Methods, systems, and devices for wireless communications are described. Generally, the described techniques provide for a base station transmitting a modulation and coding scheme index corresponding to a modulation and coding scheme table to a user equipment (UE). The modulation and coding scheme index may be applied to encoding or decoding a transport block. The modulation and coding scheme may be associated with at least two modulation orders or a differential indication according to a modulation and coding scheme table. To determine which of the modulation orders for processing the transport block, the UE and the base station may use a prior modulation order associated with a prior transmission of the transport block. The UE may process the transport block by encoding or decoding the transport block based at least in part on the determined modulation order.