Arc Raiders Community Event Guide: All You Need to Know

If you have been knee-deep in the Rust Belt since launch, you probably already know that Arc Raiders is at its best when players work together. Whether it is clearing out enemy patrols, dragging a friend’s downed body back to safety, or desperately trying to extract before the sky rains fire, teamwork is baked into this game’s DNA. But the new community event really pushes that idea even further. If you have logged in recently, you have probably noticed the giant event panel at the top of the menu, marked as Breaking New Ground. That event kicks off a multi-phase community-driven effort to unlock Stella Montis, the fifth map in Arc Raiders.

To save you time and spare you from digging through scattered patch notes, this Arc Raiders community event guide breaks everything down in plain English. As someone who has been grinding the Rust Belt since day one, I am going to give you the full rundown of how the event works, how the phases progress, how to earn merits efficiently, and where you will spend them later. By the time you finish reading, you will be fully locked in and ready to contribute.

Let’s dive into it.

What the Arc Raiders Community Event Is Actually About

Breaking New Ground went live with Patch 1.2.0 and acts as a communal push toward opening up access to Stella Montis. Think of it as the game’s first big social progression milestone. Instead of farming your way through a personal task list, all Arc Raiders players across every region are dumping resources into a central pool to repair tunnels leading to the new zone.

The twist is that this is a multi-phase event. Your donations not only help the community but they award you merits, which you will need to buy rewards once phase two kicks in. If you are thinking this sounds like the classic live service format of progress, reward, and repeat, you are right. But here’s the cool part: the whole thing scales based on global participation, so everybody’s grind genuinely matters.

And trust me, the Arc Raiders community is already pushing hard. During the early hours of the update, North and South American players nearly missed the entire first phase because Europe and Asia dumped materials so fast that progress skyrocketed. The devs had to tune it down a bit so all regions could participate. That alone tells you how engaged the community is.

Phase One: Breaking New Ground

If you are jumping in fresh, phase one is where you will spend most of your time early on. This is the foundational part of the Arc Raiders community event guide, because everything after this depends on how much you and the rest of the playerbase contribute.

Here is what you are doing during phase one:

You donate basic resources.
You earn merits for doing your part.
You push the global progress bar toward unlocking Stella Montis.

Getting to the donation screen is easy. When you load into Arc Raiders, just look at the event icon in the top-left corner of the main menu. That will take you straight into the Breaking New Ground hub.

The items you can donate come from your normal scavenging runs:

Metal parts
Fabric
Plastic parts
Rubber parts
Chemicals

If you have been exploring the Rust Belt for a while, you already know these drop consistently from enemy bases, scrap piles, and salvage points. They are not rare, and you are meant to dump huge quantities into the community pool.

More importantly, donations happen in batches of five. Every batch of five materials grants you 20 merits, up to a maximum of 900 merits. If you want the exact math, that means 225 total donated items to hit the cap.

And before you ask, yes, you should donate even after hitting 900 merits. You will not earn extra merits beyond the limit, but your contributions will help unlock the next phase faster for everyone. If you want to be a good citizen of the Rust Belt and avoid leaving your fellow raiders behind, keep donating.

Should You Donate Past 900 Merits

Absolutely. The vets will tell you straight: Arc Raiders is at its best when progression feels shared. Even though the game stops giving you merits at 900, the event itself does not end until the global bar fills. And when phase two unlocks, you will want to be there right away.

Think of it this way. Donating past the merit cap is kind of like when your crew already secured an extraction but you stay behind to help someone else fight off a Stalker pack. You do it because it is the right call for the run as a whole.

Plus, the devs slowed progression slightly so every region could participate. That means your donations actually matter more now than they did during the early rush.

What Merits Are and Why You Want Them

Merits are the exclusive currency tied to this community event. They do not drop from kills, they do not show up in loot piles, and you cannot earn them by crafting or doing missions. Right now, the only way to get merits is donating batches of materials to the Breaking New Ground event.

Merits will be used during phase two. You will cash them in for rewards and progression unlocks, though the full reward pool is still under wraps. Based on how similar events work in other looter shooters, expect cosmetics, boosts, maybe even some early access unlocks. Nothing pay to win, but definitely something worth grinding for.

The important part is to hit your 900 merit cap. If you want to be ahead of the curve when phase two launches, now is the time to farm your materials, dump them into the pool, and sit on a fat stack of currency.

Phase Two: Staking Our Claim

Once the community finishes repairing the tunnels to Stella Montis, phase two will go live. The next phase is called Staking Our Claim and will feature new challenges, a new progression track, and the ability to spend your merits.

Right now, we know the following:

Phase two will introduce a new reward track.
You will cash in merits during this phase.
More challenges will appear as the event continues.
The devs intend this to be a multi-stage community project.

Think of phase one as the setup and phase two as the payoff. We will probably see more involvement than just donating materials, since Staking Our Claim sounds like something that might involve actions on the Stella Montis map itself.

Based on the pacing of these types of events, you can expect the next phase to roll out quickly once donations hit the required threshold. So if you want to be ready on day one, make sure you do not procrastinate on your merit farming.

How to Farm Materials Efficiently

Veteran tip time. If you want to farm your 225 required materials fast, here is what you should be doing:

Farm industrial zones
These areas drop metal, plastic, and rubber parts at higher rates.

Hit salvage containers
They look boring but are packed with early-game crafting materials.

Clear out Raider bases
Enemies drop materials consistently, and clearing bases doubles up as XP.

Prioritize missions with dense scrap clusters
Some mission types spawn far more salvage spots than others.

Ignore high-tier loot for now
You are here for volume, not rarity. Faster loops beat longer runs.

If you really want to speed things up, squad up. Not because group size boosts drop rates, but because running with a team reduces downtime and lets you cut through bigger enemy clusters quickly. Fast runs equal more salvage equal more merit donations.

Should You Buy or Trade Materials

Some players have asked whether they should trade resources or pick them up through the community market. Honestly, it depends on how stocked your stash already is. If you are running low and you want to hit the merit cap fast, trading or buying the basics can help. Just do not overspend. These items drop everywhere once you start grinding efficiently.

If you need to gear up faster during the event, this is one of the situations where people start looking into third-party markets to skip farming time. If you go down that route, stick to reputable sources. For example, some players recommend checking out Arc Raiders items on G4mmo once per event cycle, but again, that is optional. You can grind everything yourself without spending anything.

Why This Event Matters for the Long Term

Events like this do more than unlock maps. They build community momentum. They give returning players a reason to log in and active players a reason to do more than just farm gear. And most importantly, they keep Arc Raiders feeling alive between major content updates.

Stella Montis is looking like a massive new zone, and the fact that we are unlocking it together through a global effort sets the tone for future expansions. If Embark Studios continues pushing out events like this, Arc Raiders will have that same shared world energy that keeps other extraction shooters thriving for years.

Final Thoughts

To wrap up this Arc Raiders community event guide, here are the key takeaways:

Donate your materials in batches of five.
Hit the 900 merit cap as soon as possible.
Keep donating even after the cap to help all regions progress.
Save your merits for phase two’s reward track.
Expect more challenges and content as Staking Our Claim unfolds.
Farm efficiently by sticking to scrap-heavy zones and fast runs.

Whether you are a new Raider or someone who has been here since early access, this event is a perfect chance to contribute, earn rewards, and help unlock one of the game’s biggest additions yet. Get out there, gather your parts, and push the community bar forward. Stella Montis is waiting.