Valorite have all the abilities of ALL of the lesser ore eles.
The pet/summons/spell immunity of the Shadow (earthquake is one of the few damaging spells that work)
The Damage Reflect of the Copper
The Ranged attack of the Bronze
The Strength of the Gold & the resists of the Agapite (or is it the other way around?)
The ability to break items that don't have an "Insured", "Blessed" or "Cursed" tag, of the Verite.
Note, though, that you can do damage to shadows and valorites by provoing other wild creatures on them, or by having them chase you to an area with blue spawns (that's why many feel the best place to mine for valorite and shadow eles are near sacrifice or spirituality in Ilshenar, as you can run to the Meer or the Oaks champ spawn, and let them kill it for you, then you loot, if you can't handle it).
The best weapon against the coppers & valorites is a fast, low-damage weapon (if you use a slayer, you want to use an earth elemental slayer for all other types, but either the Elemental super slayer (double, instead of triple) or no slayer at all against copper or valorite, to prevent a suicidal creature attack/yours reflected combo).
Archer works good, but you got to make distance.
Melee works better, but you best have a high-resist suit.
Tamer is ok, as long as you aren't going after shadow eles or valorite eles.
Axiam: note that the Vollem from the SA bonus gift crystal can replace the nightmare in the Nightmare/Fire Beetle combo for non-tamers, as it's literally a reskinned nightmare that can't be ridden, and no taming skill needed to own. Plus, it's bonded and can be rezzed, unlike the crafted Vollem (golem). So, you can have the firepower of a fully trained Vollem (nightmare) and a fully trained Fire Beetle, in addition to your weapon skill of choice on any flavor of warrior miner.
You can also play around a bit with equipment and make a template that is dedicated. My main blacksmith has 120 Smith, 100 mining, and about 600 points of combat skills (tactics, anatomy, healing, chivalry, parrying and macing, with the 120 macing being all real skill - I could actually have modified 120 by replacing my jewelry and have even more). A similar template with no smithing could add bushido (replacing chivalry with necro is optional)