Revision history: Rate-up

A rate-up is the boosted probability a banner assigns to its featured items. The detail that matters, and that players routinely misread: a rate-up almost never raises the overall top-rarity rate. It reallocates a slice of the existing rate to the featured item.

Examples from published disclosures: in Fate/Grand Order, the SSR rate stays 1% on a rate-up banner, with roughly 0.7 points of it assigned to the featured servant. [1] In NIKKE, the SSR rate stays 4%, with 2 points on the featured unit. [2] Pulling on a rate-up banner therefore changes what you are likely to get, not how often you get something good.

HoYoverse games implement rate-up differently, through the 50/50: each top-rarity result flips between the featured character and the standard pool, with loss protection. The effect is a featured share of 50% or better per 5-star, far above the fractional rate-ups of older designs, which is part of why the 50/50 pattern spread.

"Off-rate" or "spook" describes the complement: pulling a top-rarity item that is not the featured one. In games without loss protection, a spook can consume a long streak of luck without advancing the player's actual goal, which is the main argument players make for spark ceilings.

A rate-up is the boosted probability a banner assigns to its featured items. The detail that matters, and that players routinely misread: a rate-up almost never raises the overall top-rarity rate. It reallocates a slice of the existing rate to the featured item.

Examples from published disclosures: in Fate/Grand Order, the SSR rate stays 1% on a rate-up banner, with roughly 0.7 points of it assigned to the featured servant. [1] In NIKKE, the SSR rate stays 4%, with 2 points on the featured unit. [2] Pulling on a rate-up banner therefore changes what you are likely to get, not how often you get something good.

HoYoverse games implement rate-up differently, through the 50/50: each top-rarity result flips between the featured character and the standard pool, with loss protection. The effect is a featured share of 50% or better per 5-star, far above the fractional rate-ups of older designs, which is part of why the 50/50 pattern spread.

"Off-rate" or "spook" describes the complement: pulling a top-rarity item that is not the featured one. In games without loss protection, a spook can consume a long streak of luck without advancing the player's actual goal, which is the main argument players make for spark ceilings.