Payday 3 Gold & Sharke Bank Heist Guide

Gold & Sharke is the major bank heist featured in Payday 3. In contrast to the smaller bank targeted in the initial mission, this time you will be infiltrating a sprawling vault filled with copious amounts of cash. Regardless of whether you choose a stealthy or loud approach, anticipate Gold & Sharke to be one of the lengthier heists in the game due to the expansive map and the multitude of tasks required to succeed.

Executing this heist successfully can yield substantial profits, making it highly lucrative. Therefore, it is crucial to gather as much information as possible prior to undertaking it. With the assistance of this guide, you will be able to secure a significant amount of wealth.

How To Reach The Second Floor

At the outset of the heist, you will only have access to the first floor of the bank. Your initial objective is to unlock the gate that grants entry to the second floor. This area houses crucial administrative offices and, most importantly, the door leading to the vault.

To unlock the gate, you will need a red keycard, which can be located in one of the offices situated at the corner of the building.

Office	Location
Human Resources	Front left corner
Loan Officer	Front right corner
Branch Manager	Rear right corner
Bank Assistant	Rear left corner

To gain access to each office, you will need to scan a QR code. Look for phones to scan on the desks of employees in the public area, or seize the opportunity to sneak into storage rooms when unobserved. If you choose the latter approach, make sure to open all the lockers to uncover additional cash. You might also come across oxygen canisters, which will prove crucial at a later stage.

The keycard is never found in the Human Resources office, but it is advisable to make that your initial destination. By hacking a computer in the HR office, you can uncover the specific office where the keycard is located. This will save you the trouble of searching for multiple phones throughout the building.

If you are not wearing a mask, the employees in the HR office will not question your presence. However, they will become suspicious if you attempt to hack the computer in their presence.

Once you have located the designated office, thoroughly search the stacks of papers and open any accessible drawers until you find the keycard. While the occupant of the office is typically present, apart from the Bank Assistant, their field of vision is usually limited. By staying crouched, you can usually navigate in and out without encountering any issues.

If the alarm is triggered before you have the opportunity to open the gate using the keycard, you will need to utilize a drill to breach the door. This process typically takes approximately one minute. To buy yourself some time before the police assault commences, consider taking hostages from the bank floor and using them as bargaining chips.

If you have to drill the gate, the employees on the upper floor will be unable to exit the building until the drilling is complete. This presents an opportunity to acquire a new set of hostages once you reach the second floor!

How To Reach The Vault

The subsequent door you must unlock is located on the landing halfway up the main staircase. The second floor of the bank has fewer guards and cameras compared to the first floor, but it remains important to exercise caution to avoid detection. If you do happen to get caught, utilize a silencer to eliminate the two guards discreetly and disable the cameras by shooting them. Subsequently, take the bank employees on the second floor hostage. As long as you maintain a quiet approach, those on the lower floor should remain oblivious to your activities.

To unlock the door leading to the vault lobby, you will need a passcode. Head to the server room located at the front of the bank, above the main entrance. It is a small room that remains unlocked, but be aware that an employee visits periodically, so it is not entirely secure.

Initiate the hacking process on the computer in the server room. However, at some point during the hack, the progress will halt, requiring someone to access a computer in one of the two offices located at the rear of the bank to allow the hack to continue.

It is possible for this situation to occur twice if you happen to be unlucky.

After the hack is successfully completed, the computer will display four codes. One of these codes will grant access to the door when entered on the keypad.

If the alarm is triggered, the keypad will become disabled, and you will need to hack it using the panel located to the right. Stand within the circles highlighted by Shade on the second floor until the hack is complete. Similar to the server room hack, you will need to access a computer in the rear offices at least once during this process.

How To Open The Vault Quietly

The vault lobby is guarded by two patrolling guards, along with a third guard stationed in the security room. It is likely that you will need to neutralize them, which might initiate a search. However, if you have managed to reach this point without setting off any alarms, you should be relatively safe.

Don't touch the lasers.

In order to reach the vault, you must first disable the lasers. Hack the panel located to the right of the vault, as it will display which switch on an electrical panel needs to be flipped. There are four electrical panels scattered randomly on the second floor. The order in which you activate them doesn't matter, as long as you only flip the switch indicated on the screen near the vault door. The correct switch to flip changes each time you activate a panel. To keep track of the changes, you can either assign someone to monitor the screen, set up a microcamera, or return to check the screen after each panel activation.

Lastly, you will require the blue keycard, which is possessed by the bank manager. The manager can be identified by wearing a dark blue suit. Retrieve the keycard from the manager and utilize it to access his office, located near the server room. Collect all the cash present on his desk and proceed to access his computer.

Once you have obtained the keycard, you will have a limited amount of time to return to the vault and use the keycard. The recommended strategy is for the player carrying the keycard to head directly to the vault after opening the office. Meanwhile, another player should activate the computer once the keycard carrier is in position at the vault. This coordinated approach will ensure efficient progress.

Once the keycard is authenticated at the vault, you will have the ability to rotate the wheel and open the door.

How To Open The Vault Using The Thermal Lance

If an alarm is triggered, the only means of accessing the vault will be through the use of a thermal lance. Shade will dispatch a helicopter carrying the thermal lance shortly after the alarm is activated. The thermal lance is comprised of three components, which will be dropped either across the street from the main entrance or on the roof.

Obtaining the bags becomes slightly easier if they land in the street, as it provides a straight path with more cover, as opposed to navigating through multiple winding staircases.

Position all three bags in front of the vault, and securely fasten all three legs of the thermal lance. Activate the lance, and it will gradually burn through the vault door over the course of several minutes. However, if an enemy manages to reach the vault door, they will pause the lance's operation until a player reactivates it.

The thermal lance operates using compressed oxygen as fuel. The meter on the machine's display indicates the remaining oxygen in the current canister. If the oxygen supply depletes, the burning process cannot continue until the canister is replaced. Oxygen canisters are typically stored in lockers or a bathroom within the bank, and their specific locations vary with each run. Once the lance is powered up, Shade will highlight the canisters for you, but you can also search for them earlier while exploring the bank.

Each player is limited to carrying only one oxygen canister at a time.

Once the countdown on the display reaches zero, you can dismantle the thermal lance and proceed to open the vault door.

How To Escape With The Bank Server

Inside the vault, you will need to pick the locks on the cages located along each wall. Your primary objective, Patricia Sharke's private server, is concealed behind a wooden panel beneath the counter within one of these cages. Retrieve the server, gather all the cash present in the vault, and then proceed with your escape.

If the alarm has not been triggered, your escape vehicle, a van, is located in the parking garage, which can be accessed from the rear left corner of the bank. However, reaching the parking garage may prove challenging as you will need to navigate through the crowded first floor. If your plan involves completing the heist with full stealth, it is advisable to select the Elevator Access favor during the heist setup. This favor will provide you with a smoother and less conspicuous path to the parking garage.

If the alarm has been activated, you will need to make your way to the roof and ignite a flare to signal the helicopter. It will take approximately two minutes for the helicopter to arrive. Utilize this time to transport as many bags as possible to the roof and prepare them for loading onto the helicopter.

You are unable to exit the map until you have successfully obtained the server and a specific number of bags determined by the difficulty level. More challenging heists will require a greater number of bags, but they also offer higher payouts as a reward for the increased effort.