Warframe: Fortuna is the latest free expansion to the massively popular free-to-play shooter. And like many Warframe expansions, it comes with a powerful new playable class: Garuda. The gore-themed machine is a fun new addition to any player’s arsenal. She’s also a huge pain to acquire. So we created this guide to explain the tougher steps on how to get Garuda.
Solaris United Bounties and Standing
This one’s pretty simple, albeit time consuming. You need to get Garuda’s blueprints. The first of which is actually pretty easy: just complete the Vox Solaris quest line that introduces you to Fortuna and the Orb Vallis. You just need to reach Fortuna on Venus (a very early planet in Warframe’s “campaign”) to start the mission.
The next three pieces are Garuda’s chassis, systems, and neuroptics. And all of them come from the same place. You need to complete level one, two, and three Solaris United bounties. These are the missions given by Eudico in Fortuna that send you into the frozen Orb Vallis to complete semi-random objectives. If you played the Plains of Eidolon expansion, they work exactly like Ostron bounties, but award standing with Solaris United instead.
Each level of bounty is more difficult than the last. Likewise, higher-level bounties offer more standing. You need a lot of standing to construct Garuda. The downside is that standing has a daily limit. You can only acquire so much between each of Warframe’s daily resets at 00:00 GMT. So check back in daily.
Luckily, you don’t need reputation for Garuda’s blueprints. You just need to complete the bounties. Each step of each bounty gives a reward and each reward might be a blueprint. It may take a few tries on each level of bounty (tier one for the chassis, tier two for the systems, and tier three for the neuroptics), but the odds are actually pretty generous compared to a lot of Warframe grinds.
Mining and Crafting Gems
Speaking of rare items, it’s time to see Smokefinger. The NPC is located just between his fellow vendors, Legs and The Business, in Fortuna. You’ll know him by his large, unfolding cart of rare minerals. But you can’t actually do much with the merchant until you have some standing. So do a tier three bounty for Eudico (or a tier two if you can complete the bonus objectives for extra standing) before speaking to Smokefinger.
The reason being? You need at least 2500 Solaris United standing to buy a Sunpoint Plasma Drill. This handheld mining laser is the only way to scoop up gems in the Orb Vallis. Once again, if you played Plains of Eidolon, you’ll get the gist.
The good news is that mining in Fortuna is much easier (even comparatively fun) than it was last time. Just equip the Plasma Drill as a piece of gear (from the gear section of your loadout) and equip it in the frozen zone. An on-screen rangefinder and audible beeps will point you towards veins of ore. The red and blue veins “grow” on rocks in the Orb Vallis. Just aim the drill at the ore’s glowing weak points and try to match the quick-time event on-screen for the best results. And always grab the rarer blue veins.
Ore is good for a few things—not the least of which is trading in for Solaris standing. But if you’re shooting for Garuda, you want the minerals for smelting.
Smokefinger also sells blueprints for several kinds of alloys. You need six of them—Star Amaryst, Axidrol Alloy, Radiant Zodian, Travocyte Alloy, Marquise Thyst, and Venerdo alloy—to complete each of Garuda’s subsystems. The blueprints will run you 36,000 Solaris standing in total.
That’s a lot. Not to mention you need to unlock the smelting blueprints for purchase in the first place. That means spending even more reputation, plus items called debt-bonds, to level up with Eudico. All of which is to say: make sure you max out those standing gains. Every. Single. Day.
Toroid Farming
This is the most difficult (some might say worst) step in the Garuda grind. And it’s almost entirely random. Say hello to Toroid farming.
Toroids are yet another rare resource exclusive to the Orb Vallis. They don’t come from bounties or vendors, but as random drops from enemies in the open world. The drop rates are abysmally low and you need two of all three Toroid flavors to produce Garuda. To cap it all off, you don’t really get any other rewards for Toroid farming. It’s just a long, arduous grind.
There is some good news, though. Toroids are random drops from enemies. That means you can use a Hydroid with Pilfering Swarm or Desecrate with a Nekros to double your drop chances—just as if you were farming for a “normal” rare resource. Each Toroid type is also limited to a single location. So there’s no chance of spending hours farming for the last one you need, only to get a useless third copy of a Toroid you already have two of.
Remember you can hold the map button to get a full, opaque view of the Orb Vallis map. With that in mind, Toroid locations are as follows:
- Vega Toroid (for Garuda Neruoptics) – from any enemy at the Spaceport
- Calda Toroid (for Garuda Chassis) – from any enemy at the Enrichment Labs
- Sola Toroid (for Garuda Systems) – from any enemy at the Temple of Profit
Toroids also appear in caves. They work like Ayatan Sculptures, in that they must be manually picked up, instead of just walked over. Keep an eye out for them while wandering the Orb Vallis.
Killing baddies is still the best way to farm Toroids, though. Orb Vallis enemies spawn infinitely—unlike the cave drops—and can be goosed into appearing even more frequently.
Just post up in one of the three designated areas. Wait for enemies to put out reinforcement beacons (the tall, blinking staffs) and get to work. Do not destroy the reinforcement beacons. The longer you leave them, the greater your wanted level by the mini-map will rise. That will encourage more and higher level foes to spawn in your location. The more enemies, the greater the chances a Toroid will drop.
Undertaking bounties can also increase head counts. Higher level bounties seem to increase enemy difficulty and their spawn rates. At the very least, doing bounties gives you something else to do (and earn) while shooting for the elusive items. Just don’t neglect timed bounty steps in favor of farming. You can always kill more enemies, but resetting bounties is a pain.
And there you have it! Garuda isn’t an easy Warframe to farm—far from it. But this guide should give you the tips you need to get started. And you can always resort to purchasing the hard-to-acquire robot with Platinum in the marketplace.
