Risk of Rain 2 questions, answered.

What is the «void version» of an item?

Void items (the purple ones) are versions of normal items. When you pick one up, every copy of the normal item turns into it, one for one: with 3 Ukulele and one Polylute you have 4 Polylutes and no Ukuleles. While you hold it, each new copy of the normal item is converted on pickup.

That is what «corrupts» means: Polylute corrupts Ukuleles, Benthic Bloom corrupts Clovers, Encrusted Key corrupts Rusted Keys... Newly Hatched Zoea corrupts every yellow (boss) item. They only exist if the Survivors of the Void DLC is enabled when the run starts. There are 14.

All 14 void items and what each one corrupts →

How do you get void items?

Normal chests never drop them. They come from:

• Void Cradle: a purple cradle on the map. It costs half your health and gives 1 void item. Opening it can release up to 4 Void Infestors.
• Void Seed: a purple dome full of void enemies. Kill the ones inside and its cradles unlock. Up to 3 per stage.
• Encrusted Key: the void version of the Rusted Key. Each stage spawns an Encrusted Cache; opening it lets you pick 1 of 3 void items.
• Simulacrum: the wave mode. Purple orbs after waves hold void items.
• Void Locus, the void stage: it is full of cradles.
• The Shrine of Order and the Recycler can also give them.

Careful: the Void Fields give normal items, not void items.

Every void item →

What is a Void Cradle?

The purple cradle found on some stages. Opening it costs 50% of your health and gives 1 void item: 60% common, 30% uncommon, 10% legendary. Up to 4 Void Infestors can pop out: small creatures that jump into enemies and make them Voidtouched elites. Open it at full health with no enemies around.

Which void item is worth it →

What are the Void Fields?

A hidden stage. You enter through the Null Portal in the Bazaar Between Time, down the path under the blue portal, once per run.

• There are 9 cells. Each one charges in 1 minute while you stand inside. Outside the cell the fog drains your health.
• Each charged cell lets you pick 1 of 3 items: common in the first 4, uncommon in 5 to 8, legendary in 9. Normal items, not void items.
• In even cells the enemies also gain items. You can leave any time: the exit is always open.

What is the Simulacrum?

A separate game mode, picked from the menu. It comes with the Survivors of the Void DLC. You defend a bubble against endless waves: every 5th wave is a boss and every 10th the enemies gain an item. After each wave you pick an item from an orb, and some orbs are purple, with void items.

Reaching wave 50 completes the challenge that unlocks the Void Fiend (the other way is escaping the Planetarium).

Void Fiend guide →

How do you reach the void ending (Voidling)?

• From stage 7, finishing the teleporter has a 10% chance to spawn a Void Portal. A Lunar Seer in the Bazaar can also pick it. It leads to the Void Locus.
• The Void Locus has 4 Deep Void Signals: charge each one by holding its bubble. With all 4, the portal to the Planetarium opens.
• Shortcut: in Commencement (Mithrix's stage) the glass frog opens the Planetarium portal after 10 pets (1 Lunar Coin each).
• The Voidling waits in the Planetarium, in 3 phases. Beating it gives 10 Lunar Coins and counts toward unlocking the Void Fiend.

What is a lunar item and where do you buy it?

The blue items. They always give something strong and take something away: Shaped Glass doubles your damage and halves your health. Chests never drop them and gold cannot buy them; you pay with Lunar Coins:

• Lunar Pod, on almost every stage: 1 coin, random item.
• Lunar Bud, in the Bazaar Between Time: 2 coins, and you see the item before buying.

They cannot be scrapped. To get rid of one, use a Cleansing Pool.

Every lunar item explained →

How do you get Lunar Coins?

Lunar Coins carry over between runs (gold does not). Ways to get them:

• Every enemy has a 0.5% chance to drop one. Each coin that drops halves that chance for the rest of the run.
• 10 for beating Mithrix and escaping; 10 for beating the Voidling.
• 5 for obliterating at the Obelisk (15 with Beads of Fealty).
• 1 to 10 the first time you complete each challenge.

What to spend them on →

How do you reach the Bazaar Between Time?

Find a Newt Altar on the map (a small statue, often hidden) and pay 1 Lunar Coin before the teleporter finishes. When it is charged, the blue portal appears. Paying afterwards does nothing.

Inside, time stops, so difficulty does not rise. There are:

• 5 Lunar Buds (2 coins each).
• Lunar Seers (3 coins): you choose the next stage.
• Cauldrons to trade items.
• The Null Portal to the Void Fields.

Do not hit the shopkeeper: hurt him enough and he kicks everyone out.

What to buy in the Bazaar →

Can you get rid of a lunar item?

Yes, at a Cleansing Pool, found on some stages. It takes one random lunar item you carry and gives a Pearl (80%: +10% max health) or an Irradiant Pearl (20%: +10% to every stat).

Lunar items →

What are elites and what does each type do?

An elite is a normal enemy with much more health and damage (the basic ones: 4 times the health, twice the damage) and a power. Its name and colour tell you which:

• Blazing: leaves fire as it walks and burns on hit.
• Overloading: its hits leave lightning bombs that blow up a moment later; half its health is shield.
• Glacial: slows on hit and explodes into ice on death.
• Mending: heals nearby enemies.
• Gilded (from stage 3): steals your gold on hit and fires spikes.

After the first loop the tier 2 elites show up, much tougher:

• Malachite: if it hits you, you cannot heal for 8 seconds.
• Celestine: makes nearby enemies invisible.
• Twisted (Seekers of the Storm): gives its allies huge armor.
• Collective (Alloyed Collective): a dome that blocks your attacks from outside; on death it disables your items for 2.5 seconds.

Plus two special ones: Perfected (lunar enemies and Mithrix) and Voidtouched (from Void Seeds). Each elite has a 1 in 4000 chance to drop its «aspect», an equipment that gives you its power; 57 Leaf Clover raises that chance.

Which final bosses are there and where?

• Mithrix: in Commencement. From stage 5 (Sky Meadow), align the Primordial Teleporter with the moon. 4 phases; in the last one he takes your items.
• False Son (Seekers of the Storm): in the Prime Meridian, through the green portal of a Halcyon Shrine on stage 3.
• Voidling: in the Planetarium, through the Void Locus or the Commencement frog.

What do you do with the teleporter?

It is the exit of each stage. Activating it spawns a boss and a big red circle, and it starts charging:

• It only charges while you are inside the circle: 90 seconds at least. Step out and it stops.
• You must charge it to 100% and kill the boss. At 99% enemies stop spawning.
• Reward: 1 green item per player (plus 1 more for each Shrine of the Mountain you used).

Until you use it, grab what you can: the clock keeps running and difficulty keeps rising.

Which portals are there and where do they lead?

They appear next to the teleporter when it finishes (or wherever noted):

• Blue: to the Bazaar Between Time, if you paid a Newt Altar.
• Gold: to the Gilded Coast, if you paid the Altar of Gold.
• Celestial: to A Moment, Fractured (the Obelisk). After the first loop, every 3rd stage.
• Void: to the Void Locus. From stage 7, 10% of the time.
• Green (Seekers of the Storm): from killing the Halcyonite of a Halcyon Shrine on stages 1 to 3; on stage 3 it leads to the Prime Meridian and the False Son.
• Primordial Teleporter (stage 5): aligned with the moon, to Commencement (Mithrix); with the planet, back to stage 1 (the loop).

On stage 5, taking any portal sends you back to stage 1.

What is looping?

On stage 5 you can go fight Mithrix or go back to stage 1 with all your items: that is looping. Align the Primordial Teleporter with the planet, or take any portal on stage 5.

After the first loop come the tier 2 elites, the celestial portal every 3rd stage and new variants of some stages. Difficulty keeps rising: each stage multiplies it a bit more.

What does each shrine do?

• Chance: pay gold and it sometimes gives an item (45% of the time, nothing). At most 2 rewards. Clover does not affect it.
• Blood: takes health, gives gold.
• Combat: free; spawns a group of enemies.
• The Mountain: free; the teleporter boss gets tougher but drops 1 more item per player. They stack.
• Order: 1 Lunar Coin; all your items of each colour become one of them, repeated.
• The Woods: makes a healing circle.
• Altar of Gold: lots of gold; opens the gold portal to the Gilded Coast.
• Halcyon (Seekers of the Storm): drains your gold while you stand near; then a Halcyonite appears, and killing it lets you pick items and opens the green portal.
• Shaping (Seekers of the Storm): costs 30% of everyone's health and revives the dead.

What are the Gilded Coast and Aurelionite?

A hidden stage. Pay the Altar of Gold before the teleporter finishes and the gold portal appears. There are 7 beacons: lighting the 4th spawns Aurelionite, a golden giant that takes no damage while any beacon is off. Beating it gives each player a Halcyon Seed: Aurelionite then fights for you at every teleporter.

What are the Obelisk and «obliterating»?

The celestial portal (after the first loop) leads to A Moment, Fractured. The Obelisk is there: obliterating yourself ends the run for everyone, gives 5 Lunar Coins and the first time unlocks the Mercenary. If someone carries Beads of Fealty, you go to A Moment, Whole instead, with 10 more coins.

Mercenary guide →

How do printers, scrap and cauldrons work?

• 3D Printer: it shows an item. It takes a random item of yours of that colour and gives you a copy of the one shown. Scrap of that colour goes first, so scrap lets you choose what you give.
• Scrapper: pick an item and it turns into scrap of its colour (up to 10 copies at once). No lunar, void or equipment.
• Cauldron: trades items for another colour: 3 whites for 1 green, or 5 greens for 1 red. Found in the Bazaar, Commencement and the Prime Meridian.

Which items to print →

What is luck?

Each 57 Leaf Clover gives 1 luck: when something is down to chance (an item triggering, a critical hit...) and fails, it is rolled once more per clover. A 5% item becomes 9.7% with one clover and 14.2% with two.

Purity (lunar) does the opposite: each one cancels a clover. Luck does not change chest contents, the Shrine of Chance or Tougher Times.

What are skill challenges?

Optional goals («do this with that survivor»). Completing one permanently unlocks something: a survivor, an alternate skill (the locked ones on the character screen), a skin, an item or an artifact. The first time they give 1 to 10 Lunar Coins.

They are in the menu: Logbook → Challenges. Mastery skins are only earned on Monsoon.

What is equipment (the orange items)?

Equipment is the orange item: it does nothing by itself, you trigger it with its key like an extra skill, then it has a long cooldown. You carry only one: picking up another swaps them. There is lunar (blue) equipment too, and elite aspects are equipment. Items like Fuel Cell shorten the cooldown.

Item tier list →

What is a «proc» or proc coefficient?

A «proc» is an item triggering on hit (the dagger causes bleed, the ukulele fires lightning...). Each attack has a number saying how much it counts: 1 counts fully; at 0.6 the Tri-Tip Dagger goes from 10% to 6%. Very fast attacks usually count less. Bleed, burn and sticky bombs count 0: they never trigger other items.

Why does the game get harder over time?

In Risk of Rain 2 difficulty rises with the clock, not with stages: every minute enemies get stronger, and each finished stage multiplies it a bit more. That is why speed matters. The clock stops in the Bazaar.

At the start you choose how fast it rises: Drizzle (easy), Rainstorm (normal) or Monsoon (hard). Eclipse is a mode with 8 levels, unlocked by winning with each survivor.

What is the difference between health, shield and barrier?

Damage goes in this order: barrier → shield → health. You die when health reaches 0.

• Shield: refills fully after 7 seconds without taking damage. For example from Personal Shield Generator.
• Barrier: temporary, drains by itself in about 20 seconds. From Topaz Brooch or Aegis.