ARC Raiders Frozen Trail Is Live: 22 Quests, Free Weekend

Yes, ARC Raiders Frozen Trail is live: Embark Studios released the 2.0 update on 8 October 2026, with the new Pendola Pass map as the headline. The game is also free to play until 12 October at 08:00 UTC, so this page covers what shipped, what changed in progression and the Reward Pass, and which balance changes you will notice in a raid.

Embark calls Frozen Trail its biggest update since launch. The new map, Pendola Pass, is described in the official preview as an old Italian village and Exodus transport hub beyond the peaks of the Rust Belt. We already covered the map itself in the Pendola Pass, Outpost and PvE test preview, so this page sticks to what came with the live update.

The free weekend grants access to the full game. Embark specifically confirms that new players can enter Pendola Pass immediately when teamed with someone who has already unlocked it. Exact solo unlock requirements for the other maps are not established by the sources reviewed here. Read the full free weekend announcement before the cutoff.

Embark’s free weekend FAQ answers the two questions most new players have: “All maps, and there’s no level or progression cap”, and “All progress made during the free-to-play event carries over if you decide to purchase the game.” For the event, no PlayStation Plus or Game Pass subscription is needed; on PS5 in Germany a €0.25 fee applies.

These are the changes from the official 2.0 patch notes that touch how your character advances.

Quests now give XP, and 22 are new

Frozen Trail adds 22 new quests. Completing quests and quest objectives now grants XP, and XP shows as a visible reward in quest descriptions and on completion. Several older quests were updated so that objectives which previously asked for a photo now require that photo to be taken with the new camera; the patch notes name five of them: The League, Reduced to Rubble, Life of a Pharmacist, Battening Down and Groundbreaking.

Skill tree: binary middle node, choose up to two of three at the end

The middle of each branch is now one path with a binary choice between two skills, and you can make that choice again when you reset your skill tree. At the end of each branch there are two nodes where you choose up to two of three skills, after reaching the required skill point investment. A few skills carried over from the old tree were also retuned to fit the new layout: Fight or Flight now grants roughly a quarter more stamina at each level, Stubborn Mule’s stamina regeneration rises by about a third, and Back on Your Feet’s healing climbs from 30 up to 40. Embark says more tweaks are likely as it watches how players use the revamp.

Stash: two more tiers

Embark added two more upgrade tiers to the Stash, pushing the new ceiling to 328 slots before counting any Expedition rewards or acquired Nomadic Envoy space. For how Expeditions currently stand, see our Expedition 5 dates and pause piece.

Embark explains the system in its Reward Pass breakdown. In the Hotfix 2.0.2 notes (9 October) Embark said it is aware of the Reward Pass not progressing for some players and is working on a fix. Cred is gone from the game entirely. In its place, the Reward Pass is now the progression system, fueled by a new currency called Reward Points that counts automatically toward whatever pass you have set as active. Only one Reward Pass can be active at a time. The first new pass is the Frozen Trail Pass, with 60 levels across a Free and a Premium track. Existing Raider Decks were moved into a Legacy Pass; rewards you already unlocked are kept and appear as granted, and you can keep progressing it by setting it as your active pass.

Embark’s Frozen Trail overview on Steam gives the Raider Token side: the Premium Pass “can be obtained for 1,150 Raider Tokens” and pays up to 1,150 back when completed, while the Free Pass holds up to 200. The Premium Pass has no items that affect gameplay; weapons and gadgets sit on the Free Pass. The patch notes Highlights list confirms the Collector DLC is available now, and the US Steam store lists it at $29.99 (prices differ by region), requiring the base game and including access to the Frozen Trail Reward Pass Premium Track.

Feats and weekly milestones

Feats are split into Easy, Medium and Hard, each worth Reward Points and weekly milestone progression.

Weekly milestones grant 250 Reward Points each, three per week, at 4, 8 and 12 weekly milestone progress. After you finish them, Feats can still be completed but no major milestone rewards are granted until the weekly timer resets.

Milestone totals: the three weekly milestones award 750 Reward Points combined. Reaching 12 milestone progress takes twelve Easy Feats, six Medium Feats or four Hard Feats if you complete only that tier. What one pass level costs in Reward Points, and how long a Feat takes, is not in the notes, so hours to level 60 cannot be calculated from them.

New items in 2.0: the Grappling Hook, Basic and Advanced Cameras, the Tether Launcher, the Yank Grenade, the Mountaineer’s Detector, and a Banjo and Harmonica. Map conditions are not new as a system; our 1.42.0 regional map conditions explainer covers the earlier batch.

Embark’s Frozen Trail overview says Celeste offers the Outpost, so she is the place to start. The patch notes describe only the first step of the project, “Research Topside Living Conditions”, which needs a photo of a farmland house; completing the whole project unlocks the Outpost and its Research Workstation. The later steps are not listed in the notes and we have not verified them in game, so the steps below cover the start of the chain, not all of it.

A note on our services: ARC Raiders quest completion is priced per quest, so a multi-step chain costs more than its starting price; our workbench upgrade covers the six standard workbenches at levels 1 to 3, not the Research Workstation.

Pendola Pass is the test bed for a Dynamic Loot Zone system, for now exclusive to that map. Per the 2.0 patch notes, the loot value of certain areas varies from raid to raid, to make routes less predictable. What does not change is the type of loot: “Residential loot areas remain Residential loot areas no matter what”. For planning, that means you can still pick an area for the kind of loot you need, but you cannot count on the same area paying the same every raid.

The chain runs through the Outpost. Embark’s overview says the Research Workstation in your Outpost unlocks “a branching path of abilities and enhancements” for weapons, with examples such as a fully-automatic Burletta, a Renegade with a scope and a Rattler with incendiary bullets and a 64-round drum. It is rolling out to 15 weapons, with more planned. The launch post adds that the Outpost lets you “amplify your weapons to a fifth tier and unlock special abilities”.

Which 15 weapons, what each upgrade costs and what the fifth tier requires are not in the posts we read.

Combat numbers

The explosive damage formula against ARC was reworked: weapons like the Hullcracker deal over 50% more damage against armor plates but around 30% less against more fragile parts, which slightly reduces effectiveness against weak points. The Anvil moved from Green to Blue and lost its Tech Mod slot. The Anvil Splitter is no longer usable as a mod; its effect became an improved upgrade option for the Amplified Anvil. Embark says the old Splitter item should no longer drop, but existing copies can be sold or recycled into Amplified Fragments. The Bantam takes over the uncommon hand cannon role.

Embark says this is meant to separate the Snap Hook from the new Grappling Hook as a burst-mobility gadget.

Matchmaking and traders

“Solo vs. Squads” is gone from matchmaking options while Embark re-evaluates its role. Tian Wen no longer sells Anvil and Hullcracker offers; they move into the weekly Nomadic Envoys rotation, and Launcher Ammo and Energy Clips now have a daily purchase limit. For earlier matchmaking changes, see our 1.39.0 matchmaking and Seeker fix notes.

Duplicated items

Embark has begun restricting accounts that store high amounts of duplicated items and removing items obtained through duplication, to correct the economy after past exploits.

The 8 October patch notes do not list the names of the 22 new quests or the XP per quest. Hotfix 2.0.2 followed on 9 October 2026: it fixed weapon meshes turning partly invisible with attachments, weapon models missing from the inventory, several server crashes, a grate on Pendola Pass players could fall through, and an error when buying DLC bundles. The same notes list known issues, each with the status Embark gave:

• Field Repair can be unavailable after unlocking; restarting the game works around it and a fix is in the works.
• Tether Launcher repair is unavailable, to be fixed in the upcoming update.
• Picking up the Pieces cannot be completed on Pendola Pass but works on other maps, with a fix promised in an upcoming update.
• The Hydra can detect and shoot through walls in the Cargo area without dealing damage, and standing on the side of the Cargo drop can mean instant elimination; a fix is in the works.

Sources and Confidence

This table separates what the studio has confirmed and what is not confirmed yet. Each claim below is tied to the post and the game version it describes.