Arc Raiders Bounty Boards and the Culture of Calling Out Rats

Arc Raiders exploded onto the co-op shooter scene with a mix of player-versus-environment and player-versus-player chaos. In that chaos, one type of player quickly emerged as a lightning rod for frustration: the “rat” – someone who betrays others, steals loot, or otherwise plays dirty. In response, members of the community built their own solution: an unofficial online bounty board where players can post targets and claim rewards for tracking them down in-game.

Inspired by the lawless frontier fantasy that Arc Raiders’ setting already leans into, this bounty system has turned grudges and rivalries into a kind of player-made mini-game. One prominent target, the streamer known as TheBurntPeanut, has even become the board’s de facto “most wanted” for a mix of playful accusations and more serious allegations of bad behavior.

This article unpacks how the bounty board works, why Arc Raiders is a natural breeding ground for rat-hunting culture, and the larger questions this raises about community-driven justice, toxicity, and fun.

From Co-op Shooter to Player-made Wild West

Arc Raiders is a cooperative third-person shooter with PvPvE elements: players fight AI enemies while also dealing with rival human squads. Games that mix cooperation and competition tend to create strong social dynamics. Research into online multiplayer communities shows that emergent social systems are common wherever players have tools for coordination and conflict, whether that’s in shooters, MMOs, or survival sandboxes.¹

In Arc Raiders, this plays out through:

• Shared objectives where teams might temporarily ally, then clash over the final reward.
• Scarce loot that invites theft, ambushes, and last-second betrayals.
• Open voice chat, which allows players to coordinate – or mislead each other.

That blend of incentive structures gives rise to a certain archetype: the player who smiles in voice chat, helps clear a camp, and then shoots you in the back as soon as a vault door opens. In Arc Raiders slang, those players are “rats.” And instead of just complaining in text chat or on social media, some players decided to build an entire bounty ecosystem around tracking them.

The Rise of a Community Bounty Board

The unofficial platform, commonly referred to as Speranza Bounties, positions itself as a community tool for tracking and calling out betrayers. It operates outside the game’s official systems but taps into the energy of the Arc Raiders player base.

How the Bounty Site Works

At a high level, the bounty board offers several key features:

• Player identification: Users submit an Embark ID, which is the in-game account identifier for an Arc Raiders player.
• Offense tagging: Each submission can include up to three alleged offenses, which are used as short labels (for example, “vault thief”).
• Most wanted list: The site aggregates community submissions into a ranked “most wanted” board across platforms.
• Proof-based claims: Players can later submit video clips or screenshots to show that they killed a listed target in-game.
• Discord integration: A connected Discord server offers extra interaction, voting, and premium options.

In practical terms, this turns reputation into a semi-formal scorecard. If a player angers enough people – fairly or not – their name can climb the bounty rankings and make them a target for others.

Free Users vs. Premium Rat Hunters

The platform also introduces a tiered participation model. Its FAQ explains that:

• Standard users can mark a limited number of players per day.
• Subscribers who pay a small monthly fee through Discord (around $2.99) can flag significantly more targets each day.

This raises interesting questions about monetizing player frustration, but it also mirrors broader trends in online platforms where moderation, reporting, or reputation tools sometimes come with paid enhancements. For now, it remains a niche community addon rather than an officially sanctioned feature.

What Counts as a “Rat” in Arc Raiders?

The bounty board’s flavor comes from its set of offense tags – shorthand descriptions of the behavior that supposedly earned someone a spot on the list. While the exact phrasing is community-made and informal, they tend to fall into three broad categories:

Not all tags are created equal. Many players consider role-played betrayal to be part of the game’s emergent fun, while abusive speech crosses clear ethical and platform-policy lines. Major game companies and regulators treat hate speech and harassment as a serious issue; for example, the Entertainment Software Association’s outreach and public data show that negative online experiences, including harassment, are among players’ top concerns worldwide.²

TheBurntPeanut: From Proponent to “Most Wanted”

Among the many entries on the bounty board, one name stands out: TheBurntPeanut, a content creator who actively promoted Arc Raiders and streamed it across Twitch and YouTube. As the game’s launch drew attention, so did his gameplay style, which reportedly involved a heavy dose of deception and opportunism – exactly the kind of behavior the community labels as “ratting.”

At the time the referenced article was written, he sat near the top of the bounty list as an “all-platform most wanted” player. The board attached multiple tags to his entry, including:

• Voice chat snake – for using friendly comms to set up betrayals.
• Vault vulture – for swooping in on loot after others do the work.
• Hate speech – an allegation that moves from playful villainy into more serious territory.

For some community members, hunting him became a kind of meta-game: track the streamer’s sessions, queue into his matches, and try to take him down for the digital bragging rights of “claiming” the bounty. For others, the hate speech allegation made his presence on the board feel less like role-play and more like informal reporting.

It’s important to recognize that the bounty site itself does not appear to include robust verification mechanisms; accusations are user-submitted, and there is no guarantee they meet the standards for evidence that a platform or developer might require. That lack of verification is a core tension in community-led justice systems.

Why Player-made Justice Systems Keep Emerging

Arc Raiders is not the first game whose players have built their own disciplinary or reputation systems. From informal kill-on-sight lists in survival games to guild-run courts in MMOs, players have a long history of filling perceived gaps in official moderation.

Several recurring motivations drive these efforts:

• Slow or opaque official moderation: Players often feel that reporting tools vanish into a black box and that action, if it happens, is too slow.
• Desire for public accountability: Private bans don’t give the satisfaction of community-wide acknowledgement; public lists feel more visible.
• Role-play and social drama: Designing mock courts, bounty boards, or wanted posters can be fun and fit the game’s theme.
• Reputation as gameplay: Treating your in-game name as a public asset or liability adds stakes to social decisions.

Academic work on online game communities has shown that players regularly develop their own norms and enforcement tools, especially in open-world or sandbox environments where the boundaries of “acceptable” play are fuzzy.³ Arc Raiders simply provides a fertile environment for such systems because of its emphasis on negotiation, loot, and backstabbing.

The Risks: Vigilantism, False Accusations, and Harassment

While the idea of a bounty board is entertaining, it carries real risks if left unchecked:

1. No Due Process

The bounty system relies on unverified player reports. Anyone can submit an Embark ID and assign offenses, whether the target actually committed them or not. Without evidence review, appeal mechanisms, or clear criteria, the board can amplify grudges or misunderstandings.

By contrast, platform-level moderation teams usually have policies, review tools, and evidence standards to decide whether an account violated terms of service. For instance, major platforms like Xbox Safety detail how player reporting feeds into enforcement, emphasizing evidence and proportional responses.⁴

2. Potential for Targeted Harassment

Public wanted lists can turn specific individuals into lightning rods. Even if some players treat it as lighthearted role-play, others might use the board as a justification for ongoing harassment, stream sniping, or brigading. That’s especially concerning when accusations involve hate speech or other serious misconduct, which may provoke strong emotional reactions.

3. Monetizing Grievances

Introducing a paid tier that increases how many people you can label as rats per day adds another layer of concern. It effectively lets paying users wield more influence over who gets named and shamed, without necessarily improving the quality of reports or evidence.

4. Confusion with Official Enforcement

Some players may blur the line between a community-run board and actual game moderation. If a name appears on a most wanted list, newcomers might assume the developer endorses or validates those accusations, which is rarely the case.

Why Some Players Love the Bounty Board Anyway

Despite these risks, many Arc Raiders fans see the bounty system primarily as entertainment and emergent content. In practice, the board functions as:

• A role-play tool – framing the game’s world as a frontier where players become sheriffs, deputies, and outlaws.
• A content machine – streamers can build narratives around hunting or escaping bounties, creating highlight reels and storylines.
• A social hub – the Discord and website give players a space to share war stories, compare notes, and bond over common enemies.

Player-driven narrative has long been a core draw of online games; official campaigns provide one kind of story, but unpredictable interactions with other humans create another, often more memorable layer. For some Arc Raiders players, the bounty board simply formalizes that second layer.

Best Practices for Staying on the Right Side of the Line

For players who want to participate in bounty hunting without contributing to toxicity, a few guidelines can help:

• Treat it as role-play first. Focus on in-game betrayals and loot drama, not real-world insults or personal attacks.
• Avoid piling on individuals. If someone is already heavily targeted, consider whether your participation adds anything productive.
• Don’t equate the board with proof. Assume accusations are unverified; if you see serious claims like hate speech, use the game’s official reporting tools.
• Respect platform rules. Most services prohibit targeted harassment; community projects don’t override those terms of service.
• Be willing to forgive. People experiment with playstyles; a one-time betrayal might be mischief, not malice.

From a broader perspective, developers and platform holders are increasingly investing in tools to support healthier online interactions, including improved reporting flows, voice moderation, and clearer community guidelines.⁵ Community tools like bounty boards can complement those efforts if they stay playful and avoid sliding into vigilantism.

FAQ: Arc Raiders Bounties, Rats, and Community Justice

Is the Arc Raiders bounty board official?

No. The bounty site is a community-made project that operates independently from Arc Raiders’ developer and publisher. It does not represent official moderation or enforcement decisions.

Can being listed on the bounty board get my account banned?

Not directly. Listings on the board are not the same as formal reports. Only violations of the game’s terms of service, reported and verified through official channels, can result in account action.

How do players claim a bounty?

Typically, players record video or capture a screenshot of them eliminating the targeted player in an Arc Raiders match and submit that media through the bounty site or its connected Discord. The exact process is defined by the site’s community rules, not by the game itself.

What kinds of behavior usually get someone labeled a “rat”?

Common accusations include betraying allies after pretending to cooperate in voice chat, stealing loot from vaults others have opened, third-partying fights in especially opportunistic ways, or using abusive language. The first two are often treated as playful villainy, while hate speech is a more serious allegation.

Is it okay to hunt streamers listed on the board?

Targeting a public in-game character in a lighthearted, clearly game-focused way is generally accepted. However, crossing into harassment, doxxing, or coordinated abuse violates most platform rules. If you’re hunting a streamer’s character, keep it strictly in-game and within the bounds of normal matchmaking.

Could similar bounty systems appear in other games?

Yes. Anywhere players have persistent identities, social friction, and opportunities for betrayal, informal justice systems are likely to emerge. Some games may choose to support such systems directly, while others will leave them to unofficial community tools.

What Arc Raiders’ Bounty Craze Tells Us About Online Play

The Arc Raiders bounty board is part joke, part social experiment, and part commentary on how modern multiplayer games handle trust and betrayal. It highlights several core truths about online play:

• Players will always find ways to extend the game outside the software, turning websites, Discords, and social media into meta-game arenas.
• Reputation is a powerful currency; a simple list can dramatically shape how the community perceives certain names.
• Without safeguards, community justice can easily tip into unfair targeting, especially when allegations involve serious issues like hate speech.
• There is a constant tension between playful villainy, which makes PvPvE games exciting, and genuine toxicity, which drives players away.

Ultimately, the bounty board is a mirror. It reflects both the creativity and the volatility of Arc Raiders’ player base. When players use it to invent stories, rivalries, and highlight reels, it enriches the game’s world. When it becomes a vehicle for unverified accusations and harassment, it undermines the sense of community it was meant to bolster.

For now, Arc Raiders exists in a kind of player-created Wild West, where rats, sheriffs, and bounty hunters coexist. How long this ecosystem stays mostly playful will depend on how responsibly both the community and the broader gaming culture choose to wield tools like these.