Ceno:
Way back in ye’ olde days of the world, when we were all deciding upon a screenname to pick for ourselves to define ourselves on the greater internet, I decided upon the one that is ‘Ceno’. There was purpose to this choice, though that purpose seems a little mangled nowadays. Way back when (2007), I wanted a name that was humbling and approachable without being overly complex. ‘Common’ was the concept I wanted to approach, to seem as nondescript as possible. So I took to Google Translate and asked for the Latin ( 
) word for Common, which was supposedly ‘Ceno’. Well, if you’ve actually taken Latin, you’d know that ‘Ceno’ has very little to do with whether or not something is ‘common’, but I didn’t know that at the time. I wanted a ‘common’ persona that I could do great things with, that I might inspire others to do the same; if someone so ‘common’ is capable of doing greatness, then so too must you all be capable of, as you all are very special.
Since then I’ve carved out little pieces of the internet, helping out where I can with the hope that others pay help forward as well. I think it’s been working pretty well, all things considered. Today I get to take the concept a little further. With the release of this mod, and all those subsequent that I partake in, I look forward to seeing how the community receives, responds, and builds upon it. I look forward to seeing who comes up with ideas, big and small, for improvements and augmentations to this great title - Grim Dawn - that we’ve all come to love. I hope, in some way, that I had helped inspire such creativity, particularly in those that may not have endeavored to try modding out in the first place.
TL;DR Google Translate gave me the wrong name but no one has noticed yet and things have been working well regardless. Go do stuff because you can and you’re great at it!
Working with adoomgod has been great. He is an odd character, but it’s the quirky ones that usually tend to have the greatest genius in their innovation. His genius seems to come out in subtlety, that is, the fine details and minutiae are where he seemingly shines. Though he seems to play the pathos card a lot, his words do have weight behind them; he has tremendous experience with Grim Dawn, and he has been an utter pleasure to work with. Cheers, my friend!
This mod is not perfect. It won’t ever be. But it has accomplished, even now in its very basic and rudimentary state, that which we hoped to achieve: more diverse expressions and more possibilities for fun. While we set out to ‘rebalance’ Grim Dawn by tweaking numbers here and there, the main goal has always been to make it more fun. There will always be ways for you to break the balance - we have no doubts that some of you will find things here that are inherently overpowered - but whether there are always ways to have fun is another story. I think we gave GD a lot more such ways than it had before. And I love it.
Having said that, if we screwed something up - which we almost definitely did, because that’s life - let us know! This is our brainchild, yes, but it is molded and birthed from your criticism as much as our thoughts! If something you wanted to be updated was not touched upon in this release, let us know; just because this is our pass on skills and masteries does not mean it is our last one. Alongside that, ahead of now, you can look forward to us touching up Devotion Constellations, Itemization (from the lowliest of Magic affixes to the awe-inspiring Legendary drops), statwalls of Ultimate and mechanical difficulties in Ultimate. All in the name of ‘balance’ under that of ‘fun’. 
Enjoy!
Doom:
Hello everyone.
First of all, not sure we’re going to stick to this “two personal responses” per release format. I mean we might… but we might not. But as this is our first release it definitely felt appropriate here.
So where to begin? Well for starters it’s been great working with my partner Ceno. He’s definitely a very smart guy and I respect his eye for creative on-the-spot-decisions. I’ve been learning a lot from him and still have a ways to go to catch up to his pace. (I’ll be studying the in’s and out’s of github over the next few days, that’ll help) I like both the similarities in our personalities and approach, as well as the differences. It has so far felt like a symbiotic union. By the end of development we shall have fused into a singular modding entity known as Cenoom, or Doeno. I highly anticipate this.
Frankly, Ceno had more time to put into this release than I have, and I just want to acknowledge that here. He doesn’t care much for this sort of thing, and I doubt he’d ever bring it up but I want it acknowledged. I hope that soon my life-responsibilities will free me to live enslaved to the Great Will of the Mod. All hail Mod. Mod is love. Mod is life.
If I seem goofier, or at least stranger, than usual it’s because I’m giddy to be sharing this with everyone. To see what is loved, hated, and all the feelings in-between, to get great feedback to help make the mod even better, and to finally be able to play the damn thing more. I have an inkling now of how Medierra and team felt they couldn’t play their game much because they were so busy making it.
Finally, I ask for patience with us in general, as modders, as well as for future releases. Our second big release is planned (subject to change) to refine the changes made to skills, possibly change some new ones as well, and branch out into editing shit-tier constellations. (So speak up and be detailed in why you dislike constellation “x”). We will probably do tiny update-releases though for minor things if we feel it’s important. (Someone points out something is easily over-powered or still too weak with a shared character .zip to prove it, something is broken, etc.)
I truly hope you guys have a blast playing this first fragment release. We have sooooo much more in store for you all.