Comparative Warframe Guide?

[Sines314]

Is there any guide out there that lists warframes in a way to help decide between frames? Right now, I just look at the wiki, but it's hard to form an opinion on frames from just pure facts. Someone describing how a frame ends up being played in general and why a player might like it. If I knew how Trinity would play ahead of time, I would have gotten her MUCH sooner :D

If there's not any good guides out there, perhaps you can help with the specific issue I have right now. I'm currently putting together a Valkyr frame. It's massive armor and nice array of abilities looked pretty nice (although, again, a playstyle guide would have helped :P). However, I don't have the slots for it. Looking at my current set of frames, most of them have their points, but Excalibur never really interested me. Radial Blind is nice, and that's about it. His ult is just a "Kill everyone" button that lots of other people have, super jump is very niche, and slash dash just doesn't do enough damage or have any interesting utility to feel worth it. Further, he has very bland base stats on top of that. I was thinking of selling him to free up the slot (but using the shifting sands Affinity Boost to get it to 30 for Mastery first). What do people like to use him for, and how does he compare to other frames?

Oh, and I doubt it'll come up, but is there any issue just leaving a build frame in the forge indefinitely? In order to cut down on build time, I might just start building a bunch of frames long before I actually want them, and leave them there until I sell an old frame, or buy a new slot.

[Zero.No.Hikari]

Valkitty is an amazing frame though she needs corrupted mods and maxed armor and health mods to truly.shine. I run a Blind Rage Narrow minded build for hysteria warcry and paralysis along g with rage flow and vitality and steel fibre you'll find no other frame as Tanky as her bar zephyr wind wall. I myself run Excalibur as support with superjump+Slash Dash combo wombo.

[Tatersail]

usually frames have 1 or 2 skills that define them. What you use is mostly player choice

 

Ash - goes invisible, push 4 to kill everything including most boss mobs, high health

 

Banshee - Weak spots on enemies allows for massive gun damage, a knockdown and a huge channeled aoe that staggers things but does no real damage, good for interception.

 

Ember - Aoe damage skills, but doesn't scale and has nothing else, good for very low level rushing.

 

Excalibur - Radial blind stops things shooting you, but its going to be nerfed

 

Frost - Snow globe, limited protection from guns in a bubble, good for defending

 

hydroid - wishes he was Vauban, good vs infested and defense

 

Loki - Goes invisible, Disarms everything in a large radius, also had a Decoy, low health and shields, good in almost all situations.

 

Mag - Makes enemies shields explode in a large aoe, killing all corpus, and dealing massive damage in the void. high shields, stupidly good vs Corpus.

 

Mirage - spawns 4 clones that draw fire, and deals increased gun damage, also has a radial blind, good if you just want to shoot things

 

Nekros - mash 3 for more loot and O2 in surv, nice when somebody else plays this.

 

Nova - Huge damage boost, Huge aoe damage, Huge damage, can also slow or speed things, low shields, good at most things.

 

Nyx - Can control things by making them shoot each other, also absorbs damage and deals it back in an AOE

 

Oberon - bad frame don't use

 

Rhino - Great earlygame frame, ironskin absorbs damage making most missions trivial, also has a team damage bonus, and a large AOE stun, which deals enough damage to kill low levels

 

Saryn - Decent AOE ultimate + stun, this scales out later on, high health

 

Trinity - Heals the party, has huge personal damage reduction, and gives energy to the team

 

Valkyr - Can go immune and self heal, High armor and armor boost skill, can spiderman about for added fun

 

Vauban - Can pin targets in a large aoe, or pull them all into a vortex allowing total control, amazing vs infested

 

Volt - Decent aoe nuke that scales out, along with a speed and melee boost, and a 1 way shield that boosts gun damage, also has high shields

 

Zephyr - Can fly, damage reduction skill, and random tornado control skill that steals loot, has a high shields

 

 

 

 

You can watch some youtube videos... all frames have there place and do something that others can't (except Oberon)

 

its very hard to recommend frames, because its very dependent on your playstyle, the level of your guns, and frame mods, the missions you play, who you play with, and if you use multiple forma/potato.

 

I use most of the frames at some point for something, the exceptions being Hydroid, Oberon, and Ember. and I do still pull them out and do a low level mission sometimes.   need sleep...

Edited October 12, 2014 by Tatersail

[Sines314]

its very hard to recommend frames, because its very dependent on your playstyle, the level of your guns, and frame mods, the missions you play, who you play with, and if you use multiple forma/potato.

 

Yah, that's why I'd like it if there was a guide where someone went into detail on how they play, then I can make an informed decision. I love Trinity because I'm constantly casting to keep up my Link for defense, while feeding it with Energy Vampire, and clutch healing myself or my party with Blessing. Very cast heavy, and thanks to Energy Vampire, she can really pull it off. But it's hard to see how a frame will play out. Still, your telling me what they end up being used for in practice was some help.

Saying Oberon is bad is interesting though. I do have a level 8 Oberon frame that I could sell easily. The downside is that if I ever want to get him back, I can't farm him directly in an hour or two. I farmed him back when that was a relatively easy thing to do, because he dropped from a boss.

 

Anyone else want to back Tater up on Oberon being useless? Radial Blind is nice, so maybe I will sell Oberon instead and keep Excalibur for now.

Edited October 12, 2014 by Sines314

[Spacetimer]

Oberon is not easy to build, which is not the same as him being bad. He has good healing, very high damage, and decent crowd control in the form of radiation procs/knockdowns. There's a few things that's stopping him from being an amazing frame - the fact that Radiation procs need dense crowds to be reliable, the limited range of Reckoning, and Renewal's travel time. Once you learn to compensate for those he's a top-notch teammate though. I'll usually take either Loki or Oberon into T4 Defenses.

[Arabaxus]

Ash - Liberal dispensing of Shuriken and Bladestorm with Power Strength, Efficiency, and Range. Dunk duration. Can keep Smoke Screen for ghetto stun and 3 seconds of safety. Job to slay crowds (and even heavy targets) with Bladestorm.

 

Banshee - Great for augmenting gun damage and stun, abilities do little direct damage. Use Sonar and Sound Quake. Job to increase team damage output and sometimes provide CC.

 

Ember - Good against Infested and low levels as abilities do not scale well. Makes Ignis not garbage with Accelerant. Fireball, World on Fire, and Fireblast all focus on dealing direct damage through abilities. Job to slaughter crowds of infested.

 

Excalibur - Soon to be worse Radial Blind, rest of abilities are mediocre at best. 

 

Frost - Power Duration and Strength for Snow Globe, use Stretch to mitigate some of the Range issues through Narrow Minded. Use Snow Globe and Avalanche. Freeze is bad. Ice Wave is arguable. Job to guard defense points.

 

Hydroid - Reduce Power Range, increase Duration, Strength and Efficiency. Lower range increases consistency of Tempest Barrage, arguably one of the best 1 abilities for CC. Tidal Surge scales through Duration. Undertow for emergency relief, and Tentacle Swarm for immediate area CC.

 

Loki - Increase all other ability stats, reduce Power Strength. Keep Invisibility and Radial Disarm, makes you effectively invincible and removes ranged functions of enemies. Arguably one of the best frames. Job is to slay crowds with sweep melee and heavy targets while protecting teammates by making all enemies melee only with Disarm.

 

Mag - CC good against Corpus. Most abilities Magnetic based. Would increase Range, Strength, and Efficiency at cost of duration.

 

Mirage - Hall of Mirror's your only defense. Use Eclipse in light to grossly increase weapon damage, in dark to mitigate incoming damage. Forgo Prism. Boost Power Efficiency, Strength, and Duration at cost of Range.

 

Nekros - Only Desecrate, increase Range. Put mods for survivability, Natural Talent is useful.

 

Nova - M-Prime and Anti-Matter Drop for massive damage. Power Strength important, debatable on Range or Duration.

 

Nyx - Nerfed Absorb now terrible for high levels. Chaos still fantastic, crowd Radiation proc. Increase Range and Efficiency. Low Duration to be able to recast Chaos. Great for CC and lower level point defense and nuking entire rooms with Absorb.

 

Oberon - Mostly focus on healing with some CC capabilities. Consider a Rage build with Vitality. 

 

Rhino - Either Power Range to use Stomp 8 second stasis CC or increase others at cost of Range to capitalize on Stomp Damage, Roar, and Iron Skin. Roar augments gun damage, Iron Skin grants immunity to most status effects and enemy CC. 

 

Saryn - No experience, don't know.

 

Trinity - Mostly health and energy restorer for team. Support role.

 

Valkyr - Hysteria and War-Cry are good, Paralysis and Rip-Line arguable to bad. Can face-tank even without Hysteria with a Life Strike melee and Rage. Draw aggro and deal as much damage as possible.

 

Vauban - Vortex for Infested, Bastille for all. Increase Efficiency and Duration and mitigate Narrow Minded with Overextended and Stretch. Power Strength affects Bastille targets per Bastille but a cheap Bastille means you can cast multiple for better value. Keep enemies CCed and try not to die.

 

Volt - Great for non-endless missions for increased running speed. Drop Electric Shield as cover for allies and increase their damage output. Great support/buff class, with some weaker offensive abilities.

 

Zephyr - Has imprecise air mobility, Tornado CCs at the cost of flinging loot everywhere, Turbulence for % based chance to avoid damage, similar to EVA builds of other games which rely on the chance of not getting hit. Not sure about team role, usually an annoyance for me.

Edited October 12, 2014 by Arabaxus

[Kalvorax]

I used zephyr alot yesterday. she is great for survival (havent tested towers yet) due to highest health and shields (450 without vitality/redirection/vigor) and with max vat/redir can get to 1110 and 1290 with maxed vigor. Her turbulence is really good against corpus by always deflecting the normal laser rifles (ones with travel time) (except instant laser rifles) and can block grapple effects from ancients and scorpions (Grineer) and its decent against grineer as bullets can still get through. She can move around really quickly and while i cant speak for other players, I havent had issues of loot being flung all over with her Tornadoes. 

 

I'll add other frames as I can remember them.

Edited October 12, 2014 by xcynderx

[Sines314]

So, if there's new that Radial Blind will be nerfed, is there any news on buffing anything else about him? More defense? Buffs to his other abilities? I don't much care for Radial Blind, especially compared to other defensive skills, so that'd already be enough to sell the frame. But maybe if he gets buffed in other areas, then I'll be happy to move over.