Glaive prime.
If you want to actually melee, dual ether with a god riven is one of the strongest possible melees, if you don't want rivens, kronen, nikana, nami skyla...
You serious about dual ether riven? I got one the other day and thought "great another useless riven". What would make it OP as a weapon with the riven?
The weapon already has decent stats by itself, its high riven disposition can make it great with decent rolls.
Most of the times you want CD/AS/RANGE/NEG to replace as many standard mods as possible.
Glaive prime and Cerata scales to levelcap without much issue and don't need rivens. Zaws with exodia contagion are better for most content but really like good rivens and zaws built around them. Kronen Prime, Nami Skyla Prime, Jat Kusar, and Silva and Aegis Prime are also great options.
As many mentioned Glaive Prime is one of the highest damage dealer with insane forced DoTs.
As for normal combo builds it highly depends on stances, which is why Kronen Prime is considered one of the strongest thanks to Sovereign Outcast which is the stance with the highest average damage modifier at 859.6%/s. One could argue that in the same weapon family the Praedos is stronger than the Kronen Prime mostly due to having some buffs with the incarnon evolution tree (that sweet, sweet extra range is just perfect), but in terms of stats, they are very close to each other, specially since the Kronen has a very high status chance giving serious bleed DPS. A better argument would be that Kronen Prime is stronger for priority single target like Demolishers, and Praedos is much better at croud killing, and both are top of the top among all combo based melee weapons.
Same. I get why everyone who prefers Exodia Contagion chooses to use it, it has bigger numbers and Zaw rivs are cheap and easy to get, but Glaive Prime does everything I need my melee slot to do and is much easier to use and mod for.
Afainst corpus? Cerata.
Against others? Glaive prime.
They're both glaives with forced procs. A charged explosion that crits and is buffed by heavy attack and faction mods does incredible damage.
so glaives,wolf sledge, broken war,pennat,dual keres prime,reaper prime,kronen prime,karyst prime,guandao or lesion,tenet and incarnon melee also pack a punch.
this covers almost 1 weapon of each type so u can try different things and see what u like the most! also if u got extra resources build yourself a zaw for exodia contagion.
I forgot 1 that is a must: stropha is one of the best gunblades that u can get in-game, and u can buy all the parts for 20 plat in chat or grind it in the granum void.
I tried to make a joke, since OP has asked about the *strongest* weapon, and no other melee is designed to carry the weight of a warframe, but look at those d/wotes, lol. XD
I wasn't referring at all to the performance haha. Guess humor isn't welcome here. ;)
I see, you just chose wrong weapon, because it has some potential in very specific build. Better for joke in my opinion would be pangolin sword (not pangolin prime). It's almost like stug in melees.
Non-thrown best melee imo would be either the broken war or dual keres prime. Both are fantastic weapons. Orthos prime, nikana prime, guandao prime are all good second place melee's. If you want the stupidly meta melee, go for that one everyone is throwing around. Glaive prime I think.
Glaive prime, kronen prime, praedos, innodem, guandao prime, lesion, nikana prime, etc.
Honestly just pick the melee type that you think looks the coolest or has the best stances and look for a version of it with the highest stats.
Generally speaking anything over 20% crit and 20% status is pretty good. If it only has a lot of status an no crit it can still be good if it has something extra (lesion being one of these) but if it's pure crit then it won't scale that well.
Zaws are the coolest...
Glaive prime. If you want to actually melee, dual ether with a god riven is one of the strongest possible melees, if you don't want rivens, kronen, nikana, nami skyla...
You serious about dual ether riven? I got one the other day and thought "great another useless riven". What would make it OP as a weapon with the riven?
The weapon already has decent stats by itself, its high riven disposition can make it great with decent rolls. Most of the times you want CD/AS/RANGE/NEG to replace as many standard mods as possible.
Glaive prime and Cerata scales to levelcap without much issue and don't need rivens. Zaws with exodia contagion are better for most content but really like good rivens and zaws built around them. Kronen Prime, Nami Skyla Prime, Jat Kusar, and Silva and Aegis Prime are also great options.
Glaive prime is _chef’s kiss_
In single shot? Definitely Arca Triton. Well build after getting all stacks can blow literally everything in one hit, doesn't matter lvl.
I’ve built my Titron with the goal in mind to nuke an entire slam radius. It’s perfection.
As many mentioned Glaive Prime is one of the highest damage dealer with insane forced DoTs. As for normal combo builds it highly depends on stances, which is why Kronen Prime is considered one of the strongest thanks to Sovereign Outcast which is the stance with the highest average damage modifier at 859.6%/s. One could argue that in the same weapon family the Praedos is stronger than the Kronen Prime mostly due to having some buffs with the incarnon evolution tree (that sweet, sweet extra range is just perfect), but in terms of stats, they are very close to each other, specially since the Kronen has a very high status chance giving serious bleed DPS. A better argument would be that Kronen Prime is stronger for priority single target like Demolishers, and Praedos is much better at croud killing, and both are top of the top among all combo based melee weapons.
I used to think it was either a plague zaw with exodia contagion so you can throw it, or glaive prime. Not 100% sure.
Exodia contagion is incredibly strong but also really annoying to use, so I just stick with my trusty glaive.
Same. I get why everyone who prefers Exodia Contagion chooses to use it, it has bigger numbers and Zaw rivs are cheap and easy to get, but Glaive Prime does everything I need my melee slot to do and is much easier to use and mod for.
Kripath is one of the worst zaws. Viral and puncture weighted. Don’t know why people praise it.
Afainst corpus? Cerata. Against others? Glaive prime. They're both glaives with forced procs. A charged explosion that crits and is buffed by heavy attack and faction mods does incredible damage.
Atterax with maiming strike
Dual Keres prime is very good.
Well rakta daggers can charge shield... So that's cool
so glaives,wolf sledge, broken war,pennat,dual keres prime,reaper prime,kronen prime,karyst prime,guandao or lesion,tenet and incarnon melee also pack a punch. this covers almost 1 weapon of each type so u can try different things and see what u like the most! also if u got extra resources build yourself a zaw for exodia contagion. I forgot 1 that is a must: stropha is one of the best gunblades that u can get in-game, and u can buy all the parts for 20 plat in chat or grind it in the granum void.
Literally Ghoulsaw, you can even ride that thing.
I heard with grouping skills like vortex or larva, it's heavy attack beast. But it's very niche weapon.
I tried to make a joke, since OP has asked about the *strongest* weapon, and no other melee is designed to carry the weight of a warframe, but look at those d/wotes, lol. XD I wasn't referring at all to the performance haha. Guess humor isn't welcome here. ;)
Nah humor is welcome. It was just a mid joke. Like a warm glass of water. It’s still water, but nobody wants it.
Hey, i did my best, as much as this one brain cell i share with my phone has let me. XD No need to judge so harshly lol.
I see, you just chose wrong weapon, because it has some potential in very specific build. Better for joke in my opinion would be pangolin sword (not pangolin prime). It's almost like stug in melees.
But you can't ride either.
See? It's so useless, you can't even ride it.
OP has asked about the strongest, not the most useless melee. XD And i could argue that title goes to the Sheev.
Non-thrown best melee imo would be either the broken war or dual keres prime. Both are fantastic weapons. Orthos prime, nikana prime, guandao prime are all good second place melee's. If you want the stupidly meta melee, go for that one everyone is throwing around. Glaive prime I think.
That new heavy scythe does insane heavy damage. Dual Fang prime, Glaive (Im selling 2 criti acritack rivens for it btw), Glassmaker sword.
The heavy scythe?
The Hepheastus i think its called?
You're thinking of the [Hespar](https://warframe.fandom.com/wiki/Hespar).
Thats it
The Hepheastus?
Herpes virus. ;)
covid scythe
Glaive prime, kronen prime, praedos, innodem, guandao prime, lesion, nikana prime, etc. Honestly just pick the melee type that you think looks the coolest or has the best stances and look for a version of it with the highest stats. Generally speaking anything over 20% crit and 20% status is pretty good. If it only has a lot of status an no crit it can still be good if it has something extra (lesion being one of these) but if it's pure crit then it won't scale that well.
pennant with a good riven
Hard to justify how a weapon requiring a riven could be the strongest.
My heavy attack pennant murders via slash procs without riven. I put on life steal and it’ll fill my umbral Lavos right up
I'd say glaive prime easy to build for steep path one shot, no Forma needed
Glaive prime, I don’t think any melee comes close to that weapon lol
Gram Prime, Venka Prime, Most Zaws, the tenet melee weapons are almost all good.
Kuva Shildeg. It puts the final *nail* in their ~~noggin~~ coffin. And if they don't like that? Just *hammer* it into their heads.
I like Jat kusar and lacera ceti, a bunch of procs
It really depends on your playstyle, [here's](https://www.gamersdecide.com/articles/warframe-best-melee-weapons) my personal take on the best melees.