Eruptor vs Crossbow

Edit: It appears I have been running off of outdated information! I had no clue that the armor system had been reworked and that the technical videos I’ve been watching are outdated! Fun! For your reading pleasure I have updated the information of this to make sense with the new system.

Before I get into this, I just want to say, I am not asking for a crossbow nerf.

Is it just me or does the Exploding Crossbow just do better in every way than the Eruptor? The Crossbow fires faster, deals more damage, has less recoil, has more spare mags, reloads faster, and is one handed. Every other stat, like armor pen, mag capacity, damage type, they’re all identical.

The only “upsides” to the Eruptor are that it’s scope is slightly better (useless if you’re not aiming in first person) and that it’s project is slightly faster. You can’t even get much use out of the less drop the Eruptor has because unlike the crossbow, the Eruptor’s projectile has a limited life —which, mind you, isn’t even an airburst, it explodes after a fixed distance regardless of if you wanted it to or not— so it’s not going to be able to long range take out a fabricator or shrieker nest.

Like I said earlier, I’m not calling for a crossbow nerf, I actually think the Eruptor should get a single buff: increase it’s armor pen from level 3 medium penetration to level 4 heavy penetration. Don’t increase its fire rate or its damage, just make it punch through everything short of a tank. It feels more at home in an area similar to the AMR, slow and bolt action, but it can damage anything. Keep the crossbow as the generalist explosive weapon and then make the Eruptor the “worse” crossbow that can hit pretty much anything.

Thank you for coming to my Super Ted Talk