They also do less damage in the Crucible? So, Crucible is only ever challenging because of the mutators. Extremely lame.
Imo the first option in the poll will no longer be a fair statement once update hits, at far as gladiator goes. just my opinion
I voted the second to last option, though it would be more accurate to say it gives me a raging migraine. Vomiting on keyboard, not good.
I voted the last option, but I don’t really like the way the Crucible works either. The last option was just the closest to the best answer given.
I’d kind of like it if Crucible went with fewer enemies that had closer to campaign strength. Rather than fighting 2 or 3 weakened nemesis, I’d rather face 1. I think I might prefer a larger area, with more obstacles which ranged or squisher characters could take advantage of.
I like the challenge of crucible but I also dont think it is the only way to play the game. I like running AoM and the rogue like dungeons too. I like seeing fun builds such as CDR and nuke entire screen with 25 skills.
Still most of my current focus will be on crucible, ravager, and a slower but reliable HC build that can clear all content.
I hope that the community doesnt disparage builds that cant complete gladiator. And I also hope that I can post a crucible build without too much drama. I know that someone posted a cool aether dual wielding gun build. I asked if it could do crucible because thats what im into. I didnt mean to contribute to the feeling that only crucible matters.
I think balance is important too because it can encourage many different builds. I like that some stuff does not drop in crucible. Looking for the Worldeater in BoC lets me have more farming variety.
You said it, not me. :3
I actually agree with most of this except the pat where you blame Crucible. Difference in perspectives I guess. This just made me remember my Borderlands 2 days where the game had (and still has) a similar problem with OP8 (the highest (optional) difficulty which would be like having a level 50 Elite character facing against level 100 AoM mobs and bosses, though your char could equip level94 items too). In there, everyone would use almost the same guns regardless of character and build and very few people could make other things work at that level. Eventually, the community kinda settled on just not recommending OP8 to noobs (think of just telling them to stay on Elite till they git gud) or at least that’s how I saw it. Thinking about it, OP8 was much harder than current Gladiator crucible and getting there was even much harder. Maybe the next patch will tone things down to what it was before the expansion or maybe even better, especially since Fluff already hints a lot about how the new crucible will be a lot harder than it is now.
For a day’s time, the amount of posts regarding this topic is a doozy. I’ve been keeping an eye out of what’s been posted here, and now is the first time I have where I can give a response. Due to the volume of responses, I won’t address any post specifically, but provide general responses based on the general theme of the number of posts so far:
- I have no interest in discussing the loot or “farming” aspects of Crucible. I am simply asking regarding the act of beating all 150 waves, similar to Ceno’s post about “playing the Crucible instead of farming it.” Several posters now talk about how Crucible is now too easy, though the next update will surely change that. It would be nice if someone bothered to do the research and grab some posit of an idea of how much more OA/DA/resistances/survivability measures Crucible demands compared to running something like Valbury. I’ve played a toon with 3000 DA that got crit a good amount (something that would never happen in Campaign) because one of the waves in Crucible was shredding my DA by 800 or so. If we can get some real numbers regarding what separates the Crucible worthy builds from the not crucible worthy builds, we can then ask what does it take to make more and different types of builds Crucible worthy.
- A number of posts appear to be flabbergasted, utterly flabbergasted, that people want to play builds that can beat all of the reasonable content (by reasonable I mean content that isn’t “lel at anything under 7k Armor” Ravager or “lel at anything under 250% Lightning Resistance” Mogdrogen). Yes, DLC is just as much a core of the game as the expansion is, and yet people are floored to discover people want to play 100% of Grim Dawn and not arbitrarily stop themselves simply because Crucible wasn’t inserted in the base game.
- People also seem to be shocked, shocked, I tell you! that people are using their OP build posts to post their 100% optimal dream configuration, including the perfect combinations of MI’s necessary to perfectly optimize it. A good build guide should provide something of a leveling setup and a way of keeping the core concept intact without needing the exact MI’s, but why would people intentionally gimp themselves by posting unoptimized builds? The whole point of a build discussion is to discuss all parts of the build, and that includes not only what the ideal configuration looks like, but the journey it takes to reach that destination.
- I am genuinely confused that the same people who call fighting all 150 waves of Crucible boring are perfectly content running the same rogue dungeon- that has only the fraction of enemy types the Crucible has- over and over again. To me, repeatedly fighting Crucible waves and repeatedly running Valbury/BoC/SoT are functionally identical, so what are people really saying when they say “endgame needs more innovation?”
- The amount of posts asserting- the more angry they assert this, the less evidence they provide- about Crucible killing creativity is reaching serious levels of intransigence. I will give credit where credit is due and thank Autentist for actually providing examples of builds that would flourish better if it weren’t for Crucible, but Retaliation builds’ ranged caster problems are just as prevalent in the base game (unless retal players are equally willing to blast Port Valbury’s Val Aldritch for destroying those specific build ideas) and pet builds suffer from seriously undeveloped itemization that are clearly revealed when they fight Fabius / Iron Maiden / any dungeon area where 10+ mobs rush the player (a topic which I have already brought some discussion in my own feedback thread).
- The fact that one person - a person who is specifically compiling and testing a thread exclusively listing the best of the best - says an obnoxious comment does not mean that the forums are swimming with elitism. Autentist’s own Retaliator thread doesn’t even mention Crucible until page 11 - the rest of the pages are filled with unconditional praise for the build. I am willing to bet the people asserting this over and over again are just as tunnel-visioned as the guy who exclusively barges into every Soldier-themed build thread to complain about Cadence and Shields while conveniently ignoring every similar top-performing build that has nothing to do with Soldiers. Those posts that are simply asking if the build can beat Crucible without denigrating the builds, well see my point #2.
I love seeing a large variety of builds as much as everyone else, but the devs aren’t going to know what items could really add to said diversity if they were just a bit stronger if nobody posts their build ideas. If you expect the devs to help your build get over that final hump, you have to be willing to post them and teach them to how your build adds to the diversity. People are absolutely willing to dabble in new ideas as long as you can convince them that it’s entirely possible.
I am playing all content, exception is BoC. I need to see a variety of environment. If I am playing lets say 2-3 hours straight, then I am playing various areas of the games world. For this reason every area should be Loot attractive for a player, not just a Rogue like dungeons. Yes Nemeses are also in those areas, but more attraction to non Rogue like areas will be certainly very good improvement in versatility. I am able to play a lot the same area if I need a particular Item. It is not issue for me. But running same area just because of loot, no. Possibility for attractive loot should be spread across all games
world. Just my opinion of course. Sorry for an OT.
A number of posts appear to be flabbergasted, utterly flabbergasted, that people want to play builds that can beat all of the reasonable content (by reasonable I mean content that isn’t “lel at anything under 7k Armor” Ravager or “lel at anything under 250% Lightning Resistance” Mogdrogen). Yes, DLC is just as much a core of the game as the expansion is, and yet people are floored to discover people want to play 100% of Grim Dawn and not arbitrarily stop themselves simply because Crucible wasn’t inserted in the base game.
Let´s talk about reasonable content.
Nobody would call a build “rubbish” because it can´t beat these bosses. Because a special build is needed and the most builds don´t fulfill the requirements to do so.
MortalKombat posted some “requirements” for Crucible:
Defences you need for Crucible:
Damage resistances + overcaps. Fire, Cold, Lightning, Acid, Vitality, Pierce, Aether, Chaos, Bleed resistances. All of them should be overcaped by ~30-40 (because the strongest flat resistance reduction from enemy will reduce your resistances by 40). If one of your resistance isnt overcaped enough (or, god forbid, isnt capped even), you will notice very significant damage increase (2-3 times) from certain enemies, when your resistances are reduced. I managed to overcap them all by 30+ (most - by 40+), except chaos, which is 28 over cap ATM (with better roll on Mythical Chausses of Barbaros, it can be 30+ too). Overcaping resistances is especially important for my build, as it has increased caps on most resistances (88 Aether, 89 Pierce, 87 Vitality and 84 the rest). Increased resistance caps mitigate lots of damage, +4% to all caps is essentially a 20% damage absorbtion (except physical), and with 88% Aether cap (even 90% with consumable), final campain boss can easily be facetanked.
Physical resistance & Armour. Those two together will protect you from physical damage. It’s very hard to obtain high values on physical resistance, but i managed to get 54% physical resistance ATM, supported by 2.7k armour (not counting bonuses from procs). It’s a VERY high physical resistance value in GD! Hard physical hitter (like Iron Maiden) are scourge of most builds, so i ensured, that my build wont suffer from it. Enjoy!
Life Steal (or “Attack Damage Converted To Heath” - ADCTH). You will take damage, and to recover lost HP, you need some sort of sustain. Life Steal is exactly that! It heals you when you deal Weapon Damage to an enemy, so you must have a decent number of it. I recommend to have 12%+ Life Steal. My build has 18% Life Steal, which is gained through constellations and components, you can get another 8% using consumable. Do note, though, that some enemies are Immune to Life Steal (Zantarin, Banegalor, Heralds, etc). They usually deal low damage and often summon adds, that can be attacked to recover HP.
Circuit Breakers. “Circuit Breaker” is a defensive ability, that activates when your HP falls below certain threshold, and saves your ass from trouble. My build has 2 Circuit Breakers - Ghoulish Hunger and Menhir’s Will. Ghoulish Hunger activates at 45% HP and gives you extra physical resist and insane Life Steal, enough to recover full HP with almost any hit. Menhir’s Will activates at 33% HP and instantly heals you for ~1/3 of your HP pool, leaves regen effect that can trigger Wayward Soul. Shit happens in Crucible, and Circuit Breakers will ensure your survival when things go bad.
So, now let´s think about builds who can´t beat these requirements without crippling themselves. All “rubbish”?
There are a lot of builds which can. Often “Soldier” is involved. I call these builds with the German term “Eierlegendewollmilchsau” (rough translation: Egglayingwoolmilkpig–> Jack-of-all-trades).
But some builds, like mine, can´t. They can beat Vanilla without a sweat, they have high damage output, they play fluidly. All “rubbish”?
Sure, I can get something like 17 % Damage Resistance and can take Ghoul as everyone else. But when taking e . g. 17 % Damage Resistance I loose 45 % Crit Damage. For a DoT build this is not something anybody wants.
Again:
Have fun with Crucible. But calling all builds inferior because they can´t do it…
All I meant with that point is that some people may ASK if the build does well in Crucible, and even might help out by making the changes to the build themselves and sharing their results. My post was not to imply, by any measure, that I share the view that any build that doesn’t beat Crucible is rubbish. I do not, by any measure, share this view, and in fact appreciate that people post their builds with no regards to Crucible performance.
I looked at your “Everything Bleeds” Trickster, and every poster so far has praised your build for it’s OMGHAX Bleed ticks. There are zero posts in your thread insulting your build for not completing Crucible, and my experience in these forums has been similar for most builds posted here. Again, one person being a jerk does not override the vast amounts of praise of which your efforts were showered.
Now since I made the above points very clear and will emphasize again that I do not share the view that builds that can’t clear Crucible aren’t worth talking about and that I enjoy people who post their builds with no regards for performance there, I will say one last snark for nothing but fun jest: I should have put my bullet point about tunnel vision higher. 
If build cant beat Gladiator Crucible, most probably, he WILL have problems with AoM content as well. Many AoM enemies also can reduce your resistances, they deal very high amount of damage, including physical. And they deal very high damage even to capped resists, even. So at least first three my “requirements” (overcapped resists, physical resist&armor, strong HP recovery) still apply there.
Sure, you can skip some hard content in campaign - be friendly with Anasteria and Kymon’s Chosen (and dont have bad time fighting their nemesises), dont go to Mad Queen’s lair, dont go to areas where Gravatul can spawn, dont farm Bastion of Chaos where Sharzul could melt you, etc.
Or you can swap your gear for certain enemies specifically (e.g. if you want to farm Iron Maiden, you equip tons of armor/physical res, even at cost of uncapped resists, if you go farm Anasteria, you overcap fire and aether resists to boot, and forget about armor and physical res…
Or you can just die a lot. Dying sucks in Crucible, because it means you will lose a lion’s share of your rewards. But dying in normal campain? Not a big deal, you lose nothing and can get back with portal instantly (except for rogue dungeons).
But if you want to be able to beat all campaign content with a single character, and do it without deaths, and without changing gear or overusing consumables, you STILL want to stick with 1-3 defensive rules, that i wrote in my mini-guide.
Builds that cant beat Gladiator, are still worth talking about, of course. Some of them can be specialized builds, intended to efficiently farm specific boss (like Ravager/Mogdrogen farmers). Others could use fun idea and/or items (minion, retaliation builds, etc). It’s OK to play them for fun, but players who want to try those builds, have full ring to be aware about their weaknesses. Also, there are weak builds, that can be improved well enough to be able to beat Crucible. If no one hadnt done it yet, it doesnt mean it’s impossible.
I think you exaggerate the importance of defense in campaign. E.g. I first beat AoM with my lightning warder with pre-AoM gear and died only once or twice because I was cautious. I didn’t knew what to expect from the new enemies, so I regrouped when I saw my health drop rapidly, didn’t blitz into a random mob packs, etc. Since I figured out what the enemies do/can, I started dying more often, because I was more careless. If you’re cautious, you don’t need that much defense. Some guys, like new nemesis, are tricky, that’s for sure, but there are a lot of builds that can kill them relatively reliably, but can’t do Gladiator even close. I have at least 4 of those builds.
And a comment not particularly related to quoted message.
60% of this Crucible survivability comes from double rare MIs or just crazy MIs (e.g. readiness is nit a rare affix, but it’s one of the most powerful ones). I wonder what percentage of builds that do 150 glad will do it reliably w/o MIs. Like, 20-30%? I believe builds should not be judged by creator’s luck in dropping stonehide kubacabras legs of nature’s bounty or dread lords cronley signet of readiness. It’s OK to have a content that requires those to succeed. But it’s not OK to criticise people for having bad luck or no time to farm them, while rest of their build concept is logical and well thought.
1: Overcapping all resistances by ~30-40 IS impossible for most builds unless you go all out on the double rare (MI). Even reaching the res cap for all resistances on ultimate is difficult for some builds without double rares and MI if you want to use Legendary sets and gear.
Off topic: they really should boost the resistance on legendary gear esp now that resist reduction is more common.
2: Caster builds will not reach more then 1.6-1.8k armor, if you actually use caster armor on a caster that is. High Physical res is reserved for only a few masteries combinations and shield users.
3: Life Steal: Most non vit casters have no reliable access to this.
(4) 2700-3400 effective DA . Not mentioned but still important. At ~2700 DA you can no longer be crit by all normal bosses and mobs. 2700 DA at end game can easily be reached by most builds due new components. 3000+ is reserved for the mastery combinations that have good DA boosts and/or good enemy -OA skills but are only needed in gladiator due the DA debufs + Mutators there.
Honesty following your rules would invalidate the majority of possible builds from ultimate play.
Are we beating a straw man here? I’ve never seen anyone bashing people’s build just because it can’t beat Crucible even when the concept itself is solid, yet that argument seems to pop up once in a while in this thread.
And if someone actually did that, then they’s just a dick and should be ignored, it has nothing to do with Crucible or whatever the trending challenge is.
It’s possible. You shouldnt use too many DPS items, DPS devotions and DPS components. Just like i did in my build. If your DPS sucks badly without swimming in DPS items, most probably, your build/idea is weak.
Of course, not for all builds, but still.
I agree that caster gear often lacks good stats, such as physical damage reduction or armour. But those are strong only against one particular damage type.
Though not all, my build is also a caster, yet he gets ridiculous physical resistance.
That’s why, BTW, if it’s possible, casters tend to use melee gear.
Samr for life steal - it seem lame that it’s s superior to other forms of sustain.
I agree, there are many holes in GD balance still. Some builds are damn weak only because they arent supported by proper gear at all.
@thepowerofmediocrity:
First, I have to say sorry. I don´t want to imply that you share this attitude. Blame it on my english; it isn´t as good anymore as it used to be when I was younger.
It´s not about me, it was just an example; if someone would say something like rubbish about my build, I would smile and roll eyes. But I´m, compared to others here, a relatively new player in Grim Dawn. Just started this summer. When I searched the forum, I wanted a build that was fun and can beat the game (didnt know about Crucible then). Found TZ Tzs Trickster…here I am now.
What will a new player now do? Perhaps reading the Build Compendium. More likely the Zhuugus-Thread. But even if he has taken a look to Build Compendium and then reads, that every build which can´t clear Crucible isn´t in any means powerful or, as MortalKombat implies, even will have massive problems in Vanilla…why take a second look there? Let´s choose one of the cookie cutters.
And for writing a build:
Why writing something for others if nobody is interested? As Donnie Darko said: There are enough builds who clear Vanilla without problems. But when every new player isn´t interested because “Clearing Crucible” is the new standard…well, writing is time consuming, better to play in this time. 
@ MortalKombat:
As Donnie Darko said: Exaggerated.
Did I die in AoM? Sure. Reasons?
- Old gear.
- New enemies.
- Careless.
- Things had to be patched (not nerfed, but the Armor/Armor Absorption-“Bug” had to be fixed)
To say, skipping hard content while choosing Kymon´s Chosen/Outcast is strange. Iron Maiden…well, I can only speak for myself but she´s human so she should be easier than Zantarin for me. And Outcast…most people choose that because of the awesome augments, not fearing hard content.
There are a lot of differences in Vanilla compared to Crucible. You can easily cc most enemies (outside Bosses) and if you don´t get careless, you only have to fight a few at a time. You can better use environment and even flee.
Not all builds have damage bonus to humans, usually Nightblade only. And if you’re too squishy, even extra damage wont save you from being crushed by her.
You must be joking about Zantarin, he’s the easiest nemesis among them all.
Maybe i just have too high standards for “strong build” for campain? You may call him roflstomping all content and facetanking enemies without giving a shit about what they do, etc.
So here’s a question: what happens when it’s not the build but the player?
I SUCK at Crucible. I have one or two builds that can reliably clear it when I need some new gear, but for the most part when I’ve taken a lot of “high-end” “Gladiator-viable” builds (such as some of those posted in the “Reasonably powerful builds” thread) they fall flat on their face and die in very early waves (pre-100). My theory and application of build design and gameplay is simply not compatible with Gladiator…
…it may also be from the fact that I intuitively do not use Crucible buffs or defenses. I think this stems from a habit of mine I developed around 2015, in which I considered any build I made that used health potions to be a failure. Even today, I’m still struggling to shake that habit; Crucible buffs are going to take me far longer to warm up to.
Back in the day, after Crucible was released but before l stopped posting build guides, one of the most common questions I received was “How does this build fare in the Crucible?” My answer, always, was “I don’t know.” I gave that response not only because I didn’t enjoy playing the Crucible enough to check, but also because I don’t deem my capacity for playing the Crucible to be a valid judge of a build’s potency, especially when people are clearly making better use of things than I am.
Welcome to my world. 
I am really interested if my build (with some tweaks) would have a chance in Crucible. But because I am really not the best keyhitter in the world (carefully expressed) it would only be frustrating to even try. :eek: