’s beating a dead horse saying that Penetrator Augment ‘crit’ throwing knives are overpowered in Borderlands 4. Creative director Graeme Timmins has already agreed as much, noting the infamous knives “will get addressed”, alongside some unintentional interactions and broken builds, very soon.
For those living under a rock, the Penetrator Augment that can drop on throwing knives causes all damage dealt to the target to become guaranteed critical hits for a short duration. With almost any build, especially those specced into bonuses with critical hits or status effects like the bleed Vex build, this short window is more than long enough to burst down any boss in the blink of an eye. Plus, you can also get the Damage Amp Payload effect, which—in the same vein as Penetrator—causes the target to simply take increased damage for a duration. In fact, you can even get these two bonuses together if you’re lucky for guaranteed critical hits and a flat increase in damage from all sources.
Whether the effects are reduced in duration or potency, you can’t change the fact that these throwables offer unmatched, absolute power with no downsides.
That’s not to mention that throwing knives are already a strong option in the ordnance slot, dealing high damage, having multiple charges and a quick cooldown, and even ricocheting on critical hits with a Jakobs manufacturer perk.
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Unless you’re running with a dedicated ordnance build, like a Vengeance Amon build, there’s quite literally no reason not to use a throwing knife. Its mere existence completely invalidates entire skills. Why would I need Harlowe’s Glow Up perk to increase gun critical hit chance specifically against irradiated enemies when I could save multiple skill points and just throw a knife? Creator EpicNNG has a video covering all the skills that are invalidated, and it’s a lot:
Just How BROKEN Is The Crit Knife In Borderlands 4? (VERY) – YouTube
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The thing is, I don’t think there’s a satisfying nerf. Sure, you could reduce the duration of these buffs down to only a handful of seconds, but again, you can already kill bosses in a second or two with the right setup. It would still be a source of guaranteed critical hits, which inherently breaks a number of builds anyway.
If Gearbox plans to simply knock these items down a peg in the hopes of stopping them from being must-have picks, it won’t work either. Whether the effects are reduced in duration or potency, you can’t change the fact that these throwables offer unmatched, absolute power with no downsides, especially if you’re not fussed about the ordnance slot to begin with, which most builds otherwise aren’t.
As much as removing the Penetrator Augment and Damage Amp Payload effects on throwing knives and pretending it never happened would resolve the crit knife conundrum, it’s far from a perfect solution. This leads to yet another issue: like all previous Borderlands games, there would be little incentive to use grenades in standard builds, and they would become obsolete. Ironically, that’s why Borderlands 4 introduced the ordnance system and more interesting throwables like the knives.
While they’ll likely still remain best-in-slot for your typical gun builds, I think the only real solution is to change the Penetrator effect to be either chance-based, active on a certain number of shots, or even just your next shot. No matter which one, critical hits would no longer be guaranteed. It would still provide an incredibly powerful on-demand buff all for just lobbing a knife, but you’d at least be more incentivised to invest a point or two in the skills these ordnance currently overshadow.
Either way, I don’t envy Gearbox. I can only imagine how much the developers must regret having ever introduced such an item, as once you’ve experienced such a power, it’s very hard to take it away.