Into the Fire Expedition Loadouts

A tier letter is not a bag. This page turns the weapons and gadgets ranks into four kits you can copy before a playtest or, later, before an Early Access morning. Each kit assumes single-player, a morning craft in camp, and the honesty to extract before you are a legend. Stamp the result into the expedition planner.

Kit 1 — First city / New Sindra teaching run

Goal: one named or unnamed survivor, RV alive, tanks leftover.

• Extinguisher (S)
• Axe with a repair craft (A)
• Suppression pistol (A)
• Life-sign detector (S)
• Extra water tank (A)

Leave the launcher. Leave the hose. Read Getting Started the night before so you do not spend this kit on crates. If you fail, fail small: empty-handed extract beats a wipe.

Kit 2 — Interior / Ruins vertical

Goal: third-floor carry without dropping the person on a ladder.

• Extinguisher
• Suppression pistol (precision in corridors)
• Axe + Breacher if the perk exists on your build
• Rope / zipline (S)
• Stamina perk priority over Kicker

Hose and sled stay home. The extraction Ruins notes exist because people brought plaza tools into a stairwell. Do not be those people.

Kit 3 — Supply run for a thirsty camp

Goal: food, water, parts. Zero heroics.

• Extinguisher
• Axe
• Ash blower only if the detector pings a person you can afford to add
• Empty slots for crates, tanks, first aid
• No launcher, no shield

Check the daily report first. If morale is the leak, this kit is wrong — run a named rescue instead. If water is the leak, do not come home with a relic and a smile. Camp is the customer of this bag.

Kit 4 — High-skull Crimson Pass

Goal: survive overlapping hazards with one specialist.

• Extinguisher + shotgun (two corridor shapes)
• Scanner / seismograph (A)
• Shield or extra tanks, not both if weight is ugly
• Rope if any elevation exists
• Launcher only if the approach is a plaza you have already died in

Use survivor priority so you do not pick up three extras when the quake timer is already bullying the RV. Three-skull is not a loot tour.

Universal rules that outrank the kits

1. Two fire shapes or you will meet a door you cannot draw.
2. One breach tool or interiors become posters.
3. One detect tool or ash becomes a graveyard you walked over.
4. Tanks or S-tier is a lie.
5. Mobility if the trailer for that district showed a ladder.
6. Never four offensive tools. You have one back and two hands.

Perks as loadout slots

If the build offers Breacher, Kit 2 becomes kinder. Durable is a hidden slot on every kit that uses an axe. Kicker is a budget breach for Kit 3. Stamina perks are how Kit 2 and Kit 4 stop dropping people on stairs. Spend perk points like bag slots, not like an RPG trailer.

How to retire a kit

When playtest notes change extinguishing feel, rebuild Kit 1 first. When Ruins ships more vertical, rebuild Kit 2. When camp food recipes change, rebuild Kit 3. Do not wait for a 1.0 wiki. Early Access in 2026 will still be this conversation.

Kit 1 is also your regression test. After a patch that “feels more immersive” on extinguishing, run Kit 1 before you rebuild Kit 4. If you cannot extract one civilian with leftover tanks, you do not have a Crimson Pass problem — you have a basics problem. Getting Started is still the parent of every fancy bag.

Named-rescue variants of Kit 1 swap the empty loot slot for a first-aid or an extra tank, never for a second launcher. Supply variants of Kit 3 should look ugly on purpose: space for crates, no glamour. If your supply bag photographs well, you packed for a trailer.

When camp threat is already high, prefer Kit 3 or a short Kit 1 over Kit 4. A heroic wipe on three skulls does not lower threat. It spends the axe you needed tomorrow. The camp hub daily report is part of loadout choice, not a separate minigame.

Copy one kit, run it twice, then argue. Loadouts that only exist in theory belong on other games’ spreadsheets.