Modules are the muscle of your Descendant and if you want more powerful stuff in The First Descendant, you need to max them out. In order to max out or enhance your Modules, you need tons of Kuiper Shard or the special material needed for leveling them up. You’d normally get Kuiper Shards by doing everyday activities in the game, but to maximize your time, I present a Kuiper Shard farming guide in The First Descendant, complete with tips and tricks.
[Updated on August 5, 2024 – Added additional farming methods to reflect recent nerfs, buffs, and patches]
How to Get Kuiper Shards in Albion
But first, you don’t exactly need to hop into missions right away if you need a few Kuiper Shards. You can get them from the comfort of the main player hub, Albion. Do keep in mind that this method assumes you already have a surplus of unwanted duplicate Modules.
Here’s the step-by-step process to get Kuiper Shards without missions:
- Go to Albion.
- In Albion, go to Silion (east). He’s near Anais in the eastern teleporter of the map.
- Talk to Silion.
- Select Dismantle Modules.
- Select ‘Select Duplicate Modules.’
- Press Dismantle.
If you have a lot of duplicate Modules, you’ll be getting a generous amount of Kuiper Shards. However, that’s probably not enough if you’re maxing out several Modules. Thus, we’ll move on to a more proactive farming method for Kuiper Shards.
Kuiper Shard Farm Guide (Sterile Lands – Hard)
Here’s a more efficient and lucrative way to get Kuiper Shards. Follow the step-by-step instructions:
- Equip Bunny (ideally use modules that boost her skill range).
- (Optional) Equip External Components with Kuiper Shard drop rate boost.
- Open the map. Select Sterile Lands.
- (Optional) Change the World Difficulty of Sterile Lands to Hard. This rewards more Kuiper Shards. But feel free to pick ‘Normal’ if you’re doing this solo.
- Pick Battlefield Mission – Anticipated Ambush Point (Extermination). The nearest teleporter should be the Rockfall Outpost.
- Go to the mission, and start it if other players haven’t already.
- Activate Bunny’s 2nd skill and 3rd skill.
- Run over the mission area, killing everything with shock and pick up all the loot.
- Restart the mission and keep repeating it until you have enough Kuiper Shards.
With any luck, there will be other players farming the area and restarting the mission as well. In such cases, picking the Hard difficulty is more ideal. You’ll also be picking up other loot apart from Kuiper Shards so make sure to dismantle or empty your inventory periodically. With this Kuiper Shard farm guide, you’ll be swimming in them in no time.
Kuiper Shard Farm Alternatives
The method above is the easiest since Bunny is practically given for free and you can rush to Hard mode right after finishing the short main quest.
However, there are a couple of methods that can serve as an alternative– provided you have the luck since you need a couple of specific Descendants for them: Valby and/or Enzo.
- Valby and the Valby Run method – The ‘Valby Run’ or Defense Line: Vulgus Strategic Outpost (Fortress – Hard) was nerfed but surprisingly, it still yields a good amount of Kuiper shard for relatively low effort. You do need to unlock Valby and build her a bit, which is troublesome.
- Enzo and farming Encrypted Vaults – You need Enzo for this, naturally. Once you have him, farming and unlocking those pesky Encrypted Vaults which have set locations but randomized appearances is easier. Encrypted Vaults unlocked with Enzo reward more Kuiper Shards.
- Keep in mind that you still need to farm for Code Breakers and Code Analyzers, and the best place to get them would be using Bunny in the Sterile Lands – Anticipated Ambush Point (Hard), which brings you back to the first Kuiper Shard farming method.
Consider these two methods as alternatives for when you get tired of the Bunny method.
