Modding Tips

Last updated: 2026 january 22

Standard disclaimer that this is not an all-encompassing guide. It's just tips I think might be useful in the early game when you're learning how the system works and/or your resources are limited

General

Mods take up Mod Capacity when placed in a build, displayed as x/30 or x/60 on the modding screen depending on whether you have invested a potato (orokin reactor/catalyst) to double the capacity
Mods also have polarity, the little symbol in the top right of each mod (the most common three are often referred to as V, D, and - in the community). Match this polarity to the slot you place it on and half the capacity drain! Put it on a non-matching polarity and it'll instead take up 1.5x the capacity
The stats on the left will update as you place stuff on. Experiment! If you hover over a specific stat, it might tell you more about what it affects or what else falls under its umbrella
Generally speaking, while you're still strapped for endo and/or credits, investing in a lot of mods halfway >>>>> investing in a few mods all the way. Don't stress about getting a 10-pip mod maxxed (<- I barely have any maxxed, most of them are at 8/10 bc the increase in power vs increase in resource cost is just Not Worth It. But here I'm talking about leaving them at, like, 5 pips instead). You'll do a lot more with a handful of functional mods than a single very powerful one
If you have extras, combining 4 mods in your Mod Inventory Whatever That I Forgot The Name Of will turn into one different mod. This can be a way to get some stuff you don't already have! Both utter junk and Good Shit
Otherwise you can also melt down extra mods for endo or credits. Barring very specific mods for optimising builds later on, you have no use for a million extras (e.g. the mods i have fully ranked 10-pips of I also have an 8-pip copy to fit them onto more builds if capacity is tight)
Mod to make things more powerful, yes, but also more fun. Warframe feels sluggish? Sprint speed! Run out of magazine too fast? Magazine capacity! Knife feels too short? Range (on melee, not your warframe)! The no1 thing you're trying to achieve here is fun

Warframes

Aura mods, which go at the top of your build, give you Mod Capacity instead of taking it away, giving more if you match the Mod Polarity of the aura slot. You can get a lot of different aura mods from Nightwave, with the stock changing every week!
Hover over the ability icons under your stats on the left to see how your modding has affected the stats of your abilities. Most abilities scale off of a selection of Duration, Strength, Range, and Efficiency, with some oddballs also taking into account other things like Rhino's Iron Skin scaling off of both Strength and Armour
Some warframe stats improve a bit as you rank them up, in most cases these are Shields, Health, and Energy
Different warframes survive differently. Look at what their abilities can do and what their stats are to figure out whether you should invest in Health, Shields, neither, or perhaps Armour
E.g. Mag can generate Shields with her abilties and has way more Shields than Health, so you should focus on Shields with her. Volt cannot generate Shields through abilities (I'm not getting into Augments right now) but still has way higher Shields, making it more worth it. Compare to Lavos' really high Health and Armour, making these worth investing into, or Rhino's tanking through his Iron Skin instead of Health/Shield amounts
Energy Max and Efficiency are your friends to mod for if you want to be casting your abilities a lot
Okay NOW I'm getting into Augments actually. The six Faction Syndicates (the fuckers that live on relays and can send death squads after you) each sell Augment Mods to specific warframes if you reach Rank 5 with them. Which means this is a way away probably but I wanted to talk about it anyway. Augment Mods change how a specific ability of your warframe works if you add them to a build, adding an extra layer of optional bullshit you can do funny things with
Do you guys know what an Arcane is yet? Feck. Maybe. Arcanes show up on the right of you build as little sime circular dudes. You can apply two per warframe, their rank-up system is duplicate based instead of other resource based (e.g. 1 copy of an arcane is rank 0, but you can combine 3 of them to make a rank 1) and their effects are usually conditional instead of permanent (e.g. On Headshot: +60% Parkour Velocity for 18s)

Weapons - All

There are three (plus one but that's the Misc Weirdos, so three) types of elements: Physical, Basic, and Combined
Physical elements are Slash, Impact, and Puncture. What you need to know about them for now is that they act a bit weird: the mods that say they add, say, + Slash Damage only work if your weapon already has Slash. Physical elements cannot be added to weapons that lack that specific type
Basic elements are Heat, Cold, Electric, and Toxin. They can be added to any weapon, but watch out!
Basic elements combine! Two at a time. I'm not writing out the combos but you can find them on the wiki or learn by experimenting. The order in which you place your mods matters for this going left to right, top to bottom.
E.g. if you place Heat, Toxin, and Cold on your weapon, you'll get Gas + Cold. But if the order is instead Heat, Cold, Toxin, you'll get Blast + Toxin
How to know if to invest into Crit or Status on a gun: as a general rule of thumb, if the Crit Chance is 20% or more and the Multiplier 2x or more, it's worth it. If the Status Chance is 20% or more it's also worth it. If neither of these stats get that high up, I'm sorry, the weapon is probably from like 2014 and the devs shafted you there

Weapons - Guns

Most guns are Fuckign Noisy so if you want to do stealth while shooting, either look for one that shows up as "Noise Level: Silent" in the Arsenal or acquire the Hush mod to make a noisy gun shut the fuck up
Shotguns have a separate mod pool from other primaries. They just do. I'm sorry

Weapons - Melee

Much like warframes, melee weapons also have a type of mod that goes on top of the build and adds capacity rather than take it away: Stance Mods. They also modify the animation set that comes with the melee weapon, and melee types that have multiple stance mods available ofc always have A Best One and A Worst One. For now you don't need to worry about that, just add a stance mod if you have it. If you have multiple, get a feel for which one you like more
Heavy Attacks are the kinda thing you probably wanna make an entire build around but no one is stopping you from messing with it even without that. You might want to slap on some Heavy Attack Wind Up Speed if you do, to make the animations faster
Some different melee types have their own gimmicks (e.g. a few exclusive mods) but the Weirdos of the bunch are Glaives, which you wind up to throw by holding your melee key (default E) and explode mid-flight by pressing your heavy attack key (default Middle Mouse Button), which returns it immediately to your hand. Otherwise it'll return after bouncing a few times (I fuckign love glaives they are so funny)