Hi all,
What I’m basically looking for is a “rule of thumb” guide for attribute points when playing different classes. Also please give a brief explanation as to why you propose any given spread. I kind of have an idea of what the different attributes do but I’m clueless as to how they impact builds apart from the obvious melee needs physique, caster needs spirit and so on.
When in doubt go Physique. Most will end up in there anyway for most builds since it gives defensive ability and some minor health. This is what keeps you alive even if your damage output is lower. You can fix DPS through the many layers of character customization such as components, augments and devotions.
Spirit is usually around 4-5 points for most builds. After bonusses from gear, mastery levels and occasional devotion points you should have enough to wear the needed accessories like rings and necklaces. Only if you go for a true spellcaster you’ll end up around 25-35 points in Spirit. But that is mainly due to the fact it also increases your dps for spells. You don’t really need it for the mana regen, but is a nice helpful bonus. All the other spirit, damage type% and Offensive Ability, to increase your critical hits, is done through Devotions.
Cunning is something you use to be able and hit your opponents. However you can get enough Cunning through Mastery Levels, Devotions and gear in a lot of the cases. So for a lot of builds you don’t put too much in this. Only a few high crit builds go for 25-30 attributes into cunning. Then they combine that with a lot of OA on gear as well as OA/Crit% through Devotions. For melee builds I often put around 22-25 points into Cunning and rest in Physique. For Critical Hit builds I personally stick with guns for range since you can then get away with less health/physique investment in trade for higher spike damage.
Defensive Ability means that opponents have less chance to do a critical/spike damage against you. So try to go for 1400-1600 at the end with Offensive Ability no lower then 2400 with pretty much any build you make. You rarely need to look for these stats on gear for these minimum numbers. You’ll pretty pick some up on Devotions here and there as well on some pieces of gear you’ll end up wearing anyway. Another milestone I personally use is 750-850 for either, or both, OA/DA at lvl 30-32 to make sure you’re on the right track.
For Devotions start by looking at the outskirts of the constellations. Find two of the highest tier constellations that would help your build perform DPS wise. These will give you the information on how many points in any given color constellation you need before you can unlock them. Then simply make a path to gather those points with constellations that synergize with your build. Oh and make sure to have at least 1 defensive/heal constellation along the way to keep you alive in higher difficulties. Other then that…trial and error 
Since you can respec Devotions this shouldn’t discourage experimentation and failure at all. In fact…make use of respeccing when considering to get your puzzle pieces the way you want them to fit.
Hope this bit helps.
Thanks a lot Gibly, it sure does help. I’ve played Titan Quest a lot and in that game I always had a “default” spread for melee, ranged or caster characters (for example archer builds got 2 Dex / 1 Str + 1 Health every 2 levels). Of course there were always exceptions but the basic spreads worked well for most conventional builds. I figured since GD comes from the same stable it would be a similar experience but it doesn’t seem that way.
You get a total of 90 attribute points after playing through all 3 difficulty levels of the game.
1 attribute point in physique, cunning or spirit = 8
8 physique = 20hp, .4 hp regen, 3.2 Defensive ability.
8 cunning = 3.04% physical dmg, 2.88% pierce dmg, 3.2% bleed and internal trauma dmg, 3.2 offensive ability
8 spirit = 3.36% magical dmg, 3.52% magical duration dmg, 2 energy, .08 + 2% energy regen
If you were to put all 90 attribute points into one stat then it would be 720 to that stat which would equal:
Physique = 1800 hp, 36 hp regen, 288 defensive ability
Cunning = 273.6% physical dmg, 259.2% pierce dmg, 288% bleed and internal trauma dmg, 288 offensive ability
Spirit = 302.4% magical dmg, 316.8% magical duration dmg, 1440 energy, 7.2 + 180% energy regen
All this is before percentage bonuses from gear and devotions of course.
SOURCE: Grim Dawn Game Guide > Character > Character Basics > scroll down to description of 3 main stats.