Path Of Exile 3.26 Mercenaries Of Trarthus League Mechanic: How Does It Work? - Mechanic Detailed

As Path of Exile 3.26 Secrets of the Atlas’s release date draws closer, players are increasingly looking forward to some new content that this new league will bring to the game, such as new items and mechanisms. Among them, Mercenaries of Trarthus League Mechanic is the one that players pay the most attention to.

In this league mechanism, you will be able to challenge, recruit and create mercenaries who can help you kill enemies and provide additional loot with new exclusive enhancement affixes during the exploration process. If you effectively match it with your skill gems or passive skills, you will have a super high advantage in the campaign in POE 3.26.

However, it is worth noting that since this mercenary mechanism has not yet been officially launched, this guide will give you an introduction to the operation of Mercenaries of Trarthus League Mechanic and what new game experience it may bring to you based on some information currently released by the developer and player comments.

Who Are Mercenaries?

According to the developer, each area you explore will have a Trarthan Mercenary NPC, who will show you everything in his backpack after interacting with you, such as the items equipped, skill gems, and the contents of his pockets.

Not only that, it will also provide you with a window with three options: Hire, Take Item, or Exile. No matter which one you choose, you need to fight this mercenary first, because only if you win can you gain the right to dominate it.

If you are unfortunately defeated by it, the mercenary will be teleported away, and you will not encounter this mercenary with the same gear and skill gems again in this league. So it is highly recommended that you consider your exploration needs while also considering whether your build has the ability to complete this battle.

For example, when you find that its skills are mainly based on fire elemental damage, you need to buy POE Divine Orbs to make your build’s fire resistance affix better, thereby improving your survivability in this battle and keeping the power of choice firmly in your hands. After that, you can choose from the following options.

Hire

First of all, you hiring this mercenary as a permanent combat assistant need to spend some Gold, which is one of the most important currencies for settlers in Settlers of Kalguur League.

You will encounter a variety of mercenaries while exploring POE 3.26, and once you find one with stronger combat abilities or one with skills and equipment that suit your build, you can discard the previous one and hire the next one.

This way, the mercenary will be counted as half a player, so you have a team of 1.5 players, which will make your subsequent battles more difficult, but also provide you with more loot. If you find a way to make their abilities and difficulties offset each other, you will have a helper who can help you get extra loot!

By the way, you can only hire up to three mercenaries, but you can only choose one to fight by your side, which means that you need to choose a more suitable mercenary as your most capable assistant according to different combat needs or exploration needs.

Take Item

If you find a more effective item among the items shown to you by this mercenary, then you can choose this option. After the battle, you can choose an item from its equipment, a Trarthan Gem, which is new variants of existing skills, similar to Transfigured gems, or all the items in its pockets.

On top of that, if you encounter Infamous Mercenaries, they can even provide you with rare items with exclusive attributes, which are very difficult to farm in the early stages of your POE 3.26 exploration.

Exile

Of course, not all mercenaries are worth using, so you can choose to exile them and prevent any mercenaries with the two attribute types you choose from appearing in the next 10 areas.

Although the current developers have always praised players for getting more high-quality loot from this mechanism, the appearance of this option always makes people feel very strange, and it always indicates that players are likely to encounter enemies like Rogue Exiles in POE 2.

Please note that the mercenaries you defeated but did not hire or exile will not disappear permanently, they will return to your town and be ready to challenge you again. However, if you want to fight the same mercenary again, you will need to resurrect him by paying a certain amount of gold.

About Mercenary More

As I just said, the specific information of each Mercenary will be displayed in the interface that appears when you interact with it, which may include level, attributes, all items carried, and skills, etc. You can use this to determine whether it can be used by you.

Level & Attributes

What needs to be paid attention to here is that the level of the mercenary will not change, and it will always be fixed at the level you have when you hire them. So when recruiting, try to choose stronger mercenaries instead of higher-level mercenaries.

As for attributes, since the developer has too little description of them, but based on Rogue Exiles with similar mechanisms in POE 2 and the previous league mechanism, it can be inferred that they are likely to affect its combat capabilities and the gear and gems you have captured in it.

Items

After you hire a mercenary, you can give it the gear you have invested a lot of POE currency to upgrade it to replace its original weak gear, just like you equip another self.

However, once you discard or replace a mercenary’s original gear, it will no longer be usable by this mercenary or other mercenaries, so please think carefully before making these operations.

Skill Gems

Like your character, a mercenary can have up to 6 skill gems that can be linked to support gems, and they cannot be changed after you hire them. You can only obtain more effective skill gems by recruiting stronger mercenaries.

It is worth mentioning here that a small number of mercenaries will have Gilded Supports, which is one of the most powerful support gems in the current Path of Exile 3.26 league, which can bring extremely high bonuses for you and the mercenary.

The above is a part of the specific operation method and contents of Mercenaries of Trarthus League Mechanic that appeared in the new league of POE 3.26 Secrets of the Atlas. Although this is not the first time that the developer has introduced a mercenary mechanism in the game, its addition may allow players to have a better gaming experience and create more builds possibilities. I wish you a happy game!