I am getting discouraged in this Betrayal ...

I am in ACT 7 and I can't keep up with scale of the Syndicate. They are more powerful and when there are 2 or 3 of them I am dying so easily.

My character must suck big time as it did fairly well in the league prior. My resists are capped and I have lots of life.

The gear is probably lacking ... but geeze.

As for the other mechanics, should I just not bother with them until I get to the map quests? That is kind of depressing as the fun for me is the leveling of the character, progression through the story and reaching the end game having done the quests and challenges. I am not a racer so I progress fairly slow.

K

You can control how strong the syndicate is based on the choices that you make at each encounter. There are a few things to be aware of, and I will make a quick rundown to hopefully help you ease the burden.

Ranks: 0 - 3 stars

This is the easiest factor to control as you can easily manipulate each members ranks. The higher their rank, the tougher they become, so if you are getting shredded by a 3 star Haku, the next time you defeat him make sure to interrogate him. Interrogation is the easiest way to de-rank a syndicate member, and execution is the easiest way to increase their ranks. Their ranks also scale their rewards, so the tougher they are the better their loot is likely to be.

Items / Gear

When you mouseover any given syndicate member you can see what gear they are wearing, and each piece of gear basically serves as a map mod that applies to that member each time you encounter them. If you are doing very little damage to Vorici, he may be wearing something that greatly reduces your damage type, and you will want to eliminate this gear asap. Again, the easiest way to remove gear is to interrogate the troublesome member as at the end of the interrogation they are returned to the board with -1 rank and all their gear removed.

Later on in the game, you will probably want to manipulate these things to favor more challenging and more rewarding encounters, but for now, you should just interrogate the hell out of the foes that give you trouble, and take the edge off them.

Friendships and Rivalries

Some of your decisions will make some syndicate members friends or foes of each other, and they are represented by the red and green threads that connect between them. When two members are friends, they will assist each other in their respective encounters. So if Rin (Transort) and Elreon (Research) are friends, then Elreon will show up in Transport encounters to assist Rin and vice versa.

The opposite is true of rivals. They will appear in each other's encounters to hinder each other, rather than aid. This is another way in which you can tone down the difficulty. You can work on ways to remove friendships or even turn them against each other so they help you. This is the more difficult factor to manipulate as it is dependent on a bit of RNG to pull the relevant choices. There may be easier ways to manipulate this, but so far I have not noticed it.

These are just factors that affect difficulty. Obviously there are far more layers to the system than just this, but at least knowing this, they will not wreck you every other area.


EDIT: Just to add another dimension to your strategy. Know that you don't HAVE to make a decision. If none of the options you are given work in your favor... just walk away. You, don't have to choose... or more accurately stated, you can always choose to walk away.

Oh my gosh thank you soooo much. Firstly I didn't know I didn't have to make a decision. I can certainly interrogate them and now I understand the +1 ranking. Had no idea I was promoting them higher to be stronger.

I tried to read up and watch videos but there isn't much info on that.

K

I added a bit on friendships and rivalries too.

Still struggling, at first I thought it was cool, like going to the temple or the azurite mines or the beasts but having all four to manage seems a bit too much and over the top.

I am more confused as to WHAT I need to do than I was with what I need to do. Along with just the story line we have all this other stuff going on and none of it seems related to the other.

Why can't they just change the main story line with new quests and stories so it's at least fun to re-invent a character.

Ugh ... well I guess the point of this game is to either die or not die.

I never get any more of the challenges than 12 or 13 anyway ...

"

Why can't they just change the main story line with new quests and stories so it's at least fun to re-invent a character.

good idea. you should write this in suggestions forum too.

"

KyliaGypsy wrote:

Still struggling, at first I thought it was cool, like going to the temple or the azurite mines or the beasts but having all four to manage seems a bit too much and over the top.

I am more confused as to WHAT I need to do than I was with what I need to do. Along with just the story line we have all this other stuff going on and none of it seems related to the other.

Why can't they just change the main story line with new quests and stories so it's at least fun to re-invent a character.

Ugh ... well I guess the point of this game is to either die or not die.

I never get any more of the challenges than 12 or 13 anyway ...

Syndicate members can hit hard but your character is glass canon and deal only a little damage which is a terrible combination.

First of all if you can´t deal with the Syndicate right now you can just ignore them (don´t enter the laboratory anymore).

Ok lets take look at your character (Elementalist on the Betrayal)

It´s a bit messy - are you following any build guide?

I guess you want to build NO crit triple herald Elementalist Blade Vortex.
Take Elemental Overload in that case.

- your BV is only level 6! Spells are getting damage while leveling them. It´s huge damage loss!
Just buy level 18 (no less no more - you can´t wear higher level on 67) Vaal Blade Vortex
You will have both versions of BV now. BV for normal content (Vaal BV vs bosses).

Drop Power charge on crit (you have no crit at all) and summon phantasm (you play no minion build)

- get Physical to lighting gem and Elemental focus gem - you don´t need to recolour the sockets (buy already leveled gems if possible).
Ice Bite Support + Hypothermia is an alternative but it would require two green sockets (you can chill / freeze, shock eventually then). You can change to that setup later eventually (or if you have two green socket Vorici recipe).
Btw you should level gems on weapon swap (BV or Vaal)

BTW don´t remember you need 155 DEX for BV

Drop arc totem it deals no damage. You can try decoy totem with elemental resistance support instead to distract enemies.

Use shield charge (with shield) or whirling blades movement skill linked with faster attack + fortify.

Buy better rings with high DEX / life and resistance you need

- cap your resistances - get a bit of chaos resistance too if possible (for Incursion and Syndicate)

- finish the cruel Lab and get Mastermind of discord ascendancy - the core of the triple herald elementalist build.

- Drop Mind over Matter - it´s crippling your mana. To benefit from MoM you need heavy unreserved mana which you don´t have bcos of triple heralds.

Gear:

Buy Hrimburn gloves (or just Hrimsorrow) - so you can convert 100% physical damage to elemental (with Physical to light gem).

Get better weapon(s)-
The Princess with high "Gain (25-30)% of Physical Damage as Extra Cold Damage" modifier is fine and cheap or
Scepter with high elemental damage / spell damage / added spell elemental damage
I think get one weapon + shield till you get more defense.

Shield with high evasion + life + resistances (eventually high life + spell damage).

If you can afford better chest with high life and boots with 20+ MS + 60+life too.

And rings I have already told about.

Be sure you can use all your gems (BV needs 155 DEX!)

Upgrade your flasks
Atziri's Promise + good utility flasks with mods

1-2 life Divine flask with instant recovery
Stibnite + basalt / Quick silver

Invest to more life - Constitution cluster

You should be doing so much better now!

Ok thank you for that advice, looks like I have some work to do to improve this character. I will "back off" advancing until I can get the gear and changes in my tree to compensate.

I was following a build so you are correct about the high dex which was killing me and keeping from getting swords. I noticed WAY to late that I was not upgrading my BV until a bit ago when I looked at it and saw it was level 6 while my others were around 16 ... yikes. I must of stopped it sometime back and forget to advance when I reached enough Dex. That was stupid.

I will see if I can get a higher level BV or farm my ass off until mine is leveled.

off to work on it ...

I just try to avoid them at all costs. Not worth losing xp to. Risk vs reward early on in maps isn't worth it. They hit WAY to hard. Leap slam off the screen and one shot you is not fun. ( I just don't have the gear or the currency to buy the gear to survive)