Warframe Braton Guide

Warframe Braton Guide by Gratuitous Lurking

Intro: WTF is the Braton?

Because every game requires at least a little genericness, the Braton fills the roll as the player’s starting rifle in the form of the Mk1, although the standard Braton is for the most part a full upgrade to it. One part SMG, one part Assault Rifle, this weapon is pretty much the most all-rounded in the game, allowing it to be molded to playstyles a lot easier then most of the other Long-Guns.

Classified as a ‘Automatic Rifle’, the Braton series features a fast fire rate, average reload speeds, great accuracy, and in general is effective in most situations. With proper modding this weapon can outperform many larger, heavier weapons as well!

Acquiring the Weapon, Stock Stats, and Pros and Cons

Acquiring a variant of the Braton is by far the easiest of all guns to gain: Simply start a new character, and your first Long-Gun option will be the Mk1-Braton, a less-damaging but faster firing variant  If you so choose, you can purchase the Braton proper for 10k Credits at any time. Those who were lucky enough to hang around in Closed Beta will also find that they had the option to pick up the much-snazzier Braton Vandal for a mind-boggling 1 credit.

For the sake of non-redundancy, I’ll discuss the stats of the Mk1 and Braton Vandal later. These are the stats for the standard Braton:

– Base Damage: 17
– Base Fire Rate: 11.3
– Accuracy: 28.6
– Base Clip: 45
– Base Ammo Size: 500
– Base Reload Speed: Not Recorded
– Polarities: N/A

The damage for the Braton isn’t too extravagant  but it’s made up by a decent accuracy and fire rate, allowing it to fire bullets out of it’s bum. Combine with a great full-auto accuracy and the standard Braton is a good weapon for beginning Warframes.

Sadly, the Braton’s efficiency and all-roundedness does leave it wanting towards endgame, thanks to it’s lowish damage and reload rates. In addition, it has no default polarities, making it hard to mod until it’s levelled up a bit. Finally, it’s full-auto nature and need to dump bullets into targets will make the Braton a tough gun to keep fed in later levels, when it takes clips plus to kill a target.

Bundles of Bratons: A Word on Variants

The Braton is one of the few weapons with variants thus far, in this case the starter Mk1 and the Braton Vandal. Both variants have a decreased fire rate for control, however the Vandal has several other special bits, befitting it’s special status.

The Mk1-Braton

– Base Damage: 16
– Base Fire Rate: 6.3
– Accuracy: 40.0
– Base Clip: 60
– Base Ammo Size: 400
– Base Reload Speed: 2.2s
– Polarities: N/A

The Mk1 is a substantially weaker but more controllable variant of the standard Braton, befitting for a starting weapon worth discarding. It’s best to keep ahold of it until you max it, so that it fully counts to your Mastery rank, and then sold and replaced with either the standard Braton or Sturn.

The Braton Vandal

– Base Damage: 18
– Base Fire Rate: 12.5
– Accuracy: 33.3
– Base Clip: 45
– Base Ammo Size: 500
– Base Crit Chance: 7.5%
– Polarities: 1 ‘V’

The Vandal is a much more striking variant  featuring a bright chrome teal finish and the Lotus’s symbol embossed on the side, thanks to the Tenno tuning it from it’s manufactured start. In general, it is a more efficient and closer-ranged tuned version of the standard, featuring a slower fire rate and worse accuracy, but trades for damage. The Vandal also features a free ‘V’ Polarity slot, allowing players to customize it with damage mods for a reduced cost right after acquisition  It can still suffer from ammo drain in prolonged or long-ranged firefights, however.

DakkaDakkaDakkaDakkaDakka!: What to Modify and What Else to Bring

As mentioned before, the Braton is extremely modifiable and user-friendly, so feel free to experiment, however this will act as a way to get ya started. For the most part though, the Braton line features a good fire rate and accuracy, so you’ll want to compensate for it’s clip size and damage more so at the beginning of your levelling span.

For sidearm options, pretty much the sky is the limit, although as the Braton is very efficient against trash, you may want to choose something to deal with longer-ranged enemies, like the Lato, AkLato, Kraken, or Lex. Alternatively, you can choose something that’s especially efficient for trash and mod the Braton to be a big game weapon, supplementing it with the Furis, AkFuris, Viper, Duel Viper, Bronco, or Sicarus to deal with swarmers. Melee doesn’t much concern when using the Braton, so carry along whatever you’re comfortable with.

For mods, the Braton works best when stacked with damage, or given a more utility focus with upgrades to it’s functionality. For this review, I’m gonna go for the all-rounder and suggest equipping it with clip size, elemental damage, and fire rate, in pretty much any order. Cryo Rounds, Piercing Hit, Magazine Warp, Fast Hands, and Serration all work excellent on the Braton, and the only real limit is your mod points to how you can take it from there.

Final Thoughts

Whilest unspecialised  this jack-of-all-trades weapon is great for the starting player, and is able to keep it’s unique operations even in the tougher planets. As a bit of advice, however: Be sure you fully level the Mk-1 Braton to 30 before discarding it, as this will let you get the full amount of Mastery credit from it and saves you having to repurchase it to do so later. Otherwise, have fun mowing down the Lotus’s foes!