On Deaf Ears is a single-raid quest: plant the listening device on the relay mast, pull the recorder off the downed ARC unit nearby, then extract with the recorder still in your pack — and it’s the walk out, not the two objectives, that ends most attempts. Budget roughly 12–15 minutes of raid time, bring a mid-tier shield and four to six healing items, and treat the final third of the raid as a stealth problem rather than a looting problem. The quest runs on Dam Battlegrounds in the current build, and if your tracker points you somewhere else, the routing logic below is unchanged — only the map name moves.
Embark has reworded and reordered quest steps in patches before, so the quest tracker in your journal is the final authority on exact objective text and item names. What has stayed consistent is the shape of the quest — two on-map objectives plus a conditional third that only counts when you extract — and that shape is what the plan below is built around.
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What On Deaf Ears asks you to do, step by step
On Deaf Ears is an intel-gathering quest built around one piece of hardware: a signal tap you place at a comms relay, and the recorder it feeds, which has to leave the raid in your inventory.
- Step 1 — Place the listening device at the relay mast. The interaction is a hold-to-place, so you are standing still and exposed for several seconds. Clear the Ticks and Wasps around the mast before you start the hold, not after — taking damage cancels the placement and you lose the progress. This is the reason the step kills people: the mast is the tallest structure in its grid square, so anyone on a ridge, a roof or a tower has a clean line on you for the entire animation.
- Step 2 — Recover the recorder from the downed ARC unit. The wreck is a landmark, and landmarks attract players. Loot it in under thirty seconds: grab the recorder, ignore the rest of the wreck unless the raid has been silent, and move. The wreck also sits inside ARC patrol territory, so expect Leapers or a Rocketeer to have spawned nearby and to be drawn in by the noise of whatever fight you just had at the mast.
- Step 3 — Extract with the recorder in your inventory. This is the objective that actually gates the quest, and the one players fail. The recorder counts as held, not delivered, so dying anywhere between the wreck and the extraction floor resets you to Step 2 next raid. If the item can go in your safe pocket, it goes in your safe pocket the moment you pick it up — that is the only insurance the game gives you.
Where to go: routing both objectives on one map
The relay and the ARC wreck are close enough to clear in a single raid without sprinting the whole time. The route that works is the boring one: land on the edge opposite the objective grid, walk the objective line in order, and leave from the nearest extraction that is not the one you walked in past.
| Phase | Where you are | Time budget | What usually kills you here |
|---|---|---|---|
| Insert | Map edge, away from the objective grid | 0–2 min | Squads landing on the same POI and racing you to the mast |
| Objective 1 | Relay mast | 2–6 min | Tick and Wasp patrols; being watched from height during the hold |
| Objective 2 | ARC wreck, roughly one grid away | 6–11 min | Leapers and Rocketeers, plus players drawn by the noise of your first fight |
| Extraction | Nearest edge extraction, not your entry point | 11–16 min | Campers who watched the extraction ping |
Those timings assume normal pacing, and they compress hard if you take a fight at the mast. The rule to work to: if you are past the halfway mark on the raid timer and Step 2 hasn’t started, stop looting entirely and go straight to the wreck. Quest progress beats a backpack full of tier-two loot every time, because loot is replaceable and the recorder run is not.
What to bring (and what to leave in the stash)
The loadout for this quest is deliberately cheap. You are not trying to win fights on this route, you are trying to finish two interactions and leave, and every expensive item you carry is a reason to take a fight you don’t need.
| Slot | Rule of thumb | Why |
|---|---|---|
| Shield | Second or third tier you own | Enough to survive a Leaper burst plus one player volley; top-tier shields make you worth chasing |
| Primary weapon | Rifle or SMG you control at 20–40 m | Fights on this route are short and almost always mid-range |
| Healing | 4–6 items, split quick and full heals | You will take ARC chip damage on the way to both objectives |
| Backpack | Keep at least 4 slots free | The recorder has to have somewhere to go |
| Safe pocket | Empty on entry | It is the only insurance if the extraction goes wrong |
| Keys and grenades | Leave them behind | Nothing on this route is locked, and extra gear tempts you into detours |
How to extract safely with the quest progress
- Pick your extraction before you leave the wreck. Deciding on the move is how people end up sprinting into a zone that is already occupied. If the wreck is in the north half of the map, plan for a south or west exit.
- Don’t trigger the extraction until you can commit to the countdown. Once it starts, you are anchored to a small area with a visible, audible signal. Starting it while a squad is shadowing you is a free kill for them.
- Assume the ping is public. Extraction activation tells nearby players roughly where you are. Treat the countdown as a timer for someone else’s flank, and hold an angle on the most likely approach rather than standing on the pad.
- Break line of sight before you trigger, if you’re being followed. Walk a detour, put a building between you and your tail, wait thirty to sixty seconds, then come back from a different direction.
- If the zone is contested, reset instead of contesting it. Move 150 m away, let the other squad take their fight or their ride, then re-trigger. There is almost always time for a second attempt at the extraction — there is rarely time for a second attempt at your health bar.
Three ways On Deaf Ears fails, and the fix
The placement keeps getting cancelled
Cause: ARC units aggroed onto you during the hold. Check: are Ticks or a Wasp still circling the mast? Fix: kill everything within roughly 30 m first, then start the hold from the side of the mast that blocks the widest sightline. Placement from behind cover is slower to start but almost never interrupted.
You die on the walk out and lose the step
Cause: you looted after picking up the recorder, or you took the direct line to extraction. Check: is the recorder in your safe pocket? Fix: once the recorder is on you, the quest is the only objective. No detours, no second wreck, no chasing a supply drop you heard land.
Another squad is already at the wreck
Cause: the wreck is a known landmark and you arrived on the obvious approach. Check: have you heard gunfire or ARC aggro from that direction in the last minute? Fix: approach from the far side of the wreck, or reverse the order and do Step 2 first if the mast is quiet — the objectives don’t have to be done in sequence as long as both are done before you extract.
Frequently Asked Questions
Can you complete On Deaf Ears solo?
Yes. The quest has no mechanics that require a second player — both objectives are solo interactions, and the only squad-dependent part is surviving the extraction, which is easier alone because you make less noise and present one target instead of three. Solo players should lean harder on the “reset and re-trigger” approach at extraction, because you can’t win a 1v3 on the pad.
Do you lose the recorder if you die?
You lose whatever is in your backpack, which is why the safe pocket matters. Stash the recorder there the instant you pick it up if the game allows it for that item; if it doesn’t, the recorder is gone on death and Step 2 resets for the next raid. Either way, the quest step itself only completes when you extract alive.
Can On Deaf Ears be done across multiple raids?
The on-map objectives can be split, but the third one cannot — it requires the recorder in your inventory at extraction. In practice, most players finish Steps 1 and 2 in one raid and treat the extraction as the real test. If you have to split it, do the placement first in a quiet raid and come back for the wreck later.
Which map is On Deaf Ears on?
The quest currently points at Dam Battlegrounds, and both objectives sit within a short walk of each other on that map. If a patch moves the quest to another map, the routing logic doesn’t change: land on the far edge, do the two objectives in whatever order is quietest, then leave from an extraction that isn’t your entry point.
What do you get for finishing On Deaf Ears?
Quest XP and reputation with the NPC who issued it, which is what actually matters — reputation gates that vendor’s inventory and the gear tiers they’ll sell you. The direct material reward is modest compared to the loot you’ll find on the same route, so don’t run this quest expecting a big payday in the raid itself.
Can you do On Deaf Ears with a free loadout?
Yes, and it’s a reasonable way to learn the route. A free kit means losing the raid costs you nothing but time, and neither objective requires a specific weapon or key. The trade-off is that a free kit has no shield worth the name, so you should expect to avoid every fight rather than win one — which, for this quest, is the correct instinct anyway.
