You will eventually fail a hunt in Phasmophobia. That’s where insurance in Phasmophobia comes in. The game has a policy in place of making sure you can jump back into hunts when your team is inevitably slaughtered by an angry spirit. The hunts get more vicious as time goes on, so it’s a good idea to learn how insurance in Phasmophobia works.
Lucky for you the insurance is automatically assigned, no need to meet with a claims adjuster or anything, The rewards of the hunt are also important to keep in mind. The harder the hunt, the more completing objectives will reward you. The basic idea is that the price deducted from the payout is the fee for the policy. And the value of the items you lose is what’s covered under said policy. There’s no life insurance in this game, so you getting horribly possessed and murdered isn’t covered at all.
Completing objectives like taking photos and exorcising ghosts pays out cash rewards. The idea is that you use these profits to buy more complex equipment, then use that to take on more dangerous and rewarding hunts. When you inevitably die on a hunt, some gear will be lost.
All the standard gear like the EMF reader, camera, and Ghost Writing Book will not be removed though. You get those basic tools back on each hunt. The other items you buy and bring along can be lost, and you only get a portion of their value back. The amount you get back is based on the price of the item and the tier of difficulty you’re on.
You will want to hop up to higher difficulties when you’re ready. Question is, when are you ready to take on harder jobs? That’s only really a question you can answer. There’s also the fact the Professional difficulty doesn’t pay any insurance, which makes it all the more challenging.
How to use insurance
The payment process is automatic just like getting the policy. When you fail a hunt you get the payout. And when you succeed, you get the reward.
Because insurance is going to scale with difficulty, you’re going to be able to stretch the system a bit. If you’re on Amateur difficulty, you can get away with taking more items onto a hunt. You’re more likely to die if you don’t understand the mechanics of a hunt, or the higher difficulties, so keep that in mind. Failing can be very costly and you don’t want to go digitally bankrupt in the ghost hunting sim.
It’s a very good idea to get used to the game on the easier difficulty setting first. Insurance will return 50% of the equipment value in cash for Beginner difficulty. The scaling kicks in on higher difficulties dropping the payout down to 25% or lower. Because of this, it’s a good idea to learn the basics of controlling ghosts and communicating with them via items like the Crucifix and Quija Board.
We recommend playing a few early missions without buying any equipment, just to learn the basic systems. Once you have enough experience, it might be a good idea to step up in difficulty when you have some cash saved up. Use that to buy better gear to be ready for the more challenging hunts.