Risk of Rain 2 Hallowed Concepts Guide: What to Do First

Quick Answer

Enforcer is playable immediately with Hallowed Concepts. Start by exploring a Trial Gong or Shrine of Compulsion to obtain the N’Tormat and a Page. Take the reward back to your normal run instead of chaining difficult Trials too early. When you have a stronger build, use the Shrine of Descent route to unlock Acolyte.

Risk of Rain 2: Hallowed Concepts adds Enforcer, Acolyte, new environments, Trials, N’Tormat Pages, Hexes, and encounters that appear alongside ordinary stage progression. There is no separate campaign to start.

The main decision is how much of this content to take on during one run. You can collect a Page and continue toward your usual ending, accept Hexes for additional rewards, or enter Soulbound Threshold for a more demanding encounter. These objectives do not need to be completed together.

What Should You Do First in Hallowed Concepts?

If you want to try a new Survivor immediately, Enforcer is the natural starting point. His shield-based combat is useful for learning unfamiliar enemy attacks, although positioning matters because his defense is strongest against attacks coming from the front.

If your goal is understanding the new environments and interactables, using a familiar, mobile Survivor can be easier. You will spend less time learning your character while completing unfamiliar timed objectives.

For an initial run, I would prioritize finding a Trial Gong, obtaining the N’Tormat and a useful Page, and returning to regular stage progression. That gives you something new to use without committing to the longer Soulbound Threshold encounter.

There are four interactables worth distinguishing:

• Trial Gong: Opens a timed Winnowing where you can obtain N’Tormat Pages and other rewards.
• Shrine of Compulsion: Offers a challenge within the current environment, with a Page reward.
• Hallowed Shrine: Lets you interact with Hex penalties and their associated rewards.
• Shrine of Descent: Adds a Soulbinding encounter to a Teleporter event, opening the route to Soulbound Threshold.

You do not need to activate everything you encounter. A good early run is one where you take a useful reward and remain strong enough to continue.

Trial Gong or Shrine of Compulsion: Which Should You Use?

Both provide opportunities to collect N’Tormat Pages, but they require different commitments.

A Trial Gong sends you into a separate timed arena called a Winnowing. One accessible Gong can be found in the lower area of the Bazaar Between Time, giving you a way to look for a Trial without waiting to encounter one during ordinary exploration.

After completing a Trial and receiving a reward, you may have the option to enter another challenge. The important limitation is that chained Trials share a countdown.

If you have already received the N’Tormat and a Page you want, leaving is often the better decision. Continuing is worthwhile when you have enough time remaining and are comfortable taking the risk of a different objective.

The Hallowed Concepts Trials guide covers the individual Winnowing objectives, available rewards, and how to return to your normal run.

Why Does the Shrine of Compulsion Keep Resetting?

A Shrine of Compulsion gives you an objective to complete without entering a separate Winnowing.

One possible objective requires avoiding damage while a counter progresses. If you get hit, the counter resets, even when you are close to completing it.

When this happens, focus on positioning instead of damage. Move away from hazardous green areas, keep enough distance from nearby enemies, and avoid unnecessary attacks that leave you exposed.

Defensive abilities can help, but watch the objective counter after an incoming attack. If it resets despite your protection, change how you are avoiding that damage rather than continuing with the same approach.

Once the objective completes, collect the Page before leaving the area.

How Should You Use Your First N’Tormat Page?

The N’Tormat is a Curio that allows you to equip and activate collected Pages. These provide abilities with their own restrictions, rather than working like ordinary passive items.

Warp Gate is a useful example because it combines movement and damage.

Warp Gate allows you to reposition or cross difficult terrain, and its explosive effect becomes stronger over longer distances. The tradeoff is its limit of four uses per stage.

That makes it worth saving for situations where ordinary movement is not enough. Spending a charge to cross a small gap may leave you without an escape option during a difficult fight.

Not every Page has the same conditions or uses. Check the selected ability before relying on it, especially when you are entering an unfamiliar encounter. Some Pages are intended for particular locations rather than general combat.

Should You Keep Hexes or Cleanse Them?

Hexes make Hallowed Concepts runs more difficult by adding penalties. Depending on what you receive, they can interfere with health, healing, movement, visibility, or the items supporting your build.

A Hallowed Shrine offers choices involving these penalties and rewards.

Whether you should keep a Hex depends on the state of your run.

If your damage and survivability are already strong, accepting additional penalties may be worthwhile. You have more room to absorb the drawbacks while pursuing the rewards.

If you are barely surviving Teleporter events, however, cleansing troublesome Hexes may be more valuable than continuing to accumulate them. A penalty that disables important items or reduces your ability to recover can turn the next difficult encounter into a failed run.

There is one exception: the Against All Odds skin challenges require finishing a run while holding at least 10 Hexes. If that is your goal, cleansing below the required count before the ending works against the achievement.

Otherwise, collecting ten Hexes is not required to experience the DLC. Prioritize keeping your run playable rather than accepting every penalty you encounter.

You Found a Shrine of Descent — Should You Enter Now?

The Shrine of Descent opens the route toward Soulbound Threshold, where Acolyte can be unlocked.

You need the N’Tormat and at least one Page to access this route. Activate the Shrine before starting the current stage’s Teleporter, which adds a Soulbinding encounter.

This is a larger commitment than completing an ordinary Teleporter event. Reaching Soulbound Threshold leads to additional combat and eventually the Anima Harvester.

If your only goal is unlocking Acolyte, I would wait until your build has enough damage, mobility, and recovery to survive several consecutive fights. You also need to keep an eligible healing item available for the rescue interaction after the boss.

There is no fourth-Teleporter deadline for Acolyte’s basic unlock, so entering later with a stronger build is a reasonable choice.

The complete route, including the Shrine activation, Soulbound Threshold encounter, and rescue item requirements, is covered in How to Unlock Acolyte.

If you are pursuing a Survivor skin rather than Acolyte’s basic unlock, the timing and objective may be different. The Hallowed Concepts skin unlock guide covers the early-clear, hidden-boss, 10-Hex, and Monsoon Mastery requirements.

Which Skills and Achievements Should You Pursue Next?

Once you have tried the new systems, choose a goal that matches the character you want to play rather than trying to complete every challenge in one run.

Enforcer and Acolyte alternate skills: Enforcer has four combat challenges, while Acolyte has three involving her transformations, enemy control, and Sacrifice. The Enforcer and Acolyte skill unlocks cover their individual requirements and useful setups.

Six free update skills: Commando, Huntress, Engineer, Artificer, REX, and Acrid received new abilities alongside Hallowed Concepts. These do not require purchasing the DLC. The free update skill guide explains how to unlock each ability.

Achievement completion: If you want to track everything added with the update, the 34 new achievements checklist separates the challenges by Survivor and objective, with completion tracking so you can return to unfinished goals later.

You can leave a Trial after one useful Page, rescue Acolyte without pursuing a hidden boss, or focus entirely on a new skill. Choosing one worthwhile objective at a time is generally more useful than extending every run until the penalties and encounters become unmanageable.