Vaultbreakers Guide: Champions and Wolfswood Walkthrough

Vaultbreakers is a top-down extraction action RPG developed by BetaDwarf and published in partnership with Square Enix. The core loop drops you solo or in small teams onto a hostile map where you battle monsters, defeat localized bosses, harvest resources, and outplay rival players before extracting alive. If you fall in combat, you forfeit all equipped gear and lose 50% of your collected inventory items, making positional awareness, class mastery, and planned extractions critical to every run.

Matches typically last between 10 and 16 minutes. As a match progresses, a closing environmental storm constricts playable territory toward the map center. Escaping requires finding an active solo or group extraction point or surviving until the central extract opens at the end of the round. Between raids, players retreat to the Haven hub to interact with vendors, refine gear, deposit loot, and unlock account-wide upgrades.

Basic Controls and Interface

Vaultbreakers pairs classic extraction survival rules with action RPG and MOBA-inspired controls. Understanding keybindings helps ensure quick reactions during high-intensity PvE and PvP encounters:

• Movement: WASD keys navigate your character.
• Aiming and Basic Attacks: Mouse direction controls aiming, while Left Click unleashes your champion's primary basic attack.
• Abilities: Right Click and Q activate your champion's core tactical skills.
• Mobility and Defense: Spacebar executes a class-specific movement or defensive ability that usually grants temporary invulnerability frames (i-frames).
• Heroic Ability (Ultimate): R triggers your character's ultimate skill, powered by champion-specific energy pools.
• Interaction: F allows you to open chests, harvest nodes, unlock gates, and channel extractions.
• Consumables: Number keys 1, 2, and 3 deploy equipped potions, shields, or utility devices.
• Management: I opens your inventory, while J displays active quest logs.

Vaultbreakers Champion Overview

The game features five distinct playable champions, each utilizing a unique energy mechanic to fuel empowered attacks or sustain burst combos.

Bjornir Playstyle and Abilities

Bjornir excels on the front lines and performs exceptionally well in duo setups. His right-click, Wild Swing, can be tapped for a cone swipe or held to charge forward, applying two Chill stacks and taunting enemies. His Q, Power Chop, delivers heavy physical damage and stuns targets that have four Chill stacks. Spacebar activates Ice Block, encasing Bjornir in ice to grant invulnerability while slowing nearby enemies and sharing defensive resistance with allies before exploding. His R, Frost Feather Flyby, blankets an area in ice feathers that slow enemies and stun them upon reaching five Chill stacks.

Spark Wing Playstyle and Abilities

Spark Wing relies on rapid hit-and-run magic rotations. His basic attack applies Zap, which increases energy gain on follow-up strikes. His right-click, Power Vortex, creates an area-of-effect blast that yields bonus energy if targets are zapped. Zap Bang (Q) fires a conical projectile that stuns zapped enemies for two seconds. His mobility skill, Spark Flight (Spacebar), allows him to dash through enemies with invulnerability, dealing physical damage and reducing its own cooldown by four seconds for every zapped target hit. Reaching high energy lets his ultimate, Electric Form (R), surround him with orbiting circuit orbs that detonate on contact.

Nymera Playstyle and Abilities

Nymera functions as a classic marksman who kites opponents across open terrain. Her right-click, Verdant Shot, can be charged to extend arrow range, amplify damage, and apply a heavy slow. Hydra Shot (Q) discharges three projectiles in a narrow cone while knocking Nymera backward, stunning targets marked by her moth stacks. For repositioning and scouting, Soaring Strike (Spacebar) fires a moth projectile that grants vision and deals damage, allowing a second press to instantly dash to the moth's location. Emerald Barrage (R) unleashes a rapid volley of 10 piercing arrows.

Lumiri Playstyle and Abilities

Lumiri controls choke points by multiplying autonomous plants known as Shooty Flowers. Her right-click, Piercing Overgrowth, fires a shockwave that knocks back enemies, grants Lumiri and allies a protective shield, and duplicates any Shooty Flowers caught in the wave. Root Cage (Q) roots enemies in an area and creates additional flowers based on targets hit. Floral Finesse (Spacebar) acts as an invulnerable dash that uproots all active flowers and clusters them around her new position. Her ultimate, Bramble Wall (R), creates a persistent hazard that repeatedly damages and roots targets trying to cross.

Thora Playstyle and Abilities

Thora trades safety for ferocious sustained damage. She possesses no dash abilities and intentionally sacrifices her own health pool to trigger burst effects. Rager's Whirl (Right Click) swings her twin axes in an arc to taunt mobs; holding the input consumes 25% of current health as recoverable wound damage to double its strike area and slow enemies. Swift Fervor (Q) drains 25% health to award 20% movement speed and 100% attack speed. Her defensive ability, Rage Spin (Spacebar), grants immunity while spinning for continuous damage, extending its duration when striking wounded foes. Her ultimate, Earthquake (R), provides three sequential ground slams that slow enemies and heal Thora for 8% of her maximum health per hit.

Wolfswood Map: POIs, Locked Gates, and Bosses

Wolfswood is the introductory deployment zone in Vaultbreakers. The map features an open central woodland surrounded by gated outer sanctuaries. While central camps hold basic wild animals, bandits, and scrats, the outer zones require specialized keys to breach and contain rare loot and dangerous bosses.

Navigating Key Wolfswood Locations

• Venomweb Hollow: A cave complex in the central forest inhabited by poison spiders, explodable gas mushrooms, and an elite spider broodmother. Testing shows this POI is an exceptional source of venom sacks, often netting around 1,000 gold per sweep.
• Bandit Outpost: A fortified camp occupied by ranged and melee bandits alongside the patrolling named elite Aller the Trapper.
• Open-World Boss Boom Hook the Catcher: Located southeast of Venomweb Hollow. Beware of proximity mines and patrolling scrats; focus down snare snipers immediately to avoid fatal crowd-control chains.
• Roaming Lightning Storm: A moving environmental vortex that pushes players and drops explosive ground indicators. At the center of the storm wanders a neutral Wind Elemental vendor selling unique equipment.

Outer Locked Regions and Gate Keys

Accessing the perimeter points of interest requires a single-use key known as a Rune of Breaking, craftable at the blacksmith using Ironwood and Werewolf Hearts or purchasable from vendors. Certain high-tier inner sanctums additionally require a Searing Flask. Whenever a player breaches a locked gate, a map-wide alert displays the exact entrance opened, warning the entire lobby.

1. Pinecrest Village and Keep: Requires a Rune of Breaking. Inside roams the Werewolf Elder and Lunara Darkfang. Moving deeper through the western graveyard leads to the northern keep, which houses a Soul Devourer boss.
2. Grizzly Hollow: Located west of Pinecrest; filled with bears and guarded by the named elite Batau the Wanderer.
3. Elven Ruins: Occupied by hostile humanoids. The northern courtyard contains the Bandit King encounter accompanied by an Alpha Wolf.
4. Werewood Keep: Guarded by Arka the Witch Wolf, an encounter that draws in secondary Werewolf Elders during combat.
5. Gilhart Hollow: Populated primarily by Elementals, concluding in a second Soul Devourer chamber.
6. Elemental Cave and Windshear Crag: Requires a Rune of Breaking to enter the Elemental Cave and a Searing Flask to penetrate into Windshear Crag. Contains the third Soul Devourer in an environment mirroring the outdoor roaming storm.
7. Scrat Invasion and Airship: Requires both a Rune of Breaking to access the imp encampment and a Searing Flask to board the Airship, where the Flameclaw Mech boss awaits.

Moonstone Farming and Stone Circle Rituals

Moonstones are high-value resources used to craft elite weaponry, such as the Axe of Accuracy.

Moonstone Gathering

Seven Moonstone deposits spawn across the Wolfswood map, with six located in a practical circular gathering route. Picking up an unpurified Moonstone impairs your vision, turning the screen deep red. To negate this visual penalty, craft a Vial of Light from the vendor Diona before entering the raid.

Purifying Moonstones

To refine raw stones into Purified Moonstones, carry one to any of the three Stone Circles in Wolfswood:

• Northern Stone Circle (Heavily contested; experiences the most frequent PvP invasions)
• Eastern Stone Circle (Least contested route)
• Southern Stone Circle

Interacting with the central altar initiates a public ritual, alerting all players on the map. Foggy zones appear around perimeter pillars; stand within them to charge the completion meters. Each completed pillar spawns a Werewolf and a Vine Weaver enemy. Prioritize killing Vine Weavers first to eliminate dangerous crowd control. A practical tactic is luring active mobs into the next foggy circle, allowing you to charge the subsequent pillar while fighting. Once all pillars are cleansed, return to the altar to claim one Purified Moonstone, one Rune of Breaking, and Draconic Powers.

Haven Progression and Zero-to-Hero Strategy

Between deployments, you manage your operations within the Haven hub. Player progression divides between account-wide unlocks and character-specific inventories.

Haven Vendors and Meta Systems

• Milo and Garrick: Campaign quest givers that unlock base expansions, map access, and crafting tables.
• Gondrakc the Blacksmith: Crafts melee weapons, tools (pickaxes, sickles), and armor for physical tankiness.
• Vexi the Alchemist: Binds gathered herbs, mushrooms, and spider parts into healing draughts, CC immunity flasks, and shield potions.
• Vulren: Special equipment vendor whose stock rotates every 15 minutes, offering blue and green gear with specialized primary, secondary, and tertiary affixes.
• Goldbelly: Sells harvesting tools and general supplies directly for gold.
• Ley Line / Artifact Altar: Upgrades account-wide passives, such as starting every match with three healing potions, deploying vision wards, or restoring 15% health from ambient green spirits.

Testing notes from open playtests indicate that item storage is currently character-specific, meaning items and gold gathered on one champion cannot be transferred to another in town. However, quest completion, artifact tier levels, and unlocked recipes apply account-wide.

Running a "Zero to Hero" Deployment

A Zero-to-Hero run involves queuing into Wolfswood with minimal investment—such as a single bag and one crafted Rune of Breaking—to extract fully equipped with blue gear and thousands in gold:

1. Utilize the Solo Buff: If you enter the match as a solo player, the game grants a Lone Wolf bonus awarding roughly 500 bonus maximum HP, a 10% buff to overall stats, and +10 item power, balancing encounters against duos.
2. Initial Loot Highway: Clear low-tier camps, loot large crates, and eliminate open-world elites like Boom Hook or Aller the Trapper to rapidly fill empty gear slots with green items.
3. Strategic Gate Opening: Use a Rune of Breaking on a high-value gate like Pinecrest or Elven Ruins. Even if you do not plan to fight the primary boss immediately, the map notification lures geared players away from central areas like Venomweb Hollow.
4. Avoid Lingering at Final Extract: The closing circle converges on a single final portal surrounded by dangerous AI bots and camping duos. Once your bag is filled with 1,500 to 2,500 gold worth of items, extract early using individual solo portals or secluded group extraction points before the timer dips below three minutes.

Frequently Asked Questions

What kind of game is Vaultbreakers, and who developed it?

Vaultbreakers is a top-down extraction action RPG developed by BetaDwarf and published in collaboration with Square Enix. Formerly developed under project names like Project Fay and Project Haven, it combines MOBA-style WASD skill combat with extraction raid structures similar to Dark and Darker.

How do you unlock Thora?

In the official Steam playtests, Thora is unlocked by adding Vaultbreakers to your Steam wishlist. If she remains locked in-game after wishlisting, toggling the game off and back onto your wishlist refreshes your client status.

What are the death penalties in Vaultbreakers?

When you die in a match, you drop all currently equipped weapons, armor, and jewelry, along with 50% of the materials and items in your inventory. Upgrades made to your Haven's Ley Line ensure you permanently keep 50% of building materials upon death.

How do you access the second map, Artifact Refinery?

The Artifact Refinery map unlocks after completing early campaign quests and accumulating enough Ley Energy (typically between 140 and 160 energy) through town progression. It contains heightened environmental hazards like laser devices, trains, and tar pits, but yields higher-tier green and blue loot.