Rift Hunting

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.

Unlocking

Note: Players without the Scan for Rift mastery skill can complete and get rewards from rift events started by other players.

Heart of the Obscure unlock banner.

Secret of the Obscure

1. Complete the second chapter of the Secrets of the Obscure story, Hell Breaks Loose.
2. Unlocking Rift Guidance mastery in the Heart of the Obscure Research mastery track.

Janthir Wilds

1. Progress the second chapter of the Janthir Wilds story, Diplomacy and Discovery. ^{[verification requested]}
   • This will not unlock the mastery track, which requires completing the unlock process for Secret of the Obscure.

Visions of Eternity

Mechanics

A Kryptis rift awaiting interaction.

A Titanspawn rift awaiting interaction.

File:Mists Rift (Castoran).jpg

A Castoran rift awaiting interaction.

Locating Rifts

• Rifts appear throughout the world of Tyria:
  • Kryptis Mists Rifts can always be found in Skywatch Archipelago, Amnytas, and Inner Nayos.
  • Kryptis rifts will open in several other zones on a weekly cycle, which are listed in-game in the  Weekly Rift Hunting achievement category.
  • Titanspawn Mists Rifts can always be found in Lowland Shore, Janthir Syntri, Mistburned Barrens, and Bava Nisos.
  • Inquest and Choya Mists Rifts can be found in Castora.
• Using the   Scan for Rift mastery skill in an active map to locate an active rift.
  • The default keybind for Activate Mastery Skill is J, and a unique keybind can be set to Scan for Rift in the Control Options menu.
  • Using the skill will show particles around your character that flow in the direction of the rift. If the rift event is already active, it will be displayed on your screen and the area will be circled in red on your map.
  • If you use the skill in a zone without active rifts, you will be shown a list of active maps.

Closing Rifts

• 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.
• There are two types of rifts:
  • Most rifts will require you to kill a certain number of enemies to progress.
  • Rifts in Inner Nayos and some in Starlit Weald require you to defend the rift for 3 minutes, preventing enemies from escaping through it. If enough enemies escape, the event will fail.
• 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.
  • Motivations can be crafted after unlocking the appropriate Astral Ward mastery and buying the recipe, e.g. from Lyhr in The Wizard's Tower. They can also be traded with other players on the Trading Post.
  • Fine Rift Motivation - Re-toggles tracking tier 1 rifts if another rift tier has been toggled.
  • Masterwork Rift Motivation - Toggles tracking tier 2 rifts.
  • Rare Rift Motivation - Toggles tracking tier 3 rifts.
• 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 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).

Related masteries

There are several masteries that assist in rift hunting, introduced with Secrets of the Obscure.

• Since these tracks were released with SotO, their descriptions refer to "Kryptis rifts", "Kryptis Motivations" and "Kryptis essence".
• Despite these being renamed Mists Rift, Rift Motivations, and Rift essence, the mastery descriptions have not been updated.
• These masteries also affect rifts released after Secrets of the Obscure.

Heart of the Obscure Research mastery track

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

Astral Ward mastery track

•   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 — Gain access to purchasing the recipe to craft rare Kryptis Motivations for use in rift hunting.
•   Rift Mastery — Learn to extract greater amounts of Kryptis essence from rifts.

Inner Nayos mastery track

•   Convergence Mastery — Grants  Rift Essence Extractor after completing Convergences.

Events

Kryptis rifts

T1 Rift

• TIER 1: Hunt lesser minions to lure out their leader (80)
  • TIER 1: Lure out the rift target and defeat it (80)
• TIER 1: Halt Kryptis rift invaders to draw out their leader (80) (Inner Nayos only)
  • TIER 1: Lure out the rift target and defeat it (80)

T2 Rift

• [Group Event] TIER 2: Hunt kryptis to lure out their leader (80)
  • [Group Event] TIER 2: Lure out the rift target and defeat it (80)
• [Group Event] TIER 2: Halt Kryptis rift invaders to draw out their leader (80) (Inner Nayos only)
  • [Group Event] TIER 2: Lure out the rift target and defeat it (80)

T3 Rift

• [Group Event] TIER 3: Hunt kryptis to lure out their leader (80)
  • [Group Event] TIER 3: Lure out the rift target and defeat it (80)
• [Group Event] TIER 3: Halt Kryptis rift invaders to draw out their leader (80) (Inner Nayos only)
  • [Group Event] TIER 3: Lure out the rift target and defeat it (80)

Titanspawn rifts

T1 Rift

• TIER 1: Hunt titanspawn to lure out their leader (80)
  • TIER 1: Lure out the rift target and defeat it (80)

T2 Rift

• [Group Event] TIER 2: Hunt titanspawn to lure out their leader (80)
  • [Group Event] TIER 2: Lure out the rift target and defeat it (80)

T3 Rift

• [Group Event] TIER 3: Hunt titanspawn to lure out their leader (80)
  • [Group Event] TIER 3: Lure out the rift target and defeat it (80)

Castoran rifts

T1 Rifts

• TIER 1: Defeat the Inquest to lure out the root cause of the rift (80)
  • TIER 1: Lure out the rift target and defeat it (80)
• TIER 1: Stop the agitated invaders from entering the rift to draw out the cause (80)
  • TIER 1: Lure out the rift target and defeat it (80)

T2 Rifts

• TIER 2: Defeat the Inquest to lure out the root cause of the rift
  • [Group Event] TIER 2: Lure out the rift target and defeat it (80)

T3 Rifts

• TIER 3: Defeat the agitated invaders to lure out the root cause of the rift
  • TIER 3: Lure out the rift target and defeat it (Castora)

Rewards

Primary article: Rift essence

• In addition to rift essences, rifts have also a chance to reward the following items:
  • Weapon sets
    • Eagle Eye weapons (Titanspawn rifts)
    • Skyforged weapons (Kryptis rifts)
    • Skyscale weapons (all rifts, GAscended)
  • Miniatures
    • Mini Avatar of Despair
    • Mini Avatar of Envy
    • Mini Avatar of Gluttony
    • Mini Avatar of Malice
    • Mini Avatar of Rage
    • Mini Avatar of Regret

Gallery

Kryptis rift locations

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  Amnytas

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  Auric Basin

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  Bitterfrost Frontier

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  Bloodstone Fen

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  Bloodtide Coast

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  Crystal Oasis

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  Cursed Shore

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  Desert Highlands

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  Domain of Istan

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  Domain of Vabbi

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  Dry Top

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  Echovald Wilds

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  Elon Riverlands

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  Ember Bay

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  Fireheart Rise

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  Frostgorge Sound

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  Inner Nayos

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  Iron Marches

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  Jahai Bluffs

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  Lake Doric

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  Malchor's Leap

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  Mount Maelstrom

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  New Kaineng City

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  Sandswept Isles

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  Seitung Province

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  Skywatch Archipelago

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  Southsun Cove

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  Sparkfly Fen

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  Straits of Devastation

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  Tangled Depths

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  Thunderhead Peaks

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  Timberline Falls

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  Verdant Brink

Titanspawn rift locations

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  Lowland Shore

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  Janthir Syntri

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  Mistburned Barrens

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  Bava Nisos

Castoran rift locations

• Rift map Shipwreck Stran complete.jpg

  Shipwreck Strand

• Rift map Starlit Weald complete.jpg

  Starlit Weald

Promotional material

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Related achievements

•  Rift Hunting
•  Weekly Rift Hunting — Kryptis rifts (all pre-SotO and SotO zones)
•  Weekly Rift Hunting (Janthir Wilds) — Titanspawn rifts
•  Weekly Rift Hunting (Visions of Eternity) — Inquest and Choya rifts

Notes

• Kryptis  Weekly Rift Hunting rotation

#	Map 1	Map 2	Map 3
1	Straits of Devastation	Elon Riverlands	Domain of Istan
2	Sparkfly Fen	Tangled Depths	Sandswept Isles
3	Bloodtide Coast	Lake Doric	Domain of Vabbi
4	Frostgorge Sound	Ember Bay	Seitung Province
5	Iron Marches	Verdant Brink	Bitterfrost Frontier
6	Mount Maelstrom	Jahai Bluffs	New Kaineng
7	Malchor's Leap	Bloodstone Fen	Desert Highlands
8	Fireheart Rise	Dry Top	Auric Basin
9	Cursed Shore	Southsun Cove	Crystal Oasis
10	Mount Maelstrom	Lake Doric	Domain of Vabbi
11	Timberline Falls	Thunderhead Peaks	Echovald Wilds

Note 1: The Kryptis rifts in Secrets of the Obscure maps - Skywatch Archipelago, Amnytas, and Inner Nayos - are always available.

Note 2: The Titanspawn mists rifts in the Janthir Wilds maps - Lowland Shore, Janthir Syntri, Mistburned Barrens and Bava Nisos - are also always available.

Note 3: The Castoran rifts in the Visions of Eternity maps - Shipwreck Strand, Starlit Weald - are also always available.

• Players without the Scan for Rift mastery skill can complete and get rewards from rift events started by other players.
• For a summary of the amount of Rift essences rewarded by rifts, see Rift essence#Acquisition.

Bugs:

• 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.

Trivia

• Two additional maps and the  Weekly Rift Hunting (Visions of Eternity) weekly achievement category were added with the Guild Wars 2: Visions of Eternity expansion.
• Two additional maps and the  Weekly Rift Hunting (Janthir Wilds) weekly achievement category were added with the Guild Wars 2: Janthir Wilds expansion. An additional two maps were released alongside the Repentance and Absolution quarterly updates.
  • With the release of Janthir Wilds, rifts were renamed from "Kryptis rift" to Mists Rifts and "Kryptis essence" to Rift essence.
• Six additional maps were added into the rotation with the Tuesday, 26 September 2023 update.
• Eight additional maps were added into the rotation with the Tuesday, 07 November 2023 update.

See also

• Rift essence
• Convergence: Outer Nayos
• Convergence: Mount Balrior
• Bounty

External links

• First Contact: The Kryptis and Rift Hunting, Guildwars2.com
• Rift Hunting, YouTube.com