ARC Raiders' quest board is a lot bigger than it first looks. Right now, the main chain is tracked as a full 100-quest set across Shani, Celeste, Lance, Tian Wen, and Apollo, with objectives spread over Dam Battlegrounds, Buried City, Spaceport, The Blue Gate, Stella Montis, and Riven Tides. If you're trying to plan ahead, it helps to treat quest rewards and required materials like part of your route, not an afterthought, especially when checking useful resources for ARC Raiders Items before heading back into another raid. The newer MetaForge data gives the cleaner objective structure, while the wiki still has the broader reward and item table.
How the traders shape progression
Each trader has a pretty clear personality once you've done a few jobs. Shani is the practical one. She hands out weapons, keys, shields, grenades, and plenty of ARC-related tasks. Early quests like Picking Up The Pieces, Trash Into Treasure, Clearer Skies, Off The Radar, Hatch Repairs, and Down To Earth are worth doing early because the rewards actually help. Celeste leans into settlement work, ecology, research, water issues, and contamination. Lance is the medical guy, so his quests often send you looking for pharmacy supplies or health gear. Tian Wen is your weapon-tech route, packed with attachments, gun parts, and blueprints. Apollo sits closer to survival, defence, explosives, and later civilian-remnant work.
What players usually miss
You'll quickly notice that not every quest is just "go there and grab the thing." Some ask for specific hand-ins, like Batteries, Wires, ARC Alloy, ARC enemy parts, or odd lore items such as First Wave Rations and Major Aiva's Mementos. Others need you to search a fixed spot, photograph something, repair a machine, or interact with a terminal. The wording matters. "In One Round" shows up on several quests, including A Balanced Harvest, A Lay Of The Land, Bees!, and A Symbol Of Unification. That likely means you shouldn't split the steps between raids, though the sources still don't clearly explain how failure works after death or extraction.
Routes that save time
The best way to work through the quest list is by map, not by trader. Dam Battlegrounds is loaded with Celeste and Shani objectives, including Broken Monument, Water Troubles, A Balanced Harvest, and Our Presence up There. Buried City is useful for Marked For Death, A Reveal In Ruins, Industrial Espionage, Life Of A Pharmacist, and Combat Recon. Spaceport covers A Lay Of The Land, Switching The Supply, Prescriptions Of The Past, Waking the Grid, and The Stench Of Corruption. The Blue Gate is where you'll deal with Bees!, A First Foothold, A Dead End, With A Trace, and Armored Transports. Stella Montis and Riven Tides appear later, so don't stress if those names don't show up early.
Rewards that are actually worth chasing
Blueprints are the rewards that matter most over time. Greasing Her Palms unlocks the Lure Grenade Blueprint, Industrial Espionage gives the Burletta Blueprint, The Major's Footlocker gives the Hullcracker Blueprint, Last Entry gives the Yellow Light Stick Blueprint, and Test Case gives the Fireworks Box Blueprint. Keys are another big deal. Hatch Repairs, The Trifecta, A Lay Of The Land, Our Presence up There, Switching The Supply, and Cold Storage can all change where you loot next. Weapons and attachments from Tian Wen and Shani are strong stepping stones too, especially if you're not swimming in gear yet.
Planning around incomplete data
The awkward bit is that no public source has a fully verified unlock order for all 100 quests. Names also shift a little between databases, such as Tian Wen and TianWen, or The Blue Gate and Blue Gate, but they're clearly pointing to the same content. So, play it safe: stack objectives on the same map, keep rare hand-in items until you're sure they're not needed, and check your reward goals before spending materials. Some players also choose to buy ARC Raiders Items when they want to cut down the grind, but smart routing still makes the biggest difference during normal progression.
