Rost Skip

General

Rost Skip is a glitch in Horizon Zero Dawn originally found by everyday_aussie on the 29th of January 2021. It involves using climbing handholds to navigate around a deathplane to avoid talking to Rost at the start of the adult Aloy section. A second version was later found by Fleur_Bleue101 on the 13th of March 2021.

How To Perform

Aussie Version

In order to do the Aussie Version of Rost Skip, head to Rost but don't trigger the dialogue with him. Jump over the small fence and grab on to the rope which acts as a handhold below. Climb around the ridge Rost is standing on until you reach the yellow handhold, then drop down and hold forward to land on the mountainside. Carefully navigate down while heading to the left from facing the wall in order to avoid the deathplane. Save at any campfire or pick up a powercell and Restart From Save in order to unlock fast travelling.

Aussie Version video:

Fleur Version

In order to do the Fleur Version of Rost Skip, head to the two stalks of ridge-wood next to the bridge. Climb up the mountainside and head slightly to the right and jump around the invisible wall that usually blocks your path. Keep going a bit further along and carefully make your way down. You can now follow the river and will have skipped Rost. Make sure to stick to the left side of the path to not hit the deathplane. Save at any campfire or pick up a powercell and Restart From Save to unlock fast travelling.

Fleur Version video:

Mechanics

Rost Skip works by avoiding a deathplane which is spread across the ground below the the ridge on which Rost is standing and the surrounding area. This deathplane is what usually prevents players from not talking to Rost at the start of the game. If you head down and Restart From Save at a campfire or after picking up a powercell, fast travelling will be unlocked again. This is likely because the game prevents you from fast travelling while near Rost in order to stop the player from avoiding talking to him, but if you RFS at the bottom, you are outside of the zone that prevents you from fast travelling. The RFS makes the game update to reflect this. Additionally, if you have unlocked fast travelling, you can walk back into the deathplane and get teleported back up to Rost instead of dying. It is uncertain why this happens.

Uses

Rost Skip is currently not used in runs, but at one point the Fleur Version was used in the Abs% Category Extension.