MOD Aquisition as a Noob

[(PSN)firemedic623]

I have been playing for a week and after spending a bit of time playing and reading the forums, the consensus seems to be MODS make all the difference.  

I have done well farming some MODS but some are eluding me and / or I only have the damaged versions.  This leads me to my question.  

What are the top 5 or 10 MODS that I should buy from trade?  And if possible what is a fair price to pay as I don't want to get ripped off.

I am using Excalibur; whom I added a polarity slot and didn't realize it made it go unranked lol.  I also have Loki and Orthos.  I like playing all 3.  

Thank you for any feedback you may provide.  

 

Edited April 20, 2016 by (PS4)firemedic623

[ADirtyMonk]

The mods I list should be got for no more than 2p (uncommon, common) or 10-20p (rare/aura) each if unranked. Most players will have multiple copies of these mods and long time players may simply give them away for free if you ask nicely.

Essential mods (IMO)

Warframe: Vitality, Redirection (early-mid game only), Streamline, Continuity, Intensify, any aura (but pref Steel charge due to it having a higher max rank than any other aura)

Primary: Serration, Split chamber, Shred <-Rifle set. Point blank, Hells Chamber, Blaze, Seeking fury<-shotgun set

Secondary: Hornet Strike, Barrel Diffusion, Lethal torrent

Melee: Point Strike, Body count (may have to pay up to 20p), life strike (may have to pay up to 20p, do NOT rank up)

 

Other semi-essential

Warframe: steel fiber (tanky frames only), fast deflection (early game only), Corrosive Projection, Energy Siphon (passive energy regen), Rage (energy from damage taken), handspring (if knockdowns are an issue for you),

Primary: elemental mods, point strike, vital sense

Secondary: elemental mods, Winds of purity (Furis only)

Melee: elemental mods, blood rush, weeping wounds, berserker, pressure point, organ shatter

 

Edit: I have bolded the 10 I think you absolutely should get.

Edited April 20, 2016 by ADirtyMonk

[MillbrookWest]

For a new player, i personally would say Serration, and Vitality.

These won't be easy mods to level either. So the sooner you get them, the easier it makes getting everything else imho.

Once you've got those ADirtyMonk's post isn't that bad to follow either:

17 minutes ago, ADirtyMonk said:

The mods I list should be got for no more than 2p (uncommon, common) or 10-20p (rare/aura) each if unranked. Most players will have multiple copies of these mods and long time players may simply give them away for free if you ask nicely.

Essential mods (IMO)

Warframe: Vitality, Redirection (early-mid game only), Streamline, Continuity, Intensify, any aura (but pref Steel charge due to it having a higher max rank than any other aura)

Primary: Serration, Split chamber, Shred <-Rifle set. Point blank, Hells Chamber, Blaze, Seeking fury<-shotgun set

Secondary: Hornet Strike, Barrel Diffusion, Lethal torrent

Melee: Point Strike, Body count (may have to pay up to 20p), life strike (may have to pay up to 20p, do NOT rank up)

 

Other semi-essential

Warframe: steel fiber (tanky frames only), fast deflection (early game only), Corrosive Projection, Energy Siphon (passive energy regen), Rage (energy from damage taken), handspring (if knockdowns are an issue for you),

Primary: elemental mods, point strike, vital sense

Secondary: elemental mods, Winds of purity (Furis only)

Melee: elemental mods, weeping wounds, berserker, pressure point, organ shatter

 

Edit: I have bolded the 10 I think you absolutely should get.

 

 

[polarity]

Mods do not make the difference.  Leveled mods make the difference, which require that you play for a long time to collect the spare mods to fuse into them to level them up (or a lot of plat to buy max level mods).  That said:

Warframe

• Redirection
• Vitality
• Steel Fiber
• Fast Deflection
• Stretch
• Streamline
• Flow
• Intensify
• Continuity

With non-damaged versions of those at a decent level you'll be set up to farm vault mods, or go into higher leveled areas to get your hands on a wider range of warframe mods.

Warframe Auras:

• Corrosive Projection - if everyone in the group has this aura, it essentially removes all of an enemies armor, making it the biggest +damage mod at higher levels.
• Energy Siphon - gradually replaces your warframe's energy.
• Steel Charge - has a 'V' polarity where the previous 2 have a '-'.  Useful for some warframe abilities.

Slotting max level versions of these mods will actually give you more mod capacity, letting you put a max level redirection or vitality onto a level 0 warframe, making you a lot less squishy when you're trying to level it up.  Install one of the mobile apps to tell you when alerts happen, so you can get your hands on them.

Weapons (primary / secondary / melee):

 

• Serration / Hornet Strike / Pressure Point - your raw damage mods.  You will get more effect from leveling these than other mods, so getting them should be a priority.
• Split Chamber / Barrel Diffusion - Multishot will also give you a big increase in damage on ranged weapons.
• Point Strike / Pistol Gambit / True Steel - +crit chance.  More vital on crit weapons that have a good base crit chance to work from.
• Vital Sense / Target Cracker / Organ Shatter - +crit damage.  Again, more important on crit weapons, and those that already have a high crit damage multiplier (eg.soma)

Elemental mods for weapons (primary / secondary / melee):

• Hellfire / Heated Charge / Molten Impact
• Cryo Rounds / Deep Freeze / North Wind
• Stormbringer / Convulsion / Shocking Touch
• Infected Clip / Pathogen Rounds / Fever Strike

These will boost your damage significantly when you have the right combination for each enemy faction.

 

Personally I wouldn't spend plat on any of the above, unless they were 10 point mods, and they were fully leveled.  If you join a clan then people should be happy to give you most of those for nothing.  I always keep spares of every mod in case I come across a new player who needs some.  I certainly wouldn't spend any more than 2 plat on them if I wasn't having any luck getting them myself.

The only ones you might have trouble finding are the Multishot mods (farm Sargas Ruk for Split Chamber, you'll also get orokin cells which are very useful, and Dark Sector Defense for 20 waves for Barrel Diffusion), and Pathogen Rounds, the pistol toxin mod (Jupiter Elara and a lot of luck will eventually get it, but you'll also gather oxium, which is another useful resource).  You'll have no problem finding groups for these locations, and people there should be happy to carry newer players, so long as they aren't dying too much (high level redirection/vitality/steel fiber/fast deflection will ensure that)

The only mods I personally spent plat on were Rage and Quick Thinking, but they are required for some Trinity Builds, a frame that is highly dependent on having exactly the right mods.

Lastly:

Warframe Augments:

These can only be initially purchased from syndicates, and only after you have gained sufficient reputation from them by wearing their sigil while playing / doing syndicate missions, and by giving them built prime parts.  There are also 6 syndicates, while a player can represent at most 3, and the 3 syndicates you can choose won't provide mods for all the frames.  This means that you may well need to buy these mods from other players.  Some of these augments are required for certain warframe builds.

 

Edited April 20, 2016 by polarity

[(PSN)firemedic623]

I have been fortunate and picked up Flow, Streamline, and Rage over the last few days.  The other energy / power mods that I have are damaged.  

Thanks for all of the feedback, and if anyone else wants to give me suggestion I'm all ears.  

[Yzjdriel]

People hate on Redirection way too much.  It's a higher supply of effective health that heals itself.

Sure, shields won't do you much good if you get magnetic proc'd.  But the same thing goes for health when viral proc'd.  Play smart.

On a frame like Trinity (and especially Bless Trin), Redirection is waay more valuable than Vitality.  When you're leveling her, this applies even more, since you can't heal yourself that effectively until you hit level 10 - Well of Life is great and all, but I'm not going to waste bullets on an enemy who is floating above the rest of his comrades just to heal myself for the damage I'm going to take while aiming somewhere other than at the guys who are still shooting at me when I have ~100 health.  Trinity is squishy: that's why they gave Trin Prime extra memory-foam padding.

Back on topic: The set of mods that you should get for each category (higher importance listed first):

• Warframe: Redirection, Vitality, Flow, Continuity, Intensify, Streamline, Stretch.
• Shotguns: Point Blank, Blaze, Hell's Chamber
• Rifles: Serration, Split Chamber, Shred
• Bows: these conveniently use rifle mods
• Pistols: Hornet Strike, Barrel Diffusion
• Melee: Pressure Point, Virulent Scourge/Vicious Frost/Volcanic Edge/Voltaic Strike, Organ Shatter, Berseker, Life Strike, Reach
• Sentinel: Redirection, Vitality, Animal Instincts
• Kubrow: Link Shields, Link Health, Link Armor, and your kubrow will come with breed-specific mods
• Archwing: Energy Inversion, Enhanced Durability, Auxiliary Power, Argon Plating
• Arch-gun: Rubedo-Lined Barrel, Automatic Trigger, Dual Rounds
• Arch-melee: Cutting Edge, Extend

Try to get the mods for your Warframe and Primary weapon first, since those are your bread and butter.  If you prefer melee over run-and-gun, then try to get the melee mods first.

If you want to farm, the Wiki can help you figure out where to go.  If you'd rather just buy from trade, I suggest going into region and saying something like "hi, i'm new, can someone help me get the basic mods?"  Most players are friendly and will help you out if they have extra copies.  As far as pricing is concerned, Monk's right on for pricing on PC (though recently Life Strike has gone up in price by about 5p in recent weeks), though prices vary by platform.

I'd give you some of the mods myself, but sadly we're not on the same platform.

Hope this helps!

[ADirtyMonk]

7 minutes ago, Yzjdriel said:

People hate on Redirection way too much.  It's a higher supply of effective health that heals itself.

Sure, shields won't do you much good if you get magnetic proc'd.  But the same thing goes for health when viral proc'd.  Play smart.

On a frame like Trinity (and especially Bless Trin), Redirection is waay more valuable than Vitality.  When you're leveling her, this applies even more, since you can't heal yourself that effectively until you hit level 10 - Well of Life is great and all, but I'm not going to waste bullets on an enemy who is floating above the rest of his comrades just to heal myself for the damage I'm going to take while aiming somewhere other than at the guys who are still shooting at me when I have ~100 health.  Trinity is squishy: that's why they gave Trin Prime extra memory-foam padding.

Shields do not take armor, they do not regen while taking damage and there is no way to increase the regen rate outside of two rare arcanes or a few warframe abilities/aguments, as such once a player gets past early game or gains access to reliable health restore, it is vastly inferior to health.

Bless trinity should not require any survivability mods unless you are going for over 99.3% damage reduction or your loadout is not properly tuned to allow recasting of 99% blessing in under 1s.

[(PSN)firemedic623]

This is kind of a side note but when should I build / use a sentinel?

[Yzjdriel]

9 minutes ago, ADirtyMonk said:

Shields do not take armor, they do not regen while taking damage and there is no way to increase the regen rate outside of two rare arcanes or a few warframe abilities/aguments, as such once a player gets past early game or gains access to reliable health restore, it is vastly inferior to health.

Bless trinity should not require any survivability mods unless you are going for over 99.3% damage reduction or your loadout is not properly tuned to allow recasting of 99% blessing in under 1s.

This is not an endgame discussion.  This is a help thread for a new player.  Shields are vastly superior to health when you first begin, because you can simply run, hide, and wait three seconds to completely restore your effective health.

[Yzjdriel]

5 minutes ago, (PS4)firemedic623 said:

This is kind of a side note but when should I build / use a sentinel?

Whenever you feel like it, really.  I didn't get around to it until MR 8, but that's just me.

I recommend either Helios or Carrier when you decide to start that project.

[ADirtyMonk]

10 minutes ago, Yzjdriel said:

This is not an endgame discussion.  This is a help thread for a new player.  Shields are vastly superior to health when you first begin, because you can simply run, hide, and wait three seconds to completely restore your effective health.

I only posted the correction because your original post did not mention that shields are superior for early game only. Otherwise you are correct.

Edited April 20, 2016 by ADirtyMonk

[Omnimorph]

All great advices up-thread.  Just to add re. levelling mods, the cost of putting pips into mods increases exponentially (or something like exponentially, not sure), IOW, it costs as much in terms of other mods and fusion cores to rank up the last pip of a mod like Serration or Redirection, as it cost for all the pips before.

Point being that you should concentrate on prioritizing filling up the pips on all the most important mods (e.g. the main "damage" mods, Serration, Hornet Strike and Pressure Point, and the main "tank" mods Redirection, Vitality and Steel Fiber (whichever combo thereof is most suitable to your frame), are the top priorities to fill up the pips on - get all the other mods, but putting pips in these mods will give you the best bang for buck). 

But, once you're up to like 2 pips short of full on the big mods with lots of pips like that, you're kind of functional enough, no need to sweat getting them to absolutely full, you'll eventually fill them out in the course of play. 

So once you're 1 or 2 pips short on those top priority mods (damage and tanking) that's the time to start putting pips into the energy usage, duration, range and power strength mods on your frame (Streamline, Flow, Continuity, Stretch and Intensify), and then the "multishot" mods on the weapons (attack rate, Fury, for melee).  Then once you have them up to a reasonable standard, you can start looking at other mods (e.g. elemental and dual stat elementals for weapons, or possibly crit mods, and Corrupted mods for frames, etc.).

Obviously this is just a rule of thumb - e.g. if you really feel you need more range on one of your abilities and it would help you out a lot, by all means put other mods on hold and rank up Stretch, that type of thing. But as a general rule, min-max so that you put most pips into what gives you the most bang for buck at the stage you're at, and that means spreading your pips between the main damage and main tanking mods to start with.  You can slot whatever you like apart from that, it won't make much difference until they're ranked up, but those are the mods that you'll feel the most difference from.

Oh, and also be aware of the bang for buck re. what you rank up mods with: fusion cores are the most cost-effective, then a mod of exactly the same type (though it's a good rule to always keep a reserve copy of any mod just on the off chance someone might want to buy it at some point), then a mod of the same polarity, then a mod of any other polarity.  Generally, it's not cost effective to rank up a mod of one polarity with a mod of another polarity.

Edited April 20, 2016 by Omnimorph