One Weapon Is Completely Breaking PvP in Arc Raiders

Arc Raiders has built its identity around tense PvPvE encounters where positioning and risk assessment matter just as much as raw gunplay. Every fight is supposed to feel dangerous and a little unpredictable. When you die, it should feel like a consequence of a bad call or being outplayed, not like you were erased before your brain could even process what happened.

Unfornately, that last point is the current reality in PvP. That balance is now under serious threat because one weapon, the Kettle, has crossed the line from strong to outright destructive, and not because of clever builds or high-skill mastery. The Kettle is completely breaking PvP in Arc Raiders thanks to an exploit that lets players bypass intended fire rate limits using a click macro, turning an already powerful semi-automatic weapon into something that deletes opponents instantly. It is accessible, easy to abuse, and spreading fast, and the community is understandably furious.

Why The Kettle Is Dominating Arc Raiders PvP

On paper, the Kettle is not a problem. It is a semi-automatic weapon designed to reward precision and fast reactions. It’s cheap to make, but comes with some strong downsides that keep in line with all the other weapons. In skilled hands, clicking quickly while maintaining aim and dealing with its slow bullet velocity gives the weapon a satisfying skill ceiling. That design philosophy makes sense in a PvP environment where accuracy and mechanical execution should matter. The issue is that the Kettle fires as fast as the input allows, and Arc Raiders currently has no effective safeguard against automated input.

Macros remove the human limitation entirely. With a simple setup that requires no deep technical knowledge, players can make the Kettle fire at speeds that are physically impossible for a human hand to reach. The result is a weapon that melts targets in a fraction of a second, often before they can react or even understand what hit them. If someone is using this exploit against you, even if you’re aware of it, all it takes is a brief moment for the encounter to end against you. This is an instant death scenario decided by who is willing to cheat, and it is a big problem.

What makes this worse is how accessible the Kettle is. This is not a rare endgame weapon locked behind extreme progression or high-risk content. Players can get their hands on it extremely early and extremely easily, which means the exploit is not confined to a small group of top-tier players. It is showing up everywhere. Casual players, solos, and new raiders are running into macro-abusing Kettles and getting wiped without counterplay. When a broken mechanic is this easy to access, it spreads like a disease through the entire PvP ecosystem. It’s one of the sad aspects of human nature: people are willing to reduce any possible friction at any cost.

Community Reactions and What Developers Could Do

Naturally, the Arc Raiders community has largely been loud and unified on this issue, and for good reason. Players are not arguing about balance numbers or minor tuning problems. They are calling out cheating that fundamentally undermines fair play. Social channels and in-game discussions are full of clips showing absurd fire rates and instant kills, paired with frustration from players who feel like their time is being wasted. Losing gear hurts, but losing it to an exploit feels insulting.

There is also a growing fear that if this goes unchecked, it will permanently damage the game’s PvP population. When players start assuming that every fast Kettle death is a macro user, trust breaks down. Suspicion replaces competition. Legitimate high-skill players get lumped in with cheaters, and newer players simply stop engaging with PvP altogether. That kind of erosion is hard to reverse once it sets in.

Embark needs to act fast and decisively. This cannot be a slow, wait-and-see balance pass. The Kettle needs a hard fire rate cap, input normalization, or some other systemic solution that makes macros ineffective. Exploit abuse should also come with real consequences to discourage continued cheating. No remorse. Ban the players abusing, even after it’s fixed. If they’re willing to cheat once, they’ll gladly do so again when the next exploit is publicized. Arc Raiders thrives on tension and fairness, and right now, the Kettle exploit is tearing both apart. If Embark wants PvP to survive, this issue has to be treated as the urgent crisis it is.

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