![WARFRAME Wiki](data:image/svg+xml,<svg xmlns="http://www.w3.org/2000/svg" width="500" height="500"><rect fill-opacity="0"/></svg>)
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[]
- This weapon deals primarily
![DmgImpactSmall64](data:image/svg+xml,<svg xmlns="http://www.w3.org/2000/svg" width="32" height="32"><rect fill-opacity="0"/></svg>)
Impact damage. - Deals 50% bonus damage on headshots.
- Charged shots have innate 1 meter punch through.
- Innate multishot of 3 arrows.
- Alternate Fire can toggle a horizontal or vertical spread shot.
- On kill, bodies will follow the arrow that killed them, damaging enemies in their path and pinning the corpse to walls.
- Can use the bow-exclusive
![Mod TT 20px](data:image/svg+xml,<svg xmlns="http://www.w3.org/2000/svg" width="12" height="20"><rect fill-opacity="0"/></svg>)
Thunderbolt mod. - Fire rate mods apply double their bonuses.
- Innate two
![Madurai Pol](data:image/svg+xml,<svg xmlns="http://www.w3.org/2000/svg" width="20" height="20"><rect fill-opacity="0"/></svg>)
polarities.
Advantages over other Primary weapons (excluding modular weapons):
- Fourth highest base damage of all bows, behind
Daikyu , 
Lenz and 
Kuva Bramma. - Pinpoint accuracy when aiming (RMB ).
- Silent.
- Uncharged Horizontal/Vertical Shot (wiki attack index 1)
- High average number of procs per shot (0.9)
- Very high average number of crits per shot (1.05)
- Very high reload speed (0.65 s)
- High total damage (276)
- Very high crit chance (35.00%)
- Above average status chance (30.00%)
- Charged Horizontal/Vertical Shot (wiki attack index 2)
- Above average average number of procs per shot (0.9)
- Very high average number of crits per shot (1.05)
- Very high reload speed (0.65 s)
- High total damage (552)
- High crit chance (35.00%)
- Above average status chance (30.00%)
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:
- Cernos Prime (Charged Horizontal/Vertical Shot), compared to Cernos (Charged Shot):
- Lower base damage per projectile (184.00 vs. 380.00)
- Higher total damage (552 vs. 380)
- Lower base critical chance (35.00% vs. 36.00%)
- Higher base status chance (30.00% vs. 18.00%)
- Higher average damage per tap (745.2 vs. 516.8)
- Higher burst DPS (1146.46 vs. 861.33)
- Higher sustained DPS (648 vs. 469.81)
- Higher multishot (3 vs. 1)
- Slower reload time (0.65 s vs. 0.60 s)
- Greater projectile speed (95.0 m/s vs. 90.0 m/s)
- More polarities (
vs. ) - Higher Mastery Rank required (12 vs. 6)
- Lower disposition (●●●●○ (1.25x) vs. ●●●●○ (1.30x))
- Cernos Prime (Charged Horizontal/Vertical Shot), compared to Rakta Cernos (Charged Shot):
- Lower base damage per projectile (184.00 vs. 470.00)
- Higher total damage (552 vs. 470)
- Higher base status chance (30.00% vs. 15.00%)
- Higher average damage per tap (745.2 vs. 634.5)
- Higher burst DPS (1146.46 vs. 1057.5)
- Lower sustained DPS (648 vs. 746.47)
- Higher multishot (3 vs. 1)
- Slower reload time (0.65 s vs. 0.60 s)
- Lesser projectile speed (95.0 m/s vs. 100.0 m/s)
- Less polarities ( vs. )
- No innate Blight effect
Acquisition[]
Unlike most Prime gear, Cernos Prime is permanently unvaulted, with relics being obtainable through Abandoned Derelict Caches in Corpus Railjack missions.
| String | Lower Limb | Upper Limb |  Blueprint
|
Grip |
|---|---|---|---|---|
 Axi V10 Common Axi A3 Uncommon (V) Axi K2 Uncommon (V) Lith B3 Uncommon (V) Meso N8 Uncommon (V) Meso O1 Uncommon (V) Meso S6 Uncommon (V) Neo A1 Uncommon (V)
|
Lith C7 Rare Axi C1 Rare (V) Axi C2 Rare (V) Lith C2 Rare (V) Lith C5 Rare (V) Meso C3 Rare (V)
|
Meso N11 Common Axi N4 Common (V) Lith V3 Common (V) Meso C2 Common (V) Meso K1 Common (V) Meso N8 Common (V) Meso O2 Common (V) Meso S7 Common (V) Neo N6 Common (V)
|
Neo V9 Uncommon Axi B1 Uncommon (V) Axi V4 Uncommon (V) Lith A2 Uncommon (V) Lith Z1 Uncommon (V) Neo S13 Uncommon (V) Neo V7 Uncommon (V)
|
Axi S8 Common Axi H3 Common (V) Axi K3 Common (V) Axi S5 Common (V) Lith V6 Common (V) Meso V5 Common (V) Neo V4 Common (V) Neo V6 Common (V)
|
| Manufacturing Requirements | |||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
 15,000 |
 1 |
1 |
 1 |
 1 |
Time: 12 Hour(s) |
Rush:  50
| |||||
 Market Price: N/A
|
 Blueprints Price:N/A
| ||||
Vaultings[]
- On September 11th, 2018, it was announced that Cernos Prime, along with Valkyr Prime and Venka Prime, would enter the Prime Vault and be retired from the reward tables on September 25th, 2018. Any preexisting components or fully-built weapons will remain as is.
Notes[]
- The +50% bonus damage on headshots is multiplicative to other sources of +bonus damage on headshot such as Primary Deadhead and Prowl.
- The Cernos Prime's shots fire multiple arrows in a fanning spread. The number of arrows is affected by multishot mods, similar to shotguns.
- Alternate Fire toggles a Horizontal Spread or Vertical Spread fire.
- Heavy Caliber will decrease accuracy by a small amount, making each arrow fire slightly off from its normal trajectory.
- As of Hotfix 19.11.2 (2017-02-17) this was increased dramatically, making the weapon act more like a wildly-spreading shotgun than a fan of arrows.
- The arrows seem to be spread in a formation where some arrows are lower than the others, rather than being wider spread than others, this might make it difficult to get headshots with multiple arrows.
- Low accuracy will effectively invert Cernos Prime's firing mode. Horizontal shots will follow generally vertical line of shot and vice versa. This behavior is best observed while using Split Flights
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 Skins
Seasonal
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)
See also[]
- Cernos, the normal counterpart.
- Rakta Cernos, the Red Veil custom counterpart.
- Mutalist Cernos, the Infested counterpart.
201 comments
Seeing these comments make me love the ammo nerf for AoE weapons LMAO
Yes you can mod it for hunter munitions and crits and lots of multi but it is still radically under-performs any primary weapon with AoE. Best you can do is add lots of punch-thru in an attempt to hit more enemies at once with the "horizontal" mode built into the bow. The most frustrating thing about it is that it should shine as a distance weapon but it is to slow to even do that well. Unless you love slow drawing pew-pew bows (which is cool if you do), everyone else do not bother modding it. D rating.
The list of disadvantages feels a bit odd. Notably, a lot of it sounds like it was written for a shotgun rather than a bow (such as mentioning the low magazine. Well, duh, it's a bow, so of course you're only getting one shot. Or the fact that a multishot of 3 is referred to as low or even very low when most weapons in the game have a multishot of 1).
Also, some of it seems to directly contradict the advantages section. Like, the number of average procs per shot is praised under the charged shot section of the advantages and listed as a downside in the disadvantages section.
Also, there are overall very different remarks on the charged shots vs the uncharged shots when the only difference between the two appears to be base damage and projectile speed, with multishot, status chance, crit chance and crit modifier remaining exactly the same.
I think that part of the page might need some cleaning up.
So on this page, it says, "The +50% bonus damage on headshots is multiplicative to other sources of +bonus damage on headshot such as Primary Deadhead and Prowl."
But on Primary Deadhead's page, it says, "Headshot bonus stacks additively with Target Acquired, innate headshot damage bonuses on weapons such as Cernos Prime, and snipers with bonus headshot damage from scope bonuses."
So are the headshot bonuses additive or multiplicative?
Cernos Prime's headshot bonus is a unique modifier, different from all other sources of headshot bonuses. So it stacks multiplicatively with other sources of headshot bonuses.
Ah, thanks for clarifying!
Despite all the very nice stats, the what tactics of slash etc, the everyone here said it is good.... but no one uses it in mission... simple because it is not AoE weapon like Bramma! LMAO
While its power is very high and very much steel path capable, it still cannot keep topping life support off on its own vs sp Grineers unlike Bramma and maybe some other explosives.
And most of the fun I have come from trying loads of different weapons against sp Grineers and Acolytes in survival.
There are just a lot of good and enjoyable weapons in warframe and unfortunally the ones without AoE have a hard time competing against the ones that do have AoE. this goes especially when in squads, where you want to kill fast and easy out of fear an saryn or volt nukes the room before you get the change to loosen a second arrow.
Those old weapons need a riven to work properly, while Kuva, Tenet, specially the AoE, don't.
I use the crap out of this weapon. Get some reload speed as well as fire rate to really speed up bows. This is my go to for Harrow.
This is one of the best hunter munitions weapons I've found. In the simulacrum level 140 heavy gunners are almost guaranteed to die instantly or bleed to death in 1 shot.
Comparison numbers are wrong. Cernos Prime deals 552 damage on charged shots, not 184
Correction. It deals 184 per arrow, but total damage is 552. Can be very misleading at first glance, especially because unlike Artemis bow, the vertical arrows are so close to each other that in 95% of the shots they will land on basically the same spot.
I'm considering it again but i have a question:
When you just fired arrows, there seems to be a slight delay during which you can't switch from horizontal to vertical. I'm playing with critical delay and vile acceleration.
How do you compensate for this? I mean, it feels a bit clunky and instead of waiting for a second to change fire mode and hit a heavy target better, i can simple keep on shooting. Should i stay in one fire mode or get use to wait a bit for the swap?
Does reload speed affect the delay?
Internal Bleeding Cernos vs Hunter munitions Cernos : Which is better ?
Like asking for a shotgun vs sniper. Bleeding Cernos goes faster and is easier to focus on a pinpoint location of damage, were Cernos prime is very suitable for hallway coverage (vertical) and room clear (horizontal).
I believe the question was which is better for spreading the bleeds, both being on the cernos prime. so the nhotgun vs sniper doesn't really fly here.
My answer would be hunter munition as the better one for Cernos since all bleed builds also want viral (for faster death by bleeding) and the HuMu setup doesn't compete with getting proccing viral. internal bleeding on the otherhand wants impact procs, which aren't guaranteed on cernos prime so you would need to mod for them in conjunction with viral. this results in competition between the viral and impact (which needs to proc for a chance for activation of IB) and thus lower activation rates overall. If you use other sources for viral though (secondary primer?) the hunter munition build would stlll edge out, since the IPS mods add less damage to your weapon than elementals and with weaker damage per arrow comes lower slash procs.
As a general rule I only would only use internal bleeding (or it's secondary counterpart) on weapons with guaranteed impact procs (like the daikyu)
The sisters update made this even more of a beast. The new multishot mod alongside the new headshot arcane combined, the weapon was more than viable for steel path even before, but now it just wrecks.
There is no new multi shot mod
It's the Galvanized mods. There is a new one you can obtain for arbitration points.
Recent Zephyr rework adds 150% airborne crit chance, that combined with Point Strike(crit chance) + Vital Sense(crit damage) + Split Flights(up to +400% multishot) makes it an ultra crit death from above shotgun to fear
Also makes it bad
Youre bad
Cernos prime for range, kuva nukor for midrange, wukong with paracesis for melee and support. Got all bases covered! Fun? Yes. Effective? Never cared.
Tried a build with viral and internal bleeding compaired againt a viral hunter build.
The viral hunter seemed to be far more effective than the IB build. my guess is that the status chance needed for reliable procing impact and viral means sacrificing critchance and critdamage, while a viralhunter build has (rather is focused on) the crits and viral procs not competing with impact procs.
If I equip the cernos p with thunderbolt, what would happen? Is it a 30% chance for each arrow to explode? Or, does only the central arrow explode?
all can explode, but thunderbolt barely deals any damage anyway
k
Significantly stronger than dread and paris prime, but still useless.
Proof that bows have no place in the game right now.
Wow, it's almost that there are weapons with different strengths and functions in a game...Just because there are AOE weapons, doesn't mean that single-target weapons are useless. That's a stupid freaking logic you have.
^ also, how can you can a bow single target, when you can easily have over 400% accuracy using only bows and no abilities?
I agree with the op: the current version of Warframe does not generally benefit single target weapons. The current games is mostly about hordes of enemies; hence, a primary that can shoot pling...then pling.... then pling does not cut it. Of course you can use the bows in the game for the sake of fun, no harm in that.
The game only viable with AoE, so it's Bramma. All the dicks in the game use Bramma
This with Split Flights is amazing
Dude, you are just a retard if you think the cernos prime is barely usable with split flights.
It really is yes
Try that Thing out with Multishot, Viral and Hunter munitions (and crit of course) 7,5 Multishot each one 30% chance for slash paired with Viral. If you can land a good Headshot those procs can easily kill lvl 170 corrupted enemies. (Tested it out myself for some Hours)
Just noticed a bug when using the Split Flights mod.
After a successful hit, the horizontal and vertical spread are swapped for the duration of the effect.
They aren't swapped. Its just that negative accuracy primarily seems to affect the other axis.
So when in vertical mode they keep their spread from the vertical mode, but the negative accuracy is so big that arrows fly all over the place on the horizontal axis
how much should i sell a riven for this thing for
omegalul
lol
lol
lёl
Wasnt i told that this is one of the only weapons that is good looking when visible on a warframe?
We dunno, were you told that?
^^^^
Yes you were you just told us