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ARC Raiders Shared Watch Event Patch Notes (Update 1.15.0)

Embark's February 10 update opens the two-week PvE-only Shared Watch event, brings back the Cold Snap condition, and ships the Trailblazer grenade nerf the meta had been waiting on.

v1.15.0By BrokenBuilds WikiUpdated

What Changed in Shared Watch

Update 1.15.0 went live on February 10, 2026. The patch wraps a two-week limited-time event around three structural changes the meta had been asking for: the Cold Snap map condition came back to rotation with increased outdoor loot value, the Trailblazer grenade lost its wall-penetration property, and the event introduced a PvE-only progression track that paid Raiders for hunting ARC instead of each other.

Shared Watch event window

February 10 to February 24, 2026. Raiders earned Shared Watch Merits exclusively from PvE combat: destroying ARCs, assisting on ARC kills, and damaging ARCs. PvP did not contribute to merits. Twenty-one reward tiers required 1,050 merits total, which works out to about 75 merits per day for full clear over the 14-day window. The event ran in parallel with the entity:queen and entity:matriarch Harvester rotation, which let Boss Hunter loadouts double-dip on merits and unique parts.

Cold Snap returns

The freezing-damage map condition that originally launched in 1.7.0 came back to rotation for the event window. Outdoor loot value was bumped while the condition was active, which reframed the risk math: stand outside long enough to take freeze damage, and you keep loot worth the heal. Indoor extract routes still worked but paid less. The condition rotated off when the event ended.

Cosmetic drops

Vulpine and Slugger cosmetic sets were added to the store with the patch.

Balance Changes

  • Trailblazer Grenade: explosions no longer penetrate walls. The pre-patch Trailblazer was the meta utility grenade because a single throw cleared rooms through the geometry. Walls now stop the explosion cleanly. Players who built around the Trailblazer for room-clearing on Buried City corridors lost a major tactical lever overnight.
  • Trailblazer Grenade: damage scaling adjusted. Damage against small enemies (Ticks, Pops) increased; damage against entity:leaper and entity:bastion reduced. The grenade now matches its design intent (anti-swarm utility) instead of being a single-target boss-damage burst.

Bug Fixes

  • Reconnection reliability after disconnects improved.
  • Missing "tunnel scene" at match start fixed.
  • Trial-reward timeouts that caused missing objective rewards resolved. Partial rewards are now granted when timeouts occur.
  • End-of-Round screen now displays correct Merit and XP totals.
  • Platform icon visibility corrected on the squad UI.
  • Weapon cycling now works on non-mouse-wheel keybinds.

Build Impact

The Trailblazer change is the largest mid-meta shift the patch shipped. PvP loadouts that ran the Trailblazer in a quick-use slot for room-clearing pressure on Buried City corridors lost the wall-penetration trick that defined the play pattern. The grenade still has a place in PvE swarm clears, where the buff against small enemies pays off, but the PvP utility role moves to item:wolfpack or item:shrapnel-grenade depending on the loadout's weight budget.

The PvE-only merit structure changed how squads played the event window. Solo Raiders running ARC-grinding routes on Spaceport, Blue Gate, and Stella Montis pulled merits faster than three-stack PvP squads who wasted time hunting other Raiders for no event reward. Loadouts shifted toward item:looting-mk3-cautious plus item:bettina and item:hullcracker kits that prioritized ARC kills over PvP burst. The ARC Raiders Boss Hunter Build Guide became the default event template.

The Cold Snap return reactivated the case for item:looting-mk3-survivor for stationary outdoor regen, since the increased outdoor loot value rewarded Raiders willing to camp valuable spawn points through the freezing damage windows.

Event Strategy Notes

The event paid out at 1,050 merits over 14 days. PvE-focused players cleared in 8 to 10 days at a comfortable pace. Players who pushed PvP through the window earned merits at maybe one-third the rate, which made the event a bad time to grind extract-rate KDR.

Squads who ran the Harvester condition for Queen and Matriarch unique parts during the event window earned event merits and unique parts at the same time. The double-dip was the most efficient route for any Raider also chasing the Trophy Display Project Stage 4 and Stage 5 requirements.

Updated Tier Lists

The ARC Raiders Weapon Tier List does not shift on this patch. No weapon values changed. The Trailblazer change is a quick-use slot rebalance, not a weapon balance shift. Loadouts moved within the existing tier list rather than the tier list itself moving.

See Also