A noble bow to hunt hellish beasts.
The Cernos Prime is the Prime variant of the 
Cernos. Aside from increased damage, the Cernos Prime is unique in that it fires three arrows per shot in a horizontal spread, and has an Alternate Fire mode that shoots vertically, and deals bonus damage on headshots. It was released alongside 
Valkyr Prime and 
Venka Prime.
Characteristics[]
Advantages over other Primary weapons (excluding modular weapons):
Disadvantages over other Primary weapons (excluding modular weapons):
- Very wide spread.
- Uncharged Horizontal/Vertical Shot (wiki attack index 1)
- Very low magazine (1)
- Very low fire rate (1.00 attacks/sec)
- Low ammo max (72)
- Charged Horizontal/Vertical Shot (wiki attack index 2)
- Very low magazine (1)
- Very low fire rate (1.00 attacks/sec)
- Low ammo max (72)
- Below average crit multiplier (2.00x)
See WARFRAME Wiki:Stat Comparison/Percentiles for more details.
Comparisons:
Acquisition[]
Unlike most Prime gear, Cernos Prime is permanently unvaulted, with relics being obtainable through Abandoned Derelict Caches in Corpus Railjack missions.
| Manufacturing Requirements 📝 Edit blueprint requirements | |||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
 15,000 |
 1 |
1 |
 1 |
 1 |
Time: 12 Hour(s) |
Rush:  50
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 Market Price: N/A
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 Blueprints Price:N/A
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Vaultings[]
Notes[]
Trivia[]
- The Cernos Prime, alongside
Afuris Prime, 
Akbolto Prime, 
Aksomati Prime, 
Akstiletto Prime, 
Ballistica Prime, 
Dual Kamas Prime, 
Dual Keres Prime, 
Fang Prime, 
Gunsen Prime, 
Paris Prime and 
Zhuge Prime are the only Prime weapons that do not require Orokin Cells as crafting ingredients.
Media[]
Cernos Prime in Codex.
Cernos Prime as shown in the Arsenal
Cernos Prime Arrow Quiver with Arrows
Warframe - All Prime Primaries - Weapon Animations & Sounds (2013 - 2019)
2 Minute Guide to Delete Enemies in 2 Secs with Cernos Prime - Warframe
Cernos Prime Build 2021 (Guide) - The Bludgeon Shortbow - Warframe
Cernos Prime Skins
Patch History[]
Update 32.0 (2022-09-07)
- Ammo Changes
We understand the power fantasy of these weapons is very popular for some, so our first approach was to keep them powerful, but limit how often they can be used by making changes to ammo pick-up.
Ammo Pickup Overrides
The following weapons now have ammo pickup overrides, meaning they gain less from picking up ammo. This mostly applies to AoE weapons, in hopes that players will become more deliberate with their aim to make the most of their Ammo pools. The following lists the specific ammo pick up overrides per weapon category.
Primary Weapon Ammo Pick Up Overrides
15 Ammo per Pick Up:
- Cernos Prime
Update 30.9 (2021-11-11)
- Fixed the Cernos Prime Vertical Spread shot doing 2x damage of Horizontal Spread shot.
Update 28.0 (2020-06-11)
- Reduced the hit FX of the Cernos Prime.
Hotfix 27.2.1 (2020-03-05)
- Increased Cernos Prime 10% Status Chance per projectile to 30% Status Chance per projectile.
Update 27.2 (2020-03-05)
- Greater than 100% Status having meaning
Shotguns have a unique Role here based on a very patch-work history with how they interact with Status Chance. A Shotgun that shoots 99% Status Chance would give you 35% (roughly) status per pellet. 100% Status Gives you 100% Status per pellet. This huge jump in performance happens with just a 1% gain - why? Well, to answer that we have to look at our choice to make what the UI conveys reality. It would feel broken to shoot a Shotgun with 100% Status and not see a perfect spread of Effects. In reality, to make Status consistent we have to treat Shotguns as a special case.
Shotguns as a special case means we have buffed the Status Chance of all Shotguns by x3 or greater. The UI now behaves to show the reality that you are determining Status Chance per pellet.
Update 25.7 (2019-08-29)
- Normalized quick shots to have the same critical chance/damage and status chance as charged shots.
- While reviewing Bow stats the team has also refreshed all their FX (including the Lenz)!
- Quick Shot increased from 60 to 92
- Charged Shot increased from 120 to 184
- Flight Speed increased from 85 to 95
- Tightened the spread of the vertical fire mode and made the top arrow land on the reticle instead of the middle
- Fixed Cernos Prime equipped with Heavy Caliber causing Vertical Spread mode to function as a Horizontal Spread.
Hotfix 25.3.3 (2019-07-16)
- Fixed an issue with Cernos Prime arrows fired by Mirage's Hall of Mirrors clones always hitting the floor.
Hotfix 25.0.7 (2019-05-30)
- Fixed the Cernos (Prime) Energy color persisting as default on the strings.
Update 23.9 (2018-09-25)
- Cernos Prime has entered the Prime Vault.
Update 22.16 (2018-03-15)
- Fixed Cernos Prime’s vertical spread not using equipped arrow Skins.
Hotfix 22.13.3 (2018-02-21)
- Cernos Prime Alt Fire is now silent as intended.
Hotfix 22.13.1 (2018-02-15)
- Fixed numerous projectile weapons (Cernos Prime, etc) having incorrect Status Chance calculations.
Update 22.12 (2018-02-09)
- Mastery Rank increased from 8 to 12.
- Charge speed increased from 1s to 0.5s.
- Status chance increased from 10% to 30%.
- Reload speed increased from 1s to 0.7s (in note put 0.65).
- Added Secondary Fire Mode toggle that shoots a vertical spread of 3 arrows.
- Added innate +50% damage to headshots.
Hotfix 19.0.7 (2016-11-22)
- Released via Valkyr Prime Access.
Hotfix 19.0.2 (2016-11-12)
- Removed an unreleased Relic from the wild.
Update 19.0 (2016-11-11)
- Parts and Relics loaded to the build.
Last updated: Update 23.9 (2018-09-25)
