Payday 3: How to stealth Gold & Sharke

Payday 3’s big bank heist, Gold & Sharke, is complicated to finish in stealth. Fortunately, we have a guide that can offer you tips on how to complete it without raising an alarm.

Payday 3’s Gold & Sharke heist takes you to a big New York bank with the task of stealing a server and a whole load of money. This mission in the game is inspired by Payday 2’s Benevolent Bank mission, where getting through to the vault is as tricky as you’d expect. Fortunately, we’ve got a guide that’ll help you through it.

To start with, make sure you’re carrying our recommended stealth loadout. Having some of these skills will make your heist go off a lot more smoothly. 

Here’s how to complete Payday 3 Gold & Sharke in stealth. We’ve tested this on both Normal and Overkill difficulty, so expect some huge variations in guard layouts and objective spawns.

How to stealth Gold & Sharke in Payday 3

The Gold & Sharke bank is divided into three main sections; the front lobby, upper floor and vault lobby. Here are all the guard spawns we noticed on Normal difficulty:

• 2 guards in the first floor lobby
• 2 guards on the second floor
• 1 guard in the camera room
• 1 guard in the parking lot area
• 1 guard in the vault area

For this heist, you’ll want to save your radios for the top floors. We’d recommend not even masking up in the lobby area, as all the objectives can be completed without doing it.

To begin, enter the lobby and approach the gate. You’ll need a Red Keycard to get through here, and they’re being held in the Loan Officer’s office. There are two such offices located in this bank: one on the right-hand side in the near corner and another on the far left. 

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To get into the office, you’ll need a QR code. Similar to Dirty Ice, you can find these codes on cell phones littered around the map. Check the other offices and the parking lot area for any phones laying around. We found one on a desk right next to the Loan Officer office. 

Once you have the code, hack into the office and search for a red keycard. This room counts as a Secure Area, so be careful not to be spotted by the civilian in this room or any guards passing by. Search the files and the cabinets until you have the keycard and head back to the gate.

Gold & Sharke door code

Use the keycard on the gate and head up the stairs. The door to the vault lobby is ahead, but you need a vault lobby door code to get in. Turn around and continue heading up the stairs. Shade will mention something about hacking into a server room to find the correct code, so look around until you find a room containing a bunch of computers and servers.

There are at least two guards patrolling this area depending on your difficulty level, so it’s best to stay unmasked for now in case you’re caught. If you also happen to see a Blue Keycard sitting on a desk, take that too as we’ll need it later.

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Hack into the server once you’ve found it and wait for Shade’s confirmation. At some point during the hack, an error will pop up and prompt you to get clearance from another PC in a different office. Make your way over there and gain clearance. Be watchful for any civilians that go into the server room, as they’ll be alerted by the hack.

Once you’ve got clearance from the other PC and have finished the hack in the server room, you’ll receive four codes to use on the door to the vault lobby. Only one of these codes is correct, so check each one until you find one that corresponds to the thumbprints on the keypad. For example, if one of the codes reads 3901, check to see if there are thumbprints on each of those numbers. If so, it’s the correct one.

Gold & Sharke vault lasers

Head into the Vault Lobby and take note of the lasers. Interact with the keypad next to the door and Shade will ask you to hack four switchboxes. Each switchbox has a color and symbol associated with it, and you’ll need to hit the correct switch in each box.

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On lower difficulties, these switchboxes are located inside the vault area. So you’ll only really have to avoid cameras. On higher difficulties however, they’re moved into the second floor area. Every time you flip a switch, a new color and symbol is available, so be sure you head back to the vault to read the new clue (or have another player read it out to you). 

You can mask up now if you want, but be careful as you still need to go back out into the upper floor. After flipping the last switch, head back to the vault door and interact with the interface one more time to turn off the lasers.

Gold & Sharke open vault

Finally, to unlock the vault you’ll need to activate a remote signal from the manager’s office. It’s located on the far side of the bank from the vault lobby, on the upper floor. To get in here, you need a Blue Keycard. If you haven’t already found one, it can be found either on a desk in any of the offices on the second floor, or is carried by a bank teller wearing a dark blue suit. He’ll be wandering around anywhere on the upper floor.

The next part requires some expert timing on your part. Inside the manager’s office is a PC you need to interact with to unlock the vault doors. You’ll also need to use the keycard on the reader back at the vault. Both of these actions need to be done almost simultaneously. 

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This is easier with two or more players, where you can stand at each post and activate the mechanisms separately. If you’re playing solo, hack the PC, activate the unlock and quickly rush back to the vault. Avoid guards and civilians if they’re not already subdued. You’ll have about 30 seconds to open the vault with the keycard before it locks again.

You’ll know if you’ve made it in time, as the vault will be ready to open by interacting with the wheel. Open it and head inside. Bag up all the money on the central table, but make sure to also check out the rooms to the side and back. You’ll need to lockpick the gates and then check the cabinets for a server, which needs to be secured to finish the heist.

Gold & Sharke escape van

Bags need to be secured in the van located inside the underground parking lot. If you don’t have the elevator access favor, this will be difficult. You’ll need to move each bag through the lobby and downstairs to the underground. This means potentially being caught by any civilians and guards that pass through that area.

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Head down the stairs to the bottom floor and turn right. Turn right again at the end and find the door that leads to the underground area. It’ll need to be lockpicked. If you’re quick enough you should be able to avoid being spotted. Carry all the bags down here and pop them in the back of the van.

If you have the elevator access favor, the risk is massively cut down as you’ll be able to move the bags in the elevator located in the vault lobby. This will directly bring the bags down to the parking lot, where you can move them without anyone in the lobby spotting you.

Once you’ve gathered all the bags you want to leave with, step into the escape zone and finish the mission. The next heist, 99 Boxes, awaits you.

To view more heists in Payday 3, refer to the full mission list. Make sure to also see what the best heists for easy money are, as well as details on when the next DLC is dropping.