Yes. Competition and elitism is a mindset, not a game’s feature or defect. With all the MOBAs and other competitive games encouraging it what would you expect.
And Superbosses belong to that nieche too, you have all the kids who just need it at all cost for steam achievement in MP and also asking whether it “can beat Mog/Ravager” here.
As someone who is new to crucible but has over a thousand hours in vanilla GD and AoM I think it is safe to say that something is definitely wrong with the loot drops in the campaign. My best build only just beat challenger and I don’t think I want to try any higher. The problem is that all the blueprints I’ve gotten for relics and such have come from crucible. Now while that isn’t a bad thing, let me put it in perspective. I have close to 1300 hours. Of those 1300 hours I have maybe 20 hours in crucible being generous. To say that 90% of my mythic legendaries and high level blueprints have come from crucible is being generous. It might be closer to 95%.
The legendaries I’ve gotten in campaign are pretty much always the same ones and blueprints are next to non existent except for the yellow ones. Now I would much rather run through the sealed dungeons over and over than fight mind numbing waves of enemies. Also the kill timer in crucible is frustrating. I don’t know how heavily that timer and modifier impacts the loot chest at the end but sometimes you hit an enemy that is highly resistant to your damage type and will run your clock out or you hit a mutator that makes them so much harder to kill in the time limit.
I think the crucible as it stands in relation to the campaign is a menace. I want to play this game and be challenged and rewarded. The campaign should be the focus. The crucible is a DLC separated completely from the campaign except for the same loot dropping in both. Would you not want to reward the players who play the main campaign and enjoy the main campaign content rather than having it so heavily in favour of those who can
sit through hours of mind numbing and predictable enemy waves? (Apart from the transmutors.)
TLDR: Crucible is frustrating and mind numbing. I don’t want to have to go into crucible to get the things that should be dropping in the harder areas of the campaign. Give higher drop chances in closed dungeons and harder areas. Give bosses that are really a challenge a better drop rate or potential to drop more legendaries. Balance it loot wise so that those who want to do crucible can and those who want to do campaign content can and get rewarded for their time and effort.
I think, both contents should be clearly separated as far as possible.
I know, some players really enjoy Crucible. All hail to them (no irony here).
Give them unique things you can´t get in Vanilla content. Unique Armor/Weapon Sets, Potions, Illusions, whatever, which will work only in Crucible. Give them achievements, titles…you name it.
But:
Axe the loot in Crucible! No MI dropping if you haven´t fought this special enemy. Lesser Legendaries for finishing last wave. Perhaps even no loot at all but only points that you can buy Legendaries or MI.
For example:
Special Vendor for MI like in rogue dungeons with RNG, what they sell.
Vendor for Legendaries for points, no RNG, different costs (level dependent). Quick & Dirty idea: For clearing Gladiator you get points to buy 2 - 3 Legendaries of your choice.
For Vanilla, no change only perhaps more Legendaries for harder content like Rogue Dungeons/Hard Bosses. But not too much; I usually get 1 - 2 from Shar´Zul, 2 - 3 would be acceptable for me.
2-3 would be acceptable if:
1)Droprates of different armor slots were normalised()
2)Rolls didnt matter
3)Dupe were a exeption instead of rule.
Unfortunately with curent droprates of shoulders/jevelry finding something you need in vanila require too much time. And crusible farm is much better in term of revard .
You´re a talking about Vanilla, right?
I don´t think Crucible would be more rewarding then. Especially if you really strictly separate both contents so no use for loot from Crucible in Vanilla.
1)Pre-crusible shoulders were my bane.
3)I mean the same items drop again and again and again and again etc. I have 48 myth Spellbreacker sash and still miss some shoulders. :roll:
Crucible is just the most challenging endgame content.
What will you do to show that your build is badass? Will you show how he kills Zaria the Carver? Or maybe you’ll show how he performs against much more challenging foes? I am 95% sure it will be the latter.
I agree, that crucible seems to be “too cheap” endgame - a simple arena, where you kill packs of mobs that come at you.
I agree, that it would be great to have another kind of challenging and rewarding endgame content. Rogue dungeons could be such a content, but they arent as challenging as crucible, nor rewarding either (often, i question if it’s worth my key and time at all to run those at all). It would be great to have random-generated dungeons with random mods, something like “maps” in Path of Exile or Torchlight 2. Or some other kind of endgame, all will be welcomed.
I also agree that ADCTH is OP. But this is the problem for all ARPGs, not just Grim Dawn. Instant life leech based on damage is too hard to balance, and can became far too powerful.
I already said it, Crucible drops very little components and some other crafting maths (Ugdenbloom, Seal of Binding, etc). Yes, you get tons of legendaries and MI’s, but you dont get many other resources, that are also needed for every build. And to farm those, i have to farm campaign over and over again! Not that much less than Crucible! For example, to get that shitty Kilrian’s Shattered Soul, it requires 5-8 damn boring and frustrating runs.
I voted for the last option and I just wanna bring up some points on what I think crucible did and didn’t do for the game. Maybe some or a lot of these have already been said but I’,ll just keep it here.
Crucible does not hinder build creativity. The desire to be the best does. i don’t know if I can call that competitiveness cause this is a SP game but whatever. In any game, there will always be a group of best builds and those will be popular and will hinder creativity because all the people that will want to have an easy life or a high score will always use the best builds. Those who don’t are where the creativity comes from but creative builds will never be as good or as popular as the best builds unless it fills a specific niche (like ret builds for ravager). Some say that crucible pigeonholes builds to be really defensive but that’s true for most other hard content like ravager or mog.
Even if we pretend that Crucible does not exist, the best and most popular builds will most likely be the same. maybe add SS builds to that. Just tweak the builds in the glad farmer list into more offense rather than defense for more dps and you’re set. S&b will still be the most recommended because it’s safe to play while still dealing good damage. Dot builds will still have the same core albeit squishier due to more kiting room.
Crucible does lure a lot of players into grinding it a lot,
especially to new players because of the loot pool and due to this, non crucible builds are being frowned upon by some especially after AoM. Everyone already knows this so I’ll just skip this one and go straight to
There is very little separation of builds between the two game modes. this is already addressed a bit in (2). If a build stomps crucible, then it will also stomp vanilla. And this is the bigger reason why non crucible builds are being frowned upon right now. Why settle for less? Imo, Rhylthar’s suggestion on loot separation between both modes is good and I’d take it further to say that we might need a different balancing between the two game modes. Kinda like what some MMOs do where PVE scaling of skills are different with PVP scaling.
Totally agree.
EDIT: Items in Main game should be balanced exclusively for Main game/expansion only. In the case of Crucible, creatures in Crucible should be balanced to (In main game/expansion balanced) items.
I already said it, Crucible drops very little components and some other crafting maths (Ugdenbloom, Seal of Binding, etc). Yes, you get tons of legendaries and MI’s, but you dont get many other resources, that are also needed for every build. And to farm those, i have to farm campaign over and over again! Not that much less than Crucible! For example, to get that shitty Kilrian’s Shattered Soul, it requires 5-8 damn boring and frustrating runs.
Kilrian´s is true but for other components:
Dismantle your spare legendaries. You get tons of scrap and other components you need. I only dismantle epics and have enough components to build allmost everything.
Imo, Rhylthar’s suggestion on loot separation between both modes is good and I’d take it further to say that we might need a different balancing between the two game modes. Kinda like what some MMOs do where PVE scaling of skills are different with PVP scaling.
I´m an old WoW-Player, guess what I was thinking about. 
Resilience was a stat you never needed in PvE-Content but was mandatory if you seriously played PvP. A stat which is working only in Crucible but is useless in Vanilla could perhaps solve a lot of problems in my opinion.
DID NOT READ THREAD
I don’t really agree with any of these, so abstaining from voting. I guess the closest to my perception of truth is the last one, but I ultimately disagree with it to be honest. I don’t think the main campaign features anything that is as isolating as the Crucible.
Crucible is fine - it’s the best way to test build viability.
I guess that depends on what you want something to be viable for. Viable for Gladiator? Then yeah, you gotta test it in Crucible. But because enemies in Crucible do substantially less damage and have monumentally less health than they would in the campaign, but come in far greater numbers, I don’t think you can make any inferences from one to the other.
Edit: For instance, I’ve made several builds that perform exceptionally better in Crucible than they do in the campaign. That said, the vast majority of my builds are campaign-centric.
Survival Horde Mode is fine but Mutators are too much.
I don’t have a problem with mutators. Can they roll really poorly in conjunction with the enemy rolls you get and wind up fucking you over? Sure. But isn’t that the point?
Survival Horde Mode is fine but Wave ___ just takes all the fun out of it.
Wave 1+.
I’ll posit an idea here: Crucible’s “fun” has been warped by farming. What if the Crucible was never originally intended to be farmed, but was instead intended to be played?
Survival Horde Mode is fine but we need more equipment buffs so we can actually beat it.
Isn’t this just the last poll option? If you raise the floor or ceiling all that does is change what people complain about rather than actually tackling the issues of their complaints. I don’t mean to say that equipment doesn’t need buffs here and there, but buffing something for the purpose of enabling it to tackle something that’s innately broken feels a little ass-backwards, don’t you think?
The very concept of survival horde mode makes me violently ill.
If Crucible didn’t exist, the same people would be complaining about the next difficult thing.
I mean, we already have plenty of Ekket/Grava/Kuba complaints, so I don’t see the issue.
But it’s not an endgame content. It’s a DLC, an optional install, it isn’t required to be in your game files for a game to be operational. Dungeons are endgame content. Nemesises are endgame content. Crucible is not. It’s a literal Survival Mode, that somehow influences the main game, which it shoudn’t be doing.
I’ll be showing off my build killing Nemesises, Ravager, Mog, MQ. That’s what makes it viable without hindering my eyesight with constant Crucible spam everywhere in the build section.
This can be easily aplied for the Campaign content. The problem is, Crucible is optional, but it still influences people to build characters oriented on it, since this is where all the cool guys are hanging out. Many people are just playing GD for fun, so they simply search for the best… which is Crucible, of course. So they promote these builds further, then everything goes straight in-line with Crucible requirements. No one mentions Campaign content anymore.
So yeah, it does hinders creativity. Especially for RET, pet, Aura builds in particular.
Maybe so, but it will broaden people’s mindsets about creating more colourful builds instead of relying on the same rehashed concepts of Gladiator farmers. There should be a strict separation between these contents, but it doesn’t exist here. We might as well consider Crucible a part of the main game now.
But that doesn’t really make it a challenge anymore, does it? Since it’s based on luck. Luck does not equal challenge, there is no skill here.
Very good suggestion, actually. Instead of mindless farming, it can serve as a actual testing grounds for your skill area.
I’ve been playing lots of Vermintide lately (in preparation for Vermintide 2). In that game, which is a horde-survival game like L4D/2 but with an immensely higher skill ceiling, there are some things that can randomly happen that will 100% result in a party wipe.
And they’re all exhilaratingly fun.
Turning a corner and running into a Stormvermin Patrol that promptly wipes out your party in a narrow environment is among the most fun I’ve had in gaming in years. I think fighting against that inevitability is the origin of that fun, and perhaps is why people play Hardcore in GD/PoE/etc. One day or another, your HC character is inevitably going to die, and it may be very likely that there’s nothing you can do to stop it. Having such risk, when coupled with uncontrollable factors - like Crucible mutators - must certainly get one’s heart beating, no?
Point being, the challenge would still be there, it would just be insurmountable.
That crucible is used as a metric is natural, there aren’t many to begin with. That some people raise attitudes from that is more like those people’s problems. And maybe of those who take it all personally. Its not the game’s content fault.
And nothing really prevents you from experimenting or posting except you.
Sounds good. Remove all reward chests. 
No, crucible is not a test for builds, if you play campaign there is no need to stretch defenses so much as it happens with crucible.
Yes it detrimental to build variety, like any other “stress test” : raise the bar and demand more optimization aka less options.
Personally, despite i bought crucible dlc on day 1, i played it for few hours only because i find it boring BUT i have nothing against who loves it. Probably there are people around playing only crucible and it’s ok.
What i don’t like is “can’t clear crucible gladiator = shit” attitude, that hurts game possibilities and just has no sense in a singleplayer game with ZERO competion and all possible cheats available. It’s not D3 where you have to farm the high grifts fast or you won’t upgrade your gems or be paragon lvl 6000000000 and i thank god everyday for that.
Sure, i can use Dismantling. Sadly, Dismantling requires Dynamite, and i must either farm for it manually, or farm for Aether Shards, Searing Embers and Scavenged Plating. The latter two arent that easy to farm, especially Searing Ember. Maybe, if you have tons of spare dynamite or Searing Ember/Scavenged plating… I dont.
Dismantling legendaries yields tons of blood/brain/heart and missive/spirit/mutagen, as well as tons of rare components. But i already have shit tons of those rare components and crafting materials! Dismantling doesnt yield much Ugdenblood, so i have to farm it. It also NEVER produced Chtonian Seal of binding (and some crafts require ridiculous amounts of them), so i have to exterminate Bloodsworn in cosmic proportions to farm some. And i also need Chipped Claws, Serrates Spikes, Ectoplasm, and tons of other components for crafting…
The latter two arent that easy to farm, especially Searing Ember.
Maybe I´m lucky but nearly every vendor ingame sells 1 or 2. Farming means rifting around to the different vendors and buy them.
DID NOT READ ALL THREAD (nor previous one being mentionned in the original post)
There is two thing wrong in the Build Section one of them is not at all related to the topic at hand so I’m gonna jump over. The other one is simple enough
Crucible is the only factor in posting build
I gave myself the objective of building one character PER CLASS and I love the Set Item concept since they have existed (well I did started with them in Diablo 2) so I want to mix that “love of set” with the objective of 1 Character per class
That 28 Characters most of them based around a Set that is probably 22 character that will never make Crucible (I see IK Sorcerer, Warborn Commando, Dreeg Witchblade and 2-3 more as still being viable Crucible farmer with AoM content). 22 of them that based on what people see as the standard here would get look down by the “elitist crowd” so even if I was the kind of guy that wanna have fun writing guide it would serve no purpose.
Other thing that this “Crucible farmer mentality is bringing” is that 99% of the build around are based on perfect MI (most of them created using a program) and push people to believe “only such thing work”. It also remove any and all kind of leveling concept or “on the way item to look for”.
Getting side tracked here but a note on that Lazy Pokemon Build that everyone laugh at on Discord. Yeah it is far from optimal but it had item and skill at every 10 level range which made it into something that anyone not even knowing the game could look at and learn from!
I also miss those No MI / All Blue / Strange conversion concept. Yeah they ain’t optimal but they are fun and I’m playing to have fun not to Cruci Farm with Cheated Item (why Farm if you are creating item anyway?)
Scavenged Plating? Yes. Searing Ember? Not that often. To get any meaningfu amount (10, 20, 50) it requires a lot of time running between vendor to buy their components…
I agree, it’s wrong mentality. I dont know about other builds, but i assure you, that for MY build (you can see link in my signature), i farmed all items in LEGIT way (btw that rare + maxic affix non-MI ring cost me 10kk iron bits spent for crafting), and i never encourage using perfect-rolled MI’s or something. I made my build myself, using item i found myself, so i can be sure than every other player will be able to do the same, and wont ask me “what should i equip instead that double-rare MI that is impossible to obtain?”. Yet, my build still stomps Gladiator Crucible as well as all AoM content and nemesises. Even the lack of some BiS items wont stop him from being powerful. That’s the key feature of really strong build, in my opinion. And that’s what i’m really proud of!
