Secure Case Priority: What to Store Before Raids

The secure case is a small amount of storage that survives death. Whatever sits inside comes out of every raid, win or lose, which makes it the most valuable real estate you own. Most players treat it as extra backpack space; treat it as insurance instead. The question is never “what do I have room for” but “what hurts most to lose.”

The ranking principle

Rank candidate items by value per slot and by replaceability:

1. High-value rare loot. Red-tier finds and irreplaceable quest items top the list. They are hard to re-find and expensive to rebuy.
2. Keys for rooms worth opening. A key in your backpack dies with you; in the case it waits for the right raid. The key price page explains how to judge which rooms justify carrying one.
3. Expensive ammo or attachments you actually use. Only if the slots would otherwise sit empty.
4. Nothing else. Common loot, filler gear, and “just in case” items waste the case’s real job.

What does not belong inside

• Loot you plan to sell anyway. Selling is the backpack’s job; the case is for items whose loss you cannot undo.
• Cheap consumables. Their replacement cost is lower than the slot’s opportunity cost.
• Repeatable quest items. Protect irreplaceable progress, not anything you can reacquire safely.

Slot-by-slot decision list

Run this before every raid:

1. What is the most expensive item in my stash that dies with me?
2. Would losing it force me into a knife run recovery?
3. If yes, it goes in the case — even if that means carrying a slightly worse gun in the backpack.
4. Repeat until the case is full, then stop. A full case with junk is worse than a half case with anchors.

Case versus insurance

The secure case and insurance solve the same problem in opposite ways: the case guarantees survival for whatever fits, while insurance gambles on recovery for whatever does not. Fund the case first — it charges no premium and has no claim window. Insurance, covered in the worth-it framework, is for gear too large for the case.

Map difficulty changes the calculus. High-risk maps multiply your death chance, which raises the value of case-protected items; the Tide Prison loot routes show what is worth contesting there. Item tiers and key values shift between patches, so build the case list from what you would actually replace after a death, not from what the market calls expensive this week.