With the overhaul to Focus in Warframe's Angels of the Zariman update, earning Focus Points has become more important than ever. Unlocking your Focus passives and abilities will drastically increase your Operator's utility, damage output, and even buff your Warframe's effectiveness in combat.
Of course, unlocking an entire Focus school is quite the task. Millions of Focus Points are needed to unlock just one school, let alone five. In this guide, we'll be going over how Focus Points work, how to get Focus Lenses, and cover some notable Focus farms to help you hit your daily Focus cap as easily as possible.
How Focus Points Work
Focus Points are obtained by using Focus Lenses on max-level Warframes and weapons. Lenses convert a portion of all Affinity earned into Focus. The rarity of your Focus Lens determines how much of that Affinity gets converted. This also means the amount of Affinity you earn impacts your Focus gains.
Without deviating too far from Focus, it's important to understand how Affinity works before farming Focus. Killing enemies grants a varying amount of Focus based on what they were killed by. The table below showcases each scenario and Affinity breakdown.
Weapon Affinity is split amongst all weapons in your loadout. Bring fewer weapons into missions to funnel your Affinity into a specific Lens. Companions do not detract from any Affinity or Focus gains.
|
Kill Method |
Warframe Affinity |
Weapon Affinity |
|---|---|---|
|
Warframe Ability Kill |
100% |
0% |
|
Weapon Kill |
50% |
50% |
|
Ally Kill |
25% |
75% |
There are two additional ways of earning Focus: defeating Thrax enemies aboard the Zariman and converting Eidolon Shards. Thrax units grant 2,500 Focus when slain, regardless of Lenses or Affinity modifiers. Eidolon Shards convert to a flat rate (as explained below).
Lens Conversion Rates
Lenses convert Affinity into Focus at the following rates:
- Standard Lens: 1.25% conversion rate.
- Greater Lens: 1.75% conversion rate.
- Eidolon Lens: 2.25% conversion rate.
- Lua Lens: 3.25% conversion rate.
For example, if you have a standard Unairu Lens and gain 1,000 Affinity towards that item, you'd gain 12.5 Focus towards the Unairu school. This is quite slow and not practical for reaching daily caps, so that's why Convergence Orbs exist.
Convergence Orbs
Convergence Orbs multiply all Focus gains by 10x for 45 seconds. In our previous example, you'd gain 125 Focus towards Unairu instead, drastically improving your Focus gains. By maximizing your Affinity gains and using Convergence at the right time, you can earn tens of thousands of Focus in less than a minute.
Daily Caps
There is a limit on how much Focus you can earn each day. All players can earn 250,000 Focus Points each day, with an additional 5,000 Focus added to your cap per Mastery Rank. For example, an MR20 player could earn 350,000 Focus a day. This daily cap resets each day at 00:00 GMT.
Eidolon Shards
The only other way of earning Focus in Warframe is by converting Eidolon Shards into Focus Points. Eidolon Shards can be obtained by defeating or capturing Eidolons roaming the Plains of Eidolon at night. A much weaker shard called Synthetic Eidolon Shards also has a rare chance of dropping during Sanctuary Onslaught runs. Eidolon Shards do not contribute to your daily Focus cap.
Eidolon Shards convert to the following values:
- Synthetic Eidolon Shards: 5,000 Focus
- Brilliant Eidolon Shard: 25,000 Focus
- Radiant Eidolon Shard: 40,000 Focus
Earning Focus Lenses
You'll need Focus Lenses if you want to level any school through normal gameplay. Fortunately, there are a few ways of earning Focus Lenses:
- Complete open world bounties.
- Complete Zariman bounties.
- Run Lua Disruption (Rotation C drop).
- Trade with other players.
- Purchase Lenses from the in-game market.
Open world bounties will grant varying Lens rarities. The harder the bounty, the stronger the Lens. Any non-standard Lens (excluding Greater Lenses from Zariman bounties) will drop as a blueprint, meaning you'll need to craft higher-tier Lenses. This requires multiple copies of the previous Lens rarity. Alternatively, you can obtain Lenses from other players or the in-game market.
Lua Disruption is notable since it drops the blueprint for Lua Lenses, the strongest Lens type in Warframe. They're difficult to craft but give the most amount of Focus out of any Lens.
Farming Focus
Optimal Focus farms revolve around maximizing your Affinity gains and using the best Focus Lenses you own. Since higher-tier Lenses are hard to come by, most players stick to using a Warframe and a single weapon to funnel their Affinity gains into their good Lenses.
As for which activities are good for Focus farming:
- (Elite) Sanctuary Onslaught
- Eximus Stronghold Sorties
- Adaro, Sedna
- Hunting Eidolons
- Zariman Missions
Sanctuary Onslaught
Sanctuary Onslaught is an endless activity found under the "Syndicate" tab of your Star Chart UI. This mode throws your team against a swarm of enemies that continuously spawn in small tiles. Each wave you begin will also activate a Convergence Orb automatically with an escalating Focus multiplier, scaling up to 16x more Focus. The Elite variant is slightly harder but spawns far more Eximus targets, giving you even more Affinity that can be converted into Focus Points.
Eximus Stronghold Sorties
Eximus units give more Affinity than any other enemy in Warframe, so any Sortie with the Eximus Stronghold modifier can yield great Affinity and Focus gains. Sortie missions that revolve around killing hordes of enemies—Survival, Exterminate, and Disruption—are the best for this. Since Sortie missions and modifiers change daily, this farm shouldn't be relied on.
Adaro, Sedna Stealth Farming
If you aren't interested in farming Sanctuary Onslaught, you can use Warframe's stealth multiplier mechanic to rack up an absurd amount of Focus in a short period. The Adaro node on Sedna is an Exterminate mission on a simple Grineer tileset. You'll play as Equinox, using the Pacify ability to put enemies to sleep. You can use a melee or silent AoE weapon to quickly kill everyone, building a stealth multiplier. This grants 500% more Affinity, affecting your Focus gains as well. There's no limit to this farm and is quite fast once you master it.
Eidolon Hunts
Eidolon Hunts require good gear, a decent Amp, knowledge on how the fight works, and it must be nighttime in the Plains. A group is highly recommended for this strategy, but you can solo all three Eidolons with practice. This farm involves completing a "Tridolon," capturing all three Eidolons in a single run. You'll gain Eidolon Shards from each clear, an item you can convert into Focus Points. Shards do not affect your daily Focus cap.
Zariman Missions
All Thrax enemies aboard the Zariman grant 2,500 Focus for your currently-equipped school when slain, regardless of Lenses or Affinity boosts. If you want to make slow yet steady progress towards Focus, farming content in the Zariman is an option.
The Best Focus Farm
The best Focus farm in Warframe is Elite Sanctuary Onslaught, followed closely by stealth farming in Adaro, Sedna. Elite Sanctuary Onslaught narrowly beats it for the scaling Convergence Orb multiplier and abundance of small tilesets. However, if you can't farm Elite Sanctuary Onslaught or lack a DPS Warframe, farming enemies on Adaro is a great way of earning Focus.
Here's what you'll need for Elite Sanctuary Onslaught:
-
A DPS Warframe
- Saryn
- Mirage with Explosive Legerdemain
- Volt
- Harrow with Thermal Sunder
- Melee Weapon
- Smeeta Kavat (optional)
- Affinity Booster (optional)
Place your best Lens onto your Warframe and another Lens onto your melee weapon. The Smeeta Kavat can double your Affinity gains periodically through its Charm buff. Finally, the Affinity Booster doubles all Affinity earned, doubling the amount of Focus you'll receive. For your Focus school, Naramon is solid; Affinity Spike increases your Affinity gains on all melee weapons. However, if your build needs an Energy source, run Zenurik instead. Your DPS Warframe should build for as much range and damage as possible. For Warframes like Saryn, Ability Range matters far more.
As for the farm itself, you'll enter Elite Sanctuary Onslaught and kill as many enemies as possible. The first 45 seconds of each wave will have immense Focus gains, so use that period to kill as many enemies as possible. When the enemies get too tough, leave and restart the activity. Teammates can make this farm even faster by debuffing enemies, giving you Energy, or helping you kill enemies. With good tiles, you should be able to reach your Focus cap in an hour.