Grim Dawn Trading guide (updated for Fangs of Asterkarn)

Grim Dawn Guides and Tutorials
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Table of contents

1st post

  • Preface
  • Currency
  • How to actually trade in the game
  • Multiplayer
  • Trade through the forum
  • Trade through discord
  • Facebook trading

2nd post

  • Trade through steam
  • Forum post template
  • Crafting and blueprints

3rd post

  • ‘A more or less complete guide to trading’

4th post

  • Video tutorials/where to farm certain materials and components

5th post

  • Advice on asking prices
  • Final comments
Preface

If you were to ask the average player what the main characteristics of a Diablo-style ARPG are, there’s a good chance they’ll say that they are build progression and the collecting of loot.
To me personally it has indeed always been about these two, and being the magpie that I am I want to collect any item of value that I can!

trade1

I have no experience with trading in Titan Quest, but I do remember vividly how it was done in Diablo II.
There were certain servers that were called ‘trade’ or something in that regard, that you could visit to trade with other players.
There were even servers called ‘free’ with players in them that offered you the unique items they had in abundance.
I also traded in Path of Exile for a while, and that was an entirely different experience all together!
Initially trade went through their forum and there were websites that indexed everything offered on there, you also had trade chat in the game.
These days they have a trade system built in, which used to be on an external website.
The ingame droprates are designed to cater to this trading system.
In other words, the availability of higher tier items in the game seems is based on this supply and demand.

Grim Dawn is mostly a single player experience, although it does offer multiplayer.
For that reason, the community has its own ways of trading.
I will explain each one of them in this guide, and will also provide some tips and a useful template for a trading message in the designated threads on the forum.

Currency

Diablo II has gold and Ist runes, Path of Exile has a currency orb system.
In Grim Dawn you of course have iron, but it is not always the usual currency for trading.
Trading for iron has become more attractive with the release of Forgotten Gods, due to the addition of the transmute function on the inventor and the ability to stash your iron in the form of iron bars and stacks at the banker.
A lot of trades however, are either trading item A for item B, or more often trading rare materials for items.
Since the release of Fangs of Asterkarn, most materials are in a higher demand, as a result the asking price in materials will differ between what players currently lack.

In other games the prices can be pretty much set in stone because supply and demand are being indexed.
In Grim Dawn this is not the case, the price is up to the player and can vary.
That said, it is very usual for a Mythical Legendary to have a similar rate among different players, a triple rare item on the other hand can go for a lot and have a very subjective price point.
Depending on the current build of the game, a price can really be anything.

How to actually trade in the game

For new(er) players it can sometimes be a bit puzzling how multiplayer and trading in Grim Dawn actually works.
The process is pretty straightforward but there are some things to pay attention to.
For instance, trading through steam has the benefit of being able to click and join games by your friends, so you don’t have to look up the game’s name in the lobby.
It is for that reason useful to add your trading partners as friends, which you can then of course remove later.

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When you host a game you can set up a game name and a password.
For trading it’s recommended to start a game on normal difficulty, so it will be accessible to players of any level.
To ensure this, it’s also common practice to set the level range from 1 to 200, which is the default.

Steam trading

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When trading with steam friends it suffices to click their name on the bar on the left of the lobby and then click ‘join game’.
On closed servers you are then prompted to enter the password, open servers will grant you immediate access.

non-Steam trading

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When you first enter the lobby the server list will be empty.
If you know the name of the server you’re going to trade in, type in the game name and then click refresh.
If you don’t, just click refresh and pick a game from the list.

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Once you have entered the game, you and the player you’re going to trade with, need to be in the same area, in a relatively close proximity of each other.
On the left side of the screen you’ll see their name, right click on it to get a list of options.
Once you click ‘trade’, the trading window will open.

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You can now put the items you want to trade, or the payment, in the trade window by shift-clicking them.
When both players have clicked the trade button, the trade will be done.

Multiplayer

This way of trading is obvious, but also a bit rare nowadays.
Like in the old days of Diablo 2, there are sometimes servers specifically for trading.
You can just enter them and look if someone has the item you need, and then haggle over the price.
Some years ago I saw these servers quite often, but nowadays they aren’t usually there.

Nevertheless, this is a known way of trading gear

Trade through the forum

To my knowledge this is the most popular way of trading and it occurs right in the hub of our community, this forum.

There are few different variants available:

FoA softcore legit item trading
FoA hardcore legit item trading

there is also a list of trading threads available here

When we talk about ‘legit’ we mean that all items bought and sold and all currency paid for them was legitimately farmed in game
To many players, including myself, this is a sensitive issue
Because Grim Dawn is a single player experience, it’s easy to duplicate or cheat items, which is fine if that is how you want to play!
The distinction in the different threads is meant to make sure that if you want legitimate gear, that is what you’re getting
(Lately the forum hasn’t had non-legit threads, so I don’t currently list them).

The way this works is that people can look up items available for trade and will then either send the seller a PM or a steam friend request.

I will come back later in this post to what a good trading post in such a thread should look like in my opinion

Trade through discord

Discord is an app/program that you can install on your PC, laptop, tablet or phone, or approach through their website.
It is mostly meant for communication with others while gaming, but is also a collection of message boards with chat functionality.
Most modern games and companies have their own discord channel, and Grim Dawn is no exception (although the discord server is not maintained by Crate Entertainment, they have a presence there).
In the Grim Dawn discord channel there is also a messageboard that is used for trading.
Usually you list what you need there and/or what you are offering.
I do this myself by saying for example:

SC (softcore) LEGIT LF (Looking for)
-list
-of
-items

After that, I list a URL to a google document containing what I offer for trade and crafting.
The benefit of this is that I can keep that file up to date without the need to change my post every time.

When I post on the trading board of discord, it looks like this:

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Discord will automatically show the first lines of this document under this, but it will all become visible when you click the link.

Facebook trading

I would like to take the opportunity to do an extra shoutout to a facebook group called ‘Grim Dawn (community)’, this group is huge!
It has its own discord for its many members which also contains a trade channel, adding even more options for reaching out with your trade requests.
It can be found here

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2nd post

Trade through steam

When you go into steam and click on community, you see discussions coming up in the list.

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If you click that, you enter a section of steam that has discussions about all the games you own.
If you have recently played Grim Dawn you’ll see it under ‘forums for your recent games’.

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Lastly, you’ll see the available subforums, where you can choose to go to ‘trading’.

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You can start a trading discussion there, or look and respond to those by other players.
When I start a discussion I usually state what I’m looking for in the title, with SC LEGIT LF before it, and also mention that I have items available for trade and crafting.
These discussions don’t expire, and you have a chance of receiving replies to them for a long time.
You can close a discussion though, so everyone knows that the trade is off.
Mostly I get friend requests from people who wish to trade, but it also happens that they reply first to make an offer, or tell you that they have the item you’re looking for.

The content of my opening post is also usually:

SC LEGIT LF
-what
-I’m
-looking
-for

Followed by the link to my google document, like on discord

Steam rules and guidelines

Forum post template

Here I provide an easy template you can use, in a google document

In my opinion it is very important that a trading message is easy to read, so you can easily find what you’re looking for.
Views on what that means may differ but this is how I do it:

  • contact information, like this:

please PM me for trades, or message me on steam or discord

Looking for:

items
I
need

Can craft:

list
of
items
I
can
craft

after that I sum everything up sorted by item type:

blueprints

potions

helms

1h melee

2h ranged

medals

etc.

Crafting and blueprints

Some players also offer the service of crafting items for you, for a fee and sometimes even for free.
Blueprints in Grim Dawn are often rare drops and for that reason not every player has the same ones.
Craftable items usually only drop as a blueprint.
For players that like to min-max the gear on their characters, this can also be very interesting.

After reading a blueprint it will not drop another time for you, except for blueprints that come as quest rewards.
For that reason it may be useful to stash them, instead of learning them, some of them are very much sought after and can go for a hefty price.
It can of course also be argued that stashing them diminishes the chance of dropping other ones, and that farming is probably a quicker way to get materials, iron or components.

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3rd post

DISCLAIMER: written pre-FoA (Fangs of Asterkarn)

A more or less complete guide to trading by ya_

GD is a difficult game and it’s complexity can sometimes intimidate new players. Therefore, I advocate a friendly trading environment. I trade my items for whatever you can pay with as long as I can find use for it. I try to avoid giving out items for free because it contradicts the “philosophy”: you have to put in some effort to get what you want or it doesn’t make sense - you could as well GDStash everything.

As for the types of mats, advanced players usually want iron bits, scavenged platings and scrap for the crafting of Stoneplate Grieves. Scavenged platings can be vendor-farmed by visiting Isaiah Reddan in Homestead, Morris Burton upstairs from Isaiah and then Hyram in Steelcap, Malmouth. Repeating this will net you scavenged platings but also lots of scrap, aether crystals, shards and clusters, other common and rare mats, potions, low and mid level relic blueprints and others. Vendors’ stock is reset after visiting two other vendors but you have to buy something or they won’t be counted as visited. Farming or crafting dynamite and dismantling epics and legendaries gives a lot of scrap. Money and scavenged platings come along as you level your chars - just don’t get lazy filtering out yellows or skipping chests. Other desirables vary from patch to patch. These days in short supply are (IMO in this order):

battered shells/frozen hearts (mutually convertible so basically the same item; farm in Royal Hive),
chthonic seals (low drop rates make them a real pain to farm; Darkvale),
ancient armors (totally random very rare drop),
ugdenblooms (easy farm in lower Ugdenbog some or all the way to Ancient Grove)
Pre-AoM rare mats (come along as you farm bosses, also dynamite stuff)
Mutated scales (sometimes some people might be out)

However, the most desirable things are items themselves. Do not vendor or blow up mythical legendaries or even low level ones. If you run out of stash space create a mule character. Myself, I tend to keep 3-4 copies of an item before I start cleaning up. Also, many advanced players have their favorite chars whom they minmax (collect gear with best rolls). So try to keep a list of your items so that a potential trade partner can look through it and tell you which items’ rolls he wants to check out. How do you know if an item has a good roll? Go grimtools.com -> item database -> settings -> show min/max values and search for your item.

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4th post

Video tutorials/where to farm certain materials and components (spoiler alert!)

For more information on where to farm certain components and materials check out this excellent guide by @adoomgod

For newer players it can be daunting to have to supply the needed iron or mats for a trade.
To facilitate them, I have made a video guide on an efficient farming route for various materials and treasure troves.

(DISCLAIMER: new video will be up post-haste)

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5th post

Advice on asking prices/what is the value of items and currency

In a lot of trading situations players are unsure on what to ask for their items, for that reason there can be significant differences in rates.
Also, more often than not, prices are actually very low compared to the effort it takes to get the actual items.
If you need a guideline, we try to offer one here.

rates according to Ya_

A common legendary (most non-set armor, Nightshade’s Reach, Silverbolt, etc.) or a blue - 40 scavenged platings OR 80-100 scrap OR 16 blooms/seals OR 12-16 fro-hearts/b-shells OR 6-8 ancient armors OR about 1 million in bits.

An uncommon legendary (most set items, jewelry, etc.) - 60+ scavenged platings OR converted as above.

A rare legendary or a hot item (this is mostly a subjective category: things that have been eluding me, I’m selling my last piece, many people want, etc.) - 80+ scavenged platings OR as above.

All this pertains to trash legendaries with average rolls that I would dynamite if I ran out of stash. For notable rolls you gotta pay MUCH MORE (multiple times). Things like Alkamos rings or Anasteria helmet aren’t for sale but if they were I guess I’d price them at whereabouts of 500-1000 stoneplates worth of mats (yes, 12.5-35M to begin with…). This is more or less where double rare greens are as well or would be were they ever for sale.

Final comments

This guide was made with newer players in mind, or those unfamiliar with trading, but of course it is for everyone.
I hope it helps in finding the gear you need!

If you ever need help feel free to shoot me a PM or respond to this guide and I’ll fly to the rescue! :smiley:
If you don’t like to trade and like to play solo self found yourself, that is of course fine, to each his own.

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LMAO. Dat signature is 4 reel.

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of course! I don’t joke around…
if it bothers you I’ll change it of course :smiley:

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Don’t worry about it. <3

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Diablo 2 has Ist Rune. All End-game stuff are sold for Ists :wink:

10

thanks, adding that!

11

Might be worthwhile to note scavenged plating or other high demand materials if ugdenbloom is on the list.

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Might be worthwhile to note scavenged plating or other high demand materials if ugdenbloom is on the list

sure, good suggestion
I hardly ever come across players wanting other things than scav’s, frozen hearts and chthonic seals these days
any other items you think are in demand?

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you’ve hit the main ones I find myself needing and others asking for. Perhaps note frozen heart <–> battered shell is a transmute option that makes them both more or less equally desirable.

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added to the OP

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With the plethora of GDstash and/or exotic legendary guides out, I thought I’d comment on the subjective nature of trade. Especially since almost every guide recommends you trade for anything hard to find. And new players will likely look to this guide.

Basically “legit” trade is what you make of it. Users may find items from drops or crafting…but each of us sets a personal standard for what we find appropriate for gameplay.

Many feel legit play includes one or more of the following:
-storage mods
-save/reload crafting
-money transfers/increases through mods = massive crafting potential
-crafting material numbers increased by mods
-increased drop rates through mods .
-items via mods for some other justification.

Mods have oddities/bugs as they develop: for example, older versions of some storage mods had a kind of duping effect on the item variables if more than one of the same type was stored at once.

So…if you are being traded something too good to be true…it possibly is, depending on your perspective. But ymmv and that’s the call.

A particular point needs to be made with respect to blueprints. Once learned, they will never drop for a player again. Some can be bought from vendors, but most can not. Each player has is one distinct BP file list for softcore and one for hardcore. Thus trying to trade for blueprints is generally a wasted effort.

But you can have stuff made by others that know the blueprints.

Finally, some rarer items that were likely easier to find in the basic game are less likely to drop since the introduction of the expansion - due the larger number of higher probability drops introduced (new items). In this case, an alternative item could be considered to avoid too much gameplay delay. An example of this would be the rare Peerless eye of Beronath amulet.

16

I agree, “legit” should possibly be better defined

imo, legit trade would mean trading items that have either dropped in game or have been crafted by a player with items that have dropped in game, and are paid for with iron/mats/components/items that have dropped in game

the use of any mod to come by mats or items would to me seem to be non-legit
storage of items in external tools without duping them or changing their stats also seems legit to me

if it isn’t more defined however, I personally believe that people wanting to participate in legit trade can sense what that entails and are likely trustworthy

A particular point needs to be made with respect to blueprints. Once learned, they will never drop for a player again. Some can be bought from vendors, but most can not. Each player has is one distinct BP file list for softcore and one for hardcore. Thus trying to trade for blueprints is generally a wasted effort

idk how, but my trading file says otherwise
I have had some blueprints drop that my character already knew and of course I have those up for trade
that might of course be some kind of glitch, and these are usually not for items that are very high in demand
but even if we dismiss that, the blueprints sold by vendors are often worthwhile both for the seller and the buyer
say I pay a sum of iron for a blueprint that I know I can sell for a nice amount of mats in my view worth more than its iron price, not a wasted effort at all

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The BP quest rewards will drop to inventory, if you have duplicates. But those that are found in chests,etc will disappear when they hit the ground.

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The BP quest rewards will drop to inventory, if you have duplicates. But those that are found in chests,etc will disappear when they hit the ground

that is probably it

19

GD is a difficult game and it’s complexity can sometimes intimidate new players. Therefore, I advocate a friendly trading environment. I trade my items for whatever you can pay with as long as I can find use for it. I try to avoid giving out items for free because it contradicts the “philosophy”: you have to put in some effort to get what you want or it doesn’t make sense - you could as well GDStash everything.

As for the types of mats, advanced players usually want iron bits, scavenged platings and scrap for the crafting of Stoneplate Grieves. Even though there’s no real way to target farm these, it’s always a good idea to stock up before you go shopping in the community. Farming or crafting dynamite and dismantling epics and legendaries gives a lot of scrap. Money and scavenged platings come along as you level your chars - just don’t get lazy filtering out yellows or skipping chests. Other desirables vary from patch to patch. These days in short supply are (IMO in this order):

  • battered shells/frozen hearts (mutually convertible so basically the same item; farm in Royal Hive),
  • chthonic seals (low drop rates make them a real pain to farm; Darkvale),
  • ancient armors (totally random very rare drop),
  • ugdenblooms (easy farm in lower Ugdenbog some or all the way to Ancient Grove)
  • Pre-AoM rare mats (come along as you farm bosses, also dynamite stuff)
  • Mutated scales (sometimes some people might be out)

However, the most desirable things are items themselves. Do not vendor or blow up mythical legendaries or even low level ones. If you run out of stash space create a mule character. Myself, I tend to keep 3-4 copies of an item before I start cleaning up. Also, many advanced players have their favorite chars whom they minmax (collect gear with best rolls). So try to keep a list of your items so that a potential trade partner can look through it and tell you which items’ rolls he wants to check out. How do you know if an item has a good roll? Go grimtools.com -> item database -> settings -> show min/max values and search for your item.

I also wanted to include the most reasonable IMO conversion rates but decided against it as I don’t wanna undermine anyone’s “business” :wink:

Also, I’d like to appeal to all traders: posting that you want Thunderstruck Kubacabra Chausses of Kings, General’s Living Rings of Hurricane, +5 Badges of Mastery, etc. is somewhat pointless unless you have other items of similar value to contend. Nobody sane will part with a one-in-million double rare green for scrap.

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thanks for the addendum, added to the OP