Good Guy Oberon – A Bit of Everything

Oberon is a weird frame. A lovely frame, a powerful frame, but a weird frame. Often described as a paladin and a protector of nature, Oberon can both heal and hurt, giving you plenty of ways to use and abuse his power. His normal self appears as a deer-like being, while Oberon Prime takes on features that are closer to that of a goat.

Let’s start with obtaining Oberon. Oberon parts have a chance of dropping from Eximus enemies. You know, the ones with the weird mesh energy effects on them that have a range of weird and annoying abilities and auras. Theoretically, you can actually obtain a whole set of Oberon blueprints before you obtain Rhino, but Oberon requires parts that are far beyond the reach of anyone who just finished killing the Jackal. Of course, being drops from Eximus units, this means that extra Oberon part blueprints can be found anywhere, and they can become a handy mini supply of credits, especially after long Survival missions.

Oberon’s abilities are also confusing. For a being that supposedly cares a lot about nature and stuff, it’s weird that most of his abilities do radiation damage. Yeah, radiation. Last time I checked, radiation wasn’t a friend of nature.

Smite is your basic “aim at an enemy and do damage” ability, akin to Freeze, Shock and all the basic elemental abilities. It does radiation damage to a target and splits off dealing damage to other nearby enemies. Smite is actually one of the stronger elemental one-handed abilities, as the orbs that split off from your first victim do a percentage of the first victim’s maximum health and shields. So ideally, you want to aim at a stronger target if you want to maximize damage. Smite has an augment, Smite Infusion, which lets you cast Smite on allies so they deal extra Radiation damage. Good for Eidolons.

Hallowed Ground is my favourite ability. When cast, you lat out a carpet of foliage in front of you. Enemies that stand on it get radiation on them and take a tiny bit of damage every second. But allies who stand on it immediately have (almost) all negative status effects removed and become immune to further status effects. There’s an augment here too but it’s shit. I’d much rather have multiple carpets (up to four) than be able to make one carpet of grass explode.

Renewal is a healing ability. You activate it, your energy drains and your nearby allies are healed. This applies to fellow Tenno, things created by Tenno, Defense Operatives and Rescue Targets, Companions and Sentinels but not things like Excavators and Cryopods. The more things you heal, the more energy drains from you, but fully healed team mates will get status effects removed. Anyone who dies under the effects of renewal will have their bleedout timers extended. And on top of that? If you’re standing on Hallowed Ground while Renewal is active, you get extra armour too. Renewal also has a very nice augment called Phoenix Renewal, which will instantly revive a downed team mate under the effects of Renewal, with a cooldown of 90 seconds.

Reckoning is Oberon’s fancy fourth ability. Oberon raises enemies into the air and slams them into the ground, hurting them big time. You kill someone, they might drop a health orb. You do this over Hallowed Ground? Enemies that survive get less armour. Enemies that don’t get affected by Reckoning get briefly blinded. The augment for Reckoning creates fields that give allies armour and damages enemies over time, but it’s a rather niche mod.

As for how to play Oberon? That’s generally a mixed bag. Most of the time, people tend to focus on Renewal, but I use a more rounded build that focuses on both Renewal and Hallowed Ground. Luckily, that’s what’s nice about Oberon, because he’s a mixed bag, you can generally throw any set of mods on him you want and you’ll still end up with a pretty functional build. You can take Oberon almost anywhere and still be able to get things done. Sure, you’re not going to out-damage a Chroma and you’re not going to out-heal a Trinity, but Oberon has enough to be able to keep everyone on his team going, while also dealing some damage and providing utility as well.

Thanks to Oberon’s passive, Kubrows and Kavats are also good things to have by your side, as they gain extra health and shields. This is a billion times better than Oberon’s old passive, which made wild Kubrows and Kavats, as well as Hyekkas and Drahks, become allies briefly. Oberon did get a rework before he got his Prime version, but his abilities did mostly stay the same.

Ideally though, you’ll want some energy and some efficiency. Oberon’s power comes from keeping his Renewal active and using Smite and Reckoning regularly. Renewal can end up draining a lot of energy, and with no hard crowd control or super fast killing abilities, running out can be problematic to an Oberon.

There are several good tips though. Oberon can get quite energy hungry, but he has a high health pool and low shields, meaning that Rage and Hunter Adrenaline, which restore energy when you take health damage, are very good on him. Armour is also good to have as well, since your shields will do very little.

Oberon also has one of the nicest deluxe skins in the game the Feyarch skin, and with this skin is a high ranking contender for Best Butt in Warframe. Shame his butt is always covered with some sort of fabric…