The Tenet Glaxion is an MR16 Beam Rifle. With further increased stats over its other variants as well as a chaining mechanic, it is a very potent and versatile weapon, capable of holding its own in the vast majority of Warframe's content.
Acquisition
The Tenet Glaxion is acquired the same as all other Sister of Parvos weapons. A Sister of Parvos Candidate must be spawned with this weapon and then vanquished. The weapon will then be delivered via Inbox into your Foundry.
Stats
The Tenet Glaxion has great overall stats. 20%/2.2× Crit is very good, easily worth building for. 40% Status Chance is fantastic, especially with a Fire Rate of 12, however base Cold damage makes this more difficult to fully exploit.
Additionally, the TGlaxion chains to up to 3 other targets besides the original, dealing reduced damage with each jump. This is a major upgrade over its previous variants.
Of course, being a Beam weapon comes with the usual downsides, with a short damage ramp-up time, and a limited range of 30m. This is fairly respectable range by Beam weapon standards, and in all but the largest of tilesets and the open worlds, is perfectly manageable.
Augments
The Tenet Glaxion has access to one Augment, albeit one that is not yet available at the time of writing - Photon Overcharge.
Photon Overcharge increases Crit Damage, as well as adding a unique effect - any enemy damaged by a Glaxion with this Augment equipped has an increased chance to drop an Energy Orb, scaling with the number of Cold procs on them at the time of death. The current maximum number of Cold procs is 9, for a maximum Energy orb drop chance of 18%.
Photon Overcharge is an interesting option. It is slightly weaker than the top Crit mods (Vital Sense and Bladed Rounds), but still a decent second option, and its secondary effect can be very useful for Energy-hungry Frames. While I wouldn't consider it a mandatory mod by any means, it is a strong option for any flexible slots you may have remaining, on any build that preserves Cold damage (or with a Cold primer).
Builds
NOTE: These builds are pictured with a maximum 60% Magnetic bonus.
Basic 0-Forma:
Frustratingly, the Tenet Glaxion has no innate polarities, which makes early builds more difficult to fit. This pictured build takes advantage of the innate Cold to form Viral with just a single Toxin mod. Otherwise, the usual suspects are all included.
One elemental mod and base Cold damage leave very few elemental combo options available. The aforementioned Viral is a great all-rounder, with its near-universal proc increasing damage to Health. The other options, Blast and Magnetic, are significantly less useful. Magnetic is strong against Shields, however very few enemies have truly tough Shields, and you can get it as a Sister bonus anyway. Blast is, in the current meta, practically useless.
Recommended Setups: Viral vs everything, Magnetic vs strong Shields
Hunter Munitions 1-Forma:
One added V polarity and the extra ranks from being a Tenet weapon open up mod options significantly. In this example build I've added Hunter Munitions, which allows the TGlaxion to inflict Slash procs which is normally impossible for it otherwise.
Corrosive 1-Forma:
You can finally properly experiment with other elemental combos now as well.
Corrosive is a great option, with its armour-reducing proc and its great multipliers against Ferrite-armour and heavy Infested units. It combos nicely with the innate Cold, which has an above-average multiplier against Alloy-armour, the other main type of armour, as well as Shields, against which Corrosive is not very effective.
Radiation is the other option to consider, with the strongest multiplier against Alloy-armour. Its proc can be useful as a distraction for enemies, but does not directly make enemies weaker. It is also one of the other possible Sister bonuses. Indeed, with a Radiation bonus (or a later mod), you can have Corrosive and Radiation together in a near-universal anti-armour build.
Recommended Setups: Viral + HM vs everything, Corrosive vs Ferrite-armour, Infested, Radiation vs Alloy-armour
3-Forma:
Two more added Forma and the bonus ranks gives you great mod flexibility, and easy use of the last two slots.
I already recommend (Primed) Shred on pretty much any non-explosive Rifle, and this is especially true for the TGlaxion. Punch Through is almost always great on Beam weapons, but is especially potent on most chaining Beam weapons, as each enemy hit by the main beam will produce chains, drastically increasing anti-crowd damage. The TGlaxion is no different, with high enough Punch Through and dense enemy groups allowing it to hit 12 or even more enemies simultaneously. The +Fire Rate is a solid DPS increase, especially when running the aforementioned Critical Delay.
For overall, uncomplicated damage increases, you could consider Heavy Caliber or Vigilante Armaments. HC is stronger, while VA is cheaper to max and easier to fit in builds. Both become obsolete once you gain access to Galvanised mods and Arcanes.
You could instead look to boost Crit. Argon Scope/Bladed Rounds are decent conditional Crit mods, and both are very easy to trigger with the TGlaxion. Proton Jet has an unusual trigger condition, but boosts both Crit and Status Chances. Hammer Shot is notably weaker, but is unconditional and boosts both Crit Damage and Status Chance.
Finally, Photon Overcharge is absolutely worth a mention for any loadout with Cold damage/procs. It is stronger than the aforementioned Crit options except for Bladed Rounds, and its secondary ability generating additional Energy orbs can be very beneficial for Energy-hungry Frames.
If you want to truly min-max, look instead to a (Primed) Bane mod. The Faction Damage modifier is a separate damage multiplier to most other effects, and notably is applied multiple times to damage-over-time procs like Slash and Heat. This makes it significantly stronger than most other mod options at extremely high levels. That said, I have still yet to encounter content where Faction Damage mods are truly "necessary".
Finally, you could use the extra space for more elemental mods. Again, the innate Cold limits your options, but there is one last possible combo worth mentioning - Viral + Heat. Heat offers a strong damage-over-time proc that reduces armour and stacks with itself very strongly. Unfortunately, the innate Cold biases towards Viral which is undesirable, but this can be mitigated by a Heat bonus or slotting extra Heat mods.
Radiated Reload is unique in that it adds straight Radiation - no element combining required. This also allows otherwise impossible combinations, such as Corrosive (regular mods) + Radiation (Radiated Reload) + Magnetic (Sister bonus) + Cold (innate). The bigger question is usually whether you can afford the mod slot for it or not.
For the Exilus slot, Sinister Reach is the clear top contender for increased beam range, since the TGlaxion's Ammo Economy is already so good. Otherwise, Vigilante Supplies is notable for its very minor Crit increase.
Recommended Setups: see above. Also consider: Viral + Heat vs everything,
Galvanised Mods
Galv Chamber.
Galv Aptitude can be a strong option, depending on build and bonus. It requires three unique procs to beat out Serration, which can be done in several ways. A Radiation/Magnetic bonus coupled with a three-element or Viral + Slash build can do so on its own, with Radiated Reload being notable, and of course other equipment can contribute as well. Unless you are running a very specialised 1-2 damage type build, I think Galv Apt is worth using most of the time.
Galv Scope can be awkward to use. The TGlaxion can land Headshots easily and reliably thanks to its accurate Beam, however landing Headshot Kills is a somewhat different prospect. The TGlaxion excels at achieving kills through stacking damage-over-time procs like Slash and Heat, many of which do not count as Headshots, even if the proccing shot was one. As such, any kills due to Slash/Heat procs will not stack the on-Headshot-Kill condition. While Galv Scope is a fantastic option on-paper, in practice it can be very difficult to make the most of.
Base Cold damage can make the Tenet Glaxion a little awkward to choose a Bonus for. While Heat or Toxin are often quite desirable, the order in which the innate elements combine can make it quite difficult to achieve the desired combos. The Wiki suggests that having two innate single elements like this results in the elements combining in a "HCET" order (Heat, then Cold, then Electric, then Toxin).
Arcane
+Damage Arcanes:
- Primary Merciless - stacks up very quickly on the Tenet Glaxion thanks to its chaining mechanic, mitigating Merciless' primary flaws. Increased Reload Speed isn't a great secondary benefit but it's never useless.
- Primary Deadhead - stacks up faster than Merciless if you land reliable headshots, and also decays much slower. As mentioned with Galv Scope however, the TGlaxion works best when stacking damage-over-time procs like Slash or Heat, many of which do not trigger headshots or headshot kills. Increased Headshot damage is always nice, while -Recoil is a bit useless.
- Primary Plated Round - the TGlaxion can make ok use of PPR, but only if being fired almost constantly. PPR gives up to +313% Damage, slightly lower than the standard Merciless or Deadhead, and at base Fire Rate the TGlaxion empties its magazine in 15 seconds - 5 seconds longer than the PPR buff time. I wouldn't bother personally.
Other damage increasing Arcanes:
- Primary Frostbite - a solid damaging option that fits in nicely on any build retaining Cold damage (e.g. Corrosive + Cold), or with any other equipment that stacks Cold (e.g. Thermal Sunder, Cold-equipped Sentinel weapon). Needs Galv Aptitude and at least 4 unique procs to be competitive with the +Damage options. For specific builds where you can satisfy these conditions, Frostbite is a strong option, but for anything else it is not ideal.
- Primary Blight - very slightly stronger than Frostbite, however requires building for pure Toxin which is very difficult for a base Cold weapon; unlike Frostbite, Blight requires the weapon it is on to inflict the Toxin procs. The only possible combos are Magnetic + Toxin and Blast + Toxin, neither of which are notably good. I wouldn't bother.
Non-damage increasing Arcanes:
- Fractalised Reset - the TGlaxion already has fantastic Reload Ratio and acceptable Reload Speed, so I wouldn't bother.
- Primary Exhilarate - requires an Impact bonus to even work, and comes at the cost of a lot of damage. Photon Overcharge also exists, doesn't take up the Arcane slot, and doesn't require an Impact bonus.
- Primary Obstruct - you could get a Magnetic bonus to use this Arcane reliably without needing to mod for Magnetic, however again costs a great deal of damage potential.
Primary Merciless is in my opinion the best overall choice, with Deadhead worth consideration if you are good at landing headshots. Frostbite is a good option with specific builds and/or Status primers.
My Builds
With my Riven not having any elements on it, a Viral + Slash build is the easiest to fit.
Sister of Parvos Bonus
If you only care about a single combo that uses Cold (e.g. Viral), you could go for a bonus of the other element, thus not requiring any Elemental mods at all. However, this can greatly limit your build options, so I wouldn't recommend it.
Personally, I wouldn't bother trying to mess with a single element bonus, and would suggest just sticking with Radiation or Magnetic instead. Radiation has some useful multipliers, particularly against Alloy-armour and the Murmur, and its proc can be a nice distraction for enemies. Magnetic is purely an anti-Shield damage type, and is fantastic in that role, but rather lacking for anything else.
Though Impact is technically an option, I consider it worse than Rad/Mag both as a pure damage type and as a proc.
With its new chaining effect, the Tenet Glaxion tears through groups with ease. It will comfortably kill up to four enemies simultaneously, which can be significantly increased with added Punch Through. Any enemy who isn't killed by the initial direct damage will have a plethora of procs loaded on them, greatly weakened for an easy killing blow.
Combat Use and Summary
With great Status output, the TGlaxion can also perform fairly well against heavily armoured enemies. Its best scaling option is a Viral + Heat build, which unfortunately is biased towards Viral due to its innate Cold. Nonetheless, it can stack up great quantities of Heat procs very quickly, dealing respectable damage-over-time against anything that survives the initial damage.
Hunter Munitions can be installed to allow the TGlaxion to inflict Slash procs, something otherwise impossible. While such a build is lacking in up-front damage compared to pure elemental builds, the armour-bypassing damage of Slash procs is by far the best scaling anti-Armour setup available to weapons currently. While enemies may take relatively little damage initially, the accumulated Slash procs can deal massive amounts to any enemy reliant on Armour for their survival.
The TGlaxion is perhaps least proficient against unarmoured and Status-resistant/immune enemies, yet even there performs respectably. As a Beam weapon, it benefits from the 3× Headshot multiplier despite its AoE chaining mechanic, and its good Crit Chance also allows great benefit from Critical Headshots (an extra 2×). The TGlaxion's direct damage output is actually quite respectable in its category, even when it can't leverage its exceptional Status potential.
Ammo is largely a non-issue with the TGlaxion. Being a Beam weapon, it consumes ammo at only half its stated Fire Rate, and it recovers a hefty 80 rounds per-pickup. Even with +Fire Rate mods, it is difficult to run out of ammo so long as you are reliably killing enemies.
Overall, the Tenet Glaxion is an excellent weapon. Its chaining mechanic deals with large groups of enemies easily, especially if provided with additional Punch Through. Great Status Chance and very good Crit make it quite potent against heavily armoured enemies, both with and without Hunter Munitions. It is weakest against unarmoured and particularly Status-resistant/immune enemies, yet still deals enough direct damage to chew through them at a reasonable pace.
The Tenet Glaxion has no true weaknesses besides perhaps its limited range as a Beam weapon, yet that too is easily circumvented by exploiting Warframe's exceptional movement system. If you are in the market for a strong AoE Primary and don't want to worry about ammo or self-stagger/knockdown, the Tenet Glaxion is a great option to pursue.
Scores
Vs Trash Mobs: 5/5 - Respectable DPS and a chaining beam mean that the Tenet Glaxion excels at eating through groups of weaker enemies.
Vs Unarmoured Heavies: 4/5 - With very good Crit and surprisingly high base Damage, the TGlaxion can deal respectable direct damage. It can work through unarmoured and Status-resistant/immune enemies surprisingly quickly, though still notably lags behind Crit-focused weapons, especially on Headshots.
Vs Armoured Heavies without Forced Slash: 4.5/5 - High Fire Rate and exceptional Status Chance allow the TGlaxion to stack up any damage types on it very rapidly. It can run a fairly effective Viral + Heat build for very large Heat procs, although its Base damage of Cold biases unfavourably towards Viral. The combination of increased Health damage, armour reduction, and stacking damage-over-time is very effective against most armoured enemies.
Vs Armoured Heavies with Forced Slash: 4.5/5 - Hunter Munitions allows the TGlaxion to inflict Slash procs very reliably, while the TGlaxion's very high Status Chance can max out Viral procs almost instantly. While individual Slash procs are not especially strong, the TGlaxion stacks up so many that are augmented by Viral procs that it is very effective against heavily armoured enemies.
The MR16 Tenet Glaxion is an almost total upgrade over the MR12 Vandal, with many meaningful upgrades and only minor downsides in lower Mag Capacity and slower Reload Time. Additionally, the Tenet chains between enemies while the Vandal only has a small AoE on impact, making the Tenet far superior in practical use.
Comparing the MR16 Tenet Glaxion to the MR8 base Glaxion is almost cruel. On top of the massive stat mismatch, the Tenet chains while the base does not.
A Primary Vermisplicer offers solid competition as well, with comparable chaining and notably being capable of far superior Crit. However, it cannot match the TGlaxion's Status output even with a max Status build, due to the TGlaxion's much higher Fire Rate. With Sister bonus included, the TGlaxion also has the advantage in base Damage and Mag Capacity.
Vs Variants
Competitors
The Tenet Glaxion faces quite stiff competition in the AoE Beam Primaries category.
The MR10 Amprex is the first weapon that comes to mind, with a similar chaining mechanic. The TGlaxion compares quite favourably, trading a chunk of Crit Chance and a little Mag Capacity for far higher Status Chance and base Damage, even before including the Sister bonus (increasing Base Damage up to 54.4 at 60%). The Sister bonus, with Radiation or Magnetic, also gives the TGlaxion more versatility in damage types.
The TGlaxion has much longer range, at 30m to the Amprex's measly 18m, while the Amprex has longer chain range, at 10m to the TGlaxion's 7m.
Overall, I consider the TGlaxion to be largely superior to the Amprex.
The Vermisplicer uniquely has a slight homing/latching mechanic with its tentacle attack, making it slightly easier to use. However, this means that it cannot spawn multiple chains from Punch Through, which is a significant disadvantage against very large groups, and it also has some difficulty landing headshots.
The Vermisplicer's other advantages are in its Base Physical Damage types, giving it greater native benefit from Galv Aptitude, access to the Kitgun-only Pax Arcanes, and base Toxin damage being more versatile than base Cold.
Both the TGlaxion and Vermisplicer have many merits in each of their favour, and both will perform admirably in the vast majority of content.
Finally, the MR9 Ignis Wraith. The TGlaxion once again has a significant stat advantage, with superior Fire Rate, Crit Chance, Status Chance, and Base Damage with Sister bonus. As a result, its overall damage output is significantly higher. However, the IgnisW has a notable advantage in that base Heat damage is currently much stronger than base Cold damage. Additionally, the IgnisW is one of very few weaposn that has superior Reload Ratio to the TGlaxion.
The two are both AoE Beam weapons, but are very different in their AoE. The TGlaxion uses chaining as mentioned many times already. The IgnisW instead has innate body Punch Through and a small radial AoE at the end of range, or impact with an impenetrable object.
The TGlaxion is undoubtedly a stronger weapon, however the IgnisW has a few advantages, mainly in convenience and usability, and also its proficiency at breaking open loot crates.
Where the Tenet Glaxion faces its strongest competition is the Torid Incarnon, which especially once evolved fully, is significantly more powerful. Amongst non-Incarnon Beam Primaries though, the TGlaxion is among the best in the game.
Rivens
As a new weapon, the Tenet Glaxion starts at a minimum 1/5 (0.5) Riven Disposition. I could see this staying fairly low, despite both other Glaxions being rather high, as the stat increases and chaining mechanic make the Tenet far superior.
The usual suspects are all here, +Damage/Multishot/Crit Chance/Crit Damage are never bad. The latter two are notably more valuable with Galv mods and Arcanes in the mix. +Elemental Damage can be useful to save a mod slot. Given its great Ammo Economy, +Fire Rate can be a strong DPS increase with minimal downside. +Faction Damage is a particularly strong multiplier of damage-over-time procs like Slash and Heat, most useful against the Grineer. +Punch Through drastically amplifies anti-crowd firepower.
-Faction Damage to the weaker Factions (mainly Infested, secondarily Corpus) can be manageable with good positives, and has no effect on other targets. -Fire Rate in small amounts can be easily compensated with a +Fire Rate mod, but is not ideal on its own. -Ammo Max is a non-issue thanks to the TGlaxion's excellent Ammo Economy. Similarly, -Mag Capacity/Reload Speed in small amounts are negligible thanks to its great Reload Ratio. +Recoil has almost no effect. -Zoom is ideal for close quarters.
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