The fastest ways to earn Resistance Points in Far Cry 5

Far Cry 5 pits you, a humble deputy sheriff, against a crazed doomsday cult. It’s your job to inspire the people of Hope County to resist the cult by signing online petitions and using social media activism to – oh no wait, you just do a load of murders.

Grind those Resistance points!

Progression in Far Cry 5 is tied to the Resistance Points (RP) system. Each of the three main regions of the map requires you to fill up a bar with RP to unlock story missions. Once the bar is full, you’ll be able to take on the member of the vile and vicious Seed family controlling the region. Unlock all three regions and you can face down the game’s big bad, Joseph Seed, and complete the game!

Note that as you reach each threshold of the bar you’ll unlock a new level of that region. There’ll be a cutscene and mission tied to the region’s ruler, and the region will change in some way, such as adding gunboats or roadblocks. Once you reach level three, powerful opponents in planes will try to hunt you down. Be prepared for tougher fights as the game goes on.

Let’s look at how many points you’ll need to liberate each region and what’s available to do:

Holland Valley – John Seed’s region. 13,000 RP to complete.

52 missions (note this includes Prepper Stashes, which contain loot but do not offer any RP)

7 cult outposts 

14 cult properties

Henbane River – Faith Seed’s region. 13,000 RP to complete.

43 missions

8 outposts

16 properties

Whitetail Mountains – Jacob’s region. 10,000 RP to complete

41 missions

4 outposts

10 properties

Completing missions, liberating outposts and destroying cult property (either stationary silos and shrines, or mobile supply trucks and oil tankers) are just some of the ways to earn RP. Here’s all the ways you can get Resistance Points in Far Cry 5 and how much they’re worth:

• Complete a story mission: 600 to 900 RP
• Recruit a Specialist: 600 to 900 RP
• Complete a side mission: 100 to 200 RP
• Liberate a cult outpost: 400 RP
• Complete a Clutch Nixon stunt challenge: 200 RP
• Save a hostage: 50 RP
• Destroy a silo or shrine: 100 RP
• Destroy a roadblock or supply vehicle: 75 RP
• Kill a cult VIP: 50 RP

If it takes 13,000 RP to liberate just one region, it’ll take forever just by rescuing hostages at 50 points a pop. The best way to quickly get points is to…

Recruit your new best friends!

Unlocking the Specialists should be your priority at the start of the game. Not only are the recruitment missions a lot of fun and give you a helpful sidekick for the rest of the game, you earn a ton of RP for recruiting them.

Not only that, you can usually score a whole bunch of extra RP during the mission, or beforehand! For instance, some of the recruitment quests require you to liberate an outpost (worth 400 RP) to unlock the mission. To recruit the grimdark archer Jess Black, for example, you first need to liberate a lumber yard.

Use your time efficiently, so while completing the recruit missions keep an eye out for nearby outposts or cult property to destroy and civilians to rescue.

Liberate outposts

After the recruitment missions and story missions, freeing outposts offer the most RP. These are a challenge, but are fun and worth the effort –  you’ll usually unlock a side mission after liberating an outpost, which will be worth another dollop of RP. 

Try and do these missions then and there, otherwise you’ll just end up coming back to the outpost later.

More often than not there’ll be some hostages at the outposts as well. Free them for even more RP.

Note, you don’t know where any outposts are at the start of the game. These are added to your map gradually, and require you to talk to civilians or find maps and notes. Speaking of civilians…

Save the civilian, save the world

Not sure what mission to do next? Go take a drive around the roads or trek through the woods. The game will usually generate a hostage situation to deal with. Hop out of your vehicle and quickly take down the cult members (normally one to three of them), before they execute the civilian, then free the hostage with a button prompt. 

This will net you an easy 50 to 100 RP, as sometimes there’s a VIP cultist involved – you can identify VIPs by the smokey green haze around their head. Over time, these rescues will add up – just like saving pennies in a jar!

Make sure to talk to the civilian afterwards, as they might tell you about a nearby mission or outpost.

Always Carry Explosives

Silos and shrines are easily dealt with using the plethora of bombs the game gives you. You can try and use your gun but sometimes this is too slow. Easier to drop a remote explosive, back away, then watch the fireworks.

Trucks and attack boats are slightly harder to deal with – the truck can ram you and the attack boats shoot back. Try carrying a rocket launcher with you at all times, as it’ll make short work of vehicles.

Steal Nick’s plane

Once you’ve unlocked Nick Rye as a Gun for Hire (see our Specialists guide), you can turn up at his airstrip at any time and jump into his bright yellow biplane, which packs a powerful minigun and four bombs. 

Use Nick’s plane to quickly fly around the Holland Valley region and destroy any silos, trucks or convoys on your map for a decent amount of RP. There’s also a handful of side missions tied to the plane which culminates in an dogfight – lots of RP points to be earned here.

Now good luck, get out there and go liberate Hope County!