New and Improved Tips for New Warframe Players

Just under a year ago, I wrote this article about Warframe tips for new players. At the time, I was a newbie, being carried around the star chart by much more skilled players. Now though, I’m a much better player and I actually somewhat know what I’m doing. At the very least, I can give a better idea of what you should be doing.

After all, older players have helped me. I should pass the baton and help newer players. Help them with some better tips.

Early Choices

I used to recommend choosing whatever you want as your starter character, but these days, your best choice is 100% Excalibur. While Volt is a perfectly good starter and Mag isn’t as horrible as she used to be, Excalibur is tankier. But more importantly, he’s much harder to obtain later on if you DON’T pick him This is no longer the case, as Excalibur is available from Mars, rather than Pluto. If you decide you dislike Excalibur, you can always join a clan and get the parts for Volt, or make your way to Phobos and get Mag. But really, there’s a far better option once you get to Venus and Mars – Rhino provides you with strength and tankiness, while Frost provides slows, crowd control and Utility.

On weapons, although I like the MK1-Paris, the MK1-Braton is a better choice due to the increasing number of enemies one will fight. Out of the Lato and MK1-Kunai, the Lato is so boring and horrible that I’d recommend the Kunai instead. Out of the melee weapons – the Skana and the MK1-Bo, pick which one you like.

There is a selection of MK1 weapons available for credits in the marketplace, including the MK1-Strun for people who want a shotgun, and the MK1-Furax for those who like punching people.

What mods should I use?

While there is a meta for weapons, you can use any weapon you want as you travel through the solar system, as long as you use the right mods. The most important mods are Serration for Rifles (and bows, sniper rifles and other primaries), Point Blank for Shotguns, Hornet Strike for Secondaries and Pressure Point for Melee weapons. It’s better to have only a high ranked Serration on your Braton than it is to have a bunch of different mods.

Elemental Mods – Heat, Cold, Electricity and Toxin – are the next best mods to put on your weapons and can be combined into more elements. Enemies have weaknesses to different elements, e.g. Grineer hate Corrosive (Toxin + Electricity) and Corpus hate Viral (Cold + Toxin).

For your Warframe, try and put Vitality and Redirection (health and shields) on, as these will stop you from dying. After that, Intensify (ability or power strength) and Flow (increases energy/mana) are good to have.

In your mod menu, some mod spaces have little icons on them. If you put a mod with a matching icon in that space, it will only use half its normal capacity. For example, an Intensify mod normally costs 11 points, but if you put it in a V spot, it will only cost 6 points.

As you level up, you get more space for mods on your items, up to 30. Later on, you will be able to obtain Orokin Reactors and Catalysts, which will double your capacity to 60. Only use these on items you really like, as they are rather rare.

Why is everyone so fast? Why is everyone jumping and spinning? How can I be fast?

Mobility is your best friend in Warframe. Bullet Jumps (crouch then jump) allow you to leap long distances and get past enemies. Be sure to roll a lot as well, as rolling reduces the damage you take. There is a mobility and advanced movement tutorial in the Codex in your ship, which you can play to learn or practice the basics, as well as mechanics like Wall-Jumping.

When playing solo, you should go at your own pace, but when playing with others, most will run to the objective, do it, then run to extraction. A good way to practice your speed and agility is by doing Spy and Capture missions. Spy missions require finesse and timing, while Capture missions require speed. Rescue missions require a bit of both.

If you fall down a pit, do not worry, you will be teleported back to safety. Be wary though, you will lose any Warframe buffs and abilities will need to be reactivated. For example, if you use Volt’s Speed ability and fall down a hole, Speed will be deactivated when you return.

What should I be doing? Am I progressing too slowly?

When you’re just starting off, your best bet is to work towards the junction for the next planet, unlocking worlds and quests as you do so. Not only does this give you more things to do, but you get access to new enemies, resources and Warframes.

Whether you go solo or with others is up to you. If you play on your own, you can set Matchmaking to Solo, which enables you to pause the game by pressing ESC.

A secondary objective should be leveling up weapons and Warframes to increase your Mastery Rank (MR). Many weapons in the game require a specific MR to use. To level up, you have to do a short test, such as killing 30 enemies with your melee weapon or hacking 8 consoles. You can only attempt a Mastery Rank test once a day, but you can practice as many times as you want by going to the Relays on Venus, Saturn and Pluto, visiting Simaris and using the practice areas there. If you fail a test, don’t worry, you won’t lose any ranks, you just have to wait 24 hours to try again.

As to how fast to progress, it doesn’t matter really. You go as fast or slow as you like. No one will judge you.

General things to avoid:

Don’t sell a weapon or Warframe before it is level 30. You will have to build and fully level the weapon again if you want to increase your MR.

Avoid leveling up Damaged mods unless that is all you have.

Don’t take items out of the Foundry until you’ve leveled up what you already have. The Foundry can hold an infinite number of items, but players have limited inventory space.

Try to spend your starter Platinum on Weapon and Warframe slots and avoid buying cosmetics. You will be able to trade for platinum and buy cosmetics later. On top of that, you can buy cosmetics with credits later on.

NEVER buy resources from the marketplace. Things like Orokin Cells, Polymer Bundles, all of these can be earned with ease, there is no reason to buy them with platinum.

On the same note, never buy single Forma for platinum. One Forma costs 20 platinum, but there is a Forma Bundle which costs 35 platinum and gives you 3 Forma.

When it comes to missions, don’t leave people behind. Wait at lifts for everyone to arrive, wait until everyone is ready for Survival, Rescue, Excavation and Defense missions. Make sure to pick up and take a Power Core with you to the next drill in Excavation missions.

If someone is already inside a Spy vault, wait outside unless they ask for your help and avoid triggering the alarms.

Avoid the Howl of the Kubrow mission. Kubrows are too expensive for a new player to maintain and aren’t that helpful early on anyway.

General things to look out for:

Get yourself a Taxon (by completing the Venus junction) and use the Taxon as soon as possible. Give it the Vacuum mod and it will suck loot towards you. Saves a ton of time and effort.

You have to be MR2 to enable trading with other players. Doing MR tests gives you more daily trades, but also unlocks capacity on weapons early – While an MR0 person can’t put any mods on their brand new weapons, an MR5 player can put a rank 5 mod on a brand new weapon.

If playing solo, take a look around for loot. Opening crates may drop Ayatan Stars, which can be traded to Maroo on Earth for Endo to level up your mods. Sometimes you may find rare white and gold statues – these can be sold to Maroo or traded with other players.

If you need quick credits, do Dark Sector missions. Romula on Venus will give you 10,000 credits for 5 rounds of Defense. The best early game credit spot is Seimeni, Ceres, which has a reward of around 20,000 credits, and also has a chance of dropping Orokin Cells.

Pay attention during quests. The conversations people have will give you vital lore information when it comes to the big quests later on.

Don’t be afraid to ask for help! Region Chat will happily give you advice, and players in Recruiting Chat will assist you in missions if you ask.

And if you do decide to start playing, I’m always happy to help. I also have a bunch of duplicate, undamaged mods which I’m happy to give you if you need them.

After all, it’s the least I can do.