The Rally Point: Spice Wars, Imperium, and the trouble with a Dune strategy game

Out with the old, in with Villeneuve

Image credit:Rock Paper Shotgun/Funcom/Shiro Games

“Dune is unadaptable! It could never work as a film,” I cry, placing defiant fists upon my hips. “But what,” says Denis Villeneuve, “about two?”, shattering my physical form into one trillion shards. I have a difficult life.

But wait! What about as a strategy game ? Denis glances nervously at the inexplicable open pools of molten steel all around us. I’ve got him now. He hasn’t even played Spice Wars . Except… I think Spice Wars is about as good as an adaptation could be. Imperium too. Damn it. Alright Denis, let’s have a truce and sort this one out.

There have, of course, been games before the Duncening. 1992’s Dune was perhaps the most ambitious, integrating adventure game and impressive 3D travel sections into an experimental story-driven strategy game, all in real time. The main argument against that is Dune II, such a codifier of the genre that its own sequels added little. It’s mostly this that Dune Colon Spice Wars looks to, putting the book’s combat-ready factions on the surface of Arrakis to openly battle over the spice. Even the emperor lands his armies on the planet to attack the Great Houses, which is ridiculous, but makes sense if you accept the premise. Of course big daddy Corrino is gonna try to flatten everyone.

It’s an excuse, really, to have another distinct faction with its own thing going on. Instead of pure RTS, see, Spice Wars reinterprets Dune II through a filter of modern grand strategy and 4Xeses, using asymmetry not just in units but in methods. In addition to fighting, everyone has different approaches to the Landsraad, the galactic council. This meets periodically to propose three random resolutions for the four active factions to vote on, whether that’s to gain some boon or mess with opponents. Each faction has a number of innate, renewable votes and single-use influence points, and some have unique options to mess with bills. It’s where things can get dramatic, and the second-guessing over who will vote for what is a fun system with enough twists to make it worth pondering every time, yet without being overwhelming or too gimmicky.

Image credit:Rock Paper Shotgun/Funcom/Shiro Games

The centrepiece though is the battlefield, whose slow pace averts the usual RTS struggles, and small armies and invasion-punishing supply system lend a side of scheming. Expansion is a careful, complex consideration to everyone, especially the Ecaz, who live or die on map control. As do the recent DLC’s Vernius, who must spread out in sinister tentacles, making hard decisions about what to abandon, and made entirely of borders. They’re the research faction, but instead of using Big Number power to turtle or consume everything, they can channel that into Landsraad influence, or even be rewarded for not researching. They’re also purple, so automatically correct.

Conquest can be satisfying (I love that you can contest enemy territories by “liberating” them to neutral instead of snatching them), and there’s satisfaction too in out-politicking the gladhandling Atreidorks as the dark horse Smugglers. But ironically for a game that reverses the desaturated feel of Villeneuve’s desert, and recolours the famous Cinnamon as a vivid purple… Spice Wars is kind of lacking in innate drama.

Although lategame votes and invasions can be intense, it’s seldom clear why exactly an opponent does that. Nobody has much to say, either. Even an incoming sandworm portenting a delivery of angry Fremen is oddly undramatic, just a tactical consideration when you’re eyeing their village and ponderin’ a plunderin’. Oddly, this is something Spice Wars shares with the other big strategy game adaptation, Imperium.

I gave Imperium a go almost out of spite, having shared a screenshot of its impenetrable-looking board. Within a single game I kind of knew what I was doing even with no tutorial. It is about stacking coloured cubes onto board spaces to exchange them for other cubes, which makes the thing go up and why did that happen?

Image credit:Rock Paper Shotgun/Dire Wolf

<img loading=“lazy” src=“https://assetsio.gnwcdn.com/dune_imperium_1.jpg?width=2048&height=2048&fit=bounds&quality=85&format=jpg&auto=webp" onerror=“this.onerror=null;this.src=‘https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEhe7F7TRXHtjiKvHb5vS7DmnxvpHiDyoYyYvm1nHB3Qp2_w3BnM6A2eq4v7FYxCC9bfZt3a9vIMtAYEKUiaDQbHMg-ViyGmRIj39MLp0bGFfgfYw1Dc9q_H-T0wiTm3l0Uq42dETrN9eC8aGJ9_IORZsxST1AcLR7np1koOfcc7tnHa4S8Mwz_xD9d0=s16000';" alt=“Looking at a card called “The Spice Must Flow” in Dune: Imperium. - 5”>

Image credit:Rock Paper Shotgun/Dire Wolf

Except that Imperium becomes clear if you don’t fret too much about understanding everything right away , thanks to its interface. This is an incredible capture on PC of the “we’ll play a friendly game and you’ll pick it up as you go” dynamic, with the added computery advantage of it highlighting what’s possible, saving you from a million dead end questions. It’s always clear what you can’t do, and consistent enough that though you might not understand why, you’ll know there is a simple reason, and you won’t have to memorise 300 rules to learn it. In fact, a thorough tutorial might have overwhelmed me with terms and concepts better intuited over time. It helps too that its modest sound effects are plain enjoyable. I don’t think you ever outgrow “press button make fun sound”.

Most turns are a direct “pay 2 of this to get 1 of that”, or “grants 3 resources”, not Card Wars style chaining that leaves the other player bored and annoyed waiting for you to stop showing off. It’s strategy, not gimmick. Despite its depth, rounds are somewhat self-contained, and you don’t need to plan six turns ahead. Although it could definitely be clearer what cards people are playing and what they do.

There’s one winner, but it doesn’t feel zero sum (holding combat to a draw means sharing second prize, an entertaining wrinkle), and it’s hard to not score enough points to stay in the running. Comebacks are very possible, and the AI is surprisingly good at squeezing out those victory points towards the end, when the drama cards start coming out. I never felt cheated. It is, in a word, an extremely impressive adaptation, and I can tell that without even playing the board game. But as an adaptation of the book? It’s… it isn’t Dune, really.

Image credit:Rock Paper Shotgun/Funcom/Shiro Games

It represents the Dune political contest, interpreted as lives and assets spent as tokens in a cold Mentat-calculated game. There’s so little personality to any individual that you don’t even choose your fave, but draw from a lot that includes the most obscure characters. There’s little sense of relationships save where you develop your own grudges. Somehow, that matters less than in Spice Wars, which visibly depicts the killing and presents you with gorgeous character models based on equally gorgeous actors, but they’re offering trade deals that might as well be random. Spice Wars provides more colours, but both expect you to paint your own picture.

And yet I think both games are successful adaptations. Paradoxically, by jettisoning as much as possible. Imperium interprets solely the power struggle as a series of calculated actions to beat rivals to a prize, and Spice Wars those factions as competing military forces in open war.

Even prescience is barely in either. When Spice Wars introduced Paul it was insistently his young, offworld self, yet to unlock the true power of twinkdom. I would not object if he’d never appeared, because if you include Paul, the game becomes about how OP he is. Half the point of the first book is that the most powerful institutions in the galaxy primed it for him to exploit (partly upended by Kynes senior stumbling in and exploiting it first). His unstoppable union with the Fremen defines the story. Without him it’s not proper Dune, but with him it’s a foregone conclusion. This world was made to tell a story, not to play in. Blunten him, represent the whole of that world, and you get an expensive, exhausting mess ruled by accident and error. We already live there.

Image credit:Rock Paper Shotgun/Funcom/Shiro Games

Maybe an RPG, sure. Maybe a spice smuggling game, but even that would be bribes and the quiet maintenance of business as usual. As a strategy setting, Dune 1992 is about as freeform as you could get, and still solely about Paul’s campaign. Anything else would require cutting out core elements just as every other Dune game has. They’d be interpretations, fun exercises, spin offs that make no sense if you consider the setting sacred - open warfare on Arrakis would be so catastrophic that everyone surrenders rather than risk what Spice Wars plays as fine, and some rando winning control of the planet like in Imperium would render its entire philosophical foundation irrelevant.

Dunc-the-film works because it knows its limits. It’s an intelligent adaptation that makes creative choices I wouldn’t, like rendering best boy Hawat into practically a cameo because he overlaps so much with other, film-friendlier characters. I can see what it’s doing and respect it. Spice Wars and Imperium are more limited still, because they’re intentionally adapting just one slice of the pie.

Because, you see, Dune is unadaptable. It could never work as a strategy game.

Dune: Imperium

Android , iOS , Xbox One , Xbox Series X/S , PC

Dune: Spice Wars

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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