Into the Fire Gadgets Tier List

Weapons open fire. Gadgets find the living and rewrite terrain. Into the Fire’s store page and trailers keep returning to retro volcanologist inventions: life-sign detectors, ash blowers, seismographs, rope systems, sleds, fireproof shields, acid-resistant boats. Playtests then show ziplines and scanners in actual districts. This list grades those toys for extracts. Combine with weapons ranks and loadouts.

S-tier

Life-sign detector. The game is a rescue. A gadget that points at a person under ash is the difference between a camp upgrade and a rumour. Official copy even teases artifacts in the same grey layer — still scan for lungs first. See rescue.

Rope / zipline kit. Ruins and any vertical city block. Carry weight turns a missing rope into a dropped civilian. Once you have done a third-floor extract without one, you will never un-rank this. Open Playtest no.2 also unlocks a Jetpack through the LAB quest. Treat the jetpack as an earned S-tier mobility option on vertical maps, not as a starting gadget. It does not replace tanks.

A-tier

Ash blower. Unlocks the under-crust searches the trailer promises. Slightly below the detector because it is slower and greedier. Use after the detector pings, not as a vacuum for the whole street while bombs are live. Hazards will punish the vacuum.

Seismograph / seismic scanner. Time is ammo. A gadget that tells you the ground is about to become a new map is an A. Pair with the louder HUD Starward already added; the scanner is for planning, the HUD is for panic.

Water tanks / spare extinguisher cans. Boring. A. Dry S-tier guns are sticks. Craft in camp.

B-tier

Retro sled. Excellent on open lava-adjacent approaches, dead weight in tight Ruins corridors. Bring it when the district looks like a black-sand slope, not a hotel stairwell.

Fireproof shield. Acid rain, spirit spit, and “I have to cross this plane with a body.” B because it occupies the hand you wanted for a pistol. Great as a planned swap, bad as a default.

First aid. Saves a run you already misplayed. You would rather not need A-tier medicine. B is correct.

C-tier until the map asks

Acid-resistant boat. Flavour-rich, map-rare. If your build has a water crossing, it jumps to S for that hour and then goes home.

Extra garden tools. Camp items. They do not belong in a field bag. Water the greenhouse after you extract, not instead of a scanner.

How gadgets fail intelligent players

They bring three detectors and no rope, then drop Zoe on a ledge. They bring a sled into a corridor. They blow ash during a volcanic bomb tell. They skip tanks because the weapons list called the shotgun S. Gadgets are how you respect the island’s layout. Rank for the layout you queued, not for a collection.

Suggested pairings

• City named rescue: detector + tanks + rope.
• Ash suburb: detector + blower + tanks.
• Ruins: rope + scanner + tanks.
• High skull: scanner + shield + tanks, then whatever mobility the trailer for that district showed.

Lock the pairing in the planner so you do not renegotiate at the gate. Detectors have a greed setting even if the UI does not. If you ping three signatures and the RV is already talking, you do not have three saves — you have one save and two obituaries. The gadget did its job. Your priority card has to do the next job. Bringing a better detector does not create a second pair of arms.

Ropes fail in two boring ways: you forget to equip them until the third floor, or you equip them and never fire the line because you wanted to “save it.” Save it for what? The extract is the event. A rope that dies in camp unused is a C-tier souvenir. Same for shields that never leave the slot while a spirit chews the person in your hands.

Boats and sleds will look like S-tier in a trailer still. They are S on the map that has water or black-sand slope, and they are clutter in New Sindra’s hotel stair. If you do not know the district, default to detector + rope + tanks and let the loadouts page argue the rest after one scout run.

Gadgets are not cosmetics. They are how a single-player volcano still offers loadout skill.