Soulframe Motes Guide – How to Get Motes

Motes were an aspect of progression and build customisation in Soulframe, available until the Preludes 10 update. They were subsequently removed in Preludes 11 and replaced with the Runes & Totems system. While motes might be added back to the game at some point, for the time being this guide serves as an archive of how Motes worked when they were still active in Soulframe.

Motes were additional upgrades that could be slotted to your weapons and Pacts to unlock bonuses, such as flat stat boosts or damage/defence bonuses that applied in certain circumstances.

What Are Motes in Soulframe?

Motes are a special type of collectable item in Soulframe. Once obtained, they can be slotted to your weapons and Pacts to add extra bonuses and effects, allowing you to customise your build and specialise it to excel at certain aspects of combat or gameplay.

Each weapon and Pact has three Mote slots, which means you can have up to nine Motes slotted in Soulframe at the moment:

• 3 Pact Motes
• 3 Weapon Motes
• 3 Sidearm Motes

One Mote slot of each type is unlocked to begin with. The others must be unlocked by levelling up your Pact and Weapon.

While Motes are quite simple to understand, a lot of players have difficulties obtaining them, partially due to a lack of tutorials in Soulframe due to its early stage of development, and partially due to a small UI issue in the menu where Motes are obtained, which can obscure Motes you’ve earned. We’ll now explain how you can earn and claim Motes in Soulframe.

How to Obtain Motes in Soulframe

As mentioned at the beginning of the guide, Motes are not obtainable anymore. All the info below is from Preludes 10 when Motes were still available. 

Motes are obtained by fully discovering locations in Soulframe. When you enter a location that has not been fully discovered, a fully or partially encrypted version of the location’s name will appear at the top of your screen, along with some pips. The pips correspond to small glowing orbs that must be collected to obtain a Mote from that location. The small faces hovering over the blips tell you how many can be collected currently – it is rare for all of them to be present in one visit.

When you find an orb, press your Spirit Vision key to collect it. After finding all of them, the location will be fully discovered.

You can then visit Orlick in Nightfold to view the Codex. Find the location you discovered, and click the Claim Mote button. You can then choose one of two Motes to permanently add to your collection.

Please note that many locations do not have Motes associated with them right now – the Mote-giving locations are centred around the western and central parts of the map, which have been in the game for longer.

How to Equip Motes in Soulframe

Once you’ve obtained a Mote, you must equip it to see any benefits.

Enter the tent in Nightfold, and interact with the bookshelf opposite the entrance (the same place where you can equip weapons and armour and upgrade your Pact).

The easiest way to access the Mote menu is to right-click on your currently equipped weapon.

On the right side of the Mote menu, you can slot and unslot Motes from your currently selected weapon. Click an empty slot, then choose a Mote to put into the slot.

On the left edge of this screen, you can see three tabs. The default tab is the Weapon Motes tab. You can select the second tab to view Pact Motes. These work in the same way as weapon Motes, but allow you to apply up to three Motes to each Pact instead.

The third tab allows you to view all of your collected Motes.

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