Is Lightning Damage a Problem?

Precisely what it says on the tin. It seems like the dominant builds so far in this game are Lightning Damage builds. Meanwhile, if I'm not getting killed by Volatile Plants (which are apparently working as intended, since months of complaints don't appear to have moved the devs to reconsider their implementation), you can be almost guaranteed that I'm getting killed by enemies with lightning skills or lightning-modified abilities.

While in principle, the idea of a damage type whose identity is "I have a larger range than my peers" isn't bad, I think the high end hits from lightning attacks are probably too high. Having 75 or 76% lightning resistance doesn't guarantee that lightning attacks will be manageable, and their huge spikes in damage mean that one hit might nearly kill you. Meanwhile, the ailment they inflict merely increases the amount of damage you take, meaning that a pack of enemies with high attack speeds and lightning damage can kill you before you even know what's happening.

It's early days, and this might just be bad luck on my end. But it certainly seems that Lightning damage is overperforming relative to its compatriots.

Agreed.

Even from the perspective of player damage it seems overly strong. Getting a high rolled crit on bosses feels great and shock helps all damage sources in every fight.

Other types like fire seem to have nothing to compete with that. (I like fiery death for esthetics but would not give up shock for it)