The 40th frame added to Warframe comes with an interesting set of skills that will let Tenno excel in support, crowd control, and even DPS-oriented builds. Wisp brings an elusive, ephemeral air to the game, and it shows in her abilities as well. You can use a light touch, or let loose the power of the sun on unwitting foes. With Wisp, the only limit is your creativity. Her four abilities and passive will help you aid your teammates, set opponents up for team-based combos, and reposition yourself to get out of—or into—harm’s way.
How to get Wisp
Wisp’s construction isn’t necessarily easy, but luckily you’ll get all her blueprints from the Remastered Corpus Gas City on its own Assassination node on Jupiter. You’ll have to face down the Flying Eidolon Ropaloyst around 8-9 times to expectedly receive all blueprints. Once you’ve got the plans for each part, you’ll luckily have a healthy set of credits and Hexenon from Jupiter. You’ll also need commonly-used frame construction materials like Plastids, Rubedo, Polymer Bundles, and Alloy Plates. Elsewhere, make sure you find an Argon Crystal from the Orokin Void or from Assassination missions and use it on the Chassis before it decays, lest you need to hunt for another one. You’ll likely already have some Tellurium to spare from daily login bonuses, which leaves Nitain Extract as the last material to farm. Put in the time on some Nightwave missions and you’ll be able to buy 2 units required to construct’s Wisp’s systems. If you just keep up with the right objectives, you’ll be soaring through the air with Wisp in no time.
Wisp's Abilities
The backbone of Wisp’s kit are her Reservoirs. These extra-dimensional pods come in three flavors—Vitality, Haste, and Shock—and they all fulfill specific roles. Once summoned, the pod will provide an AOE buff itself as well as sending out motes that extend the buff for up to 30 seconds while outside the range of the Reservoir. Vitality increases base health and adds passive regen, Haste increases movement, attack speed, and fire rate, and Shock provides a passive DOT in a short radius that also stuns in an arc. Since Wisp can have up to 6 pods up at one time, players can feel free to proactively set down support as their team needs it. The pods duration is indefinite, so set up them in strategic situations and you and your teammates can corral enemies near them for effective engagements.
Wil-O-Wisp is Wisp’s second ability, and there’s a reason it’s her namesake. Activating the ability will have the frame cloak and summon an ethereal projection of herself that will continue in a target direction to distract enemies as it travels. At any time during the skill’s duration, players can hit the key again to instantly teleport to the projection’s location and gain temporary invulnerability. You can also hold the button down to conjure a faster projection that will still allow for teleportation as soon as you let go of the ability key. The uses of this skill are myriad. Tenno can summon this spectral clone as a "fire and forget" distraction ability, use it to jump into an engagement from afar with enemies off-guard, or as you gain mastery over the skill, a combination of both! Wisp can even use this ability to open Friendship Doors alone as well as teleport past Spy laser barriers undetected. As we’ll see with her next abilities, Wil-O-Wisp only becomes more powerful in conjunction with her full kit.
Wisp’s third ability is called Breach Surge, and it greatly extends her influence over the battlefield. In a target area, Wisp sunders the dimensions to produce an energy burst that blinds enemies. While blinded, enemies become susceptible to releasing secondary sparks on hit that will travel to nearby enemies and have a chance to blind them as well. What takes this ability to the next level is that if players cast it on a Reservoir, Wisp will teleport to that pod and the ability’s range will be doubled. She can also use Breach Surge during Wil-O-Wisp to have the projection explode forth with a second AOE around it. Using this ability’s different versions will let players dance around enemies and control space as she sees fit.
In her ultimate, Wisp turns her enigmatic abilities towards the radioactive power of the sun, tearing open a portal and channeling this Sol Gate into a giant plasma deathray. Players can reposition and aim the beam at will. Wil-O-Wisp can be used during Sol Gate to quickly hit from a different angle. When you’ve got the enemy just where you want them, holding the fire button will slow Wisp’s movement down but double the effective DPS, incinerating enemies with new vigor. Any motes from active Reservoirs will move to orbit Wisp during Sol Gate, letting you spread buffs and debuffs alike while dishing it out. Breach Surge secondary sparks also have an 100% chance of triggering from each hit of the solar assault. And though the skill continually drains 12 energy from this spritely frame, players can end it early by pressing the ability key again.
With all of Wisp’s abilities combined, you can dance around enemies while providing key support to teammates in need. You have the power to approach situations in a way that best suits you thanks to all of her movement abilities, and this is only aided by her passive, Phased. Whenever she takes to the air, Wisp wreathes herself in a dimensional shroud which renders her invisible to enemies until she lands or fires a weapon. Experienced Tenno will be able to surgically apply her buffs and fake out enemies at a moment’s notice. If you’d like to move like the wind, the ethereal Wisp is the frame for you.
Wisp builds
Wisp is such a nice frame for a range of players because no matter what build you go with her, you’ve still got an excellent kit of abilities that will test your skill and creativity. For a balanced approach, upping Ability Strength should be a priority to ensure Reservoir and Sol Gate have greater effects for both you and your team. You can never go wrong with more efficiency from Streamline, as this will let you shape the battlefield easily with more opportunities for targeted buffs and debuffs. For players looking to lean into the debuff side of things, they should definitely look into adding Overextended to their setup, as increasing the range of your abilities goes further in that it’ll mean more potential victims for Breach Surge’s secondary sparks and the stuns from Shock motes.
Definitely check out the Warframe-School for more in-depth Wisp builds and try your hand at crafting the perfect setup for your own elusive summoner at Warframe Builder. Putting time into mastering Wisp will let you dance on the wind and control the battlefield.
