ARC Raiders Dolabra Shotgun & Canto SMG Guide

Both weapons arrived with the Flashpoint update and operate on a blueprint-first system, meaning you cannot simply stumble onto them in a rusty crate like a normal person. You must locate specific blueprints, gather specific crafting materials, and have a Tier 3 Gunsmith Station that you have presumably been neglecting since day one of your ARC Raiders career. The ARC Raiders Flashpoint update represents one of the most significant content drops the game has seen, and naturally it gates the best toys behind some of the most hostile map conditions available.

Critical Reminder Both blueprints are consumed on use via the "Learn and Consume" option at Speranza. The moment you learn it, the blueprint is gone. Do not die before extracting. Store it in your safe pocket the instant it drops. The game is watching.

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The Two Weapons

Before you charge headfirst into whichever map condition is currently trying to vaporize you, let us establish what these weapons actually are and why the community cannot stop talking about them.

Dolabra

An experimental energy shotgun with variable focus firing modes. Your new reason to run Close Scrutiny nine times and find absolutely nothing.

The Dolabra is an ARC Raiders energy shotgun that operates on two distinct firing modes depending on whether you are hipfiring or aiming down sights. Hipfire opens a wide electrical cone for close-range crowd control, while aiming down sights collapses that spread into a tight, focused beam designed to punch through heavy armor plating. It runs on Energy Clips, not standard shotgun shells, which means your regular ammo stockpile is useless here. Energy Clips can be crafted from Advanced Arc Powercells and Batteries, or purchased from Tian Wen for 3,000 coins per clip. Budget accordingly. The weapon carries a magazine of eight rounds, fires semi-automatically, and sits at 100 durability baseline. Against the Vaporizer and the Shredder, it performs exceptionally well. In PvP, it is currently obliterating shields in two hits from the focused mode. The community already considers it S-tier for close-range engagements, and it is only a matter of time before a patch note appears that says "adjusted Dolabra performance." Savor the window while it lasts.

Canto SMG

A fully automatic submachine gun with four modifier slots. Faster than your ability to track it. Harder to get than the legendary weapon sitting right next to it on this page.

The Canto is a fully automatic ARC Raiders SMG blueprint unlock that runs on medium ammunition with a base magazine of 30 rounds, which bumps to 36 with the included modifier. It features four full attachment slots covering barrel, stock, ammo capacity, and grip, making it arguably the most customizable weapon currently available in the game. Durability maxes at 130 at level 4 with attachments. The fire rate is described, charitably, as rapid. Less charitably: unhinged. Think of the Ventor crossed with the Stitcher, then add more caffeine. The recoil will need management. The ARC penetration rating sits at moderate, positioning it as primarily a PvP weapon, though it handles standard ARC encounters competently enough. It is worth repeating that this is a blue rarity weapon that is currently more difficult to obtain than the legendary weapon listed above. The game's sense of humor is not always appreciated in the moment.

The Dolabra blueprint drops exclusively inside the Close Scrutiny ARC Operation, a new map condition introduced with Flashpoint. The event rotates hourly across the Rust Belt outdoor maps and spawns large ARC machines called Assessors. These are unmissable: enormous platforms that descend from the sky and announce their presence with a tall red beam of light shooting into the heavens. You will go to those. You will regret going to those. You will go again.

What is Close Scrutiny? It is the first ARC Operation, a new category of major map condition. Groups of Surveyors and Vaporizers patrol the area, scanning for materials. The ambient loot across the rest of the map drops significantly during this event, forcing everyone toward the Assessors. Everyone else also wants the Dolabra. This is by design.

Step-by-Step: Farming the Dolabra Blueprint

Load into a Close Scrutiny map

Check the map condition before deploying. The event rotates hourly across outdoor maps. During the current Flashpoint window, it has been running consistently across all Rust Belt locations, meaning you do not have to wait long between runs. That goodwill will not last forever.

Locate the Assessor

Follow the red beam of light in the sky. It is not subtle. Multiple Assessors can spawn across the map at once, so check your minimap for the objective icon. Choose whichever one has the least amount of other Raiders sprinting toward it, which will be none of them.

Equip the Photoelectric Cloak

This gadget makes you invisible to ARC enemies. It is not optional. You can attempt the Assessor without it and watch three Vaporizers and a Rocketeer discuss your corpse. The cloak turns what should be a firefight into a controlled robbery. Bring it every time.

Use smoke grenades on approach

Before you begin breaching, throw smoke on the Assessor platform to break line of sight with ARC patrols. The cloak and the smoke together give you the window needed to work through the containers without becoming a target practice dummy for Vaporizers.

Breach the three containers

Each Assessor has three high-value containers. Breaching one unlocks access, then spawns a wave of reinforcements. Clear or cloak through, then move to the next. Each breach is a new lottery ticket. The Dolabra blueprint is not a guaranteed drop. Hope is not a strategy, but it is all you have.

Safe pocket, extract, repeat

The instant the blueprint appears in your inventory, move it to your safe pocket. Even if you die, the safe pocket preserves its contents. Extract to Speranza. Use "Learn and Consume" at your base. Return to step one as necessary for the next several hours of your life.

Crafting the Dolabra

Once you have the blueprint learned, you need all three crafting materials and a Level 3 Gunsmith Station before the recipe becomes available. The materials are not trivial to gather, since two of them require you to keep running the same hostile conditions that just made your afternoon miserable.

3x Shredder Gyro: Kill Shredders. Found on Blue Gate, Buried City, Spaceport, and Dam Battlegrounds during map conditions.

3x Magnetic Accelerator: Craft from 2x Advanced Mechanical Components + 2x ARC Motion Cores. Also found in Stella Montis or from Matriarchs and Queens.

2x Vaporizer Regulator: Drops from the Vaporizer ARC enemy. Only found during Close Scrutiny. You are going back anyway.

Note on Vaporizer Regulators These are also required for the High-Gain Antenna project, meaning every raider farming Dolabra is simultaneously competing for the same enemy drops for a completely separate progression item. The scarcity is, at this point, a personality trait of the game.

The Canto SMG blueprint location in ARC Raiders is considerably less defined than the Dolabra's, which you might assume would make it easier to find. It does not. The Canto blueprint does not require a specific map condition to technically exist in the loot pool, meaning it can, in theory, drop from a random container somewhere on any map. In practice, you are farming the Hurricane event. Accept this early and save yourself considerable grief.

The most reliable method is loading into a map with the Hurricane map condition active and hunting First Wave Raider Caches. These are upgraded versions of the standard Raider Caches that only spawn during Hurricane events. They emit a distinct rhythmic electric hum rather than the usual mechanical ticking of normal caches. The Hurricane itself creates enough ambient noise to bury that sound entirely, which is why you will want to open your audio settings and enable Night Mode before deploying. This compresses the dynamic range and brings the cache hum forward in the mix. Otherwise, you are navigating by minimap markers alone and hoping the right cache spawned at the right marker, which it will do approximately one out of every five to ten locations checked.

Hurricane First Wave Cache Basics First Wave Caches share spawn locations with regular Raider Caches but only appear during Hurricane events. The Hurricane rotates hourly across Dam Battlegrounds, Blue Gate, Buried City, and Spaceport. Stella Montis is exempt because it is indoors and the weather conditions do not apply. Dam Battlegrounds has the highest cache density. Blue Gate is widely recommended by the community for its layout efficiency.

Step-by-Step: Farming the Canto Blueprint

Wait for Hurricane map condition

Check the map condition schedule before loading in. The Hurricane rotates hourly across outdoor maps. If you miss the current window, you are waiting approximately an hour per map cycle before the right combination returns. Plan meals accordingly.

Set audio to Night Mode

Go to Audio Settings and enable Night Mode before dropping. This makes the First Wave Cache electrical hum audible against the wind noise. Without it, you are playing a much less fun game called "check every Raider Cache marker on the map manually."

Navigate cache spawn clusters

Head for the highest-density cache zones. On Dam Battlegrounds, this means the central landmark clusters. Approach from 30 to 50 metres out and stop moving to listen for the electrical hum. Turn side to side to identify the directional source. The sound repeats in a pattern. If it keeps repeating, you found one.

Clear guards and open the cache

Hurricane caches are guarded by ARC. Other Raiders are also circling. This will almost certainly become a PvP situation. Bring your best loadout, prioritize mobility, and remember that extracting with the blueprint is more important than winning the firefight. A dead Raider with a blueprint is just a blueprint delivery service for someone else.

Safe pocket and extract

Blueprint in safe pocket, immediate extraction. Night Raids can additionally boost discovery rates if that map condition overlaps with Hurricane. Plan runs to catch both conditions simultaneously for improved odds. It will still take multiple attempts. There is no version of this that does not take multiple attempts.

Crafting the Canto SMG

The Canto's crafting recipe is considerably more approachable than the Dolabra's, relying on materials that can be sourced through standard scavenging and vendor purchases rather than demanding kills on specific hostile units. That is the one mercy the game offers here.

2x Advanced Mechanical Components. Scrap Rare or Epic spare parts. Found in mechanical loot areas or through recycling.

5x Magnets. Purchase from Celeste or scavenge. Reasonably common. One of three things in this game you can obtain without suffering.

3x Medium Gun Parts. Blueprint found in lockers and cupboards. Celeste also sells it. Craft from the blueprint once learned.

Consider the following before committing to either grind. They will not make the game easier. They will make failure feel slightly more informed.