That’s why each new expansion over the past year introduced a brand new NPC for players to meet. Grinding Gear Games was subtly acquainting players with what would become the new team of Masters and their eventual missions. With Betrayal, you won’t be running into Haku the Armormaster anymore, having to rush to the end of a randomized spirit cave or protect Elreon from waves of undead. Instead, Path of Exile’s new masters will ask you to jump back into 2018’s challenge leagues, like Bestiary and Delve POE currency trade , with adjustments made to make them more accessible. “It’s replacing this old content with something that’s actually worthy of how much time players spend with it in the game,” Wilson says.

In addition to the three previous leagues, Betrayal will also add a fourth league that, considering a previous expansion had you manipulating time paradoxes for loot, looks to be its most complicated. This time, players are tasked with manipulating the Immortal Syndicate, a shady cartel that found a way to resurrect people without turning them into zombies. Obviously that kind of power shouldn’t be in the wrong hands.

Like all of Path of Exile’s challenge leagues, players will have to start a new character to experience the new features in Betrayal. It's worth it too, because how you interact with the Immortal Syndicate plays out kind of like a dark fantasy police procedural—complete with a corkboard and lines of yarn charting the identities of members and their relationships.

Pulling their strings
It’s a little bit like the Nemesis system from the Shadow of Mordor games.

Chris Wilson, Game Director
The idea is that players must investigate four different branches within the Immortal Syndicate, learn the identities of key members and the locations of their hideouts cheap POE currency , and then loot them dry. But the real joy comes from how you can manipulate and exploit Syndicate members to do your bidding.