Frost, Kappa, and You : A detailed guide to farming Kappa

Farming Sedna :: Kappa can be very lucrative for XP, Mod, and Material gains. But it works best when everyone knows how to farm it effectively. This guide discusses what you want to bring to Kappa, why you need it, and most importantly how to milk this Mobile Defense mission for everything it has.

Sedna :: Kappa

Kappa is a Mobile Defense mission on the planet Sedna. The enemy level will be somewhere around 18-20, but can be manageable by lower level Warframes for success and great profit if one or more members are the Frost Warframe.

Why Kappa?
Sedna's primary resource drops include Alloy Plate and the coveted Rubedo. In a successful run, the amount of those resources can be reasonably large. Kappa, being Mobile Defense, is a good target if teamwork and Frost is used, and will result in loads of managable mobs hurling themselves at you and your group. The amount of XP gained in a successful run is quite staggering for the level of difficulty, and can be a good place to level up new weapons and Warframes. Finally, potential for Mod drops increases with the more enemies killed. The way this farming method works, you will see boat loads of enemies, and increase your chance of finding some decent Mods.

A good example of a solid run.

Team Build

Frost
A must have in order to farm effectively. Frost's Snow Globe skill will be spammed at defense points. His AoE Avalanche will also come in handy if things get hairy.

Loki
Loki is not necessary, but can be very helpful when farming in conjunction with Frost. Why? Because going Invisible, using melee to whiddle down Heavy Gunners and Bombers before they get inside your globe can make your life easier.

Rest of Team
Any warframe you need XP for is suitable for this mission. Though not recommended, an Unranked warframe can still survive if the team works well together within the Snow Globe.

Helpful warframes will be any warframe with a strong AoE to take down waves of enemies if Frost is either saving Energy for Snow Globe, and/or does not have enough to use Avalanche.

Frost Mod Build

The following is from my own experience. Criticism and additions are welcome.

By rank of importence :
Snow Globe - Bread and butter for this mission. Protection, slow, and something to bring waves of enemies to you. Max level has greatest reach, giving team more wiggle-room and protection.
Continuity - Increases Snow Globe duration. Very helpful for conserving Energy, giving Frost more freedom to destroy things within the globe.
Reach - This Mod does exactly what it says -- extends the reach of your Powers. Snow Globe and Avalanche are both affected by this most excellent mod. More room inside your Globe, and bigger reach of Avalanche is super helpful.
Streamline - This is another Mod that helps Frost with Energy management. Each rank lowers Power cost by a percentage. Lower cost Snow Globes mean less worry of being out of Energy when the Globe fails, and enables Frost use of Avalanche more freely.
Avalanche - If you have the above Mods and Reach (described below) equipped, this here can be quite beastly. A super nuke that can wipe a whole mess of normal enemies, and the ability to stagger heavies, this can save your bacon. But keep in mind it has a 100 Energy cost (without Streamline), so if you know your Snow Globe is about to go down, save your Energy for that.

From there, you can add whichever Mods fit your playstyle. I prefer Redirection for personal survivability. I also like Rush for when I Frost since he's slow as snot, but not quite as slow as Rhino. However, what will win over all is whether or not I have enough points available to equip the Mods listed above.

Weapons and Weapon Mods

This will depend on your playstyle, and what you're trying to level. I try to bring a primary that's usable, but I don't always have that option when I'm trying to level another Rifle or Shotgun. Ultimately, I try to bring at least one weapon I can do a healthy amount of damage with.

Just make sure that, whatever you decide to equip, can do enough damage to stop a Level 19 Grineer without too much trouble.

Team Roles

Frost's role will be to pop Snow Globe at each defense point. This is easily the most important element to your success farming Kappa.

But just as important is the cooperation of the rest of the team. All team members (Save Loki if Invisible) should remain inside the Snow Globe as best they can.

Why?

• The Grineer flow in groups to you. If everyone is together, not milling about, enemy spawns are near you, not somewhere else on the map, and will continue to flow out. This effect seems to be enhanced by an X factor of Snow Globe which tricks enemies in Defense missions to flock to the objective. Slowed, grouped Grineer make for juicy AoE strikes.
  
• Survivability of the team comes second to enemy flow. Because the Globe will be around you, you can fire out, but no one can fire in. This means low-level Warframes have a decreased risk of getting greased. Frost should also pop the Snow Globe with most of the objective inside to keep the mission rolling, prevent failure. For the two outer computers, I recommend Snow Globe further out on the ledge between the steps leading up to the computer. For the Artifact, pop it at the foot of the artifact.
  
• Local drops. This is a fringe benefit of killing everything in or in the immediate vicinity of the Snow Globe. I often see people request Mods/Materials be marked by other players. But if everything drops around the fight, once each Defense leg completes, they can run around collecting the important bits without guess work.

Just be conscious of where you are within/around the Snow Globe, and be aware of timing of AoEs. It would suck if two people spent their top Powers at the same time, wasting their Energy on something another already took care of. Though, in the heat of battle, this sometimes can't be avoided.

Conclusion

If everyone stays in Frost's Snow Globe as best they can at each objective, Grineer will spawn more often, in groups, and will be managable targets. This makes for more XP, more opportunities for Mod and Material drops, and can still be fun even if run until the wheels fall off. Frost is a solid option for Defense missions, but really shines at Sedna :: Kappa.

Please post any improvements, questions, or suggestions in the comments below. Thank you for reading, and happy hunting fellow Tenno!

[SoftPawsOwO]

Rhino just got nerfed so not anymore... just sayin

[HandOff]

Rhino + scindo = victory ... even if u alone =)

[76561198089240626]

lighting fast hammer loki at ur service... palamudin

[ForcesOfOdin]

If anyone wants a solid Excalibur to dash and stun and gram AOE add me (forcesofodin in game). I always find groups who just scatter and spread out the drops and it's refreshing to see that logic still exists with guides like this.

[AppliedThanatology]

Frost+banshee=Awesome 'nuf said

[Scribble*]

all this time and effort and long words , man ,your good , now .......... its almost weekend,choose yourself a call girl off google , and i,ll pay for you to wine and dine her for the night.

[theironclad]

So, since writing this guide I decided to limit my anecdotal evidence, and really try to approach it scientifically. In the following Reddit posts, I perform an experiment -- not limited to Frost's abilities -- looking at farming Kappa in general. I hope that this is a much more helpful suppliment to this guide. Let me know what you guys think.

Also, thank you for the comments and feedback, all.

For your consideration :

http://www.reddit.com/r/Warframe/comments/1dxwt9/the_great_kappa_experiment/

http://www.reddit.com/r/Warframe/comments/1e3828/so_does_staying_together_on_kappa_make_a/

[theironclad]

@vandoore - I am super curious about this, and have begun farming Mag parts. I really want to see how the AoE stacks up to Banshee, really. Like I noted in the guide, any big, badass AoE is going to be optimal for best farming. I only added Loki as a way of suggesting someone who could go stealth outside the globe would not break the setup.

@GIR and @Netusovesti - ( ^u^) Thank you for reminding me. I feel like this method of farming is less exploitable as it appears that some of the results are not-so-consitent. That said, I appreicate what you are offering and sincerely hope DE doesn't look at folks who want to farm and try to limit them... though it has happened in the past. :/

[theironclad]

@LightCCB - I wrote this guide when I first started farming Kappa. I have learned oh-so-much since... and have played with many other frames since. Banshee's AoE is phenominal with Reach. Especially in the third defense area. She is a perfect compliment to Frost, or anyone farming Kappa, really. Glad you noted this.

@TigeltoN_ - It really is easy. Especially with a leveled frame, or well-leveled mods. And it can be soloed. I found when I soloed it, that fewer enemies spawned. Barely any enemies, to be precise. Maybe they were bad instances, but twice I ran solo, and twice I walked away with hardly any kills, mods, XP. I'd be willing to try again! Also, if looking for more of a challenge, Kiste has been referred to me as an alternative to Kappa. Let me know what you think!

[LightCCB]

Banshee is largest AOE in game. I don't know whether staying near pod spawns more enemies I think depends on every level. Sometimes there are more sometimes less.