Soma

"Accuracy combined with a massive magazine make the SOMA assault rifle a formidable weapon."

- In-Game Description.

The Soma is a Tenno designed high caliber assault rifle with high accuracy and critical ratio. It uses an enormous magazine to sustain fire but must wind up briefly to achieve its maximum fire rate.

Characteristics
This weapon deals primarily Slash damage.

Advantages:
 * Very large magazine size.
 * High fire rate, achieved after a wind up time of 8 bullets.
 * High accuracy.
 * Second highest critical chance of any primary weapon, second to the Synapse.
 * Highest critical damage bonus ratio of all primary weapons.
 * Benefits greatly from elemental mods, as elements are amplified by critical damage.
 * Two polarity slots, ideal for Serration and Split Chamber

Disadvantages:
 * Requires mastery rank 6.
 * Low DPS and inefficient ammo economy without a critical hit focused build.
 * Requires a relatively large amount of uncommon resources to craft.
 * Longer reload than most rifles (not as long as the Gorgon or Supra however).
 * Lowest base damage per bullet of any primary weapon.
 * Weak Impact damage.

Acquisition
The Soma can be purchased for in the market and the blueprint for.

Weapon Loadouts
See the user build section for builds using this weapon.

Tips

 * Rifle Ammo Mutation can help regain lost ammunition if the user has ammo conservation problems or if the Soma is unranked, but leaves less room for damage mods, Alternatively, use Rifle Scavenger or Team Ammo Restores.
 * Firing in bursts helps with ammo consumption. When well-modded, the Soma is capable of dispatching many common enemies with 1 or 2 shots.
 * The Soma's crit rate can be boosted up to 75% with a maximum-rank Point Strike mod and up to 89.4% by adding a maximum-rank Critical Delay.
 * With a maximum rank Vital Sense and a Hammer Shot mod, the Soma's crit damage multiplier can be increased to 840%.
 * Once the weapon enters the fast-firing stage, some skills (like Iron Skin) may be activated without losing the firing speed.
 * Similarly, it retains its fast firing rate if you let off the fire button for short periods. This lets the wielder change targets without wasting large amounts of ammunition in between separate enemies, as long as they do so quickly. This can also be used to keep tighter firing spreads at long ranges, essentially "bursting" rounds with quick pauses between to reduce recoil.
 * Canceling the reload animation halfway still counts as a reload, essentially cutting the reload time by half.
 * This weapon has a slight wind up time, much like the Gorgon (only less prominent). This can be taken advantage of by tapping the fire button, making it fire single bullets at a time, which can be effective for sniping weaker units.
 * The significantly tighter spread at long range and hitscan properly give the Soma an advantage over the Gorgon and Supra for picking off heavy units, but the latter two are more effective at clearing large groups of enemies.

Trivia

 * The magazine curls up into the weapon while firing, and ejects when ammo is depleted.
 * The Soma's Design seems to be based on the French Chauchat.
 * Its unusual magazine shape resembles the Japanese Type 100 SMG, or the Type 99 LMG when the magazine has gone through.
 * The Soma's icon and its blueprint shows the magazine halfway depleted.
 * Reloading the Soma will eject the magazine. Repeatedly reload-cancelling can leave a pile of Soma magazines on the floor.
 * The Soma was described in the market as a "deadly and elegant high caliber Tenno assault rifle." Despite allegedly high caliber rounds, its damage is second to worst, and its magazine capacity is high compared with other weapons. Judging from the physical size of other weapons' magazines, it may be a relatively high caliber.
 * The Soma initially had a Mastery Rank requirement of 3. This was increased to 6 in Update 10.5.

Bugs

 * The colored magazine removed from the Soma will return to its original color.
 * There are several appearance bugs associated with the Soma's magazine. The magazine may get "stuck" if reload-cancelled right before the reload completes, leaving the Soma free for use without a magazine loaded.
 * Occasionally, the user can find the Soma ejecting multiple magazines on a single reload.