ARC Raiders Loot, Crafting & Progression Terms

In ARC Raiders the raid is only half the game. The other half happens in Speranza, where everything you carried out turns into something: Coins, crafting materials, a better bench, a learned blueprint, a stronger weapon. Progress is split between your Raider (level, skills, Stash, workshop) and your account (cosmetics, unlocked maps, premium currency), and that split matters when you decide whether to send a Raider on an Expedition.

This glossary explains the loot, crafting and progression terms you meet in menus, patch notes and squad chat, as they work after the Frozen Trail update of 8 October 2026. That update replaced Raider Decks with the Reward Pass, removed the Cred currency, rebuilt the skill tree and added the Outpost, so older guides may use words that no longer apply.

Term	What it is	Changed in Frozen Trail?
Rarity	Common to Legendary	Anvil moved from Uncommon to Rare
Stash	Your storage in Speranza	Maximum raised to 328 slots
Coins, Raider Tokens	Main and premium currency	Cred removed, Reward Points added
Workshop	Crafting benches you upgrade	Research Station added via the Outpost
Amplified Weapons	A fifth upgrade level for 15 guns	New
Outpost	A base on the surface you build up	New
Skill tree	Where skill points go	Rebuilt with choice nodes
Reward Pass	Free and premium reward tracks	Replaced Raider Decks
Trials	Weekly ranked challenges	Season 6 started
Expedition	Optional reset for permanent bonuses	Paused until early 2027

Rarity tiers

Every item has one of five rarity tiers: Common, Uncommon, Rare, Epic and Legendary. Each tier has its own color, and Embark's own patch notes call Uncommon green and Rare blue. Rarity is a rough guide to value and power, and Embark uses it as a balancing lever: Frozen Trail moved the popular Anvil hand cannon from green to blue, and the new Bantam revolver took over the Uncommon role.

Rarity also affects upkeep. Since April 2026, Common, Uncommon and Rare weapons lose durability faster per shot, while Epic and Legendary weapons lose it slower, so high-tier guns last longer between repairs.

Stash and Raider Den

The Stash is where everything you craft or bring home is stored. It starts at 64 slots and grows in steps of 24 bought with Coins; Frozen Trail added two more steps, for a maximum of 328 slots without Expedition bonuses or space bought from the Nomadic Envoys. Basic materials stack in large numbers per slot while bulky valuables take a slot for only a few, and early on the Stash fills up fast.

The Raider Den is your room above the streets of Speranza. It improves visually as your Stash grows, shows off trinkets and your best guns, and is where you reach the skill tree, Trials, Projects and the Codex, the in-game record of everything you have discovered.

Coins, Raider Tokens and other currencies

• Coins: the main currency. You earn them mostly by selling loot to traders and spend them on trader goods, Stash upgrades and skill tree resets.
• Raider Tokens: the premium currency, bought with real money or earned in small amounts from the Reward Pass, Projects and events, and spent on cosmetics and the premium pass.
• Assorted Seeds: Celeste's currency, used to buy basic materials from her. Scrappy brings some back after raids.
• Reward Points: earned from Feats and weekly milestones; they level up your active Reward Pass.
• Merit: an event currency used in some live events.

Cred, the old currency for Shani's goods and Raider Decks, was retired with Frozen Trail and any leftover balance expired. Shani now sells for Coins. For the general idea of a game spending its currency to keep prices in check, see money sink.

Traders

Traders in Speranza buy your loot, sell supplies and hand out quests:

• Celeste, leader of the Raiders: trades basic and Topside materials for Assorted Seeds, and since Frozen Trail also furniture materials and some new gameplay items.
• Shani, head of security: Coin offers such as Raider Hatch Keys, Binoculars, Cameras, Light Sticks and other social items.
• Lance, the android medic: healing, shields and augments, and he swaps a Free Loadout Augment for a basic Mk. 1 augment.
• Apollo, the traveling mechanic: grenades and gadgets, plus a set of Epic augments added in Frozen Trail.
• Tian Wen, the gunsmith: weapons, ammo and mods. Her Anvil and Hullcracker offers moved to the Nomadic Envoys' weekly rotation in Frozen Trail.
• Nomadic Envoys: a late-game barter stall that unlocks at level 25. It takes high-value items, often unique ARC parts and sometimes weapons, in exchange for weekly rotating rewards, extra Stash space and cosmetics. In Frozen Trail its trader Ermal left and Cassio took over, who also asks friendly Raiders for help with quests.

Workshop and crafting benches

The Workshop in Speranza is where you craft. You start with a free basic Workbench for simple weapons, ammo and essentials, then build specialized stations: the Gunsmith (weapons, mods, weapon upgrades), Gear Bench (shields and augments), Medical Lab (bandages, shield rechargers, Defibrillators), Explosives Station (grenades and mines), Utility Station (gadgets such as ziplines, the Snap Hook and Raider Hatch Keys) and Refiner (components and gun parts made from basic materials). The Research Station joined them with the Outpost.

Each station is upgraded in levels with specific materials, usually including a unique ARC part: the Medical Lab wants Tick Pods, the Explosives Station Pop Triggers, the Refiner Bombardier Cells. Higher levels unlock more recipes, and many recipes also need a learned blueprint. The Workshop's tracking option lets you tag the materials you still need, so you know what to bring back from a raid. Upgrading benches step by step is a textbook upgrade path.

Blueprints

A blueprint unlocks a crafting recipe. You have to extract with it, then choose to learn and consume it in Speranza. A check mark on the icon means you already know that recipe, and a known blueprint cannot be consumed again. Blueprints drop from containers (weapon blueprints mostly from Raider containers, explosives from industrial ones, medical from medical ones) and come from Trials rewards, Quests and Projects. The Harvester can hold Legendary Equalizer and Jupiter blueprints.

A learned blueprint stays with your Raider until an Expedition reset, and duplicates you do not need can be sold to traders for Coins.

Recycling and salvaging

Almost any item can be broken down into materials. Recycling happens in Speranza and gives the better return. Salvaging is the in-raid version: it frees backpack space on the spot but yields fewer or lower-quality materials. A typical routine is to sell what is valuable, keep what your current upgrades need, and recycle bulky items into compact stacks of materials.

Scrappy

Scrappy is the rooster living in your Workshop. While you are Topside, and only then, he gathers basic materials (Metal Parts, Fabric, Plastic Parts, Chemicals, Rubber Parts) and Assorted Seeds for you; longer rounds bring more. His box fills up after five rounds, so empty it regularly. Scrappy can be leveled up to raise what he brings, using items you find Topside. Unlike the offline progression of idle games, he gathers nothing while you are logged out or sitting in Speranza.

Weapon upgrades, durability and repair

Most weapons can be upgraded three times at the Gunsmith, and the roman numerals I to IV in a name show the level: a Ferro I is a base Ferro, a Ferro IV is fully upgraded. Each upgrade improves the weapon's stats and cleans up its rusty look. Legendary weapons cannot be upgraded this way.

Weapons, shields and augments have durability, which drops as you use them and when you are knocked out. Since April 2026 upgrading a weapon also repairs 25% of its maximum durability, which makes upgrading a cheap way to fix a worn gun. Mods (barrels, grips, magazines, stocks) are separate from upgrades and can be swapped freely.

Amplified Weapons

Amplified Weapons are Frozen Trail's late-game weapon system. With the Outpost unlocked and both the Gunsmith and the Research Station fully upgraded, you can push 15 weapons to a fifth quality level. Amplification opens a branching path of upgrades that can change how a gun behaves; Embark's own examples include a fully automatic Burletta, a Renegade with a scope and a Rattler with incendiary rounds and a 64-round magazine. Amplification is permanent, amplified guns have higher maximum durability, and they are repaired with Amplified Fragments, which come from recycling. The old Anvil Splitter mod became an Amplified Anvil upgrade.

Weapon Stencils

Weapon Stencils are cosmetic patterns for compatible weapons, added in Frozen Trail. They work like blueprints: you learn a stencil once, then apply it using Stencil Parts found Topside. There are 14 at launch, found Topside or in the Reward Pass and the Collector Set DLC. A stenciled weapon is still an ordinary weapon in a raid, so if you are knocked out, someone else can walk away with it, pattern and all.

Outpost and Research Station

The Outpost is a base on the surface, between the Rust Belt and the mountains, offered by Celeste as the first step toward reclaiming the surface. You unlock it through a project whose first step asks you to photograph a farmhouse Topside with the new Camera. After that you add modules, decorate it with furniture and unlock the Research Station, which leads to Amplified Weapons. Its upgrades call for new materials, including parts from the Bully and the Skulker.

Furniture is crafted from Designs, which work like blueprints. There are 100 at launch: most are found Topside, some unlock by upgrading the Outpost, and a few come from the Frozen Trail Pass and the DLC. For now the Outpost is a menu space you decorate rather than a place you walk around in.

Raider level and XP

Your Raider gains XP from searching containers, damaging and destroying ARC, fighting other Raiders, time spent Topside and extracting, and since Frozen Trail also from quests. You get XP even from rounds where you are knocked out. Each new level gives one skill point, and some systems unlock by level: Trials at 15, Projects at 20 and the Nomadic Envoys at 25. Each level needs more XP than the last, the usual experience curve.

Skill tree

The skill tree has three branches: Conditioning, Mobility and Survival. Skills are mostly passive bonuses (stamina, quieter breaching, faster vaulting, better healing) plus a few new abilities. Frozen Trail rebuilt the tree. Halfway down each branch there is now a choice between two skills where you can take only one, and at the end of each branch you pick two of three after investing enough points in that branch. Resetting the whole tree costs Coins per point spent, and the reset is also how you change those choices. Embark's stated aim was to replace skills that underperformed and make build choices matter more. If the shape of the tree is new to you, see tech tree.

Quests and Projects

Quests come from the traders: find something, visit somewhere, deal with some ARC. They reward items, Coins, blueprints and, since Frozen Trail, XP. That update added 22 quests and changed several older ones to require photos taken with the new Camera.

Projects are longer, multi-stage goals that ask for large amounts of materials or objectives, unlocked at level 20. Some are permanent and some are tied to updates or events: "Ascending the Mountain" ran from 8 September to 7 October 2026 as the lead-in to Frozen Trail, and the Outpost itself is unlocked through a project. Rewards include weapons, cosmetics and Raider Tokens.

Feats, Reward Points and the Reward Pass

The Reward Pass replaced Raider Decks in Frozen Trail. The current one, the Frozen Trail Pass, has 60 levels on a free track and a premium track. The free track holds the new base outfits, weapons, gadgets, cosmetics and up to 200 Raider Tokens. The premium track costs 1,150 Raider Tokens and pays the same amount back over its levels; it adds outfit toggles and colorways, stencils and hairstyles but no gameplay items. The Collector Set DLC also includes it. Your old Raider Decks live on in the free Legacy Pass, with earned rewards kept. Only one pass can be active at a time.

Passes level up with Reward Points earned from Feats, short objectives now sorted into Easy (15 points), Medium (25) and Hard (50). Feats also fill weekly milestones: three per week, each worth 250 points. After the third milestone you can keep doing Feats, but the big weekly payouts wait for the reset.

Trials

Trials are weekly challenges with a leaderboard, unlocked at level 15. Each week brings five challenges such as damaging a certain ARC or searching a certain kind of container; your score counts when you extract, and only your best result per challenge is kept. Weekly results raise your rank and earn blueprints and gear. Season 6 runs from 8 October 2026 to 12 January 2027, with the Maestro Outfit as the grand prize and rank names such as Hotshot and Cantina Legend.

Expedition

An Expedition is ARC Raiders' optional wipe. You build and stock a caravan over several weeks, sign up during an Expedition window, and your Raider leaves the Rust Belt for good. A fresh Raider takes over with bonuses: permanent extra Stash slots (12 per Expedition, up to 60), bonus skill points (up to 15 in total), exclusive cosmetics and temporary XP, repair and Scrappy boosts that grow with consecutive departures.

Departing resets what belongs to the Raider: level, skills, Stash contents and upgrades, workshop and learned blueprints. Account-level things stay, such as cosmetics, unlocked maps and Raider Tokens, and quests can now be kept if you choose. When Expeditions run, the Expedition Vault bought from the Nomadic Envoys lets you carry up to five items across to your next Raider.

Expeditions are on pause right now. The fifth Expedition departed on 29 September 2026, and Embark has said they will return in early 2027 with bigger changes to the departure windows, rewards and access for new players; earned consecutive buffs persist during the pause. Until then, there is no reset to plan around, and long-term goals such as the Outpost, Amplified Weapons and Trials are where late-game progress happens. For the general idea of repeating content for rewards, see grinding.

Related terms

• ARC Raiders Maps, Extraction & Raid Terms: maps, conditions, extraction and loadouts
• ARC Raiders Enemies & Combat Glossary: the ARC that drop the parts above
• General gaming terms: RPG progression and loot · game economy and cosmetics