You can lessen Marathon's faction rep grind by doing more than just contracts

Hopping into Marathon's server slam last week, I was surprised to see you can still have only one contract active at a time. People have had larger complaints — hard-to-parse items, a confusing UI, and a fast TTK — but the grindiness of Marathon's faction system was a bit of a turn off for me.

I was trying to rank up NuCaloric by doing contracts on Perimeter and realised the faction rewards you for looting Tick Nests, which usually spawn in the same places. After finishing a contract I headed for the Tick Nests in the Data Wall and the infested building in the Columns; each nest I looted granted 10 extra rep, which added up on top of the contract reward.

You might not always complete a contract every run, but if you remember your faction's reputation actions and complete those bonus actions you can keep progressing rep no matter what you're doing. That approach helps make the one-contract system feel a little less grindy.

marathon, server slam, faction rep, contracts, nucaloric, perimeter, tick nests, data wall, columns, reputation actions