Elite Augment Core

Elite Augment Cores (shortened to EAC [ EACs plural] or Core/Cores by players) are items in. They were added to the game in the February 2015 update that brought Nightmare Mode and Black weapons to the game.

EACs are quite difficult to obtain, and can only be obtained in five ways: The first way is via Augmentation Rewards, whereby the player is most likely to receive their first EAC and a maximum of 8 cores can be obtained. The second way to obtain an EAC is to craft it with alloy and cash, costing 300,000 alloy and $80,000,000 per EAC. The third way is to find an EAC in Nantonium Strongboxes dropped by Savage Devastator Elites (5% chance) or  Savage Necrosis Elites (15% chance). The fourth way is to receive a core(s) as a reward from Championships. The fifth and final way is to receive 1 EAC for every Epic Pack purchased. The Nantonium strongboxes from the Nightmarish Savage Devastator Elite have a 5% chance of getting a EAC, while Nantonium dropboxes from a Nightmarish Savage Necrosis Elite have a 15% chance of getting a EAC. In light of the second method, it can be considered better to open a Nantonium Strongbox dropped by a Nightmarish Savage Devastator Elite or Nightmarish Savage Necrosis Elite in the hopes of getting an EAC right there, rather than to scrap it for alloy for future crafting (5% > 0.016%).

As of version 1.10, the Faction Warfare armory may sell EACs for 40,000 credits and 2,500 planetary favors.

EACs are hard to find even at high levels (level 90-100), and they are by no means cheap to craft, thus it is recommended to use them with due foresight.

Uses
Elite Augment Cores can be used in any combination of the following ways:
 * Add an augment slot to a weapon/armor (4 slots max for weapons, 3 slots max for armor; costs 2 EACs)
 * Add an augment grade to a weapon/armor (12 grade max, costs 1 EAC)
 * Remove all augments (costs 1 EAC)
 * Increase weapon stats by + 5%, such as base damage, rate of fire, pierce, clip size, and damage over time [1 EAC / +5% and a maximum of +50% with 10 EACs in total]
 * Increase armor stats by + 5%, such as physical, heat and toxic resistances [1 EAC / +5% and a maximum of +50% with 10 EACs in total]

Related Achievements

 * The Augmented Elite
 * Ultimate Badass

Trivia

 * When they were first introduced into SAS4, a weapon or armor piece could be based cored 20 times. This has been nerfed to 10 base cores not much later.
 * Cores can be used on Z-Arm Tech weapons, but will not be shown in the Collections tab.
 * Elite Augment Cores are now giving the correct amount of damage, pierce and damage over time in the 1.11 update.(Steam, Mobile)