How to get every ending in Armored Core 6: Fires of Rubicon

Armored Core 6: Fires of Rubicon continues FromSoftware’s recent tradition of giving their games multiple endings (not that those endings are necessarily happy). Reaching the endings in AC6 will take you multiple playthroughs and require you to make specific choices. We’ll explain everything you need to know in this guide.

How to get all endings in Armored Core 6

BEWARE: While this guide makes attempts to be as spoiler-free as possible, as it discusses the ending names and steps you need to take to get each ending, there are some spoilers. Read at your own risk.

There are three endings in Armored Core 6: Fires of Rubicon. The “good” ending is called Liberator of Rubicon. The “bad” ending is the Fires of Raven, and the “true” ending is Alea Lacta Est. You can get either the good or bad ending on your first playthrough and the other on New Game+. The true ending, Alea Lacta Est, is only available in New Game++.

Every playthrough, you’ll encounter missions with a “Decision” marker. They come in pairs, and which you choose helps determine which missions you can access afterward. You’ll also need to make specific choices over the course of a playthrough to get the ending you want. Depending on the ending you choose during the first New Game cycle, getting the other one requires you to make additional choices.

Thankfully, entering additional New Game cycles doesn’t rob you of your purchased and found AC parts nor raise the difficulty of missions you’ve already completed. The New Game+ cycle doesn’t add any additional missions, but it does add critical in-mission choices and alters some mission mechanics and flow. On a New Game++ Alea Lacta Est run, there is a large selection of new mission content, and you need to make careful choices about which missions you take and the decisions within those missions.

How to get the Fires of Raven ending

Technically, Fires of Raven is the “easiest” ending to get in Armored Core 6. To start down the road to it, all you do is select the mission “Intercept the Corporate Forces” when you reach the Decision Point in Chapter 5. None of the decisions you’ve made prior to this point matter beyond determining which non-essential story missions appear.

As part of “Intercept the Corporate Forces,” you’ll need to defeat the remaining Vesper squad attacking the Xylem. That includes a tough fight against a pair of PCA advanced LCs and against the head of the Vespers, V.I Freud himself. Freud is fast and aggressive, and his laser orbit and missile shotgun backpieces act in tandem with his rifle and energy blade to cut through your defenses. Stay mobile and use high burst-DPS weapons like chain guns or dual Shotguns to make quicker work of him.

After “Intercept the Corporate Forces,” you’ll need to complete the missions “Breach the Kármán Line” and “Shut Down the Closure Satellites.” The Breach mission sees you taking down an entire fleet of PCA warships mostly by yourself and, sadly, defeating V.IV Rusty in his improved AC. The Closure Satellites mission pits you against your other true companion in an advanced AC of her own.

How to get the Liberator of Rubicon ending

The good but not ending in Armored Core 6 is Liberator Rubicon, and getting it follows a similar path to the Fires of Raven. When you reach the Chapter 5 Decision Point, choose “Eliminate ‘Cinder’ Carla” rather than “Intercept the Corporate Forces.”

In this alternate mission, the PCA duo you fought is replaced by Carla and her ally “Chatty” Stick. It’s a much tougher fight, with Carla raining down dozens of missiles while Chatty peppers from a distance. I recommend taking out Carla first if you have the ability. Like many other tough fights in AC6, burst-DPS options like chain guns, shotguns, and shoulder-mounted explosives are fantastic.

With Carla and Chatty defeated, you can then progress to the missions “Destroy the Drive Block” and “Bring Down the Xylem.” The Drive Block mission pits you against not only another Smart Cleaner that you fight with Rusty but also ARQUEBUS BALTEUS, a suped-up version of the Chapter 2 boss piloted by V.II Snail. Finally, in “Bring Down the Xylem,” you need to defeat your brainwashed Handler to stop a massive Coral explosion. It’s a bittersweet experience, to say the least.

The best ending for a first playthrough in Armored Core 6

From a gameplay perspective, there are only a few differences between choosing the Fires of Raven and Liberator of Rubicon, but the biggest of them is the difficulty of the final fights. In my experience, the Fires of Raven final boss is a bit easier than the one you challenge in Liberator, and the “Breach the Kármán Line” is a much more traditional setpiece mission than almost anything you’d find in Liberator. The Carla and Chatty fight is also a more frustrating experience than almost anything else in the Fires ending, as is the ARQUEBUS BALTEUS encounter.

As such, I think the best ending to get on a first playthrough of Armored Core 6 is the Fires of Raven. Doing so also ensures you can go into the Liberator of Rubicon run with far more gear and experience for the early game.

How to get the Alea Iacta Est ending

Latin for “The Die Is Cast,” the Alea Iacta Est ending is also the most complex, requiring a specific sequence of choices throughout the playthrough. The first is choosing to Attack your Redgun allies during “Attack the Dam Complex” in Chapter 1. Next is a major one: choose “Escort the Weaponized Mining Ship” rather than “Destroy the Weaponized Mining Ship.” Doing so starts you down the ending path. Note that you can only start this ending route if you’ve completed the other two on the same save file.

The easiest way to know which choices to make is: if it seems like you’re working against the corporations or siding with Allmind, that’s the one you should choose. And while it’s not a foolproof plan, if a mission you’ve never seen before appears, it’s also probably necessary.

Here are all the choices you need to make after the Escort the Mining Ship mission to get the Alea Iacta Est ending:

1. In Chapter 3, complete the mission “Prevent Corporate Salvage of New Tech.”
2. In Chapter 3, complete the mission “Eliminate the Enforcement Squads.”
3. In Chapter 3, complete the mission “Coral Export Denial.”
4. In Chapter 4, complete the mission “Eliminate V.III.”
5. In Chapter 5, complete the mission “MIA” to lock in the ending path.

“MIA” replaces “Escape” as the first mission in Chapter 5, and it’s followed by “Regain Control of the Xylem” and “Coral Release.” The Regain Control mission requires you to destroy five control stations to let Allmind take over the Xylem, and “Coral Release” pits you against Allmind itself, though with a surprising twist. Taking down Allmind is a tough, two-phase fight, but the same strategies that can carry you through other challenging encounters hold: high burst DPS and good mobility.

Once Allmind Falls, Coral Release occurs, leading to 621 and Ayre and any other Rubiconian minds caught in the Coral flow, spreading across the universe. That’s the Alea Iacta Est ending Armored Core 6. The die is cast, indeed.