For beginners to Escape From Tarkov, the game can prove to be quite cryptic and difficult to learn, not having any sort of major tutorial to teach new players the ropes. Dropping into your first solo raid, without initially consuming a few hours worth of starter guides on YouTube, will likely lead to at least 100 different questions flowing through your mind at once.
"Where's the map? How am I supposed to know where to go? There is so much loot variety, but half of it is worthless, what exactly am I supposed to keep? How did I just get one-shot from 160 meters away by an NPC?" Well, this rundown holds the answers to your loot questions, at least, featuring the best items to clear out room for when playing inventory Tetris.
10 Graphics Cards
Though they take up two inventory slots, GPUs are some of the most important items to pick up, and it is always recommended to place them in your Secure Container, so you don't lose them on death. They are quite rare but provide two major incentives for seeking them out.
The first is their ridiculously high flea market price, averaging at around 250,000 rubles. You likely won't want to sell them, though, seeing as how they are the main component in a Bitcoin farm, which can itself net you a good amount of money given enough time.
9 Ibuprofen
Painkillers are a surprisingly important aspect of the gameplay of Tarkov, being almost required for a successful raid. If you break a bone, naturally your character is in a great deal of pain, which can result in an interesting array of consequences, from reduced movement speed to shaky aim. Painkillers alleviate these symptoms, allowing you to thrive for a few more critical moments.
Ibuprofen is nearly the best in this class, providing excellent benefits with very few downsides, whereas other painkillers often come with their own myriad of detriments. While Tarkov isn't exactly a game known for its crafting, there is in fact a system in place. Ibuprofen is used as an ingredient in a few different recipes and is required for some late-game items. Lastly, Ibuprofen is quite a high-ticket item, often selling for upwards of 50 thousand rubles.
8 Physical Bitcoin
If you find a Bitcoin in a raid, stop everything you are doing and run to the nearest exit. With their price being tied to real-world stock, they are often exuberantly expensive, currently averaging at around 150,000 rubles. Due to its relation to the real-world market, physical Bitcoin is one of the few Tarkov items that you can't list on the flea market, only being sellable to the in-game traders.
If your luck is extremely high and you manage to find a GPU, you can also set up a Bitcoin farm, which produces one physical Bitcoin every 30 hours or so, with production time being cut by each added GPU. Certainly not a bad way to get rich pretty quickly, at least in the game.
7 AFAK
Healing your character early-game can be quite the chore, with many easily accessible healing items only fixing up certain specific aspects, like a light bleed. With these systems in place, you tend to panic a little, shuffling through 6 different items trying to heal individual limb wounds.
The AFAK is a true life-saver, literally. It heals all manner of different ailments and holds 400 HP, which is considerably more than the 100 HP many other healing items provide. Where there was complexity before, the AFAK provides simplicity-- click and heal soldier.
6 TerraGroup Labs Key Cards
There are a number of different Lab key cards, which unlock different areas on that hectic map, and these key cards represent the highest level of attainable wealth in Tarkov, with the Red variant being priced at incredible 50,000,000 rubles!
These key cards unlock the areas with the highest potential for rare loot in the entire game, so it is little wonder as to why they are so sought after. They are quite rare, but with a little persistence and luck, you are sure to stumble across one, and that moment will be the Tarkov equivalent of winning the lottery. Though it may not be the best area in Escape From Tarkov, The Lab does have that lure of untold riches going for it.
5 TerraGroup Arm Band
Escape From Tarkov has an excellent amount of player customization available, with many different styles and armbands to represent the faction you side with. One piece of cosmetic gear which could easily be used as a status symbol is the TerraGroup armband, which often sells for upwards of 900,000 rubles!
If you have the money to just casually wear this expensive piece into a raid, then that is a truly impressive feat. For players earlier on in their Tarkov career, though, this rare piece of memorabilia can be sold on the flea market for exceptionally high prices, and definitely deserves a spot in any player's secure container.
4 Injector Case
Inventory management becomes a game within itself in Tarkov, with both the in-game character and the player account having their own respective inventories which need to be sorted. After running a few successful raids, your account inventory is sure to be filling up, and it is becoming hard to find space for all of that scavenged material.
This is where containers come into play, taking up only a few slots in the inventory while having a vast amount of space inside to place items and organize them. One of the best and most expensive in this class is the Injector Case, which can store all injectable items inside, clearing up many slots in one go.
3 Key Tool
There are many locked locations scattered around the separate areas of Tarkov, some of which hold the best loot and can only be opened with rare-to-find keys. If you plan to go to one of these areas, you must then make extra space for each of the different keys for every area you want to unlock, clogging up your already tight inventory space.
The key tool will become one of your most used items, taking up a permanent slot in your secure container. It can stack every single key in the game into one slot, making it one of the best items for character inventory management.
2 Melee Weapons
It's a simple fact of the game that using melee weapons isn't a very viable strategy in raid, after all, you shouldn't be bringing a knife into a gunfight. Melee weapons are, however, a good source of essentially free loot. If you start a raid out with no knife in the slot where only knives can go, you can pick one up early on and net yourself an easy 10k.
They are often used as crafting tools, as well, so it can become quite important to have a few in your inventory. Don't let their uselessness in raid deter you from collecting a large set of melee weapons, they are well worth the space they take up.
1 Dorm Room Keys
The Lab is a map for late-game players, through and through. You can't even access the map until you find a rare entry key card, then when you get in you will be faced with the highest-geared and most confident PMCs around. For those of you looking for a slightly more chill experience, while still collecting top-tier loot, definitely search around for some dorm room keys.
These keys unlock certain rooms in the map Customs, which hold some excellent loot. If you don't feel too confident in going out to those areas, you can always sell the keys off, with the highest-priced key averaging out to a whopping 2 million rubles. With this kind of loot, you're sure to be on your way toward making one of the most difficult first-person-shooters of all time a lot easier.