Today Last Epoch released their plan to launch Trade and Item Factions with the game’s full release on February 21st. Player trading is a wildly contested topic in most ARPGs and other loot-based games. You may love auction houses and trading items for currency or you may just want to trade items with your friends while playing. Both options are now viable with Last Epoch’s new faction system. If implemented well, this could revolutionize trading in ARPGs and add a great level of depth to their cycles (seasons). Let’s recap their announcement and take a deep dive into Last Epoch’s player factions.

We’ll see a couple more previews before the 1.0 release of Last Epoch, including a Warlock and Falconer class mastery preview. Check out the roadmap below.

Trade & Item Factions for Last Epoch

The first green flag here is that Last Epoch has been working closely with the community to develop a fun and valuable trading system. Something they’ve been developing since December 22, 2022. Item Factions were a result of community feedback, to allow players to make meaningful and rewarding choices in how they want to empower their loot chase. Factions will satisfy both schools of thought when it comes to trading in ARPGs. One wanting to hunt down gear on their own and with close friends and the other wanting to buy/sell in a player marketplace. The nitty gritty details are included in Last Epoch’s forum post on the topic, but here are the main takeaways.

As you progress through the story each cycle, you will be presented with a choice to join either the Circle of Fortune or the Merchant’s Guild. Both will include rank rewards as you gain reputation and progress through faction-specific challenges. The higher your rank, the more benefits you will gain from being part of that faction. Both factions go up to rank 10, which is shared across your account (within that game mode), and you can change factions at any time. In addition to that, your level is not lost if you choose to switch factions! However, you will only be able to equip some items if you are still in that faction, at that reward level. So, there are definitely advantages to staying with one faction, but you aren’t locked in for the entire cycle.

We’ll also see faction vendors with gambling mechanics. These vendors will use favor, a new currency you’ll earn as part of your faction. They will also sell exalted items early on, which can help you level multiple characters and be a great motivation to join a specific faction. But don’t worry, these items will be outpaced by endgame items to promote other gameplay loops

Resonances for Friend Trading

Lastly, for the portion of the community that would only like to trade with their party, Last Epoch plans to allow for that as well. They’re introducing resonances in 1.0. This item will drop when you play with someone for an extended period of time. Using resonance on an item will enable it to be gifted to that player, even if they weren’t present when the item dropped! That’s pretty amazing for those of us who have that top 5!

Check out the rest of the recap here on Last Epoch’s YouTube channel.