Due to recent events ARC Raiders In Tuning, Design Director Virgil Watkins discusses the approach Embark Studios uses to balance the cost-benefit ratio across weapons and rarity tiers. After launch, ARC Raiders continued to be a hugely popular game, retaining most of its players throughout the holiday season. As good as the game is, it's not perfect, but Embark continues to iron out various issues that impact the core experience.
Even with all the cheating issues currently plaguing the game, player discussions have centered around the latest update, 1.11.0. ARC Raiders. The first update in 2026 was smaller in nature, but two changes in particular have already had a huge impact on the game. This is a major nerf to the popular Trigger 'Nade, reducing damage the further away the target is from the center while also slightly increasing the explosion time. Another major change was the firing rate of the kettle. This is because some players were able to use macros to fire much faster than usual and cause problems in the lobby.
This ARC Raiders concept will address some of players' biggest complaints.
A dedicated ARC Raiders player has designed a concept that Embark Studios might want to take note of. This will solve players' biggest complaint.
How ARC Raiders Approach Weapon Balancing
Over the past few months, players have had strong opinions about various weapons. ARC RaidersEmbark announced that it is investigating further adjustments, although nothing has been set at this time. While many weapons feel good when upgraded or modded, many people often end up relying on more common options like the Stitcher, thanks to being a much cheaper and easier-to-use option compared to the likes of the Venator or Bobcat. If players are constantly at risk of losing loot to the hands of ARC enemies or hostile players, it makes sense to take advantage of these cheap and easily obtainable options.
However, that doesn't seem to be Embark Studios' intention, as design director Virgil Watkins said in a recent interview that the game's original intention was to confirm everything. ARC Raiders A weapon in capable hands can win a battle, even if many consider it to be the worst weapon in the game. With that said, Watkins admits: ARC Raiders “It's not there yet, and certainly some of the cost-benefit ratios are a little bit off. [higher-tier] As it stands, the game gives players with better gear at least a slight edge. Watkins doesn't want that to happen, and says, “Costs shouldn't inherently fill a skills gap or a tactical awareness gap or anything like that.”
But I think we're definitely a little bit off the cost-benefit ratio. [higher-tier] weapon. It's about trying to follow the curve of gaining an advantage by spending more and more money. For example, it's not clear that I win this fight because I'm using a purple weapon. We don't want that.
Watkins outlined the studio's future plans for how to address this balance. Embark is currently exploring ways to create a better cost-benefit ratio, especially for some of its high-end products. ARC Raiders Weapons like Venator. Ultimately, the goal is to maintain the excitement players feel when discovering a rare weapon. If that doesn't happen, Embark will continue to make adjustments until it gets it right.
Lastly, Watkins confirmed that the studio is definitely open to extensive changes to weapons, hinting that certain guns could potentially be made a bit more affordable by changing their rarity levels or even adjusting their crafting and upgrade material costs. Again, nothing has been confirmed, but hypothetically, if a particular weapon performs as well as expected, it could potentially move up or down, with another weapon eventually filling the niche. Watkins confirmed that Embark is not set up where the guns are currently, so if it makes sense to move the weapons in the long term, it would likely be the case.
Fans may have to wait a bit to see these adjustments and additional balance for the weapons, but it looks like new content is on the way after fans tuned in for the date and time, with a new Trials set revealed for January 20, 2026. As part of the set, the Toxic Swamp task appeared in the list, ARC Raiders It's been rumored for weeks.
- released
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October 30, 2025
- ESRB
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Youth/Violence, Blood
