[Lavos] is my GOAT. This is the build I’ve settled on after maining him for almost a year; it’s pretty flexible and can be touched up for your own purposes, but this is my max-investment setup for those who wanna dive headfirst into the most underrated frame in the game and see how much this guy is capable of.

-LAVOS BUILD-

I like using triple umbrals here, a lot. With his high starting health and armor, investment into this (plus a maxed-out Arcane Grace and [Adaptation]) makes him functionally immortal in anything but extremely high level endurance content.

[Archon Continuity] makes priming enemies for Catalyze a little bit easier, as the additional Corrosive procs can be caused by imbuing any of his abilities with toxin cause 3 new status procs.

Valence Formation is a shoe-in. Combined with the [Cedo Prime], this augment is busted.

[Overextended] feels great on [Lavos], allowing you to hit more enemies with his 1, 3, and 4, and allows you to dash further with his 2. Strength isn’t necessary for anything but Catalyze, so offsetting the deduction here is very helpful for room nuking.

The Mecha Set allows for two playstyles: a super locked-in hyperfocused status spreading playstyle (lame) or doing nothing different than before and enjoying occasional room nukes out of nowhere (based). Whatever you choose, I think this is the most fun setup for Lavos. If that’s not your thing, you can sub-out [Mecha Pulse] for a mod of your choice ([Stretch] feels great here), and any aura mod in the game as none of them are particularly better than another here.

Exilus slot is up to you here. I run [Cunning Drift] for the extra range, and occasionally [Primed Sure Footed] for super difficult content where I need to guarantee the knockdown immunity instead of having 90% uptime on it. Again, season to taste here; it’s an exilus slot, it’s made to be low-impact on the rest of the build.

Arcane Avenger is your flex slot. If you’re having survivability issues, I recommend Arcane Blessing or [Guardian]. If you want a more melee focused build with imbued Electricity for Melee Influence or something, run Arcane Strike or [Fury]. If you want to deal psychic damage to your randoms, run Arcane Energize (and Energy Siphon in the aura slot). This is the most malleable part of the build; I choose Avenger because I LOVE seeing semi-consistent orange crits and occasional red crits on my [Cedo].

For Archon Shards, I use three red tau shards for ability duration: this more than doubles your status duration and makes your status priming far easier to work around. I also use two yellow tau shards, one for casting speed and another for parkour velocity. Just a little bit of casting speed feels great, and parkour velocity is fun for jumping into the air for mass priming.

-CEDO PRIME BUILD-

Cedo Prime is a must-have for Lavos. It’s his signature, and its alt-fire is basically his fifth ability. I prefer a multishot-and-crit focused build here because of it’s relatively high base crit multiplier and below-average crit chance that is offset by your near-permanent uptime on Arcane Avenger.

Galvanized Hell and Savvy are must-haves. You already know why.

Critical Deceleration and Primed Ravage are your crit mods.

I prefer a Corrosive-Cold setup for the most brain-off universally capable damage setup here, making the next three mods Primed Charged Shell, Contagious Spread, and Primed Chilling Grasp. I don’t use 60/60 mods here because with [Valence Formation] guaranteeing imbued status procs, we dont really need more status. We use CorrCo for the damage benefits, the [Glaive] priming, and for a little bit of help with my arcane of choice, Primary Frostbite.

I like Primary Frostbite over the typical choices of Primary Merciless/Deadhead because it is more fun and the multishot bonus scales really well with [Valence Formation]. Using your 2 with as much range as it has makes it really easy to get the 40 stacks of cold needed to get maximum value out of this. Having the extra crit damage with Arcane Avenger also feels pretty great.

Exilus slot is your choice. I use [Vigilante Supplies] because I’m a red crit addict and I’m constantly chasing the dragon. If you have the room, [Counterbalance] feels pretty good here; [Galvanized Acceleration] if you wanna see your [Glaive] go 200mph. Not a lot of great options here, to be honest.

The last slot is a flex slot. I use a Riven because my favorite frame’s favorite gun needs one, but the [Cedo Prime]’s low dispo makes this entirely optional, and I’d even consider it suboptimal with anything but a god roll. For the sane among you, I’d use shotgun barrage to more than offset the fire rate debuff of Critical Deceleration.

-EPITAPH PRIME BUILD-

Maybe a boring choice, but if you like using Catalyze, using this as a primer feels AMAZING. I use a pure status-AoE build with Secondary Encumber with my preferred playstyle, which is: seeing Catalyse is off cooldown, holding 1 and 4 to imbue Gas, bullet-jumping into the air, spamming left click at every enemy I can see, landing and pressing 4, and watching the minimap progressively clear itself of red markers. Your choice of 60/60s is up to you, I use Viral because that status isn’t found anywhere else on my build. Not a very high investment build, and considering Epitaph Prime’s popularity, you have likely already invested the one or two Forma needed for this.

-DUAL VICISS BUILD-

This entire slot is a flex, but I’m using the brand-new [Dual Viciss] mainly because it looks really cool, has a fun moveset with the [Carving Mantis] set, and the passive feels great on [Lavos] assuming you imbue Gas damage as much as I do. I like using a Melee Vortex setup because it synergizes well with my Gas status spam, and because Melee Influence is overused and boring, even if it is probably the optimal choice here. If Influence spam is something you like, I recommend the Dual Ichor modded specifically for blast or viral, and using your electricity imbuement to proc the arcane.

-COMPANION BUILD: PHARAOH PREDASITE-

You can use your choice of predasite or kubrow here to fill out the remaining two Mecha Set mods, or if you’re not running that set, run something completely different like a grouping and priming [Nautilus Prime] and [Helstrum] like I have in the past. I like using beast companions because of the loot bonus mods they get. On my predasite, I use [Link Vitality] and Fiber because of the umbral mods on [Lavos], [Fetch] because of course, [Anabolic Pollination] for occasional damage bonuses, and [Primed Animal Instinct] because I throw that mod on every companion I have for no reason. If you don’t want to forma a companion, you can fit a few more mods on for free: I use [Resourceful Retriever] for loot, [Endoparasitic Vector] for a bit more viral priming, and an underleveled [Primed Pack Leader] for a bit more sustain. You could slot just about any bond mod you feel like you’d want here. On the claws, use Frenzied Posture and throw in Mecha Overdrive, Bite, Maul, and as many status mods and 60/60s you can fit. I have mine set up for toxin, radiation, magnetic, and gas status for a bit more free random priming. Again, not necessary to forma here as it has such a minimal impact on the build as a whole.

-MISCELLANEOUS-

I prefer using Madurai school for this build because of the extra casting speed it can occasionally provide, and it makes self-reviving with Last Gasp far easier, though with this health tanking build this is a rarity.

Using [Oraxia]’s Noble Animation set is a must have, allowing your Lavos Prime to slay like he was born to do.

Here are some other fun and off-meta choices you can use for weaponry:

[Innodem], built with Melee Crescendo and for max finisher damage because [Lavos]’s 1 opens up enemies for finishers

[Kompressa Prime], because vomiting bubbles everywhere with high status and Secondary Enervate is really funny

[Grimoire] with tome mods for support and because your [Lavos] works out at the library

(Coda) Caustacyst for projectile vomiting status on enemies in front of you, and because scythes are badass

Bubonico for vom- okay this bit is getting old but this gun @#$%&! if you invest a bunch of forma into it

Just about any shotgun in the game with high multishot, and built for/imbued with blast damage to make it pseudo-AoE

[Ax-52] with Primary Crux to make your enemies play Touhou

[Harmony] heavy attack on an enemy that is riddled with toxin procs thanks to your toxin imbued shotgun of choice

Tenet Exec or Agendus with Melee Afflictions for a funnier, ragdoll-oriented version of above

[Ceramic Dagger] incarnon with initial combo evolutions to pull out and immediately deal with steel path acolytes

[Amanata] with mandatory [Condition Overload] allows you to hold W and E to blend any enemy you run into

Finally, make sure your fashion is well done and to your liking. Studies show that warframes that look cool feel 14-18% better to play than base appearances. After all, fashion is the true endgame.

I hope you enjoyed reading my unfiltered tism rant for the only self-made man in Warframe. Like to like, "reblag" to fuck me nasty or something