My Five Favourite Warframe Bows

In most games, bows are generally not particularly strong, at least when compared with guns and the like. But in Warframe, bows are actually really strong, keeping up and even beating standard guns. In fact, some of the strongest weapons in Warframe are bows. Anyway, here are my favourite bows.

5. Rakta Cernos

Coming in at number five, we have the Rakta Cernos. Compared to the rest of the list, the Rakta Cernos is very much a standard bow. It shoots basic arrows that basically pin enemies to nearby walls. However, what makes the Rakta Cernos stand out is how quickly the bow fires. It’s firing speed is insane, and you can really fire a lot of arrows in a short space of time. The bow also isn’t insanely difficult to get – while you do need to get to max rank with Red Veil, you can purchase the bow fully-made, rather than having to buy a blueprint.

The Rakta Cernos also wins when it comes to style. It’s the only bow that hangs symmetrically on your back, rather than being holstered to one side like all other bows.

4. Lenz

The Lenz is a weapon I’ve mentioned before, but it’s a really unusual bow, even compared to other bows in Warframe. Each shot creates a sphere of freezing energy that slows enemies down, before exploding in a massive area of effect, with a short delay. The Lenz easily kills a lot of enemies in one go, and because of the cold damage, it stops enemies from escaping the explosion. The only downside is that you have only a handful of shots before you run out of ammo. Luckily, the Lenz does have built-in ammo mutation, meaning it can convert different ammo types into the type that the Lenz uses.

3. Proboscis Cernos

Have you ever played as Nidus? If the answer is yes, then you can doubly enjoy the Proboscis Cernos. Its mutated arrows work just like Nidus’s Larva, shooting out tentacles and dragging enemies together. But then the infested arrow explodes, doing plenty of damage. Not only is the Proboscis Cernos strong, but it also offers crowd control, which very few other weapons can offer. However, the crafting process is not easy. To get a Proboscis Cernos, you first need to craft a Cernos, craft that into a Mutalist Cernos, then craft the Mutalist Cernos into the Proboscis Cernos. A pain in the butt, but it’s worth it.

2. Kuva Bramma

The Kuva Bramma is very much a “love it or hate it” weapon. You either love it for the amazing damage it causes, or you hate it because you think it’s too powerful. In fact, the Kuva Bramma has been nerfed multiple times. Its latest nerf was the fact that specters and clones (i.e. Wukong’s twin, Equinox’s other form and Excalibur Umbra) using the Bramma will run out of ammo, same way a normal player would. However, despite all these nerfs, the Kuva Bramma is still an amazing weapon. Its explosive shots explode into smaller bomblets, with quite a good range on them. The downside is that the explosions can easily knock you back, so you need to keep some distance. That being said, the Kuva Bramma helped me immensely on the Steel Path, and I still recommend it, even if it has been nerfed a lot.

1. Mutalist Cernos

At the end of the day, my favourite bow is the Mutalist Cernos. While it’s not as strong as its brother, the Proboscis Cernos, I find the Mutalist Cernos is one of my favourite weapons overall. I mean, every time you fire it, it spawns a cloud of fart gas. It also pairs very nicely with Split Flights, which the Bramma and Lenz both can’t use. In fact, multishot is the way to go with this bow. While ideally you want to get direct hits for any real damage, but in low level missions, the clouds themselves are also pretty damn deadly.

The Mutalist Cernos is also the weapon I’ve opened the most Rivens for, for a total of 6, three of which were all in a row. Sadly I sold most of my Mutalist Cernos Rivens a while back, but I do still have one Riven which I regularly use. The amount of multishot I can get on the Mutalist Cernos is insane, and leads to corridors of yellow gas.

The Forgotten Bonus Bow – Nataruk

I don’t know why, but I constantly forget that the Nataruk exists. It’s given to you during the New War, a weapon made by Hunhow himself, to help defeat his errant children. The Nataruk is a brilliant bow and does wonders against Sentients. It needs very little to work and it packs a punch. However, it’s weirdly not very memorable, despite being the main weapon in the New War, alongside the Sirocco amp/Drifter gun. I still prefer the Mutalist Cernos though, it’s more fun.