ARC Raiders Missing Skill Points: Expedition 3 Fix

ARC Raiders Expedition 3 ended on May 11, 2026. Players reset their progress, gave up their stashes, and waited patiently for the promised skill point rewards. A good chunk of them logged back in to find fewer points than expected: some as many as five short. Not a visual glitch. Actually missing.

Embark Studios confirmed the issue publicly via their Discord and the in-game news update (patch 1.28.0): "The team is aware of an issue causing some expeditioners to be missing skill points after departing. While we've managed to solve the issue, we are still tracking down the remaining accounts affected and will be granting skill points in the following days."

Status as of May 12, 2026

The fix is identified. Points are being pushed to accounts manually in batches. You do not need to do anything. They will appear. Patience is reportedly free.

Why It Keeps Happening

This is not the first time ARC Raiders expedition bug complaints have flooded the subreddit. In December 2025, a patch failed to address an expedition progression bug that had been present since launch. Players were understandably vocal about the lack of communication. History, as it turns out, rhymes.

The current issue is at least partly tied to Embark recently changing how skill points are awarded during expeditions. Previously, your stash value determined extra points: rewarding cautious, hoarding playstyles. For Expedition 3, it flipped to damage dealt, which briefly turned every lobby into a chaos exhibition. The backend likely did not survive the transition cleanly.

The Numbers You Should Have

Each ARC Raiders skill tree caps out at 75 total points across three branches: Mobility, Survival, and Conditioning. With no points wasted and Expedition 3 bonuses applied, some players should have had around 16 points available on fresh characters. If you logged in with 11, you are short by 5. That math tracks.

Important: you cannot max every tree. 75 points for 135 available skills means you will, by design, leave half the board untouched. Plan. Or don't, and complain later.

Best Early Skills: Mobility First, Feelings Later

While waiting for your points, here is what to do with them the second they arrive. ARC Raiders best early skills consensus is clear across every guide, every build theorist, and every streamer who has played more than six hours: start with stamina, then loot speed, then weight capacity. Anything else is roleplay.

Mobility Tree: Non-Negotiable

Your stamina bar at base is an embarrassment. Marathon Runner (5/5) reduces stamina drain during movement: max this as fast as possible, ideally before level 11. Follow it with Youthful Lungs (5/5), which expands the stamina pool itself. Together these two skills make you a functional human being rather than a gasping liability. One point in Nimble Climber unlocks the tier. Do that first, then fill in.

Slip and Slide is worth a point early. ARC Raiders' slide mechanic is your emergency exit out of most bad situations. stamina management ARC Raiders is not a side concern: it determines whether you escape, loot, and extract, or die holding a full backpack in a bush.

Survival Tree: The Loot Engine

Put two points into Agile Croucher and Revitalizing Squat immediately: not because they are extraordinary, but because they unlock In-Round Crafting, which absolutely is. Crafting bandages, shield rechargers, and grenades mid-raid eliminates the need to overprepare before every drop. Stop buying things. Start making them.

Looter's Instinct (5/5) is the other pillar of the Survival tree. Container reveals faster during searches: a passive that compounds with every raid. Looter's Instinct ARC Raiders is often underestimated by players who have not yet done the math on how many containers exist per map, and how much cumulative time the animation saves across a session.

Skip this early unless you have medium or higher shields already equipped. Used to the Weight becomes relevant once your gear is heavier: not when you are running starter loadouts. Broad Shoulders matters later for carry capacity. Neither is worth delaying your Mobility investment for.

One Thing About Respecs

ARC Raiders skill respec is possible: but it costs a skill point to reset your entire tree. You cannot reset individual branches. You lose the point. If your build is a disaster, you pay to undo it. There is no free take-back. Plan accordingly, or enjoy the expensive lesson.

The Expedition system is the other reset vector: an optional 8-week wipe that strips your progress in exchange for permanent bonus skill points. If you have no intention of resetting, your current allocation follows you indefinitely. Good or bad.

The Castaway Store Rotation

Patch 1.28.0 also dropped the ARC Raiders Castaway skin set into the store alongside the new Whaler cosmetics. The Castaway set is a fisherman/space-survivor hybrid with an unusual amount of customization: removable jacket, removable headgear, toggle-able emissive effects, and three colorways: yellow, black, brown. Yellow is the most visible. Whether that matters to you depends on how much you enjoy being shot first.

The Whaler set includes a whale-shaped raider tool (it is a pickaxe, it is shaped like a whale, and yes it is exactly as absurd as that sounds), a fish trap back attachment, and an anchor charm. The emote pack of three is also live. One of the emotes is a wave. It will not help you survive.