I’m happy to report that Menace feels just as deadly and uncaring as Battle Brothers

If not quite as charming

Image credit:Rock Paper Shotgun/Overhype

Unlike Battle Brothers , there’s no hoofing it across an overworld map in the hoo-rah space marine tactics of Menace . Instead, you’ll build your squad and deploy them across strings of missions on what I assume at this point are multiple different planets. I’d love to be able to tell you more about the context surrounding the battles, since that context was what, for me at least, made Battle Brothers interesting. Edwin’s got you somewhat covered there, anyway . For now, though, I can tell you that Menace feels intricate in its detail and occasionally cinematic in its skirmishes, with a focus on terrain, positioning, and line of sight that evokes a particularly chaotic and deadly tabletop miniatures game.

It’s also a big tone shift. Comically sudden axe mutilation is out, panicked comms about the “sitrep” are in. There’s a bit of snark - dare I say a touch of goof - in the combat barks and starting traits of your soldiers, but while Battle Brother’s vaguely Germanic and Norse medieval fantasy soup felt very much like an intentional sandbox, the tonal lines are more vividly defined here. What is new is how chaotic, cacophonous, and genuinely painful each burst of gunfire sounds and feels. Thus, we’ve fallen into a predictable pit: the prettier and more technically impressive games wot have bullets get, the more seriously they apparently have to take their stupid cartoon violence.

This being the third preview we’ve done, I figured the most useful thing I can do here is go hard on the granular detail. Perhaps this will become tedious? We’ll just have to find out together. So, I’ll spend the next few paragraphs walking you through how I built up my squad. To be honest, I did somewhat lament being thrown in with a heap of combat supplies - effectively a sort of point limit for squad building - and what seemed like a pile of advanced equipment. Again, it’s about context. The light machine gun you’re given freely just doesn’t chugga chugga as hummingly as the light machine gun you pried from some unfortunate bastard’s shivering grease mittens. I can understand Overhype wanting to let the press play about with different options, though. Let me introduce you to the gang, then.

Image credit:Rock Paper Shotgun/Overhype

First up is Lance Corporal Jane Darby, a “full ace graduate of the pathfinder school” with an eye for disabling enemy special weapons with her attacks. As you’ve likely picked up by now, infantry units in Menace consist of several individuals. And, for the enemy, this sometimes means they’ve got an array of different gear. Jane’s shots would later often result in a ‘specialist disabled’ notification, making her perfect for gradually weakening the pirates I was up against. For now, though, I just picked it because it sounded snipey, and I’d already decided that’s how I was going to kit her out. So, she gets a rifle and the ’take aim’ skill, which boosts her accuracy but piles on a hefty additional AP cost for subsequent attacks. Next, she gets ‘well placed shots’ for additional crit chance, some extra ammunition, and some soft armour - I don’t plan on putting her in the line of fire.

Next, it’s Lance Corporal Charles Lim. He’s an aspirational lad, this one, with a discount to promotions. He gets a rocket launcher - basically essential for taking out enemy vehicles with any sort of efficiency. He also gets a combat drone for scouting, and some protective plating against small arms.

Image credit:Rock Paper Shotgun/Overhype

Oh, it turns out they’re all Lance Corporals, so I’ll stop writing that now. Curse my dedication to the authenticity of making notes chronologically and not trying to hide gaps in knowledge in the editing process. Edwin Pike is ‘stalwart’, giving his squad good morale. Into the vanguard he goes, with a machine gun and some frag grenades. Then, there’s Jean Sy. The game tells me she’s a megacorp scion and “likely the richest person in the wayback”. Were I the money queen of space, I do not think I would fight in a doomed intergalactic megawar. But then again, maybe this is why I am not the money queen of space. Jean gets a grenade launcher and some smoke grenades to protect her less well-heeled comrades.

Last up, there’s Cody Greifinger. An ex-terrorist with a penchant for assassinating political, business and military leaders, says the game. He gets big defense bonuses when he’s adjacent to enemies. So, I swap his carbine for an SMG, give him a light machine gun and an explosive charge, and we’re into the first mission. My objective here is to take out 80% of the enemies to protect civilians. In theory, anyway. In practise, I’m still not quite sure why that 80% is there, since the mission didn’t complete until I’d taken out everyone. Perhaps I could have extracted, or perhaps Overhype simply wish to massage my ailing self esteem by letting me feel like I’d overachieved. Thanks Overhype!

Image credit:Rock Paper Shotgun/Overhype

Right, we’re in. First impressions? This map is dense. Buildings and walls of varying heights. Abandoned vehicles. Sandbags. Like Battle Brothers, actions and movement feel expensive, and it doesn’t take long to realise how important positioning is as I move my squads north through the fog of war. There’s a stretch of open ground between the two urban areas, but squads can go to ground to make themselves harder targets, and they’ll also need to do this to deploy heavy weapons like missile launchers. It makes for a slow, stop-and-start approach, but one bolstered by that familiar, satisfying feeling of a crack squad not leaving anything to chance. There’s always those smoke grenades if things get a little dicey, too.

We make contact after a few turns, and this is where the importance of suppressive fire reveals itself. Suppressed units take big morale hits and have their movement penalised, so spreading your attacks over different threats to keep them on the back foot feels like the play. This is me strategising in hindsight, however: we got absolutely fuckbustered on my first attempt. Still, this did clue me in to another nice trick Menace pulls by giving you squads instead of individuals. There’s more tragedy to go around, basically, and you get a more convincing sense of a larger skirmish unfolding.

You can drop things on people! From the sky! |Image credit:Rock Paper Shotgun/Overhype

Thankfully, though, this doesn’t mean moments of individual derring-do and derring-doh are absent. Take the ignoble end of Edwin Pike, for example. Towards the end of the mission, I was left to mop up a few units and one roving vehicle with a laser railgun. Unfortunately, I’d spend all my missiles, leaving poor Edwin to limply hurl grenades at the armoured truck to little effect. Unfortunately, he had to be quite close to the truck to throw them. And the problem, I learned, with being close to a truck is that the trucks quite like running people over. When Edwin got run over, he went “aghhh!”. Actually, it was more like “arrrrghhhhugg!”. It was quite funny. Soz, Edwin.

A detail I found worth noting once I’d finished the mission was that we’d gained both trust with a local faction, and a trading bonus. Again, I didn’t have access to the parts of the build that would have made these things relevant, but it’s good to know they’re there. I decide to launch another mission to apply what I’ve learned, and that’s when I spot it: I can bring in a vehicle. Also, the vehicle can have guns. Really big ones!

Image credit:Rock Paper Shotgun/Overhype

And this is the map that really drives home what a huge difference cover makes in this game. It’s a lot less dense, this one. A few scattered rocks. A speck of industry. Mostly, though, it’s me rolling my battlebus around uncontested, two-shotting bands of pirates with casual glee.

Did I have fun? I don’t know! As I said, I need the sort of context built up over hours for these missions to mean anything to me, really. I can safely say that, should that context land in the full thing, Menace absolutely has the cinematic chops to make those emergent story moments hit incredibly hard. I’m cautiously optimistic about enjoying some absolutely horrible things happening to pretend soldiers I’ve grown to care about, in other words.

Menace

PC

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All 75 Arc Raiders Blueprints and where to get them

These areas have the highest chance of giving you Blueprints

Image credit:Rock Paper Shotgun/Embark Studios

Looking for more Arc Raiders Blueprints? It’s a special day when you find a Blueprint, as they’re among the most valuable items in Arc Raiders. If you find a Blueprint that you haven’t already found, then you must make sure you hold onto it at all costs, because Blueprints are the key to one of the most important and powerful systems of meta-progression in the game.

This guide aims to be the very best guide on Blueprints you can find, starting with a primer on what exactly they are and how they work in Arc Raiders, before delving into exactly where to get Blueprints and the very best farming spots for you to take in your search.

We’ll also go over how to get Blueprints from other unlikely activities, such as destroying Surveyors and completing specific quests. And you’ll also find the full list of all 75 Blueprints in Arc Raiders on this page (including the newest Blueprints added with the Cold Snap update , such as the Deadline Blueprint and Firework Box Blueprint), giving you all the information you need to expand your own crafting repertoire.

In this guide:

• What are Blueprints in Arc Raiders?
• Full Blueprint list: All crafting recipes
• Where to find Blueprints in Arc Raiders Blueprints obtained from quests Blueprints obtained from Trials Best Blueprint farming locations

What are Blueprints in Arc Raiders?

Blueprints in Arc Raiders are special items which, if you manage to extract with them, you can expend to permanently unlock a new crafting recipe in your Workshop. If you manage to extract from a raid with an Anvil Blueprint, for example, you can unlock the ability to craft your very own Anvil Pistol, as many times as you like (as long as you have the crafting materials).

To use a Blueprint, simply open your Inventory while in the lobby, then right-click on the Blueprint and click “Learn And Consume” . This will permanently unlock the recipe for that item in your Workshop. As of the Stella Montis update, there are allegedly 75 different Blueprints to unlock - although only 68 are confirmed to be in the game so far. You can see all the Blueprints you’ve found and unlocked by going to the Workshop menu, and hitting “R” to bring up the Blueprint screen.

It’s possible to find duplicates of past Blueprints you’ve already unlocked. If you find these, then you can either sell them, or - if you like to play with friends - you can take it into a match and gift it to your friend so they can unlock that recipe for themselves. Another option is to keep hold of them until the time comes to donate them to the Expedition.

Full Blueprint list: All crafting recipes

Below is the full list of all the Blueprints that are currently available to find in Arc Raiders, and the crafting recipe required for each item:

Note: The missing Blueprints in this list likely have not actually been added to the game at the time of writing, because none of the playerbase has managed to find any of them. As they are added to the game, I will update this page with the most relevant information so you know exactly how to get all 75 Arc Raiders Blueprints.

Where to find Blueprints in Arc Raiders

Below is a list of all containers, modifiers, and events which maximise your chances of finding Blueprints:

• Certain quests reward you with specific Blueprints .
• Completing Trials has a high chance of offering Blueprints as rewards.
• Surveyors have a decent chance of dropping Blueprints on death.
• High loot value areas tend to have a greater chance of spawning Blueprints.
• Night Raids and Storms may increase rare Blueprint spawn chances in containers.
• Containers with higher numbers of items may have a higher tendency to spawn Blueprints. As a result, Blue Gate (which has many “large” containers containing multiple items) may give you a higher chance of spawning Blueprints.
• Raider containers (Raider Caches, Weapon Boxes, Medical Bags, Grenade Tubes) have increased Blueprint drop rates. As a result, the Uncovered Caches event gives you a high chance of finding Blueprints.
• Security Lockers have a higher than average chance of containing Blueprints.
• Certain Blueprints only seem to spawn under specific circumstances: Tempest Blueprint only spawns during Night Raid events. Vulcano Blueprint only spawns during Hidden Bunker events. Jupiter and Equaliser Blueprints only spawn during Harvester events.

Raider Caches, Weapon Boxes, and other raider-oriented container types have a good chance of offering Blueprints. |Image credit:Rock Paper Shotgun/Embark Studios

Blueprints have a very low chance of spawning in any container in Arc Raiders, around 1-2% on average. However, there is a higher chance of finding Blueprints in particular container types. Specifically, you can find more Blueprints in Raider containers and security lockers.

Beyond this, if you’re looking for Blueprints you should focus on regions of the map which are marked as having particularly high-value loot. Areas such as the Control Tower in Dam Battlegrounds, the Arrival and Departure Buildings in Spaceport, and Pilgrim’s Peak in Blue Gate all have a better-than-average chance of spawning Blueprints somewhere amongst all their containers. Night Raids and Electromagnetic Storm events also increase the drop chances of certain Blueprints .

In addition to these containers, you can often loot Blueprints from destroyed Surveyors - the largest of the rolling ball ARC. Surveyors are more commonly found on the later maps - Spaceport and Blue Gate - and if one spawns in your match, you’ll likely see it by the blue laser beam that it casts into the sky while “surveying”.

Surveyors are quite well-armoured and will very speedily run away from you once it notices you, but if you can take one down then make sure you loot all its parts for a chance of obtaining certain unusual Blueprints.

Blueprints obtained from quests

One way in which you can get Blueprints is by completing certain quests for the vendors in Speranza. Some quests will reward you with a specific item Blueprint upon completion, so as long as you work through all the quests in Arc Raiders, you are guaranteed those Blueprints.

Here is the full list of all Blueprints you can get from quest rewards:

• Trigger Nade Blueprint: Rewarded after completing “Sparks Fly”.
• Lure Grenade Blueprint: Rewarded after completing “Greasing Her Palms”.
• Burletta Blueprint: Rewarded after completing “Industrial Espionage”.
• Hullcracker Blueprint (and Launcher Ammo Blueprint): Rewarded after completing “The Major’s Footlocker”.

Alas, that’s only 4 Blueprints out of a total of 75 to unlock, so for the vast majority you will need to find them yourself during a raid. If you’re intent on farming Blueprints, then it’s best to equip yourself with cheap gear in case you lose it, but don’t use a free loadout because then you won’t get a safe pocket to stash any new Blueprint you find. No pain in Arc Raiders is sharper than failing to extract with a new Blueprint you’ve been after for a dozen hours already.

One of the best ways to get Blueprints is by hitting three stars on all five Trials every week. |Image credit:Rock Paper Shotgun/Embark Studios

Blueprints obtained from Trials

One of the very best ways to get Blueprints is as rewards for completing Trials in Arc Raiders. Trials are unlocked from Level 15 onwards, and allow you to earn rewards by focusing on certain tasks over the course of several raids. For example, one Trial might task you with dealing damage to Hornets, while another might challenge you to loot Supply Drops.

Trials refresh on a weekly basis, with a new week bringing five new Trials. Each Trial can offer up to three rewards after passing certain score milestones, and it’s possible to receive very high level loot from these reward crates - including Blueprints. So if you want to unlock as many Blueprints as possible, you should make a point of completing as many Trials as possible each week.

Best Blueprint farming locations

The very best way to get Blueprints is to frequent specific areas of the maps which combine high-tier loot pools with the right types of containers to search. Here are my recommendations for where to find Blueprints on every map, so you can always keep the search going for new crafting recipes to unlock.

Image credit:Rock Paper Shotgun/Embark Studios

Dam Battlegrounds

The best places to farm Blueprints on Dam Battlegrounds are the Control Tower, Power Generation Complex, Ruby Residence, and Pale Apartments . The first two regions, despite only being marked on the map as mid-tier loot, contain a phenomenal number of containers to loot. The Control Tower can also contain a couple of high-tier Security Lockers - though of course, you’ll need to have unlocked the Security Breach skill at the end of the Survival tree.

There’s also a lot of reporting amongst the playerbase that the Residential areas in the top-left of the map - Pale Apartments and Ruby Residence - give you a comparatively strong chance of finding Blueprints. Considering their size, there’s a high density of containers to loot in both locations, and they also have the benefit of being fairly out of the way. So you’re more likely to have all the containers to yourself.

Buried City

The best Blueprint farming locations on Buried City are the Santa Maria Houses, Grandioso Apartments, Town Hall, and the various buildings of the New District . Grandioso Apartments has a lower number of containers than the rest, but a high chance of spawning weapon cases - which have good Blueprint drop rates. The others are high-tier loot areas, with plenty of lootable containers - including Security Lockers.

Spaceport

The best places to find Blueprints on Spaceport are the Arrival and Departure Buildings, as well as Control Tower A6 and the Launch Towers . All these areas are labelled as high-value loot regions, and many of them are also very handily connected to one another by the Spaceport wall, which you can use to quickly run from one area to the next. At the tops of most of these buildings you’ll find at least one Security Locker, so this is an excellent farming route for players looking to find Blueprints.

The downside to looting Blueprints on Spaceport is that all these areas are hotly contested, particularly in Duos and Squads. You’ll need to be very focused and fast in order to complete the full farming route.

Image credit:Rock Paper Shotgun/Embark Studios

Blue Gate

Blue Gate tends to have a good chance of dropping Blueprints, potentially because it generally has a high number of containers which can hold lots of items; so there’s a higher chance of a Blueprint spawning in each container. In my experience, the best Blueprint farming spots on Blue Gate are Pilgrim’s Peak, Raider’s Refuge, the Ancient Fort, and the Underground Complex beneath the Warehouse .

All of these areas contain a wealth of containers to loot. Raider’s Refuge has less to loot, but the majority of the containers in and around the Refuge are raider containers, which have a high chance of containing Blueprints - particularly during major events.

Stella Montis

On the whole, Stella Montis seems to have a very low drop rate for Blueprints (though a high chance of dropping other high-tier loot). If you do want to try farming Blueprints on this map, the best places to find Blueprints in Stella Montis are Medical Research, Assembly Workshop, and the Business Center . These areas have the highest density of containers to loot on the map.

In addition to this, the Western Tunnel has a few different Security Lockers to loot, so while there’s very little to loot elsewhere in this area of the map, it’s worth hitting those Security Lockers if you spawn there at the start of a match.

That wraps up this primer on how to get all the Blueprints in Arc Raiders as quickly as possible. With the Expedition system constantly resetting a large number of players’ Blueprints, it’s more important than ever to have the most up-to-date information on where to find all these Blueprints.

While you’re here, be sure to check out our Arc Raiders best guns tier list , as well as our primers on the best skills to unlock and all the different Field Depot locations on every map.

ARC Raiders

PS5 , Xbox Series X/S , PC

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