Ability stats explained: Strength, Duration, Efficiency and Range

Every Warframe has four ability stats. You find them in the Arsenal below your Warframe’s stats, and they always start at 100 %. Mods push them up or down. That way the same ability can become a damage hammer, a long buff or a huge crowd control field.

The key terms in short:

Ability Strength

How powerful an ability is: damage, healing, buff size, slow and much more.

Ability Duration

How long an ability stays active. For abilities that drain energy over time, it also lowers the drain per second.

Ability Efficiency

How much energy an ability costs. More efficiency means lower costs.

Ability Range

How large the radius or how long the targeting distance of an ability is.

Corrupted mod

A mod with a big bonus and a drawback. It raises one stat a lot and lowers another one.

Channeled ability

An ability you toggle on and off that drains energy per second while it is active.

Additive

All bonuses to one stat are simply added up before they take effect.

Each ability only uses some of these stats. When you hover over an ability in the Arsenal, you see its values with your current mods. Values that never change are not tied to any of the four stats.

All bonuses to the same stat are added up. Your Warframe starts at 100 %, then every mod adds its percentage. Negative values simply subtract. The final value is then multiplied with the ability’s base value.

1. 01

   Base value

   100 % Ability Strength.

2. 02

   Add the mods

   Intensify +30 %, Blind Rage +99 % and Transient Fortitude +55 % make 284 % Strength.

3. 03

   Apply it to the ability

   Rhino’s Roar gives 50 % bonus damage at base. With 284 % Strength that becomes 142 %.

Efficiency works a little differently. The cost is base cost × (200 % − Efficiency). With 130 % Efficiency you pay 70 % of the cost, so Roar costs 52.5 energy instead of 75. It can never go below 25 % of the base cost, and never above 175 %. That is why the Arsenal shows at most 175 % Efficiency.

You get the four basic mods early on. Some of them have stronger versions. You can only equip one version of each mod family at a time, so not Intensify and Umbral Intensify together, for example. All values are at max rank.

Mod	Effect (max rank)
Intensify	+30 % Strength
Umbral Intensify	+44 % Strength (up to +77 % with the full Umbral set)
Archon Intensify	+30 % Strength, another +30 % for 10 s after healing with abilities
Continuity	+30 % Duration
Primed Continuity	+55 % Duration
Archon Continuity	+55 % Duration, Toxin status effects from abilities also apply Corrosive
Streamline	+30 % Efficiency
Stretch	+45 % Range
Archon Stretch	+45 % Range, abilities that deal Electricity damage restore energy

Then there are the five classic corrupted mods. You find them behind vaults that you open with a Dragon Key, or you buy them cheaply from other players.

Mod	Bonus	Drawback
Blind Rage	+99 % Strength	−55 % Efficiency
Transient Fortitude	+55 % Strength	−27.5 % Duration
Overextended	+90 % Range	−60 % Strength
Narrow Minded	+99 % Duration	−66 % Range
Fleeting Expertise	+60 % Efficiency	−60 % Duration

Other useful mods: Augur Secrets (+24 % Strength), Constitution (+28 % Duration), Power Drift (+15 % Strength, fits the Exilus slot) and Precision Intensify (+90 % Strength for your 4th ability only).

Besides regular mods there are other sources. They are added up as well.

Source	Bonus
Crimson Archon Shard	+10 % Strength or +10 % Duration per shard (Tauforged +15 %)
Helminth Invigoration (7 days)	for example +200 % Strength, +100 % Duration, +100 % Range or +75 % Efficiency
Helminth ability Empower	+50 % Strength for your next ability
Growing Power (aura)	+25 % Strength for 6 s after a status effect with your weapon, for the whole squad
Power Donation (aura)	squad +30 % Strength, you −30 %
Energy Conversion	+50 % Strength for your next ability after picking up an energy orb
Molt Augmented (arcane)	+0.24 % Strength per kill, up to 250 times (+60 %)
Arcane Power Ramp (arcane)	+9 % Strength per ability cast, up to 4 stacks
Molt Efficiency (arcane)	up to +36 % Duration while your shields are up
Arcane Concentration (arcane)	+60 % Duration for 3 s after casting an ability

Learn more in Archon Shards: unlock, farm and socket them, Helminth: unlock it, feed it, swap abilities and Arcanes: slots, ranks and farming.

Before you mod, check which stats your ability actually uses. A few well known examples:

Ability	Strength	Duration	Range
Rhino Roar	Bonus damage (50 %)	Run time (30 s)	Radius (25 m)
Rhino Iron Skin	Health and armor multiplier	no	no
Loki Invisibility	no	Run time (12 s)	no
Saryn Miasma	Damage (150)	Run time (6 s)	Radius (20 m)
Nova Molecular Prime	Explosion damage and slow	Wave and prime duration	Explosion radius

For every ability, the energy cost depends on Efficiency. The values in brackets are base values at ability rank 3.

• Damage (nuke): lots of Strength and enough Range. Typical picks are Blind Rage, Transient Fortitude and Intensify, plus Stretch. Streamline offsets the higher costs. Example: Saryn’s Miasma.
• Buff for you and the squad: Strength for the size of the buff, Duration for the run time, Range so your squad gets it too. Example: Rhino’s Roar.
• Crowd control (CC): Range and Duration first. You only need Strength if the ability benefits from it. On abilities that do not use Strength, Overextended is almost free.
• Invisibility and utility: often only Duration matters. Narrow Minded is ideal here because Range does not matter.
• Channeled abilities: Duration and Efficiency both lower the drain per second. Duration is often the easier way.