Mm, I think I may actually have been determined to try at 100 true for a bit (darn pride!), and then 125 true, and then 150, making it a bit easier.
I’ve definitely started just trying to make life easier and raising Hoards to more comfortable levels (when possible) for the Faction runs.
There’s nothing that kills the desire for a play session or sours the end of one like a few failed Faction 500s, imo 
(honestly just not a great user experience, I don’t think, with the combination of limited tries and low chance of success – subject to randomness – yet impacting on progress).
This.
For me, that’s the kicker —
I don’t mind that it’s hard.
I don’t mind that it’s subject to luck and randomness (at least, not too much).
What I mind is that I can’t keep trying anytime I fail.
Let me try again and again. I will still fail again and again, trust me — Orc’s honor.
And I will still have limited attempts per-day because each attempt can take an hour or more, in certain factions. So limit me by my own time constraints rather than this artificially imposed energy system that gasp! Gems of War totally has and really should stop pretending it doesn’t have.
And — oh — if the reason unlimited attempts isn’t already in the game is that the devs are worried about people just resetting to get the ideal rooms they want to reach the boss, two things:
1 – this is bad design because it means there are “ideal paths” when, if these paths were balanced better, each would be considered equal to its fellows, thus eliminating any way for the player to “game the pathway” to success. Players shouldn’t be roadblocked by RNG — they should be roadblocked by intentionally-designed challenges and game mechanics (which can be governed by RNG, but I don’t want to get too in the weeds here).
2 – the more important point here (though I think #1 probably points to why “the problem” exists in the first place, and so is valuable for that reason) because it points to a “solution” for the fear of “pathway gaming,” is that there is a way to prevent this that already exists in the code: re: gnome appearances; if a player quits a battle where no gnome shows up, hoping to farm more, that player is denied the chance of a future spawn until a battle is actually completed. The same could be done for room reshuffles: if players quit-out rather than play a fight, then when they reload they just get the same “bad” room configuration.
So a removal of the delve sigil energy system should happen. It would make people who like delves happy to be able to engage more with the mode they enjoy. It would make it easier for new players to catch up. And it would make it more likely that people wouldn’t be unable to sink their gold into hoards due to lack of treasures because this would also allow the farming of chaos shards (which — if that is a “problem,” too, could easily be throttled just by having the delve chests no longer roll for shards/gold/whatever-is-deemed-“too-valuable” after the third roll of the day).
Think it over. For the Horde
Or just straight up have no chests at all for anything beyond the third attempt.
… not saying that this is ideal …
Of course I would LOVE to see unlimited attempts in the future but it’s highly doubtful. For one, this would make shards amazingly farmable. Which would be a fantastic thing from a player perspective, but takes away from their tuesday event which is really where they want players spending their gems and time. If players could just grind infinitely it would def throw the underworld economy for a loop. Again, as a player, I would love to see this happen lol. Even a bump to 5 or 6 attempts would be welcomed.
While I agree this is def an energy system, it’s not one you can pay to increase. I don’t know if I’d want to see a paid version of extra daily sigils though, it just seems dirty to even think about it like that.
The forever systems will always(i hope always anyway) will be explore and pvp. Outside of that it’s fair game in terms of gacha microtransactions and gem sinking.
As we get closer to all factions being in the game I think having a way to help newer players, and players still yet to finish delves, would be a nice help. I don’t think delves will ever be unlimited like explore or pvp, nor should it be. But I do believe increasing the daily amount of sigils would be a nice compromise to this problem. The other help would be boosting the xp gain from treasure or reducing the cost to level hoard, or both!
Exactly!
I could be wrong, but I think the infrastructure is all there:
Using language from the game:
Ta-da!!!
We already have events that include Kingdom or Troop Type restrictions locked in.
Defeating Level 500 with daily Sigils could unlock the right-hand panel in my first image. It would cost 0 Sigils, and include no Delve Chest as a reward (and therefore no chance of farming Shards or similar).
As someone who is catching up on this game after a 2 year hiatus, what is generally considered the easiest faction to get to 2500 renown?
The next one to be released, since you have three days and access to Potions of Power. Failing that, I’d guess Amanithrax or Primal Rift.
I would say Amanithrax for sure. King Gobtruffle just keeps looping.
I think I went with Explodestool and 3x Gobtruffle.
I’m going to have to disagree a bit and say The Deep Hive. Amanithrax is indeed one of the easier delves but it’s a minimum five rooms (more chances for things to turn against you). It took me a lot more tries than I expected to beat it potionless. The Deep Hive uses practically the same strategy but Queen Beetrix is a stronger troop than Gobtruffle.
Amanithrax and Deep Hive;
then (in no particular order) Depths of Sin, Emperinazar, Tinkertown, Wild Court, Primal Rift, Crypt Keepers, Silver Necropolis, Illithia, Fell Roost, Mirrored Halls;
after that the rest.
Beetrix may be stronger with her true damage but only 40% chance of extra turn. Once King Gobtruffle gets going the enemy never even gets a chance to hit back. Gobtruffle may be a bit slower but much safer.
With 2 Beetrix on board i could easily wipe out lvl 500 pure faction on deep hive, with truffles, you need to proc your passive, or you will get short on mana. Beetrix not only gets 40% chance for extra turn, but her gem creating also leads to a lot of match4/match5. IMO, she’s more reliable on relooping, than truffle. + Deep Hive faction has that Bug, who gains armor and barrier on cast - tank, which Amanitrax doesn’t have.
I’m for Deep Hive with this one 
from other things:
pure faction Mirrored Halls, Hoard 101, faction bonus 50% (had lots of Blue deeds laying arround, so pushed Glacial Peaks to 15 before starting attempt). Doppleganger into Glutonny strategy.
Started with:
Glass Golem
Doppelganger
Copy Cat
Mirrored Queen
Mirrored Halls banner
battle1:
Make sure you dont lose your Doppelganger (or any troops, shouldn’t be difficult).
Ended up with my team untouched.
battle2:
It had Glutonny, so doppelganger changed into it, ate few enemies. Downside was that Glass Golem died in the proces. Ended up with setup:
Glutonny
Copy Cat
Mirror Queen
Boss battle:
Managed to charge Gluton quite fast, but he failed to eat Glass Golem. Focused him 1st for 2 reasons: eating him, would give glutton a lot of armor and hp + it would allow to skull hit enemy doppelganger before he could transform. Manages to fill copy cat with gem explosions, from glutton cast and… copy cat, copied gluttony.
battle was like:
| me | vs | Ai |
|---|---|---|
| Gluttony | Glass Golem | |
| Gluttony | Doppelganger | |
| Copy Cat | Copy Cat | |
| Mirror Queen | Mirror Queen |
I felt pretty confident as this point, but than… enemy doppelganger changed into Gluttony… oh boy… will be nasty…AI might eat my Queen, and skull bash everything else…
| me | vs | Ai |
|---|---|---|
| Gluttony | Glass Golem | |
| Gluttony | Gluttony | |
| Copy Cat | Copy Cat | |
| Mirror Queen | Mirror Queen |
Next few rounds it looked pretty bad. No luck with Gluttony devour, but enemy was pretty dumb with his Gluttony, as he targeted… my Gluttony (immune to devour…) And than, whoohooo, 2 casts and 2 enemy troops eaten: Golem and Queen:
| me | vs | Ai |
|---|---|---|
| Gluttony | ||
| Gluttony | Gluttony | |
| Copy Cat | Copy Cat | |
| Mirror Queen |
Here comes RNG with enemy glutton having skull skyfalls from nowhere and making the board look like this:
| me | vs | Ai |
|---|---|---|
| Gluttony | ||
| Copy Cat | Copy Cat | |
| Mirror Queen |
Managed to finish off, enemy Gluttony with Queen cast, or something meaningfull like 3skull match.
Thing is, once board started to look like this:
| me | vs | Ai |
|---|---|---|
| Copy Cat | Copy Cat | |
| Mirror Queen |
I knew it’s just a cleanup. Copy Cat, copied himself into copies etc. and my copy cat, copied Queen. At one point it looked like this:
| me | vs | Ai |
|---|---|---|
| Mirror Queen | Copy Cat | |
| Mirror Queen | Copy Cat | |
| Copy Cat | Copy Cat | |
| Mirror Queen | Copy Cat |
But it was the clean up part. As each AI summoned copy is weaker than the original caster i didn’t lost a single troop, while clearing it up:
| me | vs | Ai |
|---|---|---|
| Mirror Queen | ||
| Mirror Queen | ||
| Copy Cat | ||
| Mirror Queen |
Another 2500, with hoard ~100.
Edit: Sorry for no screenshots, but didn’t count I’ll make it on 1st attempt, especialy after loosing Golem in 2nd battle…
Late to the party, but this topic feels dead anways.
Beat pure faction 500 first try with potions
Hoard 199, 50% hoard, 4 tier 7, 3 medals of season
Took a lot of damage in the boss room, but it wasn’t too hard.
Horned Guardian, Mechataur, Mechataur, King Minos (Maze Banner)
Dont leave room 1 without your Horned Guardian being the top slot. Leave Rhinotaur for last as its the easiest way to fix team order. Just let it cast and knock the back troop to the front until HG is up front again.
Focus on the enemy Horned Guardian in the last room first. Even if your other 3 troops die, you can still solo the delve with your Horned Guardian if their Horned Guardian is dead.
Had The King Highforge/Queen Ysabelle legendary room. Focused on Highforge, and barriered when Ysabelle casted. Had Viper/Venoxia. Focused on Venoxia, then Viper.
Unfortunately, this is a stat check delve so… no potion is probably a nightmare.
Biggest help of potions here is the barrier at the start of battle…
I took your advice and my sanity is intact!
Threads died because of the stupid design to grief players.
First time I’ve chosen to do a faction with potions, as all others completed without.
I tried this morning with 2 attempts without potions. I quit both times due to having insufficient damage vs Horned Guardian getting out of range. First time it skulled away 3 of my troops before I quit.
Second time pretty much the same.
Spent min poss Tiers and hoard 166. Kingdom 25%.
Same strategy, all damage to Horned. The Rhino killed 2 troops at boss due to enrage and skull 
sky battalion but finished with 2 more or less fully intact.
I may have a couple of further potionless goes some time if it actually meant anything - but probably not.
Apologies to those wanting me to maintain the potionless full completion of all without doing with potions. 
agreed, horrible horrible faction… it’s some sort of gem sink rather than a challenge at this point …
Used the advice here and beat it at pf 500 on my third try.
Hoard 124, Kingdom 15, 3 tier 7, 3 season medals.
This is my first time completing a Faction with potions. I’ve had a lot of free time. It takes ages and if I had anything better to do than sit at home, I’d rather do that instead.
Wasn’t quite as hard as I expected, but as I said, I’ve never done a pf run at 500 before lol; they were definitely a help over potion-less runs. Having no images for the opponents was tons of fun, the black boxes are epic troop art and I hope they keep it for the next Fation. 
Labrynth PF 500…ugh
Hoard 100, Kingdom 50% bonus, Legendary Pet with Tier 7 potions x7
2 Nysha & 1 Orpheus medals
After two failed attempts, I switched up the team order
Mechataur
King Minos
Horned Guardian
Mechataur
Dragon Banner
I Medalled Horned Guardian & Mechataur (mainly to get the 5 medalled troops for kingdom level 21)
The idea of moving Horned Guardian back a few spots was to make it easier to finish the 1st battle with the tank in 1st slot. It Worked like a charm. 2nd fight was against Glaycion, 3rd was the Shadow Hunter.
Final battle I focused on Mechataur, then King Minos, then Horned Guardian, hoping that Silence would come into play. I tried to wait till I had both Mech’s filled before I cast them.
I wasn’t able to play much on the weekend, so tried to rush and get most of it completed on Friday. Finished up to 500 on Friday and then knocked out PF Saturday morning.
Doubt I’ll even bother attempting this without potions. Putting it in the rear view mirror and moving on.
So, Labyrinth potionless…
Short version - bang your head against the wall. Trust me, it’s more fun.
Longer version:
300 true hoard (200 + 50%); Horned Guardian/2x Mechataur/King Minos.
You can get out of starting room pretty consistently, but - getting out with Horned Guardian in front is altogether different; the choice of winning the room with scrambled team versus they kill my troop comes up pretty often.
I got to boss room with correct lineup once (all incorrect lineups ended even before that) - choose the dreaded Liar of Random over this every day. 300 true is simply not enough to even make a dent; anything you can do is much too slow and much too late (well, of course, if you always got sky gems and kept them constantly silent…).
Even without armor their Mechataur does too much damage, so you can’t fully concentrate on taking down Horned Guardian; their King does too much damage, so you can’t fully concentrate on taking down Horned Guardian and by that point in time Horned Guardian is too big to kill…oh, did I mention that - very likely - your Horned Guardian will be sent somewhere back as soon as the first opportunity occurs?
Maybe 450 true (seems like an absolute minimum, but wouldn’t be surprised is it’s still to little and creeps up to way more) would give some chance, but I’m not going to try.
So far, I’d say is this is hands down the most obnoxious, annoying and stupidest (put your own cursewords here) delve of them all.
Thank you enormously for creating this pleasure!
I just found this thread and wanted to ask something:
How do people get treasures? I have a REALLY hard time accumulating enough for basicalyl anything. I resort to leveling my new hoards with Chalices ONLY to 100 so that if I need to push further I got better treasures at least and it won’t take ages.
I’m resorting to doing CoT at low level just to farm now but it’s such a waste cause for some stupid reason they thought limiting delves to 3/day was a good move. I agree with someone post about either lifting that limit or making PURE runs cost nothing. So many runs I’ve wasted and since you get fuck all rewards when you don’t finish (especially when doing least amount of rooms cause you’re trying to do pure) you get basically nothing for it and can’t up hoard either. So your choices are to either farm CoT (or another low level one) or try again. There’s no inbetween. You never get to advance in any way.
My plan now is to just farm CoT, get all remaining hoards to 200 before even trying again. Might as well farm a lot before trying and not wasting my time and get frustrated over the damn cascades that always seem to happen.