How to unlock all archetypes in Remnant 2 guide

Remnant 2 is a class-based third-person shooter that takes all the right lessons from Soulsborne games — including bizarre secret weapons. And like the titles that inspired it, Remnant 2 has a load of different playstyles to choose from, this time in the form of classes called “archetypes.”

Archetypes work a bit differently than your typical RPG class. While you do pick one at the start of the game, think of this more as a “free class” and not your class forever. As you progress, you’ll be able to equip a secondary class — which comes with all the same benefits minus the “Prime Perk,” which is reserved for your main class — and even change your original class out for a better one.

You’re only able to choose from four (five if you pre-ordered the game) of the 13 Remnant 2 classes at the beginning. But in this Remnant 2 guide, we’ll teach you how to find all of the game’s classes and tell you a bit about them.

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Medic

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If you didn’t pick the Medic class to start Remnant 2, you can unlock it by picking up the Medic Pin in Ward 13. Go up and talk to Dr. Norah, who is in the makeshift medical tent in the Ward. Look at her wares and buy the Medic Pin for 1,500 Scrap. Take the Medic Pin to Wallace and pay to upgrade it into the Caduceus Idol Engram. This item will allow you to equip the Medic class to either your prime or secondary archetype slots.

As you might’ve guessed, being a Medic is all about healing yourself and your allies. Your Prime Perk is Regenerator, which causes you to generate additional Relic (your healing item) charges when healing someone — yourself included.

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Hunter

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If you didn’t pick Hunter as your starter class, you can unlock it by visiting Brabus in Ward 13, over by the shooting range. Talk to him and he’ll eventually show you his wares — which consists of mostly guns. Buy the Rusty Medal off of him for 1,500 Scrap and take it to Wallace. Pay Wallace and he’ll upgrade the Rusty Medal into the Sniper War Medal Engram, which will allow you to equip the Hunter class in your prime or secondary archetype slot.

Hunters are all about dealing damage from a distance. As a Hunter, your Prime Perk is Dead to Rights, which causes you to extend duration-based abilities by dealing Ranged Weakspot damage (aka getting headshots). This is particularly good for abilities like Hunter’s Mark, which marks targets and gives you bonus damage against them for a period of time.

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Challenger

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If you didn’t pick Challenger as your starter class, you can grab it by visiting Reggie in Ward 13, who sits next to Mudtooth. Talk to Reggie and he’ll eventually show you some wares he’d like to sell. Grab the Old Metal Tool off of him for 1,500 Scrap. Then take the Old Metal Tool to Wallace and pay to have him transform it into the Steel Enswell Engram. Now you can equip it to either your prime or secondary archetype slot.

Challenger is the tank class, built for up-close-and-personal combat. If the Challenger is your prime class, you’ll be able to take advantage of the Die Hard Prime Perk. When you take fatal damage as a Challenger, your character doesn’t die and instead punches the ground, dealing damage to enemies around you and healing you to about half health. This can only happen every 10 minutes and some enemies are able to kill you through it, but it’s a very powerful effect for this rather punishing game.

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Handler

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Handler is easy to miss if you don’t select it as one of your starter classes. The item you need to unlock this pet-class is locked behind old Mudtooth’s dialogue. This guy is a storyteller, and boy does he love to tell stories. The first several times you talk to him in Ward 13, he’ll tell you some purposefully long-winded lore. But if you keep asking him for stories and keep talking to him, he’ll eventually open up a shop.

With the shop unlocked, you can purchase the Old Whistle from Mudtooth, but it’ll cost you 1,500 Scrap. Once you have it, take the whistle to Wallace and pay to upgrade it to the Silver Whistle Engram. You can now equip the Handler class in your prime or secondary slot.

The Handler’s main gimmick is that you have a pet dog to do your bidding and help you out in combat. The Handler’s Prime Perk is Bonded, which allows the dog to revive you if you go down, just like a fellow player can in co-op. This makes Handler a very powerful choice for single-player runs of Remnant 2.

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Gunslinger

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The Gunslinger’s unlock requirements are a bit odd. For players who pre-ordered Remnant 2, you can simply select the Gunslinger when making a new character. For those who missed out on the pre-order — or if you picked a class other than Gunslinger for your starter — you’ll need to play a fair bit of the game.

Continue with the main story until you obtain the Root Earth. Then go talk to Mudtooth in town (the old dude in the rocking chair). If you haven’t already spoken to him to unlock the Handler, you’ll need to exhaust his stories to even open his shop. He talks forever, but if manage to hear everything he has to say (you need to specifically ask him to tell you a story), he’ll hand over the Worn Cylinder. Take it up to Wallace and he’ll upgrade it to the Iron Cylinder Engram, which you’ll be able to equip The Gunslinger in your archetype slot.

The Gunslinger is all about slinging guns and dealing big damage with weapons. Its Prime Perk is Loaded, which causes your character to instantly reload both of your weapons when activating a Gunslinger skill. Loaded also grants you infinite ammo for a short period of time after activating it.

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Alchemist

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The Alchemist is one of Remnant 2’s secret archetypes, and you can unlock it in Losomn, the Victorian-esque horror world. If you haven’t unlocked Losomn yet, just continue playing through the campaign and you’ll get there eventually, as the order of the worlds differ playthrough to playthrough.

Like many of the secret classes, getting the object you need for the Alchemist is a random event. However, instead of needing a particular area to spawn, you instead just need to approach one of the many sewer grates along the street.

The sewer grates in Losomn have a chance to spawn a Manticora — the giant, ugly bat-bears that attack you and the villagers of the town. Normally Manticora pop out of these grates, attack, retreat, and pop out elsewhere to surprise you. But if you’re standing next to one of the grates, a Manticora can grab you and pull you into the sewer. This is a random chance, so simply approach each grate you see and push up against it. Eventually, a Manticora will grab you.

Once in its lair, kill the Manticore (it’s not a boss, just an obnoxious elite in a small arena) and it will drop the Mysterious Stone. Take the stone to Wallace and pay the usual fee of 10 Lumenite Crystals and some Scrap. This will enable you to equip the secret Alchemist archetype in your prime or secondary slots.

The Alchemist is all about buffing yourself and your nearby allies with tonics that you can chuck at the ground or at someone else. Its Prime Perk is Spirited, which lets you have an extra Concoction buff active.

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Summoner

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The Summoner is another of Remnant 2’s secret archetypes, and it’s a bit of a pain in the ass to get. You’ll find it in Yaesha, the jungle world. As you progress through the world’s story, you’ll find a Bloodmoon Altar shop, which just looks like an NPC on the map. This Bloodmoon Altar sells the Faded Grimoire item for 15 Blood Moon Essence, and you’ll need to buy that book if you want to become a Summoner.

So that begs the question: How do I get Blood Moon Essence? And the answer is, you get a little lucky and then you manipulate that luck as much as you can.

Once you complete Yaesha, go to one of the map’s larger areas (the Faithless Thicket worked best for us), and travel in and out of the zone until you get a Blood Moon. You’ll know you’re in a Blood Moon because the color pallet of the world will change to a red/purple hue, and you’ll see purple wisps floating around the area.

Once you’ve found your Blood Moon, do not activate the Checkpoint again, or you’ll ruin it. Shoot the floating purple wisps you find and they’ll come flying back to you as Blood Moon Essence. Eureka! Now all you need to do is walk into a new zone via the yellow doorways — any side dungeon or normal dungeon attached to the Faithless Thicket will do — and then load back into the area with the Blood Moon. This will repopulate the wisps, which you should collect, and then repeat this process.

Once you have enough Blood Moon Essence to buy the Faded Grimoire, head back to the Bloodmoon Altar and purchase it. Now take it to Wallace in Ward 13 and pay to have him transform the Faded Grimoire into the Tomb of the Bringer, which will allow you to equip the Summoner class.

The Summoner is, as you might’ve guessed, a pet class. It revolves around summoning some familiar enemies from the earth to act as your pets and fight for you. Its Prime Perk is Ruthless, which allows you to shoot your own minions in order to enrage them, causing them to deal even more damage for a short period of time.

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Engineer

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The Engineer is one of Remnant 2’s secret archetypes, and it’s so hidden that it’s almost impossible to stumble upon by accident. You’ll be able to unlock the Engineer once you make it to N’Erud and advance the story there a little bit.

Once you reach the second open-world area on N’Erud — for us it was the Timeless Horizon, but it can also be The Eon Vault — walk around the perimeter of the zone. Look out at the poison fog along the edge of the zone and keep an eye out for a group of stalagmites (the ones on the ground) on your right, a short platform with stalagmites on your left, and a small gap in between. If you need a visual reference, check out our image above.

Image: Gunfire Games/Gearbox Publishing via Polygon

Run through the gap — ignoring your character’s coughs — and jump from one cliff to the next once you reach a hole in the ground. Quickly grab the armor off the body on the other side. Then jump off the cliff to the smaller platform below. On the ground, just before you die, you’ll find the Alien Device. Grab it and succumb to your fate.

Once you get ejected from the checkpoint crystal, head back to Wallace in Ward 13. Give him the Alien Device and a handful of Lumenite Crystals and he’ll give you back the Drzyr Caliper, which will allow you to swap into the Engineer class.

The Engineer is a master of machines in Remnant 2, and you can place turrets on the ground to do your bidding or pick them up like heavy weapons. The High Tech Prime Perk allows you to overclock your tools of destruction, causing them to deal more damage and fire more quickly.

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Invader

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The Invader is another of Remnant 2’s secret archetypes. You’ll only be able to unlock Invader once you finish the first three worlds and reach Root Earth, the final area in the game.

The first thing you need to do to unlock Invader is make sure you already have the Dreamcatcher melee weapon, which a little complex to acquire. You’ll find it in the Asylum of Losomn. Find the prison key and the three stone dolls around the asylum. Give the dolls to the doctor hiding behind the door in the basement. Then unlock the door to acquire the Nightweaver Stone Doll. Give the Nightweaver Stone Doll to the Nightweaver’s Web in the corrupted version of the basement to earn the Dreamcatcher.

Anyway, once you have the melee weapon, make your way through Root Earth until you reach the Corrupted Harbor. Progress until you reach the smaller checkpoint areas. You’ll face a few unique bosses here, but you’ll also find an offshoot to a wide, open area that has a dead body in the center. Kill the enemies that spawn into the arena and walk up to the body. Collect the Escalation Protocol amulet and then hold down the melee button with Dreamcatcher equipped. You’ll spin the stick and earn a consumable called Walker’s Dream. Slot it into your consumable bar and use it in front of the body.

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Using the Walker’s Dream will teleport you to a different dimension in the same area. Walk back to the open space and you’ll find that the dead body is not only alive, but that it’s a boss called Bane. Bane is very easy to kill, although it is surrounded by much harder enemies. Focus down Bane as quickly as you can and it will drop the Wooden Shiv. Once you have it, you can either clear the rest of the critters or die, it doesn’t matter.

Use the checkpoint to return to Ward 13 and give the Wooden Shiv to Wallace. Pay the man his usual price and he’ll upgrade your Wooden Shiv to a Serrated Root Blade, which will allow you to equip the Invader archetype.

The Invader is a decoy and trickery-based class. Its Prime Perk is Shadow, which causes you to leave behind a Decoy for three seconds after casting any Invader skill. This Decoy draws enemy fire, and you’ll permanently deal 5% bonus damage to enemies that aren’t targeting your character — which makes Invader a great class to pair with a pet archetype like Summoner or Handler.

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Explorer

The Explorer is technically a “secret archetype” but it’s impossible to miss as long as you finish the game. That doesn’t mean we’re going to say it’s an easy class to acquire, because the game’s final boss is no slouch.

We won’t spoil the boss’ name or what it looks like here, but you’ll have to fight it on Root Earth in an area called the Blackened Citadel. If you’re struggling, we recommend you leave the boss arena and replay some of the areas on Adventure Mode. This will help you upgrade your weapons and level up your archetypes a bit more.

Once you finally kill the boss, it’ll drop the Broken Compass. Return to Wallace as usual, pay him, and he’ll transform the Broken Compass into the Golden Compass. This will allow you to equip the Explorer subclass.

The Explorer archetype is good at finding loot and collecting items — basically the perfect subclass for cleaning up all the other stuff you didn’t do in your first playthrough. Its Prime Perk is Lucky, which gives you a 10% chance to spawn extra items and rare drops from enemies.

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Archon

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Unlocking the Archon archetype is a bit extreme. So extreme that the developers intended Dataminers to discover the method and spread it around. However, just because players have discovered how to unlock the Archon, actually doing it isn’t any less work for you.

First, you’ll need to beat the game and get the Explorer archetype and level it all the way up to 10. Then you’ll need to make sure you have the Dreamcatcher melee weapon, which you can get in Morrow Parish in Losomn. After that you’ll need to level up the Invader archetype to level five. And after doing all that, you’ll need to collect a very specific assortment of weapons and equipment, put it all on, go through a portal, and follow a complex maze.

If you’re interested in getting the Archon archetype, we recommend you check out our guide on unlocking the Archon archetype if you want to go for this class.

As for why you’d want the Archon, we can answer that here. This class is all about weapon mods, which are already extremely powerful in Remnant 2. Its Prime Perk is Tempest, which causes you to constantly generate Mod Power, and increases generation for all mods when you cast one.

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Ritualist — Awakened King DLC

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The Ritualist is a new archetype in Remnant 2 that’s exclusive to the game’s first DLC, The Awakened King.

To unlock the Ritualist, you’ll first need to start the DLC as a “one shot” and make your way to the heart of the flooded city to find the Ragged Poppet. This is all a bit more complex than it seems, so check out our Ritualist unlock guide if you want step-by-step instructions on how to unlock this new, status effect-focused class.

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Invoker — The Forgotten Kingdom DLC

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The Invoker is a new archetype in Remnant 2 that’s exclusive to the game’s second DLC, The Forgotten Kingdom.

To unlock the Invoker, you’ll first need to start the DLC as a “one shot” and make your way to the Ancient Canopy area in Yaesha to get the Old Flute. Like the Ritualist, getting this archetype is a bit complex, so check out our how to unlock the Invoker guide if you want step-by-step instructions on how to unlock this skill damage-focused class.