This is a follow up to the post I made in 2021, there have been some changes since then and my perspective and testing has also changed slightly.

Here are the best Components, Armaments, Mods, Intrinsics, Crew and everything for building the ultimate Railjack, updated for 2024.

How to farm and build Railjack parts

You can skip building MK0, MK1, and MK2 parts entirely (MK0 are the parts you buy from your Clan Dojo), hop on Void Storms and farm MK3 parts directly, so long as you are not the host, you will be playing on other players' Railjacks.

MK3 parts drop from "high level" Rj missions (normally Pluto and Veil), so Neo or Axi Void Storms, for the mission type I would recommend Skirmish or Survival.

Void Storms are some of the most rewarding missions in the game btw, they drop Railjack parts, Railjack XP, Rj Intrinsics, Holokeys, Prime parts, Relics, Void Traces, Epitaph or Sevagoth parts, and good amounts of XP, Credits and Endo (you can dissolve Railjack parts that you won't use, they give you very nice amounts of Endo).

You can also look for Void Storm or Holokey runs on Recruit Chat, after a few days, it's pretty easy to get most of, if not all the Railjack parts that you need.

Components

Shields

Stats-wise, Lavan Shields have the better stats, however, Railjack shields aren't great at taking damage, so I choose them based on their pasive skills, Zetki's is a bit more useful in the endgame.

Engines

Lavan Engines have the highest speed while boosting, and since Railjack boosting is infinite, that's our pick.

It is worth noting that between Lavan and Vidar's engines passives, Vidar engines will be faster if our shields are depleted, however, that is inconsistent at best, for this reason I choose Lavan over Vidar.

Plating

Plating determines the health and armor of our Railjacks, Lavan and Vidar platings have almost the same EHP, so I advise you build both, and use whichever you are able to max out first.

If you already have both maxed out, then Lavan has slightly more EHP.

Reactor

Reactors are a special case, for MK3 Reactors, Zekti would be the best, since it gives the most Strength, and also Range, which are the 2 most important stats for Railjack skills/battle mods.

As for the Pasive traits/skills, Fire hazards are more common, but I find Electric ones more annoying and inconvenient to fix.

MK2 Reactors are particular in that they do not strictly provide less stats than their MK3 counter parts, as an example, MK3 Zekti provides 40% Range, and 60% Strength at max, and MK2 Zekti provides 80% Strength instead.

This is more important because the strongest battle mod rn is by far Seeker Volley, which is not affected by range or duration, only Strength, so if you rely heavily on Seeker Volley, and you most likely do or will, MK2 Zekti will be the best Reactor for you.

Armaments

After testing every MK3 Zetki turret, my top ones are Zekti Apoc and Talyn, they deal very high damage and have great range and accuracy, gunner Crew NPCs become killing machines with them.

Photor is useful on the front turrets to take down Corpus Crewship shields.

The most useful Ordnance is Tycho Seeker MK3, mainly for taking down shield generators (weak spots) on Crewships. All Ordnances come from the Clan Dojo, not RJ missions.

Testing Process

To determine the best armaments (Railjack turrets), I used a combination of practical testing, and the following DPS table from the Warframe Wiki.

I tested All Zetki MK3 variants of all turrets on R-9 Cloud, Veil, which has the highest ship lvl of any regular RJ mission.

I used a Crew NPC with rank 5 Gunnery which gives it max accuracy, as well as shooting them myself with maxed out RJ Intrinsics.

Testing shows travel time and distance are very important, turrets with high damage suffer greatly at long-medium distances because of their slow travel time.

Turrets with a faster travel time like Apoc, Talyn and Carcinnox work great at almost any distance, and they still deal plenty of damage.

Also tested Gunnery 10 Intrinsic, enemy ships will very often snap out of aim lock, or if they are far away, turrets with slow travel time may miss them regardless, so all in all, it doesn't seem all that good to me.

Plexus Mods (Railjack Mods)

This is the build I use.

For the Matrix (aura) mod, Ironclad Matrix provides health, armor and shields.

Onslaught Matrix is more focused towards damage buffs.

Since there are no other HP or Armor mods, the essential/mandatory mods for me are the speed mods and Artillery Cheap Shot.

Base and Boost speed are multiplicatively with each other when boosting.

The Forward Artillery for taking down Crewships is such a key part of Railjack gameplay.

Each mission you start with only 2 shots on the Forward Artillery, this 2 shot max increases every time you refill the Artillery ammo thru the Forge, however going to the Forge over and over is time consuming and annoying, so Artillery Cheap Shot is such a must have.

The Turret Damage, Crit Chance and Crit Damage mods are a big damage increase for Turrets, and they are non-conditional, so they always take effect.

The Turret Faction damage mods are faction dependent, and I personally don't like switching builds every time I go into a mission, Railjacks deal plenty of damage without them.

Sentient RJ enemies are only present in certain events or quests.

Cruising Speed is nice for getting to objectives and enemies far away.

Shooting at Crewships' engines with the Forward Artillery always guarantees a one shot kill. Forward Artillery might be useful in niche situations, like if you destroy all the engines by accident and you have to shoot at the ships' bodies.

Crimson Fugue is a really great stacking damage buff for Turrets, in particular if you have good turrets and good gunner Crew NPCs, it's very easy to stack.

Turret Velocity is not always necessary, but it's almost mandatory if you use turrets with slow travel time like Vort.

Mods I don't recommend.

Waveband Disruptor doesn't work on Corpus Crewships' shields.

Protective Shots: +30% is a relatively small damage increase, and it's almost impossible to keep your shields above 75% consistently.

Fortifying Fire on a maxed out Railjack shield regen is so fast, that it becomes redundant.

Defensive Fire increases maximum shields, RJ shields are pretty bad at taking damage, and the buff only lasts for 10 sec, the duration doesn't stack.

Ordnance has niche uses and I would never use a mod slot on any Ordnance mods.

Battle mods

Battle mods are abilities that can be used with the number keys when driving a Railjack or manning a turret, just like Warframe abilities.

Battle Mods use the energy of your Warframe, and as such you can make use of the regular methods to regen your Warframe's energy and spam them endlessly.

Energy Pads, Energizing Dash, Arcane Energize, Protea's Dispenser, either in the protea frame, subsuming the ability to another frame thru the Helminth, or a Warframe Specter of Protea (I haven't tested how good this last one is).

Using (Primed) Flow or Preparation on your Warframe will work for Battle Mod energy, but Warframe Ability Efficiency or Duration mods will not affect RJ Battle Mods.

Lavos uses 10 seconds cooldowns instead of energy.

Battle mods energy cost will double after casting an ability, and will return to normal after 5 seconds.

Hildryn uses shields instead of energy, but it costs 10 times the default amount, so she is not a good option.

Sahasa Kubrow's Dig doesn't seem to work on the Railjack, for reasons unknown to me.

Blackout Pulse is great for immobilizing Crew Ships for an easy shot with the Forward Artillery.

Shatter Burst deals decent AOE damage for 5s. Tether shoots a projectile that latches on to and pulls in a set number of enemies. Tethered enemies take 50% bonus damage from all sources and deal 2000 AOE Blast damage when killed.

Tether is a nice debuff but ultimately I find them both redundant to Seeker Volley and Forward Artillery.

Seeker Volley might as well be the strongest Railjack mod as of now, it uses a lot of energy, but can kill a large number of enemy ships (not Crewships) in a huge area.

Phoenix Blaze and Void Hole are great, but they fall behind to Seeker Volley.

Tactical mods

Tactical Mods are abilities that are used from the Tactical Menu (L key).

These do not consume energy, having cooldowns instead.

I find Form Up very useful for teleporting everyone back to the Railjack after completing a mission.

Maxed out Turrets usually have plenty damage to kill any enemy ships so Death Blossom might be better then Battle Stations, but both are great.

Void Cloak is very useful if you need to leave your RJ unattended for whatever reason.

Railjack Intrinsics

The cost for unlocking RJ Intrinsics escales multiplicatively, Rank 1 Intrinsics cost 1 point, Rank 2 cost 2 points, Rank 3 costs 4 points, then 8 points,16, 32, 64, 128, 256, and 512 points for the last rank of each Intrinsic category.

So the last ranks are much harder to unlock, but the first 5 or so ranks of each category are very easy.

Farming Railjack Intrinsics

Railjack Intrinsics are obtained thru XP gained on Railjack missions, the XP is automatically converted to an equivalent in Intrinsic points.

I couldn't find any above and beyond method for farming RJ Intrinsics, I tried exploiting the stealth kill XP multiplier in high level RJ Survival and Exterminate missions, but enemies in such missions seem to never spawn unalerted, so it was impossible.

In the end, I decided the two best ways are Void Storms (Railjack's version of Void Fissures), endless Survival or Skirmish missions.

I noticed Skirmish was just as good, if not better than endless Survival, killing Railjack ships with Seeker Volley and the Forward Artillery in quick succession, seems to drop good XP, plus Void Storm Skirmish missions drop more loot in general, so that's my preferred method.

Best Intrinsic Skills

I would prioritize getting 4-1-2-5-3 asap.

That is [ Tactical 4 - Pilot 1 - Gunnery 2 - Engineering 5 - Command 3 ]

Below are the best and most impactful RJ Intrinsics.

Tactical

Rank 3

Allows teleporting to different parts of the Railjack through the Tactical Menu.

Rank 4

Using the Omni Repair Tool outside of the Railjack will teleport you back inside.

Rank 5

Enables summoning and using Necramechs in all Railjack missions.

Particularly useful for ranking up Necramechs and Archguns.

Rank 6

Reduces Energy Consumption for Battle Mods by 25%

Rank 8 - Works outside of Railjack missions

Reduces Archwing Blink cooldown by 25%

Reduces Necramech summon cooldown by 25%

Piloting

Rank 1

Hold LShift to boost Engine Speed.

Rank 2

Tap LShift to burst.

Rank 4

Double-tapping and holding the boost key (LShift) to drift or boost.

Rank 5

Vacuum radius of the Railjack is increased to 3000m while boosting, drifting, or dodging.

Hidden derelicts are marked with an optional mission objective marker.

Rank 8 - Works outside of Railjack missions

Archwing Speed increased by 20%

Gunnery

Rank 2

RJ Turrets will have all visual and movement restrictions removed.

Allows for full 360 degree shooting.

Rank 3

Unlocks the Archwing Slingshot.

Useful for boarding enemy ships for sabotage and launching yourself to far away mission objectives.

Rank 4 - Works outside of Railjack missions

Increase Archwing Attraction range by 25m, Melee Range by 0.75m and Damage by 20%

Rank 5 - Works outside of Railjack missions

Increase Necramech Gun damage by 20%

Rank 6

Reduce Turret Heat Accretion by 20%

Rank 8 - Works outside of Railjack missions

Increases Archwing power:

Damage +25%, Ability Strength +20%, Ability Range +20%, and Ability Efficiency +20%

Engineering

Rank 1

Omni Repair Tool circle now has a boxed indicator that will immediately repair the damage if timed correctly, similar to Mining Tools.

Rank 4

Unlocks the ability to craft Dome Charges (Forward Artillery ammo) at the Railjack's Forge during missions.

Rank 5

Increases Forge yields by 25%

Unlocks the ability to craft Hull Restores at the Railjack's Forge.

Rank 8 - Works outside of Railjack missions

Increase Archwing defense.

Health +30%, Shield +30%, and Armor +30%

Rank 9 - Works outside of Railjack missions

Increase Necramech defense.

Health +25%. Shields +25%

Command

Rank 1

Unlocks the first Crew member slot and the ability to hire them from Ticker.

Rank 3

Unlocks the second Crew member slot.

Rank 5

Unlocks the third Crew member slot.

Rank 9

One of your RJ Crew members can be summoned on any mission through the On Call Crew item on your Gear Wheel, much like Warframe Specters.

Crew Summons are very useful, they are not consumable unlike Warframe Specters, meaning you don't have to constantly craft them. They use fully modded weapons from your Arsenal, which means they have access to weapon mods such as Hunter Munitions, Viral builds and the likes, and some of the Elite Crew variants have additional buffs such as additional Crit chance.

Rank 10

Elite Crew members become available for recruitment from Ticker.

Crew NPC

Railjack Crew are NPCs that roam your ship and help you with various tasks, including repairing your ship, defending from boarders, manning the turrets, and piloting the ship for you.

To obtain your Railjack Crew, you must first unlock the Command 1 Railjack Intrinsic.

Crew then can be purchased from Ticker on Fortuna, for Credits and various Railjack materials.

Engineer is the most important Crew role, it repairs your ship, and can also double as Defender.

For Engineer I would prioritize Endurance, Repair and Combat.

Gunner Crew are very OP with Talyn and Apoc turrets, and Pilot Crew should be neglected, they don't offer anything special, Piloting is better done by a Player.

For Gunners, max Gunnery and Endurance/Repair.

After unlocking Command 10 Intrinsic, Elite Crew can be purchased from Ticker.

Elite Crew have slightly higher stats and Traits, which are special buffs defined by whichever stat the NPC has more of.

• +150% Critical Chance bonus with Rifles/Pistols (stacks additively with mods like Point Strike).

• Killing an enemy heals all nearby allies by 500 over 10 seconds.

• +50% damage for Vidar/Lavan/Zetki turrets.

• +25% speed for Vidar/Lavan/Zetki engines.

Crew NPCs with the Engine Flight Speed Trait have the unique ability to buff the Railjack's speed from anywhere in the ship, the buff works regardless of who is piloting the Railjack.