Revision 3

SAND: Raiders of Sophie can be played entirely solo or in a crew. The developers have said the game is designed and balanced so a single player can enjoy it as well as a full team, so grouping up is a choice rather than a requirement. At the Early Access launch a known issue could still place solo players into larger crews; the developers acknowledged it on June 26, 2026 and, in early July 2026, said the fix was proving more complex than anticipated but remained one of their highest priorities.

Crew Size

You can play alone or in teams of two to six players. The maximum crew size is six. If you want to run a larger crew, your Trampler needs enough crew rooms to house everyone, so team size and Trampler design are linked: a six-person crew has to build for the extra occupants.

Roles Aboard a Trampler

A crew shares one Trampler and divides the work. Different players can take specialized roles such as piloting the machine, manning weapon stations, or managing the storage and loot. A coordinated crew makes a Trampler far more effective in both exploration and combat than one person juggling every task at once.

Matchmaking and Server Population

Matchmaking is based on the size of your crew, and the number of players you share a server with scales with that size. The confirmed launch caps are below.

For the technical side of the online experience, including anti-cheat and supported languages, see Servers and Online. For how losing a crew's Trampler and resources works, see Getting Started.

The developers have also announced a planned gear-based matchmaking system, not yet live, intended mainly to give new players a gentler introduction while keeping most of the community in the same queue. See Early Access for what they have described.