Guild Wars 2: Secrets of the Obscure content
Guild Wars 2: Janthir Wilds content

Rift Hunting

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Disambig icon.png This article is about the feature introduced in the Secrets of the Obscure expansion. For the achievement category, see Rift Hunting (achievements).

With the help of the Heart of the Obscure, you’ll find nascent rifts across Tyria. Fully opening a rift will reveal Kryptis invaders who were roaming Tyria while hidden from sight. Defeat enough of them, and a more formidable champion will appear for you to face. Taking down the final Kryptis target will allow you to close the rift and will grant you Kryptis essence: powerful material you can use to craft weapons, armor, legendary armor, and bait to lure out deadlier Kryptis from rifts.

— Official site

Rift Hunting is a feature introduced in the Guild Wars 2: Secrets of the Obscure expansion, suitable for both solo and group play. Rifts appear in various parts of the world of Tyria, which can be activated to spawn several groups of enemies and a mini-boss.

Mechanics[edit]

A Kryptis Rift awaiting interaction.
A Mists Rift awaiting interaction.
Locating and Closing Rifts
  • Rifts appear throughout the world of Tyria:
  • After unlocking Rift Guidance mastery in the Heart of the Obscure Research mastery track, using the  Scan for Rift.png Scan for Rift mastery skill in an active map to locate an active rift.
    • Using the skill will show particles around your character that flow in the direction of the rift and the associated event will be displayed on the world map.
    • If you use the skill in a zone without active rifts, you will be shown a list of active maps.
  • Upon interacting with a rift with the Heart of the Obscure, a pre-event will start which requires you to kill lesser minions that begin spawning in the area.
  • After the pre-event, a single player will have to interact with the rift again with the Heart of the Obscure or a Rift Motivation to begin the fight with an elite (for Tier 1) or champion (for Tier 2 and 3) enemy.
  • The rift can be closed with the Heart of the Obscure after killing the final enemy.
  • There is no cooldown for Rift Hunting, so another can be sought out after closing one.
Motivations and Rift Tiers
  • There are 3 tiers of rifts. The first and easiest tier is, by default, intended to be completable by a solo player. Higher tiers are scaled for groups by default.
  • One of each tier of rifts exist simultaneously in a single zone instance, all tracked separately. By default only tier 1 rifts are tracked. Use/activate a "Motivation" item in your inventory to grant an effect that changes the tier of rift Scan for Rift will track. Doing this does not spend the motivation item.
  • When you interact with the rift after finishing the pre-event, you can use a motivation of the appropriate tier instead of the Heart of the Obscure, which increases the rewards you'll get for completing the rift. Doing this will spend the motivation item. Applying an available motivation from your inventory is always an option even if another player uses their heart of the obscure to open the rift.
    • Spending Fine Rift Motivation.pngFine Rift Motivations on tier 1 rifts is optional; they can be opened without one, but it increases your personal rewards.
    • Higher tier rifts require that at least one player spends a motivation item of the given tier in order to open them. Other players then have several seconds during which they can (but don't have to) spend their own motivations as well to increase their rewards from the event.
  • Players may receive rewards from participating in pre-events and rift closures even if they do not own, or have not started, the Secrets of the Obscure story. However, these players will not be able to open rifts, spawn the elite or champion enemy, or close the rift (since doing so requires access to the Heart of the Obscure).

Events and location[edit]

Kryptis Rifts[edit]

T1 Rift
T2 Rift
T3 Rift

Mists Rifts[edit]

T1 Rift
T2 Rift
T3 Rift

Rift spawns by map[edit]

Related masteries[edit]

Heart of the Obscure Research[edit]

  • Rift Guidance.png Rift Guidance — The Heart of the Obscure can be used to find small Kryptis rifts.

Astral Ward[edit]

  • Astral Craft.png Astral Craft — Gain access to purchasing Astral Ward armor and the recipes to craft common and uncommon Kryptis Motivations for use in rift hunting.
  • Emotion Control.png Emotion Control — Gain access to purchasing the recipe to craft rare Kryptis Motivations for use in rift hunting.
  • Rift Mastery.png Rift Mastery — Learn to extract greater amounts of Kryptis essence from rifts.

Gallery[edit]

Related achievements[edit]

Notes[edit]

  • Map instance shards that were active before weekly reset may not properly allow for rift hunting, necessitating a forced opening of a new shard, a server update, or a closure of the map instance shard.
  • Using the Scan for Rift skill outside of weekly zones and selecting Mount Maelstrom directs to Seitung Province instead, and vice versa.
  • The direction animation doesn't work properly in the Mistlock Sanctuary for most zones.

See also[edit]

External links[edit]