The best Crests in Hollow Knight Silksong

The best Crests for Silksong’s early, middle, and late game

Image credit:Rock Paper Shotgun/Team Cherry

Wondering which Crests you should be equipping in Hollow Knight Silksong? With Crests so spread around the world of Pharloom, knowing which to use at what point in your playthrough will make your progress that little bit more efficient. All the Crests have their good points, and can all carry you from awakening in Act 1 to the dark descent of Act 3. Some give you more Tools (sometimes literally) to overcome Silksong ’s challenges, while others provide consistent, passive bonuses that cannot be overlooked.

In this guide, we’ll list the three Crests you should be equipping for the early, middle, and late game of Hollow Knight: Silksong . We’ll discuss the remaining four Crests afterward and why you should at least experiment with them.

In this guide:

• Best Act 1 Crest
• Best Act 2 Crest
• Best Act 3 Crest
• The rest of the Crests

Reaper Crest: Best Act 1 and early game Crest

Go on, reap what you sow! |Image credit:Rock Paper Shotgun/Team Cherry

The Reaper’s Crest beats out the Wanderer’s Crest for best early-game choice thanks to the additional survivability it provides. The little Silk orbs it passively creates can provide a clutch heal when you’d otherwise not have one. The same is true if you rely on Silk Skills for a good portion of your damage and if you’re good at avoiding taking hits yourself.

Silk is a precious resource, especially early on when you’ve not upgraded how much Hornet can hold. The fact that the Reaper’s Crest also has a balanced Tool loadout — you can equip a pair of each available color — puts it over the edge. You might not have access to many tools for the first few hours of a playthrough, but having the freedom to equip most anything you come across for a while is a lovely bonus.

Architect Crest: Best Act 2 and mid game Crest

Tool lovers, rejoice - the Architect Crest is for you. |Image credit:Rock Paper Shotgun/Team Cherry

Never, ever underestimate the power of Tools in Silksong, and with the Architect Crest , you’ll have access to a Crest dedicated to Tool use that also comes with some handy other features.

Beyond the Architect Crest giving you access to three red attack Tools, it also has a powerful charge attack that turns Hornet into a drill. Said drill deals a frankly absurd amount of damage, and when paired with some of the top offensive Tools in the game, there isn’t much you can’t take a chunk out of in a single use.

The Architect Crest also offers two yellow and blue slots apiece when fully upgraded, meaning you’ll have a ton of buildcrafting options with it equipped. The one detriment to it is the lack of a Silk Skill. If you’d prefer saving your Silk for healing, that’s more than enough reason to take the Architect Crest over any other.

The last thing that puts the Architect Crest over its mid-game rival, the Witch’s Crest, is its relative ease of acquisition. You do need to purchase a small armory of Tools to open the door to the Crest, but it isn’t locked behind any obscure quest steps. Just farm a cart-load of Rosaries and buy your way to success.

Witch Crest: Best Act 3 Crest

Like the idea of Hornet using tentacles to smite her enemies? Check out the Witch Crest. |Image credit:Rock Paper Shotgun/Team Cherry

The Witch Crest overtakes the Architect Crest in Act 3 for two reasons. The first is speed. The Witch Crest healing effect is significantly shorter than other Crest animations, and that reduced time can and will save you from almost certain death if used correctly.

The second reason to choose the Witch Crest for Act 3 is its ability to potentially equip a whopping four blue Tools. The passive effects blue Tools provide can be as useful as, if not more useful than, active Tools, because you don’t have to think about them. Want your Silk Skill attacks to crackle with purple lightning? And do you want them to be able to heal four masks of health and make the healing animation even shorter? Equip the Witch Crest and be amazed at the power you wield.

Perhaps the only issue you’ll encounter with the Witch Crest is that you need to hit enemies with the tendrils you generate to heal. Spamming the healing animation in empty air is simply a waste of Silk. That the Witch Crest is locked behind Bilewater and one of the most disturbing quests in Silksong is another matter entirely.

The Rest of the Crests

The four remaining quests all have their uses and can easily carry you to the end of the game. We used the Reaper Crest for quite a while in our walkthrough, for instance. They’re presented here in order of their overall usability and usefulness across a playthrough.

Wanderer Crest

The Wanderer Crest is the most vanilla of all the Crests in Silksong, but it’s probably the best all-around option if you aren’t using any of the ones mentioned above. Sure, you’re losing out on a bit of attack range, but the higher attack speed allows for better free burst damage, and the simpler down slash makes for easier pogo-ing.

You can equip a healthy assortment of Tools across all colors, and a single Silk Skill, but the main benefit you gain from the Wanderer Crest is the moveset. And sometimes having consistency in the core mechanics of a game trumps any kind of fancy build or damage output setup you could concoct.

Hunter Crest

The starting Crest in Silksong is a perfectly functional choice, especially if you were able to acclimate to the awkward, diagonal down slash for platforming. Its passive ability, unlocked by upgrading the Crest in Weavenest Alta, gives a stacking damage bonus provided you don’t get hit. While not flashy or complicated, it is as useful as it sounds.

Beast Crest

The Beast Crest loses out for a few reasons. First and foremost, it has no blue Tool slots. The lack of any passive bonuses or protections will only make your time in Silksong more dangerous and potentially frustrating.

You also must play hyper-aggressively with the Beast Crest, as the only way to heal is by dealing damage with the healing bind buff active. You get a nice damage bonus with it up, which is handy, but if you don’t get any hits in, you’ve wasted resources, time, and potentially thrown away a fight.

The Beast Crest’s down slash is also even more awkward to use than the Hunter’s for platforming. It’s not horrid once you get accustomed to it, but there are still many more preferable choices out there.

Shaman Crest

The Shaman’s Crest is the least of the Crests in Silksong, and gets its regretful station for two reasons. First, you simply can’t get the thing until you’ve ventured deep into Act 3, making its usefulness in a full playthrough almost nonexistent. It could be the greatest thing since sliced bread, but if there is no functional way to use it for multiple dozens of hours, it gets knocked down a peg.

The Shaman Crest’s focus on Silk Skills is also a detriment, and not just because there are so few Silk Skills relative to Tools. As powerful as they can be, you need Silk to use them, and that resource has a bad habit of being depleted exactly when you need it most. With the right setup, you can passively generate enough Silk for a single Skill usage, but miss or poorly time it, and you’re still out of luck.

It’s for those reasons, among others, that you should focus on getting and getting used to playing with the three best Crests in Hollow Knight Silksong: the Reaper Crest, Architect Crest, and Witch’s Crest. And if another one suits you better, don’t hesitate to focus on mastering it above all others.

To keep better track of where you find most of the Crests, you’ll want to know where to find all of Shakra’s maps . There are lots of miscellaneous quests to complete in Silksong , as well, many of which award some nice gear or materials.

Hollow Knight: Silksong

PC , Nintendo Switch

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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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