Alright guys here is my Christmas present to the PoE Resetera community:
Here is my Syndicate farming guide.
Pros:
*Farm currency with 0 investment.
*Safe and guaranteed if doing lower tier content.
*Not build dependent, anyone can do it but faster builds have edge as they always do.
*Don't even need to be in maps to do it but its better with a character that is well geared.
*Decent returns per hour invested if you do it correctly.
Cons:
*Takes a while to set up, like 5-6 hours. Still faster than setting up a Shaped Elder map strat though.
*Some RNG is still in play with how Syndicate members spawn and their options.
*Needs to be at a level you are comfortable farming multiple rank 3 members or else you can get killed. I would not try this at high Red maps.
*Can be boring and tedious.
*If you don't do it correctly then you end up wasting a lot of time trying for perfect set up and that time could have been spent on farming maps or delves instead.
WHAT IS THE GOAL?
The goal is to farm Intervention Safehouses for maximum Scarab rewards. Scarabs are in very high demands and the best ones sell immediately, you don't even need to undercut prices aggressively. The best ones can go up to 30 Chaos as of this post.
The most optimal set up is:
Tier 1 (one of these MUST be the leader of the Intervention safehouse. You still want both of these in Intervention at rank 3) - These are worth 27-30C Gilded
Rin (Map Scarab)
Cameria (Sulphite Scarab)
Tier 2 - These are worth like 16-20C Gilded and you want both of these guys in.
Gravicius (Divination Scarab)
Haku (Strongbox Scarab)
Tier 3 (only choose one of these, preferably Tora) These are worth around 10-12 C Gilded
Tora (Harbinger Scarab)
It That Fled (Breach Scarab)
ALL MEMBERS OF INTERVENTION MUST BE RANK 3 FOR MAXIMUM REWARDS! ESPECIALLY THE LEADER WHICH HAS TO BE EITHER RIN OR CAMERIA (preferably Rin over Cameria, its a difference of a few Chaos)
You can skimp on Tora/It the Fled rank, maybe even Gravicius/Haku if you are impatient.
You can also have It the Fled in Research for the empowered Breachstone. You want It at rank 3 leader of Safehouse but this requires investment for returns as you need completed Breachstones on deck (20C minimum). Two minumum Breachstone that's like 40-50C and most people may not have that so for now I would say ignore this and focus only on Intervention.
The Leader of a Safehouse gets DOUBLE REWARDS so if you have Rin at rank 3 and Leader you will get GUARANTEED 2 Gilded Cartography Scarabs for around 27-30C each. Everyone else will drop one Scarab each depending on their ranks (rank 1 is rusted, rank 2 is polished, rank 3 is gilded). If you do the math then with optimal set up you can get around 100-120 Chaos per run.
And don't listen to that ZiggyD video that says ranks don't matter.. they absolutely do. They may have hotfixed after his video but you must have high ranks on members for maximum rewards which are the gilded scarabs.
HOW TO SET THIS UP
This is the complicated section but with a few rules in mind, it actually becomes pretty easy.
When setting up the Syndicate members, always apply these rule of thumbs:
*
NEVER RUN ANY SAFEHOUSE THAT ISN'T INTERVENTION. Unlocked Safehouses means that division CANNOT spawn in a map. After a while the Safehouse progress bar does decay so you may encounter them again before they are blocked off. This is how you achieve
"Division" blocking and is an essential part of this strategy. Exception to this rule is discussed below that is related to dislodging particular members.
*Anyone that is NOT someone you want in Intervention division, you want them associated with another division. That means no one should be an unranked "
FREE AGENT". This is for two reasons:
1) Free agents will try to join divisions that spawn. Logically speaking, if you have 3 Safehouses blocked and are always spawning Interventions, then any free agents while appear in Intervention spawns hoping to join the branch. You don't want this UNLESS it's for members that you actually want in Intervention (more on this later).
2) Free agents can actually become Division leaders after you complete a Safehouse. This screwed me over two times before I realized what was happening. Everyone who was associated with the Safehouse gets demotes to 0 rank and at that point a free agent can actually takes priority over them. If there are no free agents then the leader is someone in that branch who was below the leader at time of Safehouse raid (you can look at portrait in case of situations where members are same ranks) and they default to rank 1 of course.
*Do not Interrogate members unless they are rank 2 or higher. At rank 1 an Interrogation not only yields less Intel but it also makes them into a free agent if you do it when they are at rank 1. This is especially true if you are dealing with Intervention members. So members without a rank are free agents and you generally don't want this.
*Remember that walking away is your hidden 3rd option. Sometimes you will get a rank 1 member asking to remove someone from the board who is someone you want in Intervention. You don't want them becoming a free agent and you definitely don't want to remove Intervention members so just walk away and try other members first.
*When there are 3 members, at least one of them almost always has a rank up option through Execute. When there are two members there can be Execute or Betray option. This means that you need to interact with Intervention members FIRST before any other division members to see if they have Rank up option (assuming they are already in Intervention, if not then you Interrogate them to derank them so they turn free agent and have option to be recruited under Intervention). If there is one member remaining then there is either a Betray or Bargain option usually Bargain which gives free intelligence or some items. Of course if an Intervention member is max rank then save them for last as that is logical (since they can't go up in rank so that's a wasted option).
*
Always remove rivalries from the board. Always remove items from members. Always gain trust with as many members on the board as possible even across divisions. Unless the member is someone you want in Intervention but is in another division, in that case you interrogate them to dislodge them from that other division.
*There is no need to gain intelligence on Intervention until you have properly set up the board. That means that free intel is actually bad if that free intel unlocks the Safehouse because that blocks the Intervention division temporarily. Only start gain intel on Intervention until it's close to being set up.
*DO NOT insta gib members as they appear out of portals. This will result in them being clumped over each other forcing you into an order that may not be optimum. Imagine having 2 Intervention members, one rank 3 and one rank 2. Rank 3 stacks on top of rank 2 and you can't access the rank 2 one to Execute them for the rank up. That's horrible and you essentially wasted a precious syndicate proc. Let the members spread out after spawning before killing them. Hopefully they fix this because it's very annoying.
*Gain intelligence on other safehouse as a priority while not interrogating members that are rank 1 (again, unless they are members you want in Intervention). You want the other safehouses unlocked as soon as possible so that you maximize Intervention procs. Essentially non Intervention members are safe to interrogate if they are rank 2 or rank 3.
*There can be only 3 members in interrogation. If you add a 4th one, then the oldest one gets dislodged. This isn't too big of a deal you just lose out on some intel, nothing to fret yourself over when it comes to overloading your jail.
*Make sure every division has at least one subordinate. If there are no subordinates in that division then the game will not spawn that division if other safehouses are unlocked until the leader spawns which has a low occurence rate. This means you can potentially fully block yourself from spawning ANY Syndicate members. If this happens you can just run one of the safehouses but that's not optimum so just make sure this doesn't happen to you by making sure every division has at least one subordinate.
OK OK that's a lot of rules… now how do I apply these rules?
Lets use some example problems and see how we solve them.
1) A board is spawned. You locate 4 out of the 5 members that you want on Intervention but they are in other divisions. The 5th members isn't even on the board!!! What do we do?
Simple. You remove a different member (non Intervention member obviously) from the board until you get the member that you want (there is always a set number of members so removing one adds another one to the board). You may need to raid safehouses to identify or even dislodge Intervention members from other divisions. Remember that to remove someone from the board, they usually need to be rank 1 or lower so just start interrogating the unwanted people in order to get your Intervention members present on the board.
2) Ok you got all 5 members on the board but they are all in different divisions! And Gravicious is the leader of Transportation and he never appears!
This is also a simple issue to fix. First you just run the map until you encounter these potential Intervention members. Keep building up Trust and keep deranking them until eventually they get an option to move to Intervention. Just do not block off Intervention safehouse. Blocking other safehouses works here because if you have free agents and only Intervention is available to spawn then they are VERY likely to join Intervention as long as some Trust exists.
Once all the non leaders are in Intervention, then you need you start making sure that NO ONE ELSE IS A FREE AGENT. This includes non Intervention members. Once this is set up, focus on gaining Intel on Transportation to proc Gravicious. Division leader rarely spawn especially if they have low trust numbers but if they do great! Immediately interrogate Gravicious to dislodge him just make sure someone is available under Transport to replace him.
In my experience leaders very rarely spawn so usually you need to just raid the safehouse to dislodge them (yes yes I know this breaks one of the rules but I said there was on exception and this is it). It's usually faster this way unless you get lucky. The opposite is also true. You may get someone in Intervention as a leader that you don't want there. Same rules apply just make sure there are no free agents to take over in Intervention as leader when you run it otherwise you are going to waste more time as the free agent might become the new leader.
3) Alright alright, you dislodged Gravicious and have a few members in Intervention. How do youget all 5 in Intervention?
You run maps or zones for as many Syndicate procs as possible. Use the rules listed before. If they are non Intervention members, rank them up to 2 or above. if they are rank 1. If they are already high rank (2 or higher), then interrogate them to gain intel on that division in order to block off that division. Again to clarify, THIS is for NON INTERVENTION divisions.
Do not gain intel on Intervention division in this stage. Potential Intervention members that spawn, you either place them in Intervention, derank them to dislodge them from non Intervention division and if they are already in Intervention then rank them up to rank 3. All the while keep gaining Trust with all members to maximize procs. The more Trust you have the faster this will move along.
4) Fine fine… you got all 5 members in Intervention after some time. You have now also blocked or nearly blocked other branches. Your division leader isn't Rin or Cameria.. what the hell do you do now?
You are almost there. At this stage you need to pay more attention. You need to keep running maps until the Intervention leader procs. This may take a while but when they appear you must interrogate. Just make sure before you do this, Cameria and Rin are rank 3 while the other 2 are rank 2 or lower. As always never Interrogate an Intervention member that is rank 1 or they become free agent. Get Rin or Cam to rank 3, other two to rank 2 and keep proccing until leader appears. If there are no free agents then interrogating the leader will derank them one level and put Rin or Cam as leader. The previous leader will return to the division after a while you just need to rank them up again. Once the leader is set, start ranking them up to lvl3.
5) Ok you have finally set it up to what you want. No free agents, 5 Intervention members all rank 3, Rin or Cam as leader, every other division is blocked or close to it, every other division has at least one subordinate. You run the safehouse, get your loot. Now you come back to see everyone in Intervention is a free agent and someone else is a leader! Do you have to do this whole 6 hour set up again!!??
You have already done the set up, from now on it doesn't take more than a couple of hours to get the Intervention safehouse in order again. Remember that the remaining divisions are already blocked or close to blocked off. That means that now when you proc Interventions, you will have previous Intervention members (that you just beat in your safehouse) as free agents wanting to join back into Intervention. Repeat the previous step to rank them up and get the appropriate leader in place. Run safehouse again and profit. Repeat as many times as you want!
Potential Issues you may run into:
*I have Cameria and Tora Trusted with each other in Intervention at around rank 1 or rank 2 (or any other two combination of members). Whenever a Syndicate procs, these two appear but they want to betray each other. How do I fix it??
Ans: From my hours of testing, it seems that there are natural rivalries in the Syndicate. Tora and Cameria generally hate each other and hate working together. Even if there is a Trust line present, they are likely to betray each other. Remember that betrayal can occur even if trust exists (can't have betrayal without existing trust by definition of the word!). If this keeps occurring then I would say cut your loss and interrogate one of them that has the higher rank. It will set you back a bit but as long as the member is still in the division its fine. Much better than Betrayal option that leads to them being dislodged from Intervention or worse yet from the board.
*
I have wasted many hours setting up my 5 members in Intervention but I can't get leader to spawn to dislodge them to replace with Cam or Rin.
Ans: This can happen with bad RNG or if the leader has few Trust lines. The last resort option is to rank up all of the remaining members and run the safehouse as is. You will lose some Chaos but you will save time in long run. Its not bad at all to have Gravicious or Haku to in leader as well, you generally lose bigger if its Tora/It that Fled in leader position.
*The zone or map I am running takes too long to find Syndicates. Whats a good place or map to do this?
Ans: I started this strat on Blood Aqueducts then tried on Quarry and then finally yellow maps with easy layouts. Blood Aqueducts you just run from one end to the other and encounter syndicates on your way. If you find a proc closer to beginning, just do it and head back or teleport to town. If its closer to end then just keep going forward to exit. Respawn zone with ctrl plus click. With Quarry its both faster and slower. Its faster when Fortification is blocked because then the syndicate spawns always happen in a square perimeter around way point that isn't too big or a perimeter so you just do a circle around. However, if Fortifications spawn then appear in 3 fixed corners of the area that take a while to get to. This greatly increases time where you first search for 3 divisions then you need to check corners. In the time it took me to check Forts, I realized I could do maps. I tried white maps first, Strand and Beach are amazing for this. I moved on to yellows maps after that and for me it was fine, can still kill members quick but not too quick where they might stack on top of each other from instant kills. Shaped Atoll, Toxic Sewer, Ashen Wood, Shaped ramparts, Canyon are all easy maps or any map you like to run that you can handle syndicates on. It will take longer with maps but you will get other rewards too while running so IMO it's better to run low tier maps. Less boring as well and you can make decent change while setting up the board.
I hope this was helpful, I tried to make this detail. You just keep doing this and this will start to make sense as you will notice patterns.