KickStarter Grim Dawn

[Unkillable Cat]

So I'm in the final stages of the Malmouth expansion, and I think it's easily the most boring part of the game so far. Vast, endless mazes of tunnels through a blasted cityscape, yet there's only One True Path through it all. The only dungeon I've seen which is worse than Malmouth is Port Valbury, which takes this to the extreme. Malmouth at least offers some side tunnels to go down for extra content, but Port Valbury not only has just the one path, it is purposefully as long and winding as humanly possible. No shortcuts allowed.

Speaking of Port Valbury and the Dangerous/Treacherous Domains, I'm very disappointed in how the difficulty in these areas is artificially inflated by the additions of terrain-based hazards. Having tougher monsters is one thing, having arena fights that limit your kiting is another, and finally there are terrain hazards like mines, spitters and shit. Balancing these three things is the key to a fun but challenging dungeon. Grim Dawn don't care about that, it just throws all three at the player at once and lets them figure it all out. The Ancient Grove is a prime example of this, there's so much cheese in that dungeon alone. In Ugdobogen there are these large mushrooms that mostly count as scenery, but occasionally they're actually acid mines that go off if you walk on them. In the Ancient Grove they're all acid mines. Special mention goes to the baddies that do some new green-colored AOE attack in an area with an almost identically colored ground, so you don't see what's hurting you. But the final battle is the worst culprit of them all. The Boss monster there has a trillion HP but moves like molasses. To compensate for that the fight takes (at least) two rounds and the second round cuts down the arena size to a veritable strip on the very edge (because flamethrowers in the walls)... and suddenly the boss now moves faster despite being bigger in size. I want a challenge, not a trolling dungeon.

Also, small admission of sillyness on my part: I completely forgot about the Devotions. I took one look at that system at the start of the game, thought to myself "this system looks so convoluted, yet I'll bet there's only like one or two viable builds in there" and didn't give it any further thought until I'm at the outskirts of Malmouth and had about 35 Devotion points to spend. Turns out I was right, there are three viable builds in the Devotion system, and they all fork off of one 'essential' starter build, so kudos to the devs for making such a complex system that does fuck-all - except, as it turns out, crank up your character's powers up to 11.

Still, having a blast gunning through everything in sight. Most of my gear is either Rare or Epic by now (except for my Medal and Leggings which are Legendary) but my Bread and Butter, the two guns I'm packing? They're still Magic. RNJesus just doesn't seem interested in giving me Sum Gud Guns, and the current ones I got from storekeepers rather than loot chests. As a result I'm not doing optimal DPS, but so far I melt everything into dust in about 5-6 seconds unless it's some super-special boss. Like that Rashalga fight, that one took me ten minutes. I'm still dreading The Sentinel fight.

 

[Cyberarmy]

Yeah Malmouth expansions later areas are boring as hell. Funny swamp part was felt better for me eventhough I hate swamp maps as a habit.
Last expansion was fun for me btw, only monster variety was a bit lacking.

 

[Okagron]

Also, small admission of sillyness on my part: I completely forgot about the Devotions. I took one look at that system at the start of the game, thought to myself "this system looks so convoluted, yet I'll bet there's only like one or two viable builds in there" and didn't give it any further thought until I'm at the outskirts of Malmouth and had about 35 Devotion points to spend. Turns out I was right, there are three viable builds in the Devotion system, and they all fork off of one 'essential' starter build, so kudos to the devs for making such a complex system that does fuck-all - except, as it turns out, crank up your character's powers up to 11.

Which difficulty are you in? If Normal, yeah, the devotion system is not really required given how easy normal is (it still helps a ton tho). But Elite and specially Ultimate? It's mandatory.

I honestly love the devotion system. It's like a puzzle, you have to come up with a path that fits your build the best. Sure, at endgame, each build archetype and specific damage type usually end up with similar paths, but a lot of people like to use paths with different procs and skills to spice things up.

 

[PorkBarrellGuy]

So I'm in the final stages of the Malmouth expansion, and I think it's easily the most boring part of the game so far. Vast, endless mazes of tunnels through a blasted cityscape, yet there's only One True Path through it all. The only dungeon I've seen which is worse than Malmouth is Port Valbury, which takes this to the extreme. Malmouth at least offers some side tunnels to go down for extra content, but Port Valbury not only has just the one path, it is purposefully as long and winding as humanly possible. No shortcuts allowed.

Speaking of Port Valbury and the Dangerous/Treacherous Domains, I'm very disappointed in how the difficulty in these areas is artificially inflated by the additions of terrain-based hazards. Having tougher monsters is one thing, having arena fights that limit your kiting is another, and finally there are terrain hazards like mines, spitters and shit. Balancing these three things is the key to a fun but challenging dungeon. Grim Dawn don't care about that, it just throws all three at the player at once and lets them figure it all out. The Ancient Grove is a prime example of this, there's so much cheese in that dungeon alone. In Ugdobogen there are these large mushrooms that mostly count as scenery, but occasionally they're actually acid mines that go off if you walk on them. In the Ancient Grove they're all acid mines. Special mention goes to the baddies that do some new green-colored AOE attack in an area with an almost identically colored ground, so you don't see what's hurting you. But the final battle is the worst culprit of them all. The Boss monster there has a trillion HP but moves like molasses. To compensate for that the fight takes (at least) two rounds and the second round cuts down the arena size to a veritable strip on the very edge (because flamethrowers in the walls)... and suddenly the boss now moves faster despite being bigger in size. I want a challenge, not a trolling dungeon.

Also, small admission of sillyness on my part: I completely forgot about the Devotions. I took one look at that system at the start of the game, thought to myself "this system looks so convoluted, yet I'll bet there's only like one or two viable builds in there" and didn't give it any further thought until I'm at the outskirts of Malmouth and had about 35 Devotion points to spend. Turns out I was right, there are three viable builds in the Devotion system, and they all fork off of one 'essential' starter build, so kudos to the devs for making such a complex system that does fuck-all - except, as it turns out, crank up your character's powers up to 11.

Still, having a blast gunning through everything in sight. Most of my gear is either Rare or Epic by now (except for my Medal and Leggings which are Legendary) but my Bread and Butter, the two guns I'm packing? They're still Magic. RNJesus just doesn't seem interested in giving me Sum Gud Guns, and the current ones I got from storekeepers rather than loot chests. As a result I'm not doing optimal DPS, but so far I melt everything into dust in about 5-6 seconds unless it's some super-special boss. Like that Rashalga fight, that one took me ten minutes. I'm still dreading The Sentinel fight.

OK, so. PV fucking SUCKS, absolutely. I did it like... twice and decided there wasn't anything PV could offer me that made it worth slogging through. Ancient Grove is somewhat annoying and that boss fight is silly but I actually did it on my first go. Was genuinely surprised. Devotions are the epitome of squandered potential, but they are a must for Ultimate and recommended for Elite. Sentinel is, in my experience, MUCH easier than Rashalga. Rashalga is a fucking superboss. Few things are genuinely more dangerous than her - Rashalga is nastier than a lot of Nemeses, and IIRC Rashalga makes a habit out of obliterating pet builds. Sentinel can be rough, but it's mostly because of where you have to fight him.

 

[Zakhad]

So I'm in the final stages of the Malmouth expansion, and I think it's easily the most boring part of the game so far. Vast, endless mazes of tunnels through a blasted cityscape, yet there's only One True Path through it all. The only dungeon I've seen which is worse than Malmouth is Port Valbury, which takes this to the extreme. Malmouth at least offers some side tunnels to go down for extra content, but Port Valbury not only has just the one path, it is purposefully as long and winding as humanly possible. No shortcuts allowed.

Speaking of Port Valbury and the Dangerous/Treacherous Domains, I'm very disappointed in how the difficulty in these areas is artificially inflated by the additions of terrain-based hazards. Having tougher monsters is one thing, having arena fights that limit your kiting is another, and finally there are terrain hazards like mines, spitters and shit. Balancing these three things is the key to a fun but challenging dungeon. Grim Dawn don't care about that, it just throws all three at the player at once and lets them figure it all out. The Ancient Grove is a prime example of this, there's so much cheese in that dungeon alone. In Ugdobogen there are these large mushrooms that mostly count as scenery, but occasionally they're actually acid mines that go off if you walk on them. In the Ancient Grove they're all acid mines. Special mention goes to the baddies that do some new green-colored AOE attack in an area with an almost identically colored ground, so you don't see what's hurting you. But the final battle is the worst culprit of them all. The Boss monster there has a trillion HP but moves like molasses. To compensate for that the fight takes (at least) two rounds and the second round cuts down the arena size to a veritable strip on the very edge (because flamethrowers in the walls)... and suddenly the boss now moves faster despite being bigger in size. I want a challenge, not a trolling dungeon.

Also, small admission of sillyness on my part: I completely forgot about the Devotions. I took one look at that system at the start of the game, thought to myself "this system looks so convoluted, yet I'll bet there's only like one or two viable builds in there" and didn't give it any further thought until I'm at the outskirts of Malmouth and had about 35 Devotion points to spend. Turns out I was right, there are three viable builds in the Devotion system, and they all fork off of one 'essential' starter build, so kudos to the devs for making such a complex system that does fuck-all - except, as it turns out, crank up your character's powers up to 11.

Still, having a blast gunning through everything in sight. Most of my gear is either Rare or Epic by now (except for my Medal and Leggings which are Legendary) but my Bread and Butter, the two guns I'm packing? They're still Magic. RNJesus just doesn't seem interested in giving me Sum Gud Guns, and the current ones I got from storekeepers rather than loot chests. As a result I'm not doing optimal DPS, but so far I melt everything into dust in about 5-6 seconds unless it's some super-special boss. Like that Rashalga fight, that one took me ten minutes. I'm still dreading The Sentinel fight.

I agree that Port Valbury is not that much fun. I like the Ancient Grove, though...

It sounds like your resistances aren't that good (which is pretty common for a first character, especially if you haven't farmed bounties to get augments and are below level 70 when the armour augments become available). Bad poison resistance makes the whole of Ugdenbog and related areas a massive pain in the arse. You also ideally want some "break glass in case of emergancy" skills like MoE (can't remember what your build is so not sure if you have access to that). Depending on your build, there are a load of different skills that promote survivability in the devotions, e.g. Giant's blood.

Also shouldn't some of the monster-infrequent guns dropped in that area be better than your magic pistols? Try the merchant plant in the Ancient Grove, I think he stocks them? Or maybe just stocks the double-handed ones.

 

[Zakhad]

More generally: has anyone found an oathkeeper build that is fun to level/fun to play/survivable? The Warlord I tried to put together was insanely weak after playing an AAR arcanist build and a shaman/inquisitor two-hander ranged build as my most recent characters. The S/I jumped up to elite and has only died once, despite clearing out a lot of tough optional content. On the other hand, I had to level the Warlord for ages in veteran because it kept dying against bosses in elite/ultimate and it was still pretty uninspiring even with decent gear. I just don't see where the damage comes from that I can't do better with demo, or where the survivability comes from that I don't get from soldier, etc. Good for ploughing through basic mobs, but hopeless at bosses. AAR Arcanist could melt Rashalga in seconds on veteran, this guy.... can't. Am I missing something obvious? Poison builds more viable?

 

[Lone Wolf]

OK is - in my experience so far - a support class. Take it for its ability to frame a toon, not to act as a centrepiece. It's been pretty great for my OK/NB poison/acid build, because it provides an auto-attacker and the exclusive skill.

On the other hand, you might just be running into the Phys class (Soldier/OK/TH Shaman) early game malaise, where their survivability keeps you from dying, but the lethality just isn't there until you're getting the sets/legendaries. Levelling those guys is watching paint dry. That's why people usually recommend going relatively glass cannon with a spammable AOE for the early game, then re-speccing. A fun OK experience might be to take the first 15-20 levels in something (you'll be parterning the OK with, in any case) that has a reliable, spammable AOE early tier that you can clear Veteran with, quickly (and you'll finish AoM Veteran around lvl 60 with no farming). For example, when I was levelling my Cadence pistolero (DW Cadence ranged build), the single target lethality was huge, but it had no AOE. So what I did was that, for the first 35 levels, I was just spamming Word of Pain, basically cleaning the entire screen in two clicks.

Eventually, I'll respec that character into physical damage with some built in AOE for Cadence.

 

[Unkillable Cat]

I agree that Port Valbury is not that much fun. I like the Ancient Grove, though...

It sounds like your resistances aren't that good (which is pretty common for a first character, especially if you haven't farmed bounties to get augments and are below level 70 when the armour augments become available). Bad poison resistance makes the whole of Ugdenbog and related areas a massive pain in the arse. You also ideally want some "break glass in case of emergancy" skills like MoE (can't remember what your build is so not sure if you have access to that). Depending on your build, there are a load of different skills that promote survivability in the devotions, e.g. Giant's blood.

Also shouldn't some of the monster-infrequent guns dropped in that area be better than your magic pistols? Try the merchant plant in the Ancient Grove, I think he stocks them? Or maybe just stocks the double-handed ones.

You're absolutely right on the resistances, but the Devotions and improved loot drops have been helping me out. I went up against The Sentinel and he folded like a bad poker hand. The Shaper of Flesh took longer, but only because he kept assuming his Ultimate Form.

Now I'm done with Ashes of Malmouth, save for some reputation-based quests. I'm wondering whether I should jump straight over into Forgotten Gods or try to complete other content first and farm some rep.

I met up with the shopkeeper in the Ancient Grove, but he only had a single recipe for me. Meanwhile the shopkeeper in the Steps of Torment had so many recipes I spent over 600.000 bits with him. The shopkeeper in Port Valbury had nothing.

I've also been fortunate in finding enough materials for a couple of Dread Skulls, and they're now part of my kit.

 

[Lacrymas]

Just skip as much of the content as possible and do it on Ultimate. You should've skipped AoM too, but eh.

 

[Unkillable Cat]

So I started the new expansion, and the first chest I come across dropped a Totally Normal Shield.

Does the expansion have a lot of these 'joke' items?

 

[Zakhad]

So I started the new expansion, and the first chest I come across dropped a Totally Normal Shield.

Does the expansion have a lot of these 'joke' items?

Better than the joke items in the original and the first expansion (the soiled trousers and the fart helmet). I think this was just included so people can dual-wield shields (kinda).

 

[PorkBarrellGuy]

So I started the new expansion, and the first chest I come across dropped a Totally Normal Shield.

Does the expansion have a lot of these 'joke' items?

Better than the joke items in the original and the first expansion (the soiled trousers and the fart helmet). I think this was just included so people can dual-wield shields (kinda).

I remember there being idiots demanding dual-shield some time before Forgotten Gods was officially announced. In a way I'm glad Crate decided to turn their idiotic fever dream into a joke.

 

[udm]

More generally: has anyone found an oathkeeper build that is fun to level/fun to play/survivable? The Warlord I tried to put together was insanely weak after playing an AAR arcanist build and a shaman/inquisitor two-hander ranged build as my most recent characters. The S/I jumped up to elite and has only died once, despite clearing out a lot of tough optional content. On the other hand, I had to level the Warlord for ages in veteran because it kept dying against bosses in elite/ultimate and it was still pretty uninspiring even with decent gear. I just don't see where the damage comes from that I can't do better with demo, or where the survivability comes from that I don't get from soldier, etc. Good for ploughing through basic mobs, but hopeless at bosses. AAR Arcanist could melt Rashalga in seconds on veteran, this guy.... can't. Am I missing something obvious? Poison builds more viable?

My Oathkeeper/Soldier has something like 14k DPS (22k DPS with the special ability from the Rovers' elder's amulet) and 12k health with reasonably high resistances on Elite (except for Cold). I'm only using Soldier for the shield/physical passives. Using a ton of health regen and health leech items with physical and fire damage stacked. I did die a couple of times, but it was due to overconfidence. Generally, I can plow through bosses and heroes without breaking a sweat. Probably the only boss that I considered a challenge was Kravall, but that's because it had like a ton of cold spells, and cold was the only resist I didn't stack. I also have procs and skills that slow/stun enemies, so that might have helped?

Spoiler

 

[Zakhad]

More generally: has anyone found an oathkeeper build that is fun to level/fun to play/survivable? The Warlord I tried to put together was insanely weak after playing an AAR arcanist build and a shaman/inquisitor two-hander ranged build as my most recent characters. The S/I jumped up to elite and has only died once, despite clearing out a lot of tough optional content. On the other hand, I had to level the Warlord for ages in veteran because it kept dying against bosses in elite/ultimate and it was still pretty uninspiring even with decent gear. I just don't see where the damage comes from that I can't do better with demo, or where the survivability comes from that I don't get from soldier, etc. Good for ploughing through basic mobs, but hopeless at bosses. AAR Arcanist could melt Rashalga in seconds on veteran, this guy.... can't. Am I missing something obvious? Poison builds more viable?

My Oathkeeper/Soldier has something like 14k DPS (22k DPS with the special ability from the Rovers' elder's amulet) and 12k health with reasonably high resistances on Elite (except for Cold). I'm only using Soldier for the shield/physical passives. Using a ton of health regen and health leech items with physical and fire damage stacked. I did die a couple of times, but it was due to overconfidence. Generally, I can plow through bosses and heroes without breaking a sweat. Probably the only boss that I considered a challenge was Kravall, but that's because it had like a ton of cold spells, and cold was the only resist I didn't stack. I also have procs and skills that slow/stun enemies, so that might have helped?

Spoiler

I'll be honest, I find your inventory massively triggering... why store all those components in there and not in the shared stash?

I've moved on to a Sentinel for the moment, which I like a lot more so far, and is doing about 12k at level 38 with pretty good survivability (but not enough resists yet).

 

[udm]

I'll be honest, I find your inventory massively triggering... why store all those components in there and not in the shared stash?

Nah man just did a run and sold off the green items. Haven't had time to store components in the stash yet.

 

[Zakhad]

I'll be honest, I find your inventory massively triggering... why store all those components in there and not in the shared stash?

Nah man just did a run and sold off the green items. Haven't had time to store components in the stash yet.

ahhhhhhh

 

[Unkillable Cat]

I'm pretty much done with Grim Dawn. While overall enjoyable, there are some serious basic underlying flaws that detract from the experience.

I didn't think much of the Ashes of Malmouth areas due to them feeling rushed and just adding content for the sake of content. But Forgotten Gods? It's even worse at this. AoM at least had an interesting setting and backstory to keep me interested, but Forgotten Gods makes me think the devs went: "Hey! We have all these assets from the Titan Quest game! Let's recycle those!" and then just ported over lots of TQ stuff into Grim Dawn. I was not impressed or interested by the Forgotten Gods expansion area at any point.

I played on Normal+Veteran (mostly because nothing else was available from a fresh install) and after having looked at the shenanigans with the higher difficulty levels I'm not gonna bother. Playing through easier difficulty levels should NEVER be an essential requirement for advancement, but Grim Dawn asks this not once, but TWICE.

Thanks, but no thanks.

 

[Hobo Elf]

Babby's first Diablo clone? Not that I disagree, but that has been a genre staple since the genres inception, and it's showing no signs of leaving. There are lots of moronic things that are done simply because Diablo did it before and breaking conventions would be catastrophic. The sheer volume of people who want every new ARPG to replicate the Diablo 2 class design should clue you in on how simple the fans are and how much they just want to experience the exact same game design each time a new ARPG comes along.

 

[pomenitul]

What I want is a Diablo clone that builds on 1 rather than 2. This may seem counterintuitive but what the first instalment had and that subsequent attempts discarded was focus.

 

[Hobo Elf]

What I want is a Diablo clone that builds on 1 rather than 2. This may seem counterintuitive but what the first instalment had and that subsequent attempts discarded was focus.

I prefer replaying D1 than D2 because it is as you say, focused. Furthermore the lack of grind needed to beat the game is nice. In D2 you rely on RNG drops to do the higher difficulty levels unless you happen to play a Druid. In Diablo 1 all the good items are given to you via quests. I'd like more loot determinism in this genre and less brainless loot grind, but I'm the minority here and the genre has been hijacked by people who suffer from crippling gambling addiction.

 

[Sykar]

What I want is a Diablo clone that builds on 1 rather than 2. This may seem counterintuitive but what the first instalment had and that subsequent attempts discarded was focus.

I prefer replaying D1 than D2 because it is as you say, focused. Furthermore the lack of grind needed to beat the game is nice. In D2 you rely on RNG drops to do the higher difficulty levels unless you happen to play a Druid. In Diablo 1 all the good items are given to you via quests. I'd like more loot determinism in this genre and less brainless loot grind, but I'm the minority here and the genre has been hijacked by people who suffer from crippling gambling addiction.

No just no. The best items for many slots are random drops like Obsidian Ring of the Zodiac or King's Sword of Haste. The only other source for those is Wirt.
I also do not see how D1 is more... focused. It is extremely primitive and character builds hardly vary. This is due to large part the fact that you will easily maximize all your attributes, there is little thought going into them in the long run once you brought back the Black Mushroom, or are at that stage when attribute boosting potions can be bought and drop. Skills is the same problem, you get them as high as possible. All character have the same spells, the only difference is how high you can get the spell level which is tied to your magic attribute.
The only area in which D1 is superior to D2 by a small notch is atmosphere. Otherwise D2 until 1.09 is superior to D1. Starting with 1.10 the powercreep became retarded though.

 

[Matalarata]

Grim Dawn asks this not once, but TWICE

Once you access higher difficulty levels you can buy "merits" from the misc vendor in FG and have each subsequent character start from that tier. Also, while I found the world interesting and the atmosphere above par (comparing GD to other ARPG), if you ever wish to play it again do yourself a favor and just push through normal without exlporing everything, just rush the seal of the Loghorrean, unlock elite and consider everything before that as an extended "tutorial". Personally, I haven't had time to play in month but my next char will try starting from elite on level 1, should spice things up quite a bit.

 

[rusty_shackleford]

did they ever do anything about the absurd loot distribution for a singleplayer game?

 

[Lacrymas]

It depends on what exactly you want. They reduced the chance for duplicates (even though I still get them quite often), and they added a smith/artisan who can transform your set items to other items in the set or to another random set. Which means you can craft hoods for the major sets if you have the recipes and transform them into the other parts of the set. The price is always the same, however, even if you want to transform level 20 sets, which I find ridiculous.

It seems like they made/are going to make AAR pierce through enemies. Neat.

 

[RoBoBOBR]

they added a smith/artisan who can transform your set items to other items in the set or to another random set

where is he located?