What To Do First In ARC Raiders

While Embark Studios has described Arc Raiders as a more accessible take on the typically ruthless extraction-shooter genre (it is), this isn't an easy game. PVE is punishing and your fellow raiders won't always be friendly.

READ: Arc Raiders- Put This In Your Safe Pocket

If you want to have a smoother journey with less frustration and with fewer "quit moments", here's what to do first in Arc Raiders. We'll go over the Workshop, early-game loot and weapons, and what to do with currency.

Workshop

Image Via Embark Studios. Screenshot Captured By Blast.

Your Arc Raiders workshop comes equipped with the Workbench (and Scrappy, of course), but you can fill it with six more useful tables. These are:

• Gunsmith- Weapons and attachments.
• Utility Station- Quick use items for specific occasions like Raider Hatch keys, Ziplines, etc.
• Gear Bench- Loadout kits and shields.
• Refiner- Refine lower quality materials into better ones.
• Explosives Station- Grenades.
• Medical Lab- Better bandages and shield rechargers.

Your first few raids should be focused on completing Shani's quests and fetching items for your Workshop. Do not go around recycling all items you see for Fabric and Plastic Parts, though. You can get those by trading in Assorted Seeds at Celeste's shop. Even if those rarer items have descriptions saying that they only serve for recycling purposes, that is not true. You will need them for Workshop upgrades.

While making all your Workshop stations is easy, upgrading them to level II will take some time. You should track all upgrades so you can figure out what you can and can't recycle, and you should be keeping all the Arc Drivers you encounter.

When it comes to upgrading order, you should be focusing on upgrading the Gear Bench and the Refiner, followed by the Gunsmith. This will get you access to MK. 2 Augments, better weapons, and a reliable way to have the necessary resources to craft these new toys through refining.

Alongside these Workshop focuses, you should of course be looking for a Dog Collar and then Lemons and Apricots for Scrappy, the best boy. Having him collect common materials will allow you to ignore them in raids for better loot, and to not have to recycle uncommon items.

Early Game Weapon Tier List

We consider Early Game Weapons anything that you can craft at the level 1 Gunsmith station. Those are:

• Ferro
• Hairpin
• Kettle
• Rattler
• Stitcher

Hairpin- F Tier

The worst early game weapon in the game is the Hairpin. This weapon sucks at any kind of combat, be that with ARCs or other Raider. Only use this if you have it lying around in your stash and you don't plan on fighting anything topside.

Kettle- C Tier

Image Via Embark Studios. Screenshot Captured By Blast.

While I personally love the Kettle, it really needs to be fully-modded in order to excel. It is accurate and fires relatively quickly for a semi-automatic weapon, but it deals very low damage due to its Light Ammo.

It can deal with Raiders relatively well from medium to long ranges, but you will be destroyed in closer quarters and will take a long time dealing with Arc. It is also incredibly slow to reload, so I would not recommend using it unless you can reliably fill its four mod slots.

Stitcher- B Tier

The Stitcher is the Kettle's big brother. It deals around the same damage, but it is fully-automatic. This makes it good enough to deal with the smaller ARCs, but only in close to medium range encounters. Anything further away or against a more armored opponent, and the Stitcher is useless.

It excels at PVP, though, especially if you can reliably close the distance or get the drop on unsuspecting Raiders. Emptying most of a clip on someone will knock them down, even if they have a full shield. The Stitcher is also compatible with four mods, so you can make it even deadlier.

Rattler- A Tier

The default Rattler is the quintessential jack of all trades, master of none. It deals more damage than the two previous weapons on this list due to the medium ammo, but it is capped at 10 bullets per magazine. This means that being fully-automatic isn't too impactful.

Having medium ammo not only improves its damage, it also boosts its ARC armor penetration, so you'll have a considerably easier time dealing with robots, especially if you take careful shots to the weak points (like the thrusters). The Rattler can be a reliable PVP weapon, but you really need to be careful with how wasteful you are with your bullets, or your enemy can heavily punish you.

Ferro- S Tier

Image Via Embark Studios. Screenshot Captured By Blast.

The Ferro is the weapon you'll encounter the most in the Dam Battlegrounds, and for good reason. Not only it destroy lower-tier ARCs from any distance, it can annihilate a Raider's shield with a single headshot. This is due to its heavy ammo and much higher damage per bullet than all other early game weapons in Arc Raiders.

S tier does not mean perfect, though. While it deals a ton of damage per shot, it is a a Break-Action battle rifle, which means you need to reload after every shot. Do not engage in PVP fights if you're outnumbered unless you can keep your distance, and be careful not to get overwhelmed by a group of ARCs, or you will be done for.

What To Do With Money In Arc Raiders?

There are three currencies in Arc Raiders:

• Coins- The game's main currency which is used to upgrade your stash and to buy items from traders.
• Creds- A secondary currency used to unlock Raider Deck tiers, the game's version of a free battle pass.
• Raider Tokens- Arc Raiders' premium currency used to purchase cosmetics and cosmetic-only bundles. It can also be earned through the Raider Deck.

I'm obviously not here to tell you what to do with your Raider Tokens since that is your hard-earned cash, but I can help guide you with the two other currencies.

The Raider Deck functions similarly to Marvel Rivals' battle pass. You get five pages with seven unlocks each, and a final sixth page which gives you 250 Raider Tokens. For the first five pages you can choose in which order you unlock the items. My only advice is to unlock the Packs first, as those will give you actually usable items, while all the other rewards are purely cosmetic.

Image Via Embark Studios. Screenshot Captured By Blast.

When it comes to Coins, your utmost priority should be to upgrade your Stash as much as you can. If you have any hope of upgrading your Workshop, you should be hoarding most items you find, and that will lead to a permanently packed Stash. Upgrading it costs only Coins, but that cost rises exponentially as you further upgrade it.

If you're wondering how to get coins, sell the items marked with a gem icon and described as Treasure. As far as I've seen, those serve no other purpose and they pay quite well, even in lower rarities.

READ: ARC Raiders- How to get all gadgets

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