So, I just beat Ashes of Malmouth in normal (veteran). I’m sitting at lvl 70 and I was about to start Forgotten Gods.
The problem is, I’m so OP right now (veteran from Diablo, PoE and others…) that I didn’t even enjoy most of AoM (I killed the last boss with a fast facetank… didn’t even see his “skills”). So I want to go to Elite or even Ultimate difficulty for the last DLC.
My doubt is: Will I lose any content for going to the DLC after act 1 instead of a normal progression? Vanilla-AoM-FG (For example, I saw some side quests in AoM that came as a continuation of vanilla game content… like the girl from homestead that became an adventurer and her quest continued in AoM).
I love the lore of this game, and I wouldn’t like to miss the interactions and references (but I don’t want to actually complete the whole game again before going to FG). So… that’s my question… what do I do?
Does Creed or other relevant characters appear in FG? Will I miss content?
Is there any way to “fake” that I completed my game in elite or ultimate so I can do this content directly? (I know the defiler mod allows me to unlock ultimate, but I want the game to think my progression was made in elite or ultimate directly… like, clicking on elite and the game loads just where I am right now, but in that difficulty. Can I fake that somehow?).
If I could do that, I would also be able to repeat some bosses (like AoM final boss) without repeating the whole campaign… also do the faction quests at a higher difficulty (when I reach new ranks, the quests they offer won’t be so trivial…)
Thanks beforehand for your advice and help!
PS: For those wondering… I don’t think I’m particularly good, but I played the whole game in coop with a friend, and when you have a party, the game becomes real easy… you really need to step up the difficulty of the game (the sinergies get you OP real quick). So we could get a challenge that way…
Normal/Veteran, Elite and Ultimate is not just simple difficulties in this game, they are like a phase; you finish the game with phase one, then move on to phase to and repeat. Finishing the game means mostly doing everything in Ultimate. Though I really enjoy leveling on veteran, until ultimate everything is preparation and after some point monster scaling will stop so you won’t get proper experience in that level so game basically push you to move on to the next difficulty.
But since it’s the first playthrough for you, go ahead and do FG a bit, get shrines etc or just go back to main menu and switch to elite, start all over again. And remember in this game, monsters should be higher level than you so if they start to get a bit weak, then you’re dwelling more than you need to do.
I usually level in veteran till 70-75 then jump through ultimate directly with merits(which you can use with your second character by transfering from first)
First, thanks for your answer ^^
Secondly, although I completely see your point, my partner is totally reluctant (unwilling?) to play content she has already played (she does not enjoy grinding) so we won’t get a second playthrough together… (for example, I’m sure we will go to SR just to try it, but she won’t actually climb it… same goes for Crucible).
She’s a good player and enjoy this genre, but she doesn’t get that “farm-grind part” of it and enjoy it only while is story driven (which is fine because we have a huge playlist of games to go after we finish GD… so replaying GD feels like a “waste of time” for her… we could use that time to play Wasteland 3 for example… or Baldurs Gate 3).
That’s precisely why I want to step up the difficulty only for the last part…
Than I’m afraid to say that Grim Dawn gets better when you start noticing the details, finding secret lores, areas, hidden jokes which requires some playing time and playing time means repeating the acts and creating more characters. The game is 5 years old but we discovered something very recently that shocked a lot of players who spent thousands of hours to this game When you get into it, this game never stops to amaze you.
And there is no way to jump to ultimate and just do FG area directly, you gotta complete act 1 atleast to go there. And also no way to jump ultimate from normal with your first playthrough. It’s only possible by transfering an item that you buy in ultimate with your first character. So you have to finish act 4 in elite yo reach ultimate, or you can do FG area in elite after act 1.
That’s awesome. I will probably keep playing the game (saving a lot of blues/purples for other character builds), but right now we are doing our first playthrough together. She doesn’t like the idea of farming reputation to unlock content (which is a completely respectable choice), so she won’t probably see the end of the Barrowholm questline.
Still, we were very methodical in our first playthrough… explored every map and dungeon (Skelleton Key), killed every pack of monsters and found a lot of secrets (like secret merchants and a lot of lore).
We are missing a lot of content? Sure.
Is it worth to play another 40 hours to see the 25% of content we missed? She doesn’t think so.
Question about what you said about difficulty… If I complete the game by myself in elite and then go to ultimate… she can join my game in ultimate? Or the game will say she didn’t earn it?
Hmm, I don’t play much multiplayer except trading so can’t be sure but the logical procedure would be that she can’t join your ultimate game with unlocked progress. And merits that allow you to unlock everything before ultimate can’t be traded unfortunately.
alot of what your asking is personal taste. Once you play through everything including FG. Personally im not about end game, farming etc. Basically once I get to 50 and done Necropolis I move onto elite till about 70 do necropolis again. Then move onto Ultimate alot of peeps dont believe the game even really starts till ultimate. Some quests are not available till ultimate. Factions offfer better quests etc. I personally do the hidden quests on ultimate only mainly because I hate the void. After finishing on Ultimate then I finally do FG. But like most things its what you get out of it. What you enjoy. Me about the ton of alts & mods available. Love trying new things etc.
The next difficulty unlocks once you kill the final boss in the base game down in the Necropolis. Both expansions are optional, there’s no need to do them if you want to move up. If you want to do FG content before continuing with the base game you can; you just go back to DC when you’ve done it and continue from there. It does screw up the storyline a bit, but the dialogue does change to reflect that iirc.
As said, only Dailla is the only one who appears and even then it’s only as an aside. There is one other that you will run into, but I won’t spoil it for you by telling you who (or what) it is.
As said finishing the base game unlocks the next difficulty so you can move up to Elite now. To unlock Ultimate though you need to do the base game again in Elite - or use GDStash or GDDefiler to unlock it. And you would have to kill the Warden in Act 1 Ultimate to unlock the Forgotten Gods content so you could play that.
Unlocking the next difficulty resets all quests though you carry over your level, faction rep, etc. As for difficulty your top row of resistances will take a 25% hit when you move on to Elite and the same again when you move to Ultimate - plus on Ultimate the bottom row also takes a 25% hit. Whether the quests will be harder will depend on your gear, skills, etc. Plus once you reach higher levels of faction rep some factions will offer new quests. Plus I doubt you’ve yet reached Nemesis status with any of the hostile factions; that will also provide new foes you’ll have to deal with when you run into them.
Multiplay does make the game easier because GD is mainly a single player focused game and is balanced around that. If you want more challenge then don’t multiplay.
Thanks for the answer!
Really complete and well explained. We have finished Act 1 in Ultimate today, and will start the FG DLC tomorrow. This difficulty feels much better adjusted now. At least enemies don’t just get dissintegrated and bosses deal some proper damage. I’m using my potions for the first time in a long time.
About that spoiler you don’t want to make (I appreciate that). Will I run into it if I go now to the FG? Or should I finish vanilla+AoM before?
Beside that, thank you all for the warm welcome! first post here and I got a lot of genuine friendly advice/help!
You will run into it no matter when you do the FG content. Can’t be avoided if you want to finish the expansion.
Also for other characters you may want to have a read/watch of this
Once you have a character into the FG content in either Elite or Ultimate you can buy these for you other characters to use; just put them in the transfer stash. I can tell you that starting at a low level (or even from L1 if you have Crucible and can access the transfer stash there) in Elite or Ultimate is certainly challenging.
When you get into it, this game never stops to amaze you.
Let her play what she wants and you go on in single player.
