Understanding Prime Drop Rates: A Deep Dive

How Relic Drop Rates Work in Warframe - The Math

Warframe Relic Drop Rates - I spent about 45 minutes last week explaining relic math to someone in my clan, and realized most players don't actually know how the percentages work when you refine relics. Let me share what I've learned after opening probably hundreds (maybe thousands) of relics over my 4000+ hours in this game.

For those who don't know, every relic contains 6 different rewards. You've got three rarity tiers. Common stuff, uncommon stuff, and rare stuff. You crack the relic open in a fissure mission, and you get one of those 6 rewards.

OK, so void traces. You spend them to refine your relics, which changes the percentages you're working with. I wish someone had explained this to me earlier, because I probably wasted 5000+ traces on garbage relics when I first started.

The Base Drop Rates

An intact relic has this as the base drop rate:

• Common rewards (bronze): 25.33% each (there are 3 commons in every relic)
• Uncommon rewards (silver): 11% each (there are 2 uncommons)
• Rare reward (gold): 2% (only 1 rare per relic)

That 2% is rough; without a radiant group, you will have a hard time getting the rare item. It hurts even more when you're using an Axi relic, which is hard to farm in itself. Doubling the grind.

Here's what each tier gives you:

Intact (costs 0 void traces):

• Common: 25.33% each
• Uncommon: 11% each
• Rare: 2%

Exceptional (costs 25 void traces):

• Common: 23.33% each
• Uncommon: 13% each
• Rare: 4%

Flawless (costs 50 void traces total):

• Common: 20% each
• Uncommon: 17% each
• Rare: 6%

Radiant (costs 100 void traces total):

• Common: 16.67% each
• Uncommon: 20% each
• Rare: 10%

See what's happening? Going from Intact to Radiant LOWERS your common drop chance from 25.33% to 16.67%. This is why radiating relics when you want a common part is literally throwing away void traces for nothing.​

Are you radiating every relic you open? Because that's a mistake I made for a while when I was a new player.

Why The Jump From Intact To Radiant Matters

Radiant gives you 5 times better odds on the rare (2% to 10%). That's massive. But it costs 100 void traces.​

I did some farming on Ukko last night to test trace income, and I was getting about 7-8 traces per run solo, maybe 13-14 in a full squad. So 100 traces means you need to run like 8-10 fissures just to afford one Radiant refinement. That's time. That's opportunity cost.​

Note: Running radiant relics with a resource booster is always worth it for the extra resources and traces.

Here's the thing though. Sometimes that 100-trace investment pays for itself. Sometimes it doesn't.

Running Relics In Squads Changes Everything (Radshares)

Let me explain the most important part of relic farming that changes the whole math.

So you're in a fissure mission with 4 people. Everyone cracks their relic. At the end, you see 4 different rewards on the screen. You can only pick one of those 4 options.

If you're hunting for a rare part, here's the play. You find 3 other people with the same relic type. Everyone refines their relic to Radiant. Everyone brings that same Radiant relic into the mission. This is called a "radshare".​

This is where the odds turn in your favor:

Every Radiant has a 10% chance of being rare. 4 Radiants means 4 chances to see it pop up. The probability that AT LEAST ONE rare shows up is 34.39%.​

Let me show you how this works because I got into an argument once with someone who didn't believe the math. The chance that NO rare drops from all 4 relics is:

0.90 × 0.90 × 0.90 × 0.90 = 0.6561

That's 65.61% chance of NOT seeing a rare.

So flip it around. The chance you DO see at least one rare is:

1 - 0.6561 = 0.3439 (which is 34.39%)

I ran a radshare for Glaive Prime Blade two weeks ago. We did 15 runs total. The rare showed up 6 times. That's 40% which is a bit lucky but close to the expected 34%.​ Glaive Prime used to cost 400 platinum for a set at one point.

Solo Radiant vs Radshare - The Difference Is Huge

• Solo Radiant: 10% rare chance
• 4-player Radshare: 34.39% rare chance

With a radshare you're seeing a rare roughly every 3 missions instead of every 10 missions. In the end it depends on RNG but its always better to run similar relics with our players to increase your platinum per relic.

I usually run radshares with my clan where we agreed to take turns if we get duplicate rares. Keeps it fair.

Should You Always Run Radiant Relics?

Here's where players waste the most traces. Not every relic is worth upgrading to Radiant.

The refinement costs are:​

• Intact → Exceptional: 25 void traces (rare rate goes from 2% to 4%)
• Exceptional → Flawless: another 25 traces (rare rate goes from 4% to 6%)
• Flawless → Radiant: another 25 traces (rare rate goes from 6% to 10%)

Wait that doesn't add up. Let me explain it better.

If you're starting from Intact:

• To get to Exceptional: 25 traces total
• To get to Flawless: 50 traces total (25 + 25)
• To get to Radiant: 100 traces total (25 + 25 + 50... no wait that's wrong)

Actually, it's 25 for each tier. So 25 + 25 + 25 + 25 = 100 total to go from Intact to Radiant.​

The last refinement step from Flawless to Radiant costs 50 traces and gives you a +4% bonus (6% to 10%). That's actually better value than the first step which costs 25 traces for only +2% (2% to 4%).

But here's what matters more. Void traces have value because you could use those 100 traces on a different relic instead.

Recommended Tip: Only upgrade relics when the rare part sells for way more platinum than the common parts. If the rare is worth 120+ plat and the commons are worth like 3-5 plat, then yeah radiate it. If the rare is only worth 20 plat? Keep it Intact and save your traces.​

I tested this myself tracking platinum per hour. I spent one week radiating every relic I owned. Then I spent another week only radiating expensive vaulted relics and keeping cheap relics Intact. The second week I made like 60% more platinum because I wasn't wasting traces on low-value relics.​

When Exceptional Makes More Sense Than Radiant

Sometimes the middle-tier refinements are a better value.

Let's say you have 200 total void traces. You could either:

• Make 2 Radiant relics (100 traces each, 10% rare chance on each)
• Make 8 Exceptional relics (25 traces each, 4% rare chance on each)

For medium-value rares (like 25-50 plat parts), spreading your probability across 8 attempts with Exceptional can actually be more efficient than gambling on 2 Radiant attempts.​

The math gets complicated here, but the short version is this. With 8 Exceptional relics at 4% each, you're not guaranteed to see the rare. But your overall expected value might be higher because you're opening more relics total and getting more uncommons along the way.

Honestly, it depends on how many relics and traces you have. If you're rich in traces but poor in relics, go Radiant. If you're rich in relics but poor in traces, go Exceptional or even Intact.

The Expected Value Math (For The Math Nerds)

For the math nerds out there, here's the platinum calculation to see if radiating is actually worth it.

Let's say you have a relic where:

• Rare part = 120 platinum on warframe.market
• Common parts average = 3 platinum each
• Void traces have an opportunity cost of about 0.2-0.3 plat per trace based on farming time​

Let's use 0.25 plat per trace. So 100 traces = 25 plat opportunity cost.

Intact relic expected value:

(2% chance × 120 plat rare) + (98% chance × 3 plat average common/uncommon)

= 2.4 plat + 2.94 plat = 5.34 plat per Intact relic

Radiant relic expected value:

(10% chance × 120 plat rare) + (90% chance × 3 plat average) - 25 plat trace cost

= 12 plat + 2.7 plat - 25 plat = -10.3 plat

Wait, that's negative. That means upgrading to radiant actually LOSES you platinum when you run solo.​

But in a radshare, it changes. With 34.39% chance to see at least one rare in 4 Radiant relics:​

Expected runs to get rare = 1 / 0.3439 = 2.91 runs

So you spend 291 void traces on average (2.91 relics × 100 traces each) to get one rare worth 120 plat.

291 traces × 0.25 plat opportunity cost = 72.75 plat cost

120 plat value - 72.75 plat cost = 47.25 plat profit

OK, so radshares for expensive parts ARE worth it. But solo Radiant is not.​

Let me be honest, I didn't figure this out until like 1500 hours into the game. I was upgrading my relics solo like an idiot. But I also blame it on the fact that I am MR28 with plenty of traces to spend on weird relics.

How Mission Rotations Affect Your Relic Farming

Mission rotations don't mess with relic reward rates. What they DO affect is how fast you farm the relics in the first place.

Endless missions use an A-A-B-C rotation pattern:​

• Wave 5: Rotation A rewards
• Wave 10: Rotation A again
• Wave 15: Rotation B
• Wave 20: Rotation C

Then it cycle repeats. Wave 25 is A, Wave 30 is A, Wave 35 is B, Wave 40 is C.

If the relic you want drops from Rotation C, you gotta stay for 20 waves minimum. I usually do exactly 20 waves and extract because the time efficiency falls off after that due to enemy difficulty and most level scaling. You're spending 20 minutes on each C rotation reward.​

Capture missions are faster but the relic drop rates are lower (usually 6-12% per mission). So it's a speed vs consistency tradeoff.​

I tested Ukko (Void Capture) for Axi relic farming and was getting relics about 1 in every 8 runs. Takes like 90 seconds per run. So 12 minutes per relic. Compare that to 20-minute survival rotations where relics are guaranteed. Survival is actually more efficient if you value your time. But for some reason, I keep on thinking that capture is faster.

Are you tracking your relic drops to see which missions work best for your playstyle? I started keeping notes, and it changed how I farm.

Void Trace Farming Strategy

Quick tip. If you need void traces fast, run Capture fissures with Intact relics in a full squad.​

You get 6-7 traces from your own relic. You get another 1-2 traces for each squad member who also cracks a relic. In a 4-player squad that's 12-14 traces per mission.​

Capture missions take like 2 minutes. So you can farm 300+ traces per hour running Captures.​

I did mine on Ukko yesterday and got 340 traces in about an hour. That's enough to Radiant 3 relics.

Recommended Tip: Don't use your good relics for trace farming. Use whatever Intact relics you have sitting around that have low-value rewards. You're just there for the traces.​ I usually do a few forma relics run to farm for traces.

Does RNG Even Out Over Time

One thing I see people asking a lot. Is the RNG actually random or does it manipulate your drop rates?

Based on my tracking of 200+ relics, the rates match what the game says pretty closely. I opened 87 Radiant relics solo and got 9 rare drops. That's 10.3% which is basically the expected 10%.​

Over small sample sizes (like 10-20 relics) you can get unlucky or lucky streaks. But over hundreds of relics it evens out. RNG is RNG.

I genuinely don't think the game manipulates relic drop rates. The mission drop rates for certain things might be weighted weird but the relic reward tables seem fair based on the published percentages.

For those who don't know, you can see the exact drop rates on the official drop tables on the Warframe wiki. Every relic shows you the percentages for each reward at each refinement tier.​

Wrapping up the math:

After this long article, here is the TLDR:

• Intact relics: 2% rare, don't waste traces unless rare is valuable or part of a higher valued set
• Radiant relics: 10% rare, only worth it for 80+ plat parts in radshares​
• Radshares (4 Radiants): 34.39% to see at least one rare​
• Intshares (4 Intacts): 68.9% to see your target common​
• Solo Radiant is usually negative expected value, radshare Radiant can be profitable for vaulted parts​
• Check warframe.market before deciding refinement tier
• Farm traces on fast Capture missions with Intact relics​

Check the wiki drop tables to see which missions drop the relics you need and at what rotation. You can view our Lith, Axi, and other Relic pages for each relic name and then figure out if soemthing is worth farming or not.