*This guide is currently a simplified beginner-friendly guide for people trying to get into arbitrations
It is created for and by the Warframe Arbitrations Discord community.
You are very welcome to join us, get notified about the current Arbitration, ask questions, discuss strategies, or find a group to run with.
Summary
Basic Strategy
The goal of Arbitrations is to kill enemies as quickly as you can after they spawn, as more kills per minute will equal more Vitus Essence. Arbitration Drones (which drop vitus essence) will spawn up to a maximum of 5 alive on the map at once, so fast kills = more loot and that’s the gist of it. You’ll be running a lot of Power strength + Ability duration and applying a lot of buffs to yourself and your team so even in very long runs you’ll still be killing every enemy with one shot. Your team will set up on one point of the map from where you can see all spawns and you’ll shoot at enemy spawn points from that point of the map, everyone will stay at this point of the map and only leave to go pick up loot between rounds after which you will come back to this point of the map to refresh all your buffs. Sometimes people will also have to run to a spawn and shoot at it if enemies are slow to leave or if the Ai gets stuck and stops moving. You’ll understand more as you play, so don’t be afraid to join up with people once you’ve got your builds straight.
The 4 main meta frames for Arbitrations are: Saryn (The main damage dealer), Mirage (Buffer + secondary damage dealer), Volt (Another buffer + secondary damage dealer and a speed buffer for faster looting) and Wisp (A support buffer frame who will also run a support weapon that buffs your team, Afentis + Sporelacer so pick one frame to start off with and slowly try to build all of them up so you can fill in more roles for different teams you play with. The Kuva Ogris is the only weapon that’s currently good for Arbitrations, as with the Nightwatch Napalm Augment it will leave an AOE that will keep killing enemies on spawn so that’s what you’ll be running on every frame that’s not wisp. Make sure you enter runs AFTER you’ve fully built out one of these roles as incomplete builds can ruin runs.
To make sure you’re getting the most out of your runs, please don’t forget to equip a Smeeta Kavat, buy a resource booster which doubles the amount of resources you pick up as well as make sure someone on your squad has a resource drop chance booster. You can also get a resource drop chance blessing from relays if a Mastery Rank 30 player decides to give it to people, so if your teammate is MR 30 or if you’re okay to ask around in relays and wait 5 minutes then it’s well worth it to have that as well, and only the HOST needs the resource drop chance blessing.
Focus schools
You’ll either Run Madurai, Zenurik or Unairu based on what you have. The following will help you decide which focus school to run.
Madurai
Best tree to run if you have primed sure footed and aren’t worried about getting staggered maxing out the “Sling Strength” node will give you 40% power strength for 20 seconds when you dash twice in operator mode which is great if you’re doing super long runs or if your power strength mods aren’t maxed out yet.
Unairu
If you don’t have Primed sure footed (PSF), the starting node in Unairu “Poise” will give you stagger resistance for 40 seconds when you transfer from your frame to your operator. This is essential to run if you don’t have PSF as getting staggered constantly will lead to either your death or much slower clear times.
Zenurik
If you’ve already invested into Zenurik for general gameplay and have Primed sure footed then “Wellspring” node will give your team energy regen which can be nice and “Hardened wellspring” node will give your entire team 20% power strength, very nice if you haven’t invested into madurai and have PSF already (One person in your squad should run this to buff the team)
Frames
Upgrade your normal mods to primed versions when you can.
These build recommended here will work perfectly fine for 80-100 waves in defense, anything above that might be a bit risky. They’re relatively lower-investment builds with 4 forma each so you don’t have to forma every frame 7-8 times. You can opt for umbral intensify for more power strength eventually when you can commit more formas to the builds.
More advanced builds will follow later.
Saryn
Primary DPS, huge buff for teammates and herself.
Strategy
Throw down an ancient healer specter when your team will camp and press x on it to make it sit still
Cast subsumed skill
Double Dash with operator if you’re running Madurai or put hardened wellspring if Zenurik
Get energy orb,
Cast 1st ability (hold it to buff yourself and teammates)
Get energy orb,
Cast Toxic Lash
Kill stuff
Subsumes
Subsume on your 4th ability
- Energized Munitions
Energized Munitions helps with the constant ammo required to quickly spam your Ogris at the spawns. - Nourish
Nourish (Grendel) adds viral damage to the attacks of you and your team.
Builds
Basic Build
Advanced Information
Some people like to run Contagion Cloud, to use its damage numbers to spot enemy spawns faster.Whether or not this is worth running is still under investigation.
Mirage
Strong buff frame with 3 copies that use your Ogris.
Strategy
Throw down a Nidus specter and wait for him to tether to you
Double Dash with operator if you’re running Madurai or put hardened wellspring if Zenurik
Cast 4th ability
Get energy orb
Cast 3rd ability
Cast 1st ability
Kill stuff
Subsumes
Subsume on your 4th ability
- Energized Munitions
Energized Munitions helps with the constant ammo required to quickly spam your Ogris at the spawns. - Dispensary
Dispensary (Protea) can provide additional ammo to your entire team.
Builds
Basic Build
Volt
Cast shields, buff teammates.
Strategy
Put down Protea Specter and press X on it to hold position
Double Dash with operator if you’re running Madurai or put hardened wellspring if Zenurik
Get energy orb
Hold 1 to buff yourself and teammates
Cast 2nd ability to boost reload speed
Press 4 and then hold 4 to give team Thermal Sunder buffs
Kill stuff
Subsumes
Subsume on your 4th ability
- Thermal Sunder
Thermal Sunder (Gauss) with Thermal Transfer grants Cold and Heat damage buffs to the entire teamBuilds
Basic Build
Wisp
Support Frame, buffs team
Strategy
DD with operator if you’re running Madurai or put hardened wellspring if Zenurik
Place your Nidus Specter and wait for it to tether you
Use an operator ability to trigger Molt Vigor
Get energy orb
Put down your fused reservoir mote where your team will camp, always make sure nidus is tethered before you put them down and that you picked up an energy orb to proc energy conversion before putting motes for maximum power strength
Get energy orb
Cast Roar
Throw down Afentis, then run to enemy spawns and clear them out on smaller maps with sporelancer
When you reach max stacks on molt augmented, make sure to reset your motes so they benefit off the additional 60% power strength
Nidus Specter is key to increasing your Ability Strength to the high levels desired for Arbitrations
Subsumes
Subsume on your 4th ability
Advanced Information
Power Donation and Enemy Radar are interchangeable, coordinate with your team as one person running Enemy Radar can really help with shooting at spawns but make sure at least 3 people are running Power Donation
Weapons
Kuva Ogris
Any progenitor element is good. Riven is not required at all. Make sure to equip the bane mod since it’s a must have. Non-primed bane is fine too. Nightwatch Napalm leaves lingering AOE damage zones, these will kill enemies on spawn as long as you’re firing at the spawn points which makes this the best weapon for Arbitrations.
MAKE SURE YOUR OGRIS ENERGY COLOR IS PURE BLACK, or you’ll blind all your teammates with the visual effect
Basic Build
Afentis
Wisp will be running Afentis to boost her team. Drop Afentis where your team camps and refresh the buff when it’s about to run out, you get Afentis from rank 5 Kahl garrison so if you don’t have that, just use the Kuva Ogris and DPS with your team
Basic Build
Sporelacer
Sporelacer is good as a secondary it helps you clear out spawns and still help your team with killing enemies if you’re running Afentis as your primary weapon]
Basic Build
General Weapon Advice
Secondary Advice
If you have Amalgam Barrel Diffusion, make sure to pop it on whatever secondary you’re running as it gives a good parkour velocity boost when you’re rolling which really helps with looting fast.
Companions
Smeeta Kavat
The Smeeta Kavat can potentially be very good and help boost Vitus essence anywhere from 10% to 50% in a good run, always run this if you have it.
Charm, Animal Instinct, Tek Enhance and Fetch are the mandatory mods, Tek assault is optional but can be very nice to have.
Basic Build
Gear
Having Energy Restore Pads and Ammo Restore Pads can come in clutch sometimes as well so make sure you’re stocked up on plenty of those. You can get 100x restore blueprints from the different labs in the dojo.
Specters
The specters used are Ancient Healer Specter, Nidus Specter and Protea Specter. Protea for Dispensary and Nidus for Parasitic Link just make sure to make them stationary where you’ll be camping. The quality of the specter also does not matter as a 1 star specter will functionally be the exact same as a 4 star specter so make sure to use whichever ones you have.
Mods do not apply to Specters
For weapons ensure you use Battery Weapons on them so that they don’t take ammo away from you. Besides that weapon choice doesn’t really matter as you’ll really just be using them for their abilities.
Recommended Warframe Settings
For the map
For whatever frame you’re hating to hold abilities (ex. Vauban)
To save your eyes really
Nodes, Tiles and Mission Types
For your convenience, the best tiles have been sorted into the S-Tier and A-Tier category and you can simply pick up the roles to get pinged for these in the server.
Mission types
Interception and Defense are the best mission types to farm Vitus essence. Defense is simple enough (camp one point and shoot at spawns) and there is an example video at the bottom of this guide.
For interception you want to make sure the rounds go on for as long as possible so you can do much longer runs as enemies will scale much much more slowly. To achieve this, you’ll want to capture TWO points at the start of the round and neutralize one other point. Once your progress is 2% higher than the enemy you can let the neutralized point get captured back again and proceed to return to the camp point and shoot at spawns until next round. Be careful not to get distracted and let enemies capture any of your points after that though. Make sure to coordinate with your team about who will cap and who will neutralize at the start of runs to make things easier.
Double Dipping (DD)
How to run the same mission twice
Some arbitrations are just better than others. Sometimes the map is better so you can shoot at spawns without there being walls and obstructions which leads to higher kills per minute which leads to getting more Vitus essence and there’s no guarantee that the next Arbitration map will be just as good. This is why DD or Double Dipping is so important as it allows you to play the same map twice.
To achieve this players need to party up and all join a relay together. Once in the relay you’ll have to try and get a resource booster blessing either from a kind stranger or from someone in your party whose mastery rank 30 for more loot.
Everyone will then LEAVE the relay and make a party again. You will then join a relay again and start the arbitration from the navigation area of the relay. Make sure to leave 5-10 minutes before the arbitration ends. Once you’re back in the relay you’ll be able to select the arbitration mission again and do a full long run of it and it’s that simple to double dip. Make sure you don’t leave the relay or join a different relay after finishing your first arbitration run as you’ll lose the ability to play the mission again.
The only map that you can’t double dip well is the frozen world corpus one as you can get a random selection between 3 maps when you load into that and only one of the maps is good.
Example Videos
Here are defense and interception example videos of the arbitration gameplay loop as mirage, it’s pretty much the same for all other roles as well
Defense: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OB6srluQdXA
Interception: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dDERzXZsaec