Damage

Damage in Warframe can be broken down into six damage types: normal, armor piercing, electrical, fire, freeze, and poison. In addition to these types, most forms of damage can critically hit.  Different factions of enemies are resistant or vulnerable depending on the element.

Damage is displayed on the HUD as numbers that spawn near the point of impact with an enemy. Damage to health is shown in a white. Damage to shields is shown as a blue. Critical hit damage, damage initiated from Warframe's Power to Stealth, or damage done while undetected are displayed as a yellow. Finally, melee critical hits while stealthed are shown in red.

Each of the damage types will spawn a separate number indicator. Shotguns will also spawn separate indicators for each of their pellets. Damage that is reduced to zero, such as normal damage on Crewman's head, will not spawn a number indicator.

Normal

Normal damage is the basic type of damage that the vast majority of Weapons deal. Weapons that don't deal Normal damage either ignore armor completely (ex: Bolts), modify the Normal damage with a multiplier (ex: Slashing), or very rarely do Elemental Damage.

The basic damage from weapons can be calculated by the following formula:

Damage done = (weapon damage) * (1 + mod value) * (target's armor)

• Weapon Damage: determined by the equipped weapon. There is no range of damage in Warframe; all weapons will always deal a set amount equal to what is listed on their tooltip.
• Mod Value: determined by the rank of the equipped "damage" mod, if any.
• Target's Armor:each enemy type has their own value which can range from 0% to 200+% damage taken (0% means no damage will be done). See Enemy Vulnerabilities for exact values.

The mods that alter base damage are as follows:

• Rifles: Serration
• Shotguns: Point Blank
• Pistols: Hornet Strike
• Melee: Killing Blow and Pressure Point

Melee Charge Attacks

Attacks from a melee weapon using its charge attack generally ignores the armor values of the enemies they are used against. This feature allows the weapon to deal a consistent 100% charge damage for body hits and 200% charge damage for head hits where applicable. Elemental mods and critical hits will be based on full charge damage, making them quite powerful. Sometimes additional damage adjustments to a weapon's charge damage are made based on a weapon's type as noted in the following section.

Weapon Types

Main article: Weapon Types

Although every weapon's base damage is modified by basic damage mods, only bullet weapons always conform to the armor values of enemies. Bolt-based long-guns and pistols, and all melee weapons are subject to their own special rules concerning Normal type damage. These weapons can be grouped into weapon types.

Critical Hits

Main article: Critical Hit (Mechanic)

Most sources of damage can critically hit for additional damage. Each weapon attack, or each pellet in the case shotguns, has a separate chance to critically hit. Elemental mods will only critically hit when the weapon itself does. Stealthing will give characters a 100% melee critical hit chance.

Multishot

Main article: Multishot (Mechanic)

Multishot is a feature that weapons do not normally possess, but can be added through equipped mods. Multishot adds one or more additional bullets, bolts, arrows, or pellets to each shot fired. These additional projectiles do not consume any extra ammunition.

Elemental Damage

Main article: Elemental Damage

Each elemental damage bonus on a weapon will add a separately calculated bonus hit to an attack. Different elemental damages will not interfere with each other or with a weapon's normal damage. Includes: armor piercing, electrical, fire, freeze, and poison.

Stealth Attacks

Main article: Stealth

Melee attacks from stealth deal 150% of the total damage they would otherwise do. Every attack while stealthed receives this bonus, there is no chance involved. Stealth attacks generate yellow hit indicators the same as critical hits, although they are not affected by critical damage mods. True melee critical hits while stealthed can be denoted by their red hit indicators.

As long as players on a mission remain undetected through the use of stealth, they can perform melee attacks that deal increased damage to their enemies. Non-melee weapons are not eligible for a stealth damage increase. Even after a mission's enemies go on alert, temporary stealth can also be achieved through the use Loki's Invisibility and Ash's Smoke Screen. Shade's Ghost is disrupted if owner attacks, therefore it does not grant any stealth attack bonuses.

Damaging Shields

While an enemy is protected from shields, any damage they take will not be affected by armor or resistance values, and damage to the weak point of that enemy will not result in additional damage. Shields take 100% damage from all sources except from freeze which will deal 200% of its usual damage. Shielded enemies are immune to critical hits and additional damage caused by stealth attacks.

After the shields of an enemy are depleted, any remaining damage amount is reduced by a value of one and then run through the regular damage formulas to calculate damage taken as it normally would have occurred after taking into account critical hits, resistances, and weak points.

Warframe Powers

Damaging warframe powers determine their damage, critical rate, and critical damage through the equipped power mod. Powers that deal normal type damage determine how they handle an enemy's armor value on a per power basis. Some powers will be affected by an enemy's armor while other powers might ignore it similar to a melee charge attack. Warframe powers that do not deal normal type damage are affected by the resistance rates of the particular enemy the skill is used against. See the individual warframe articles for information on how each power handles its damage.