Risk of Rain Returns

Risk of Rain Returns

141 ratings
All Providence Trials | Gold Ranks
By Helix
Tips and videos on how to get gold medal/crown for every providence trial (sorted alphabetically).

Full playlist:
https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLx0qhIeA9wvrQH05aLmwshVLB-wG4zS0x
4
2
6
2
   
Award
Favorite
Favorited
Unfavorite
A Colossal Feat
Get the equipment from the chest as soon as possible. Use it to reset your shotgun (RB) cooldown. Focus on killing monsters to make the next ones appear. When the Jelly boss dies, switch to its equipment to damage the Colossus.

A Duplicator?!
This trial is a race against time: how many (RB) skill uses can you fit in 3 minutes?

Start by getting the Alien Head in the $25 chest, then use your first (RB) but don't pick the items up yet. We need to get a Duplicator first from the $50 chest. You'll be able to use a second (RB) before opening the chest, then grab all the items on the ground.

Then get another Alien Head from another $25 chest on the upper ledge. From now on your gameplay loop is just to deal killing blows with your utility skill for scrap generation, and use (RB) for item generation. Repeat this as many times as possible.

A Fresh Harvest
Your real objective here is catching the +15 seconds bonuses that spawn every 15~20 seconds (and despawn in ~5 seconds). If you miss two or three, you'll lose because of time. The lemurians do not despawn so don't be in a hurry to reach them. Always keep an eye open for the time bonuses.

Use your (RB) before (LT) to kill plants and birds. Stack the golems in the bottom floor with (RT).

Use capsules to heal if needed. They will respawn after use.

Also I noticed it really late but you can climb down one of the vines from the middle floor to the bottom pit!

A Rung Above
It might help to set the zoom scale to 1x.

Try and kill the dragons who can drop a scarf (chance to dodge). Focus the spear throwers and the plants. It's important to kill the plants but not make them fall, otherwise you lose their 5 pts drops.

At some point a fire worm will spawn. Focus on beating it fast and pick its keycard. You should be able to open one of the legendary chests by then. Hope you don't get the fire boots which are pretty useless. Open the locked door and pick up your points and the equipment. You can pick the syringes as well if you dash to the left after falling.

At some point a big robot will spawn. You should beat it if you can because not only it's very annoying to dodge its attacks, but it drops a huge 50 pts which might be enough for you to reach the objective at this point.

I went on quite a bit after this, and got a very silly death to end the run (turns out you cannot cross the waterfall).

A Toxic Path
Your kills increase your speed thanks to the provided Harpoon item, so try and keep your utility skills for groups of enemies. Your equipment heals you and removes the slow from the pesky throwers.

Go for every reasonable spawn of Goat Hoof, but don't make too much of a detour for them especially during the third and final lap.

Here is my suboptimal run, still reaching 1:45 (Crown is 2:00). I'm not sure yet if the spawns of Hooves are triggerable or random.

Assassination Contract
The utility skill can be used to slam down the lava worm really quickly (two hits), and also to stun bosses such as the imp when he's about to attack. I think the large hitbox of bosses makes the skill hit repeatedly.

The circuit is Worm -> Imp -> Colossus -> Vagrant + Wisp -> Totem. There's an invisible rope after the Vagrant that lets you join the Wisp easily without having to climb everything. It's probably the fastest route, but can be executed quite a bit faster than on my video. Still got 40+ seconds to spare.

Blades in the Wind
Focus on not letting your boomerang come back to you and avoiding damage.

When a boss dies, drop down to loot then buy something on the top floor. Stacking bleed might be optimal. I'd always pick the knife first.

When reaching 3+ boss kills, don't hesitate to buy something when possible and also chill on the top floor if your life is low: the run is not timed.

Brave Heart, Steady Hand
Your main combo is Combat Knife (RT) into Suppressive Fire (RB). Dodge fire whenever needed either by walking through the lizard or Tactical Diving, otherwise blast your way to victory.

Break the Targets!
Just follow the video for this one.

Bullseyes Only
You can turn back before using the backflip utlity skill to make a big jump forwards. You can also charge quickscope while in the air.

Don't kill any enemy, it's not worth it.

When nearing the boss, make it spawn so that its towers will disappear when you're ready to cross the bridge for the final target.

Castle of Memories
Grab some key items by breaking walls with dynamite, then rush to the end area. The optimal route is shown in the video. The final fight is somewhat hard and might require several tries.

Caustic Climb
Your damage reduces cooldowns (useful for the bubble), so try and get some damage over time on enemies when it does not make you lose time. Your utility skill speed boost is nice for that.

The video shows the route: we rush to the right side for the Hopoo Feather. Maximum height seems 115 as the mission ends when you reach that.

Colossal Lift
Your attack speed beacon (RB) should be up every two or three colossus if you're fast, but if you just want to reach the gold objective of 14 you can take your time and wait for it to be ready every time. Time your invulnerability shield (RT) for kicks from colossus. Otherwise just bash with (LT).

I suggest taking every drone dropped from colossus, as well as repairing drones on the ground. For items, it's probably best to take the defensive choices (Medkit, Tough Times): offense is not a problem.

After the tenth colossus, they start getting stronger. At this point it's best to take the Behemoth from the legendary chest.

Crash Landing
We go for the Hopoo Feather and Afterburner northeast of the spawning point first. The feather can be reached in two grapples.

Afterwards we go back to the spawn and do a little tour of collecting objectives, going for the second afterburner as soon as possible.

This route completes the objectives of 70 with nearly 30 seconds to spare.

Danger Orbits
Go to Settings and change zoom scale from 2x to 1x. You'll see the vagrants coming from much further away. This is the one big trick to this trial, but it still remains really hard and RNG heavy.

Try to always explore your fireballs on elites and bosses. Once you reach the Alien Head, you should be in a much better spot already, but still prone to bad spawns.

Don't Think, Feel
This is a very "personnal skill" trial and there's only a couple tips I can give.

1) Wait until the enemies start moving to use your skill. That's because they sometimes move past you so waiting until they stop is the best indicator.

2) When the birds spawn (at 10 pts), try and parry them at the same time as a golem or crab; you get two points this way.

Drowning in Research
You'll notice that enemies fall at different speeds. The most dangerous are the lemurians and the crabs. One bad spawn of both at opposite sides of the level and you'll take a hit.

My main advice would be to keep the utility skill stocks until you're nearing the target of 135 points. Start using them above ~75 points when 4 or 5 slow monsters are going down; they will protect you from a bad spawn of crabs and lemurians on the opposite side.

Also the bonus stocks don't disappear so never jeopardize your run by going for them, just pick them up when convenient.

Emergency Ejection
Get vertical movement with your Airstrike (RB) and to a lesser extent your diagonal strike (RT). Use (RT) sometimes to tempo for the parachute cooldown.

The only mandatory part in the run I would say is going left in the slight corridor with a bumper at the end. Otherwise, the challenge is not too hard and the gold objective can be reached comfortably.

Endless Stand-Off
There's no timer here so focus on keeping your Stand-Off ability up and surviving. Try to always aim a low health enemy to refresh your Stand-Off counter.

Equivalent Exchange
This trial is more of a long one than a hard one. The thing that makes it work easily is that you don't have to pressure yourself into recycling every single monster tooth: it help to pick some regularly to heal yourself when you kill monsters.

Pick recycle stocks just after recycling if possible, otherwise it's not very worth it, especially if the stocks spawn very far from you.

I show my run here although there's not much to say about it.

From all Angles
The starting position is bad. Get to one of the deadends and place your turrets there. Keep an eye on your health at all times, but from this position they shouldn't be in too much trouble. If your turrets are doing good but you're low on health, you can also make them tank for you.

Use your utility skill as much as possible. Don't waste your mines; they're a great tool in a tight corridor!

For items I'd say either start with the Ukulele or the missiles. Then second wave gasoline is probably the best considering or layout.

Get Off My Lawn!
This is by far the worst trial.

Don't use your towers at first and just kill monsters with mines and mortar for some quick cash. Get the 150$ chest (Meat Cube) before it disappears. Pick up every item you see. You want to get at least 4 eggs.

Eggs heal you rapidly when you have not taken damage recently, so prepare to run around a lot without getting hit.

Once the first green monster spawns, walk it around a little while dodging to get your health up. Then two green monsters spawn. You should absolutely NOT kill them, because the next spawn is a super strong shadow monster which will ruin your HP. So just walk around the green guys until the end while dodging every hit.

Go On Without Me
I tried really hard not to cheese this one but failed.

So just take a look at this: there's a spot on a ledge where big lemurians cannot spawn and fire ones can't see you apparently. Just get there and hold fire until you reach the 250 pts.

Gup Sorting?
This one is a puzzle. The answer is revealed by the stone pillars. The number of pillars and their size will tell you the number and size of Gups you have to bring there. Go to settings and set the zoom scale to 1x, which will give you an ensemble view.

The shackles might help you because if Gups are stacked together, hitting one will slow it and separate it from the other.

Highway Robbery
Abuse flashbangs and max range to kill enemies. There is no timer so just wait for your cooldowns. The video shows the route for >1100 coins.

Hot-Rope Hop
That one is hard. The most helpful tip is probably to use the boomerang (RT) as much as possible. It destroys both enemies and objective targets. You can't let enemies overwhelm you.

Try and dodge the birds in particular as best as you can. If your health falls low, it's ok to just avoid everything for a while and heal up.

You'll need to really master the rope movement and the aiming in order to get this one.

In the Clouds
They key point for this one is that Tectonic Surge can launch you either horizontally or vertically. Get comfortable with both and use whichever you prefer (sometimes you don't have a choice). I prefer the vertical launch which gives you more control and horizontal movement when falling down anyway.

The video shows the route, and my choices of horizontal/vertical. Be prepared to die and retry a lot of times!

Inner Demons
Defeat the enemies the traditional way or just get them offstage, the choice is yours! My tip would be not to feel too pressured to get them offstage; a good time is achievable by damaging them.

It's useful to stun with RB before attempting a knockback offstage. Also keep in mind that your utility shield also knockbacks when you activate it. I'm not sure what the brain (equipment) is supposed to be doing apart from additional damage

Judgement (Drifter)
This shows one of the easiest ways to complete the Judgement Trial. The drifter is one of the best choices since you can just get carried by temporary items.

If you want to play it really safe, play all the levels, otherwise take the shortcut after the first stage.

Juggling Priorities
Try and get the crab next to a wall, removing a degree of randomness. Abuse your (RT) skill! It's really useful and replenishes fast. It can trigger a stun which grants a guaranteed landing on an airstrike basically.

Kited Blades
Use your (RB) before your (LT) to throw knives all around you. Keep (RB) stocks for certain interesting spots.

Follow the video for a route (110 objective, 120+ reached).

Lightning Strikes Twice
Fire your arrow over the heads of the golems so that you can detonate late, and so that it does not explode on impact (which makes you fail).

You should be concentrating on your movement. Keep a side eye to the golems and trigger the arrow almost like a reflex.

There's a bonus round at the end for those who want more! I didn't really try it yet

Lone Wolf
Use your LT a lot, especially when RT is on cooldown, and try hitting a lot of white reloads. Keep RT (snipe) for multiple enemies if possible, and don't always charge the bar to the maximum! Think about using your RB when a big enemy spawns.

Be very mobile: pick items, go to the lane where it's most needed.

Main Systems Offline
The easiest way to complete this challenge is to stay in the main central room and not open all locked doors. The reason is that opening keycard doors will trigger the spawn of stronger enemies.

Farm the first keycard then open the door on the left. Pick the items up and kill everything until the second keycard spawns. Go back to the central room (by the upper passage, so you don't lose health to the boars), and now loot everything in the room on the right.

From now on, you will stay in the central room and kill everything until you reach 900 pts. Birds in particular are nice to farm because they all get baited on the ground in groups. Use the ladders and platforms to your advantage. Try and keep your drones (RT) for elites and insects, but just spamming the skill whenever available also works.

Meteor Showers
The main trick for this one is that after triggering a meteor shower, you have to hide on a rope. While climbing a rope, meteors can't hit you and bosses are nicely packed. You just have to dodge birds.

Once you have 100pts and 400$, head to the big chest and get the feather. You can then reach the teleporter which will double your points, giving you the 200pts gold mark.

Perilous Descent
Two tips:
1) always bag previous cubes to get some scrap back
2) be careful when surfing on a cube to sometimes step back a little, because (LT) pushes you forward and you might fall

The video shows a viable route!

Piercing Space and Time
The crucial tip to achieve a good time in this trial is that you can jump right after being teleported when your arrow hits. You need to have mastery of this move.

Try to minimise the time travelling by foot, which is much slower than by arrow. You can move around and dodge enemies while your arrow is mid-flight; you'll be teleported when the arrow hits, no matter where you were before.

Below is a good run with a somewhat hard route.

Race to the Finish
You can angle your utility skill dash upward (by aiming Up + direction). Airstrike (RB) will give you a little bit of vertical movement when needed, so can your Target Acquired (RT) although a bit tricky to do so.

The route shown in the video seems pretty optimal, but the execution can be better still. Some tricky moves to pull off that will require a little training, but it's only ~21 seconds long!

Routine Maintenance
Prepare for one of the hardest trials.

Use your utility skill right off the bat and go to the right to force spawns there. We'll be positioning ourself on the platform in between the two higher ledges.

Bait the attacks from the golems then push them. If they fall on the platform, jump and punch at the same time. When the birds spawn, you'll have to dodge them: wait for their move before attacking. Wait for all golems to spawn before attacking, too, otherwise you might get hit by a newly spawned one. When a bison is near the edge, jump and hammer at the same time to stun it then push it down.

Open the 50$ chest to take the boxing gloves which can sometimes be really useful. Ignore the other chests.

When the Ifrit spawns, the towers should not be too much of a problem thanks to our location. Continue as before except now it's more chaotic. Good luck!

Ruins of the Future
Start by getting the feather just left of the spawn, then do a tour of the right part of the ruins. Use your speed boost (RT) often; try and time it between spider kills so that the boost is not wasted.

The video shows a route which, while executed with many mistakes, still ends with almost 30 seconds to spare. You should be able to get the gold comfortably.

Scavenger Hunt
Your aim is to have 2 or 3 combined drones for the final fight. My strategy is to just buy all $20 drones and check once in a while whether I can combine.

Farm money efficiently for a couple minutes, then deal with both lizards at the same time (ignore them when they first spawn). Open and loot the keycard stashes (both including +15 seconds of time), do a final drone buying / combining, then head to the boss. Aim for a 2:30 time when descending to the boss.

Scorching Heart
This is a rather easy one. Just use (LT) and (RT), the other skills aren't worth it.

Your first and main obstacle is the elite golem, but it can be cheesed by just stepping down the ledge and attacking it from there. Then kill the lava worm, take the loot and go down to the turtle. Kill the turtle and from there it's mainly lemurians that you can just bash with (LT) until completing the objective.

Shadows of the Past
Start by dashing (and stunning) the enemy three times in a row, then activate double attacks (RB) and damage him. You should get a comfortable lead and bring it to phase 2 soon enough.

When he retreats, pick up a heal if needed in a capsule, then fight the monsters. This is rather tough as they all hit quite strongly; try to land as many triple dashes as possible and only go in when double attacks are active.

When the mercenary comes back, the strategy is similar to phase 1, except you have to dodge the elder lemurians in addition.

Slide to the Finish!
The video provides a viable route and some tips. It's an early run; there's a lot of room for improvement still, but still can get the Crown consistently and not too hard to pull off.

S.O.S.
The key to this trial is to actively fight enemies and level up instead of just trying to rush the objective balls and avoid enemies. When possible, get the items giving you 5 objective pts at once, but be careful not to be ambushed by enemies when going in those deadends.

If you do that, you should get to 100 in a few runs.

Specimen Sampling
The goal here is to bring the two slimes to the end while keeping them as intact as possible. The slimes will mostly follow you so don't let them linger on acid pools for too long, and don't rush too fast either or they will lose track of you.

Use your shield charge to cross obstacles such as acid, and block projectiles.

The Right Ingredients
Try always going for multikills when cooking. In the beginning, go where 2 crabs or items are. Use your utility skill before jumping to help you reach the other side.

Use (RT) to make crabs fall to the bottom floor and stack them here. Try and make multikills with stacked crabs and vagrants. You can snowball pretty quickly with multi cooking yielding several items at once. The objective of 25 is not too hard to reach.

Think of the Children
You have to lead the children to the parent, with the main obstacle being that they cannot cross some gaps. In those cases, you have to "help" them a little with a good push.

Not much to say here, the video shows the route.

Uncontrolled Experiments
This is very straightforward. Throw some snot and teleport to it.

The video shows my route - a comfortable gold even with a few mistakes.

16 Comments
esteemed devil 31 May @ 11:01pm 
i did it...
esteemed devil 31 May @ 10:11pm 
i actually LIKE the trials but OMG in the clouds is so frustrating ufghvoureijhugv-r0igvhirsueldtfhboi;rdtgjbniultyhdfgukibjilkrjfgbujkioytgkjubklgrtdnbkjtyjbku
Iluszachane 18 Feb, 2024 @ 8:06pm 
Great guide obviously, but it would be slightly more helpful if you used different nomenclature for the skills (maybe 'P' for primary, etc) so us keyboard peasants didn't have to translate each entry.
Lonk 6 Jan, 2024 @ 2:22am 
a way better strat for "The right Ingredients" is that you just shoot the crabs to the lowest level and then kill like10 of them in one try.
So just running around, shooting down enemies and picking up Items.
Helix  [author] 7 Dec, 2023 @ 10:55am 
Whoops! Thank you, fixed
GruntOfAction 6 Dec, 2023 @ 10:12am 
the rung above video is the uncontrolled experiments one again .c.
Zoro4rk 3 Dec, 2023 @ 1:15pm 
You're a life saver for making this, thank you a lot!
Mr Reach 23 Nov, 2023 @ 5:45pm 
I genuinely hate all the trials. I just want the fucking artifact.
Helix  [author] 21 Nov, 2023 @ 10:12am 
The guide is finally complete! :dealwithit:

I will probably add a section for the Judgment Trial later on.

@decabooter368 all tips for the gold also apply for the standard completion. You have more time to get some money. I'd say open every chest, starting with the $20 ones, and combine drones whenever possible
decabooter368 20 Nov, 2023 @ 10:36pm 
Any tips for clearing scavenger hunt not going for gold. only one i cant complete.