An Arcanist's Problems (And More)

Grim Dawn General Discussion
1
  • I’ll post a TL;DR-Version below -

Hey guys! <3
I just recently stumbled upon this game by accident. I used to play Titan Quest back in the days and was a huge fan of it; that being said, I was quite young back then and only played it casually - never even bothered about hardcore mode etc. Don’t even know if I ever finnished a normal run tbh. I bought GD while it was on sale and it is finally a solo-game I enjoy again, so I definatly will invest some time in it. However, I don’t really have much time to play during the week, so I’d rather ask for some help, than to figure out stuff the “hard way” (like being 1-shot every single time cause of sucky gear).
That’s why I will post some questions below and if someone is willing to answers some (or all?) of them, I’d really appreciate the invested time and the answers. Not all of them are ingame-question, as you will notice.
Additional Information: I do NOT own any DLC (yet?). Only the basic game.

1. Arcanist and then what?
I just finnished the first playthrough on normal difficulty (perfect timing to create a forum account and post this thread, yey!) and ended up still not having chosen a second class, cause I just don’t know what to pick!
I really really enjoy Panetti’s replicating missile and I set it as a mandatory requirement for whatever build I will be playing.
I have been using gear that increases mostly Aether-Dmg so far, mixed with some fire damage and some other stuff. It did not appear to be important in normal mode to have specific gear, so I had no problem to go through it.
My maxed out skills are obv PRM (except supercharged), Devastation and Reckless power. Got some 1-Point skills to “try them”, but nothing I frequently use (except Mirror of Eroectos).
I feel like there are so much more skills I need to lvl up, especially the passive skills on the very bottom of the skilltree. Investing in most of them will decrease my skillpoints drastically though, which would result into less points spending on a second class.
Yet I have not had a need to pick a second class (as, to me, it seems Arcanist is a great class on it’s own), but I’d like one that complements my playstyle of using PRM. Maybe something that debuffs resistances? Something that gives me survivability? Something with single target nuke?

So my question is: What second class could I choose to make “my” PRM-Arcanist even better?
[u]

  1. Arcanist passives[/u]
    This is probably depending on the first question, but what passive skills of arcanist should I look into, if I want to mainly use PRM?
    Do I need Iskandra’s Elemental Exchange for example? I read it only affects weapon damage or skills that use %weapon damage as a component, so to me it appears to be useless for PRM. What about the upgrades of it though? Does it make a huge difference?
    Do I want the %spirit from Inner focus? Do I need reduced energy cost on skills from mental alacrity? Is the wasted +chaos dmg from Fabric of reality a reason to not invest into it?

Question here: What passive skills of Arcanist should I invest in?

3. Devotions
There are awesome constellations in the DLC for Aether damage. Sadly, I do not have access to them (yet?), so I have to invest into other constellations.
Should I focus on getting defensive constellations for the upcomming reduced resistances? Or invest into more offensive ones?
The only “huge” constellation I could see myself invest in is the Spear of the Heavens - with “wasted” Lightning damage. Plus, I read the skill of it is kinda lackluster.

Question: What constellations should I invest in (as (PRM) Arcanist)?

4. Reroll Equipment
Some gear I found was nearly perfectly fitting my needs, but some stats of it would just be wasted. If I could just tweak this one +vitality-dmg and turn it into something else… or try to get the 11% dmg to 20% - Welp. Is it possible? I have not yet found a NPC that allows me to reroll the stats of an item. But maybe I am just blind.

Question: Can you reroll/replace stats of gear?

5. DLC
While the Ashes of Malmouth DLC offers great Constellations and probably even classes, is it worth (the money)? Keep in mind I bought the basic game for around a fourth of the originaly price and hesitated buying it for the full price (the full price is still low, don’t get me wrong, I just don’t have that much money to spend on games) - Still, I allready spend more time on the game than I intended to and I like it way more than I expected to, so I definatly do consider purchasing the DLC. (And if I continue playing, I might aswell make a “good character” - with the Aether-Dmg conestalltions, that is.) That said, is the content/stuff the DLC offers “enough” to justify buying it? Like, did you play it thinking “this is a great addition, gladly I bought the dlc!”?
What about the crucible mode? Is that something you guys would recommend? Tbh, I have little to no information about it yet, might have to look into it first though.
Also, if I buy the AoM-Dlc, will I keep my characters as he is? Or do I have to restart him or whatever?

Question: DLC(s) worth it or ney?
[u]

  1. Endgame Content[/u]
    What does the “endgame” look like? Will I be running the same game over and over again, farming the same mobs till I finally drop the gear/components I want to max out my builds? Or is there something more to do? I’d be fine with that though, I kinda like grinding stuff and seeing my geared up character in action, getting better and better. - But maybe there’s more, so I’ll just ask.

Question: What is there to do in the endgame?


7. Multiplayer
I know this game supports multiplayer. I couldn’t convince my friendy to buy the game, so I’m playing alone for now. Do people from the community - so, uh, YOU - host sessions for newbs like me to join in just for the lulz? Or is it either single playing or hardcore-farming with pre-invited mates?

Question: If I have no friends (that bought the game, that is), am I restricted to solo-playing?


TL;DR-Version:
What second class could I choose to make “my” PRM-Arcanist even better?
What passive skills of Arcanist should I invest in?
What constellations should I invest in (as (PRM) Arcanist)?
Can you reroll/replace stats of gear?
DLC(s) worth it or ney?
What is there to do in the endgame?
If I have no friends am I restricted to solo-playing?

Well, I guess that’s it for now.
Thank you a lot for reading through this!
Maybe these questions have been answered a billion times before, but googling those question only led me to threads of the year 1993 or threads not really making up my mind.
If you are willing to help out a newb, I’d really appreciate your effort! Any input on class selection is welcomed! Any recommendation for constellations is wanted! Any money for the DLCs is gladly taken! (jk ofc)

With love and regards,
John McLaren

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Hi welcome to the game!

1 & 5)
I can recommend that you read this guide about what to do with an Arcanist as a new Grim Dawn player http://www.grimdawn.com/forums/showthread.php?t=80822 but you need the AoM dlc for that :stuck_out_tongue: :wink: So you have probably guessed that the AoM dlc is SO WORTH IT, it is a completely different game if you grab it. Totally worth it!

  1. No you cant reroll stats on items.

  2. End-game. You can farm, you can test your builds against nemeses and other though special monsters. And you make more builds. That is what Grim Dawn is for me, make many many wierd builds and test them

  3. Multiplayer is kinda meh, since there is no server and everyone is playing with their single player chars (which are easy to modify/cheat) and the monster scaling is kinda broken in GD MP.

And you cant play MP with people that has the AoM expansion…

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Since you don’t have the DLC the most sensible second mastery would be demolitionist or occultist I guess. Demo grants flat resistance reduction on blackwater cocktail and occultist has frailty. If you like aether damage then demo would make more sense. Bear in mind though without the dlc I think aether PRM is hard to make work due to lack of conversion gear, can’t recall though.

I think the best class for PRM uses dlc mastery though (inquisitor).

Ideally you will have some slow and stun resist. 3k DA/OA is the standard goal for crucible crafted builds. Usually this means at least one +%DA constellation and some flat DA from devotion if needed also. Otherwise it’s up to you whether you mix in some defensive devotion like dryad/behemoth or ghoul+flame torrent.

4

I like battlemage as the soldier mastery beefs up where the arcanist lacks.

Here is a link with my suggested passives/skill trees. I’ve left off points, so that i didn’t exceed the 85 level cap of base game.

I also didn’t include items, as I don;t know what you have in your stash, nor do i want to spoil finding the new items for you :slight_smile:

There is also a devotion setup (50 points for base game). Looking where the OA and DA figures ended up, you should end up more on the cannon side of the equation. But overall will come out fairly balanced once you put physique up to 1050 to wear all heavy armour.

One drawback of the build is not huge amounts of RR. So if I had more time, I’d work through which part of PRM I was pumping in damage (aether or ele), and then workout getting total RR to about 100. May need to not use Soldier to get there.

https://www.grimtools.com/calc/a2dv6A1Z

As for the xpac. It is totally worth it :slight_smile: Makes PRM become a super beast as someone above mentioned, you can start converting your damage into just one type, and therefore be more focused.

5

Get DLC.

1 Second choice inquisitor or Necro. Enjoy PRMing it up.
2 https://www.grimtools.com/calc/qNYYK3eN
5 AOM makes GD a superior product. I feel the same about the upcoming Forgotten Gods (I am a playtester)
6 End game is farming gear for marginal improvements. Like oldschool arpgs.
In Forgotten Gods an endless dungeon is coming to test your character’s ability to delve deep against infinitely scaling enemies.

But the end-game of GD is finish game, finish character, --> make more characters. I have over 100.

  1. I’ll be back in multiplayer with whatever strangers want to play come FG’s release.
6

Ashes of Malmouth is absolutely worth it, great content!
Crucible is totally optional and doesn’t have any new content besides the arena gamemode. Save your money for AoM and consider buying Crucible later. Imo leveling up in Crucible is really boring and tedious, but once you have your endgame build it’s a fun challenge.

You can do roguelike Dungeons, hunt down Nemesis monsters and farm Monster Infrequents (these activities are often overlapping). And of course try to beat the Crucible if you own that DLC.
However, the upcoming DLC Forgotten Gods will bring the Shattered Realm, an endless challenge dungeon. It’s gonna be awesome and totally worth every dime, so if you’re short on money you should probably skip Crucible altogether and buy FG instead :smiley:

Absolutely not. I think multiplayer is often much more fun than singleplayer, especially if you find players who play at the same pace as yourself. Half of the servers I see are new players such as yourself who are looking for others to level up and trade loot with and have fun exploring the world together.

The only problem is, there aren’t too many public servers around at any given time (at least in my region), so you might have a hard time finding a server with players within your level range. But in my opinion it’s worth checking the server browser everyday for the reasons mentioned above. Or just open a server yourself. One tip though, multiplayer is prone to crashes when people connect/disconnect, a good way to minimize these crashes is to set maximum players to 3.

7

First of all you need AoM expansion. The best arcanist builds are with necromancer and the best PRM build is with inquisitor. From present perspective arcanist must have sucked in vanilla because no classes are even close to spellbinder (for all things aether) and magehunter (for PRM).

With PRM you have two choices: go elemental (mostly lightning) with Invoker set or aether with Slathazar Crest medal. You can find the former done by Mad_Lee here and the latter done by me here.

8

Hey guys again!
First of all: Thank you very much for all the answers! Your taken time is highly appreciated and all the links and grimcalcs you posted have been really helpfull!
I have been reading the guides and got some nice ideas from them, so thank you for posting them!

I kinda figured I need/want the DLC some day, but I wanted to get some opinions first - and apparently, I can’t go wrong purchasing it.
Even though I’m thankfull for the builds not taking the DLC into account, the Inquisitor-Class sounds super good for what I want to use it for. I have not been looking into the class before - but now that I did, I want just that.
So thanks again for the input for the DLC and Classes!
And also thanks for answering the minor questions aswell. You guys have been really helpfull!

I will be getting the AoM expansion and picking Inquisitor as my second class, getting the sweet new constellations and will grind the hell out of that character! - I’m hyped allready, so thanks one last time!

9

Good luck with everything :slight_smile:

Also, there is a another expansion coming out pretty soon too :wink: