The ARC Raiders skill tree gives you 76 points to spend across three branches that together cost 153 to max, so the real question is which half of the tree you skip. Short answer: open with 11 points in Mobility for Marathon Runner and Youthful Lungs, grab In-round Crafting early, then commit to one 36-point capstone that matches how you play. Below you get every node with its exact effect, the gate math, three full 76-point build orders (solo PvP, squad looter, PvE farmer), the trap skills we skip on every account, and what the October 8 Frozen Trail rework does to all of it.
Build context: this covers the tree that is live as of Store Update 1.47.0 (last checked September 2026) and stays live until the Frozen Trail update on October 8, when Embark’s confirmed skill tree rework replaces it. Read the rework section before you spend a 150k-coin respec.
How the ARC Raiders skill tree works
The tree is simple on paper and stingy in practice. You get 1 skill point per level from 0 to 75, which is 76 points total. Each branch (Conditioning, Mobility, Survival) has 15 skills: nine 5-rank nodes and six 1-rank nodes, 51 points to max a single branch. In practice you can finish one branch and roughly half of another.
Two gates shape every build. The single-point skills in the middle of each branch need 15 points spent in that branch, and the capstones (Back On Your Feet, Flyswatter, Vaults on Vaults on Vaults, Vault Spring, Security Breach, Minesweeper) need 36. A node only needs one point in the skill before it to open, so you can path cheaply through a 5-rank node you do not care about. Values and prerequisites below come from the ARC Raiders Wiki skill tree page, cross-checked against the in-game tooltips.
- Levelling gives you 76 points, 1 per level, stops at 75.
- Expedition bonus points: departing on an Expedition paid out up to 5 extra points based on stash value (600k per point on the second Expedition, per Embark’s second Expedition post). Embark capped those bonus points at 15 total, and Expeditions are paused until early 2027, so for a new Raider 76 is the number to plan around.
- A respec costs 2,000 coins per spent point. A full 76-point reset is 152,000 coins, which hurts but will not bankrupt a level-75 stash.
Every node in the three branches
Here is the full tree with the numbers that matter. “Gate” is what you need before the node opens. Our verdict column is the take from running these trees on client accounts every week: core means almost every build wants it, situational means build-dependent, trap means we skip it unless we are paying the tax to reach a capstone.
Conditioning (combat, breaching, getting downed)
| Skill | Ranks | Effect at max | Gate | Verdict |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Used To The Weight | 5 | Cuts the movement penalty from heavy shields by up to half | None | Core |
| Blast-Born | 5 | Explosion deafness from 8.5s down to 4.5s | Used To The Weight | Path-through (1 point) |
| Gentle Pressure | 5 | Breach noise range down 5m per rank from 100m | Used To The Weight | Situational |
| Fight Or Flight | 5 | Recover roughly 2.8% to 15.6% stamina when a player hits you | Blast-Born | Core for PvP |
| Proficient Pryer | 5 | About 5% faster breaching per rank | Gentle Pressure | Situational |
| Survivor’s Stamina | 1 | About 25% more stamina recovery at critical health | Fight Or Flight + 15 in branch | Core |
| Unburdened Roll | 1 | Free dodge roll within 20s of your shield breaking | Proficient Pryer + 15 in branch | Core for PvP |
| Downed But Determined | 5 | About 6s longer before you bleed out, per rank | Survivor’s Stamina | Squad only |
| A Little Extra | 1 | Breaching gives 1-2 crafting materials | Survivor’s Stamina or Unburdened Roll | Path-through |
| Effortless Swing | 5 | Cheaper melee stamina | Unburdened Roll | Trap (unless Flyswatter) |
| Turtle Crawl | 5 | 6.6% damage reduction per rank while downed | Downed But Determined | Squad only |
| Loaded Arms | 1 | Equipped weapon weighs 50% less | A Little Extra | Core |
| Sky-Clearing Swing | 5 | More melee damage to drones | Effortless Swing | PvE only |
| Back On Your Feet | 1 | Regenerate to about 30% health when critically hurt | Turtle Crawl or Loaded Arms + 36 | Capstone |
| Flyswatter | 1 | One melee hit destroys Wasps and Turrets | Loaded Arms or Sky-Clearing Swing + 36 | Capstone (PvE) |
Mobility (stamina, vaulting, escaping)
| Skill | Ranks | Effect at max | Gate | Verdict |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Nimble Climber | 5 | Faster climbing and vaulting | None | Core |
| Marathon Runner | 5 | Cheaper sprinting, roughly 3s more sprint per bar | Nimble Climber | Core, take first |
| Slip and Slide | 5 | Longer, faster slides | Nimble Climber | Trap |
| Youthful Lungs | 5 | About 24% more max stamina | Marathon Runner | Core |
| Sturdy Ankles | 5 | Less fall damage | Slip and Slide | Filler |
| Carry The Momentum | 1 | 3s of free sprinting after a sprint dodge | Youthful Lungs + 15 in branch | Core |
| Calming Stroll | 1 | Stamina regenerates while walking | Sturdy Ankles + 15 in branch | Situational |
| Effortless Roll | 5 | Cheaper dodge rolls | Carry The Momentum | Core for PvP |
| Crawl Before You Walk | 5 | Faster crawling while downed | Carry The Momentum or Calming Stroll | Squad only |
| Off The Wall | 5 | Longer wall leaps | Calming Stroll | Trap |
| Heroic Leap | 5 | Sprint dodge rolls travel further | Effortless Roll | Good for PvP |
| Vigorous Vaulter | 1 | Removes the slow vault while exhausted | Crawl Before You Walk | Situational |
| Ready To Roll | 5 | Wider timing window for recovery rolls | Off The Wall | Trap |
| Vaults on Vaults on Vaults | 1 | Vaulting costs no stamina | Heroic Leap or Vigorous Vaulter + 36 | Capstone |
| Vault Spring | 1 | Jump at the end of a vault | Vigorous Vaulter or Ready To Roll + 36 | Capstone (niche) |
Survival (looting, carrying, field crafting)
| Skill | Ranks | Effect at max | Gate | Verdict |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Agile Croucher | 5 | +10% crouch speed (2.5% per rank) | None | Path-through |
| Looter’s Instincts | 5 | +25% faster loot reveal (5% per rank) | Agile Croucher | Core for looters |
| Revitalizing Squat | 5 | +4% stamina regen per rank while crouched | Agile Croucher | Path-through |
| Silent Scavenger | 5 | Quieter looting | Looter’s Instincts | Situational |
| In-round Crafting | 1 | Field-craft items while topside | Revitalizing Squat | Core, take early |
| Suffer In Silence | 1 | Quieter movement at critical health | Silent Scavenger + 15 in branch | Situational |
| Good As New | 1 | +18% stamina regen while healing | In-round Crafting + 15 in branch | Good |
| Broad Shoulders | 5 | +2 carry weight per rank (+10 max) | Suffer In Silence | Core for looters |
| Traveling Tinkerer | 1 | Extra field-craft recipes | Suffer In Silence or Good As New | Good |
| Stubborn Mule | 5 | About 11.6% stamina regen while over-encumbered | Good As New | PvE farmers |
| Looter’s Luck | 5 | Chance to reveal two items at once | Broad Shoulders | Good |
| One Raider’s Scraps | 5 | Small chance of extra items in Raider containers | Traveling Tinkerer | Good |
| Three Deep Breaths | 5 | 0.5s faster exhaustion recovery per rank | Stubborn Mule | Situational |
| Security Breach | 1 | Breach Security Lockers | Looter’s Luck or One Raider’s Scraps + 36 | Capstone, best in tree for looting |
| Minesweeper | 1 | Defuse mines and explosive deployables | One Raider’s Scraps or Three Deep Breaths + 36 | Capstone (cheap add-on) |
The trap skills we skip
Every point in a trap is a point not spent on Broad Shoulders or Marathon Runner, and with 76 points to cover 153 you cannot afford decoration. These are the ones we leave empty:
- Slip and Slide past rank 1. The slide buff is so small you will struggle to notice five ranks of it in a real chase. One point to open the right side of Mobility, nothing more.
- Off The Wall and Ready To Roll. Ten points combined for wall leaps and a recovery-roll window you will use a handful of times per session.
- Blast-Born past rank 1. Shorter deafness is nice, but you are rarely in a spot where 4 seconds of hearing decides the fight. One point to reach Fight Or Flight.
- Effortless Swing and Sky-Clearing Swing unless you are going all the way to Flyswatter. Ten points for melee economy is a lot.
- Downed But Determined, Turtle Crawl, Crawl Before You Walk for solo players. These are revive-window skills. With no teammate coming, a longer bleed-out is just a longer loading screen.
We will defend one “trap”: Sturdy Ankles as capstone filler. If you need four more Mobility points to hit 36, fall damage reduction is at least useful when you jump off a Buried City roof to break a chase.
Build 1: solo PvP runner
This is the default we put on solo accounts. Stamina wins more solo fights than damage does, because the fight you survive is usually the one you walked away from. It stacks the full Mobility spine, the PvP half of Conditioning (Fight Or Flight, Unburdened Roll, Loaded Arms) and the vault capstone, then spends the tail on quiet looting. Pair it with our solo extraction guide for the routing side.
- Points 1-11: Nimble Climber 1, Marathon Runner 5, Youthful Lungs 5.
- Points 12-14: Agile Croucher 1, Revitalizing Squat 1, In-round Crafting 1.
- Points 15-19: Nimble Climber to 5 (Mobility hits 15), then Carry The Momentum 1.
- Points 20-29: Effortless Roll 5, Heroic Leap 5.
- Points 30-44: Used To The Weight 5, Blast-Born 1, Fight Or Flight 5, Gentle Pressure 1, Proficient Pryer 3 (Conditioning hits 15).
- Points 45-48: Survivor’s Stamina 1, Unburdened Roll 1, A Little Extra 1, Loaded Arms 1.
- Points 49-58: Slip and Slide 1, Sturdy Ankles 5, Calming Stroll 1, Off The Wall 3 (Mobility hits 36, this is the capstone tax).
- Point 59: Vaults on Vaults on Vaults.
- Points 60-72: Looter’s Instincts 5, Silent Scavenger 5, Agile Croucher to 3 (Survival hits 15), Suffer In Silence 1.
- Points 73-76: Broad Shoulders 4.
Final split: 37 Mobility, 19 Conditioning, 20 Survival. The downside is carry weight: you haul less than a looter and cannot open Security Lockers, so the stash grows slower. We think that is a fair trade for getting out of third-party fights alive.
Build 2: squad support and looter
In a trio, somebody should be the pack mule who opens every Security Locker, and that person should be hard to finish off. Security Breach is the single highest-value node in the tree for anyone who extracts regularly, and in a squad a longer downed timer earns its points because someone is actually coming to pick you up.
- Points 1-11: Agile Croucher 1, Looter’s Instincts 5, Revitalizing Squat 1, In-round Crafting 1, Silent Scavenger 3.
- Points 12-22: Nimble Climber 1, Marathon Runner 5, Youthful Lungs 5.
- Points 23-28: Agile Croucher to 5 (Survival hits 15), Suffer In Silence 1, Good As New 1.
- Points 29-34: Broad Shoulders 5, Traveling Tinkerer 1.
- Points 35-44: Looter’s Luck 5, One Raider’s Scraps 5.
- Points 45-47: Silent Scavenger to 5, Revitalizing Squat to 2 (Survival hits 36).
- Points 48-49: Security Breach, Minesweeper.
- Points 50-64: Used To The Weight 3, Blast-Born 1, Fight Or Flight 1, Gentle Pressure 5, Proficient Pryer 5 (Conditioning hits 15).
- Points 65-76: Survivor’s Stamina 1, Downed But Determined 5, Turtle Crawl 5, A Little Extra 1.
Final split: 38 Survival, 11 Mobility, 27 Conditioning. Gentle Pressure and Proficient Pryer at 5 matter here because you are the one breaching doors while the other two hold the hallway. The weight side ties into the current loadout meta: with Broad Shoulders maxed you can run the heavier kit without living in the slow-walk penalty. With only 11 Mobility points you are slow and easy to run down on your own, so do not solo queue on this one.
Build 3: PvE farmer
This one is for the Raider who wants to loot and kill ARC while avoiding people. Carry weight and stamina while overloaded matter more here than anything PvP-flavoured, and Flyswatter turns Wasps and Turrets from a reason to reroute into a melee chore.
- Points 1-9: Agile Croucher 1, Looter’s Instincts 5, Revitalizing Squat 1, In-round Crafting 1, Silent Scavenger 1.
- Points 10-18: Nimble Climber 1, Marathon Runner 5, Youthful Lungs 3.
- Points 19-24: Agile Croucher to 5, Silent Scavenger to 3 (Survival hits 15).
- Points 25-37: Good As New 1, Suffer In Silence 1, Broad Shoulders 5, Stubborn Mule 5, Traveling Tinkerer 1.
- Points 38-52: Used To The Weight 5, Gentle Pressure 5, Proficient Pryer 5 (Conditioning hits 15).
- Points 53-63: Unburdened Roll 1, Effortless Swing 5, Sky-Clearing Swing 5.
- Points 64-73: A Little Extra 1, Blast-Born 3, Fight Or Flight 3, Loaded Arms 1, Survivor’s Stamina 1, Downed But Determined 1 (Conditioning hits 36).
- Point 74: Flyswatter.
- Points 75-76: Looter’s Luck 2.
Final split: 30 Survival, 9 Mobility, 37 Conditioning. It skips Security Breach, and you will feel that. If you would rather open lockers than swat drones, drop the melee line (Effortless Swing, Sky-Clearing Swing, Flyswatter and the filler) and put those points into Looter’s Luck, One Raider’s Scraps and Security Breach. That variant ends up close to Build 2 with more Stubborn Mule.
If you would rather skip the 75 levels of grinding to get any of these online, our ARC Raiders leveling and raid help covers levelling runs, loot farms and squad carries on your schedule. We can save you the hours, though picking the build is still on you.
The three builds side by side
| Build | Split (Con / Mob / Sur) | Capstones | Best at | Weakest at | Mode |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Solo PvP runner | 19 / 37 / 20 | Vaults on Vaults on Vaults | Disengaging, third-party escapes, stamina fights | Carry weight, locker loot | Solo |
| Squad support and looter | 27 / 11 / 38 | Security Breach, Minesweeper | Loot per raid, surviving downs, breaching | Running away alone | Duo, trio |
| PvE farmer | 37 / 9 / 30 | Flyswatter | Hauling heavy, clearing Wasps and Turrets | PvP of any kind | Solo or squad, PvE-first |
Read across the rows and each build pays for its capstone with the branch it neglects, so pick the weakness you can live with.
What changes with the Frozen Trail skill tree rework
The tree above has a shelf life. Embark’s Frozen Trail first look lists “a Skill Tree rework including new and improved skills” for October 8, and executive producer Aleksander Grondal described the direction plainly: instead of unlocking everything, you select a few. Some skills are removed, some are added, and new gates make you choose between abilities instead of eventually owning both.
Preview coverage suggests each branch drops from 15 to 14 skills and that several nodes move (Youthful Lungs reportedly shifts to the start of Mobility, Broad Shoulders over into Conditioning). Treat that as preview-grade until the patch notes land; the r/ArcRaiders revamp preview thread labels every icon in the preview and is the best place to watch the community piece it together. A few things should survive the rework, since they come from how the game plays rather than where the nodes sit:
- Every build still opens on Marathon Runner and Youthful Lungs, wherever they end up in the new layout.
- You will still commit to one capstone, and choice gates make that even more true.
- If Security Breach survives, it stays the priority for anyone extracting for value.
If you are sitting on a messy tree right now, do not pay 152,000 coins to respec it days before October 8. Wait for the new tree and rebuild once.
Where these builds fall short
These builds have limits. First, the orders are optimised for level 75. At level 20 the “points 1-19” section is your whole build, and that is fine, but do not bend early choices around a capstone you are 50 levels away from. Second, the solo build spends ten points on Sturdy Ankles, Slip and Slide and Off The Wall purely to reach 36. Plenty of good solo players skip the capstone entirely and put those points into Broad Shoulders and Looter’s Instincts, and they are not wrong. Third, the effect values here come from the community wiki, and Embark does not publish exact per-rank numbers for every node. Treat them as close approximations. Last, the rework could invalidate a chunk of this in a week, which is why the build logic matters more than the exact order.
Frequently asked questions
How many skill points are there in ARC Raiders?
76 from levelling, one per level from 0 to 75. Departed Expeditions added bonus points on top (up to 5 per departure, capped at 15 total), so long-time Raiders can sit well above 76, but a new account should plan around 76.
Can you max out the ARC Raiders skill tree?
No. Maxing all three branches costs 153 points and you get 76 from levelling. You can max one branch (51 points) and put the rest into a second, which is exactly what the three builds above do.
How much does it cost to reset the skill tree?
2,000 coins per spent point, so a full 76-point respec costs 152,000 coins. Partial point refunds cost the same per point.
What is the best first skill in ARC Raiders?
Marathon Runner. One point in Nimble Climber opens it, and five ranks of cheaper sprinting help every playstyle from the first raid onward. Youthful Lungs is the natural second pick.
Is the ARC Raiders skill tree changing?
Yes. The Frozen Trail update on October 8 reworks the tree, removing some skills, adding new ones and adding choice gates so you cannot take everything. Expect to rebuild after it lands.
Is Security Breach worth it?
For any looting build, yes. Security Lockers are some of the best containers on every map and nothing else opens them. It needs 36 points in Survival, so either route toward it from the start or respec into it once you have the points.
So: Marathon Runner and Youthful Lungs first, In-round Crafting early, then one capstone that matches how you play, and skip the slide and wall-leap nodes. Rebuild once after the Frozen Trail rework rather than twice around it. And if the grind to 75 is the part you would rather hand off, the ARC Raiders boost page has levelling runs, raid help and squad carries so your points are spent before the next reshuffle, not after it.