:o
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If by self found you mean, you found gear on one of many different characters and pass them on to the ones that can best use it, then I can agree, but “self found” often means you only use gear that character found.
The game clearly was meant to pass on gear to other characters, otherwise there would not be a shared loot mechanic.
Dara dum dum dum another troll bites the dust!
This is the problem with the grim dawn community, instead of listening to very serious criticism about the game, they just dickride it and say “well I guess this game just isn’t for you”
No dude, it’s just not a very good game. If you like grinding there are better alternatives, I would argue going back and playing d2 is more interesting. Legendary items are horribly designed, the skills and basic functionality are acceptable, but many of the skills are just upscaled auto attacks (I’m looking at you cadence/savagery)
Ultimate grinding is terrible, this is coming from someone who was one of the first (I’m the first to my knowledge) to beat this game on ultimate in HC and with about 1300 hours played. The game actually got WORSE with the release of ultimate. This is because ultimate was originally balanced by 1 person, because he was the only one to beat the difficulty in internal testing. Then it gets released, obviously overtuned in many ways but the most pressing one being the large mob effective life pool, making the game boring. White mobs have lots of life and do lots of dmg and bosses feel fairly easy in comparison to regular mobs. The hardest part of ultimate was walking from a3 to fort ikon when I played it because the white beasts would hit me for about 4k (with pre nerf maiven’s shield) and the Ultimate Log fight was actually pretty easy. Am I saying its too hard? Nope but I’m sure someone is going to think that, it just makes me play more defensive, kiting constantly, and the true challenge is getting myself to stay awake. Is the balance better now? Probably, but I wouldn’t know, I was done with vanilla after that. I was wearing half yellows as well, mostly “vitality” and “attack gear” and was largely carried by a legendary called tome of names which was much more powerful at the time. What’s the point of grinding for legendaries? A lot of them are seriously not even better than good yellows and rare affixes are often not stronger than their magic counterparts.
So don’t say “oh well this game maybe just isn’t for you” no it was definitely my kinda game but poor decisions by devs have ruined my love for it. The only reason I check in is to see the work being done by the modding community. Honestly, you should check out some basic changelogs in the cornucopia mod, one of them was to update an affix so it scaled upwards from level 8, I mean seriously? The more changelogs I read from that mod the more I believe these devs are just incompetent. I played TQ, boring snail paced gameplay. I liked GD because it was much faster paced, but now I really can’t say that about it. I would literally rather just grind any% normal sorceress speedruns in d2.
That’s the problem with getting all your feedback from a forum dedicated to the game, people who don’t like it just quit and stop caring, but people who like it turn the place into one giant echo chamber where progress and quality feedback is largely impossible. This affects everyone who likes the game because if there isn’t enough support for expansions, they will stop coming. Everyone here should have a vested interest in making the game as good as possible.
From one alpha player to another, I disagree that ultimate difficulty made the game worse. It was a rough go at first, but so was normal/veteran when it was first released and being balanced. Remove the rose-tinted glasses for a bit and recall that the alpha had its shoddy moments and took an extensive period of time to balance, much like Ultimate difficulty is currently in the balancing state. It’s not fair to give up on a game after 1300 hours just because the original poorly-balanced Ultimate difficulty left a bad taste in your mouth. It left the vast majority of us feeling sour, but we persevered because we liked the premise of the game and knew that the devs respected our opinions related to balance.
Speaking of these opinions, if you take a gander at the feedback section of the forums, you’d realize that it’s one of the busiest sub-forums on this website. There is of course some echo chamber effect going on, but you’ll realize that most of the players that love the game the most and respect the developers sometimes give the most detailed feedback and offer realistic solutions to problems that they experience. This brings us to this topic, which is moreso a cry for attention than a serious critique of the gameplay. The TC has already clearly made up his mind and formed an opinion about Grim Dawn rather than posing feedback and remaining receptive to future changes.
Many affixes and Legendaries are certainly underpowered and drops can sometimes feel unrewarding. Many posters have brought up these issues and posed solutions rather than simply stating that they’re “done” with the game. It’s hard to take even valid criticism seriously when it is posed in such a childish, attention-grabbing manner.
It doesn’t help that unlike most other ARPGs, the level cap in Grim Dawn is relatively incredibly easy to reach. In other ARPGs, even if you didn’t get the item you wanted in a farming session, you could end that session knowing you got some exp for your character.
In grim dawn, meanwhile, if you didn’t get any items of use to you, then you were no where closer to any of your goals than when you first started playing, since you’re probably already at the level cap and have been there for a long time.
The OP says they’ve played for several years which suggests they’ve also been involved since the alpha came out and have participated in the game’s development. So sorry, but they knew what sort of game they were getting into. Yeah, RNG can suck - I’m still trying to get a pair of Batrachos Greaves in TQIT after 8 years!
Suggesting going back to D2 is laughable. From what I’ve read grinding in that game was even worst and in some cases you need to trade to get what you want. And don’t get me started on that ridiculous miniscule inventory. By the time you’ve got a few of the special things that help your toon there’s no space left to pick anything up! And that was only as far as Act 2 Normal! God knows what it would be like in latter difficulties. :rolleyes:
It sounds like this game isn’t for you.
Nah, droprates in GD are actually pretty fair, all things considered. There’s a couple source-related drops I’d change (because personally I like farming specific bosses for specific legendaries, though that doesn’t seem to be coming to GD, other than in very small doses like Mad Queen Claw and the Sentinel Helms), but statistically drops/hour are pretty OK.
This can be improved with time. Feel free to offer feedback on the matter, as Cadence and Savagery are presently fairly hot topics. And where were you when I wrote my massive feedback on every Legendary in the game? 
Objectively false. I know at least two praetorians who beat Ultimate in testing. :3
Actually the problem with release Ultimate was excessive OA+DA on everything. Mob health is still generally too low.
Which…we do, except it seems you’re just dropping by to vent rather than offer feedback. Kudos.
Edit: To elaborate a little more, there is a slight but important difference between being frustrated and venting on a forum and being frustrated and venting and making suggestions on a forum. One is welcomed, one is met with hostility. Any guesses? The OP’s post did not make suggestions at all, it simply said “X IS WRONG SO I’M LEAVING, BYE.” How are we to receive that, much less interpret it? Your post is not more than complaining about existing problems - as perceived by you and/or others - without offering suggestions to fixing them either. So how is the game meant to ‘git gud’ without anyone knowing how to make it ‘git gud’ aside from a select few knowledgeable individuals like yourself and the OP?
Thanks for the minor complement to Cornucopia though. I think.
The drop rates are fine, I agree, the primary issue for me is that drops from level 50-85+ are horribly unrewarding due to the extreme specificity of the items such that the vast majority of legendaries/empowered epics are catered to a single specific build of a single specific set of 2 masteries. I’m not pushing for generic +spirit +cunning items, but when half the item budget (and most of the “upgrade” part of the item) is +skills to two skills I’ll never use, it really takes the excitement out of finding it. My suggestion would be to add an enchanter and allow a subset of the stats on a legendary to re-roll and then the +skills on items are randomly chosen from a small set of skills. This allows each item to benefit multiple builds and open up the selection of legendaries for any average build from < 5-6 out of the >200 the game likes to brag about.
I agree the OA/DA was way out of tune, but Ultimate has a larger problem. Build diversity goes down from Elite -> Ultimate and the only viable way to build for Ultimate is to sacrifice damage for tankiness and resists which reduces fun for most players. I wish they would have been more elegant with Ultimate’s “ultimate-ness” instead of just making everything hit really really hard which homogenizes builds and makes everyone just go all in on Physique (Physique being god has other contributors like the % damage scaling is awful). I know we love to rag on Diablo 3 but I don’t feel weaker fighting in T10 versus T1 as my gear I’ve grinded for has upgraded both my offense and defense but I can’t say the same for Ultimate in GD.
I am sorry for saying this as I actually understand your point of view and it certainly seems that way for many players…However, the “all points into physique” strategy used in order to survive Ultimate is a myth that was disseminated when Empowered Legplates of Valor were BiS. There are actually at least 4 examples that contradict this point:
- Pierce/Cold Blademasters - they should not and DO NOT put all points into physique because they survive through lifesteal coupled with high burst / dps. It is not unusual to see Top Tier Blademasters with 30-40 points into cunning.
- Vitality Conjurers - they need spirit because Sigil keeps them alive and maintains their survivability. Also one of the easiest classes for Ultimate Hardcore.
- Bleed Tricksters - high cunning is essential for +% duration to their bleed - which is in turn essential because they can’t facetank like other classes.
- Time Dilation builds - I have specifically showed a 300.000 dps chaos/vitality build with just 50 points in physique. Not only was I able to beat Ultimate with 0 deaths with it, but also the Mad Queen and every nemesis for more than 50 times each while “facetanking”.
If anything, changes in 1.0.0.3 and 1.0.0.4. (*especially Hotfix 2) expanded build diversity immensely. The community, however, does not want that because many people are still in love with their Blademasters and want them to be the top dogs forever (not me, though).
You’re sort of making my point with naming niche builds (except for BM). This isn’t a personal opinion, its shared by nearly everyone. Its a fact that 95% of builds on the build forum just say “just invest all your attribute points in physique”. Unless you need the stats for gear requirements, you can almost always get enough energy regen from stats/augments. Also Pierce/Cold BM’s abuse an OP heal and that’s the only reason they can get away with it and even then you still need substantial physique for gear requirements. Your Time Dilation build also abuses a mechanic and it will almost for sure be changed by the dev’s because of it.
It is the one glaring red flag still left in the game that largely can’t be argued against, the fact that spirit/cunning are extremely unrewarding to stack at high gear levels (largely due to % damage scaling and past nerfs) while physique is god since most of its benefits are flat increases rather than a % of a base and those benefits go towards defense which is needed by nearly everyone in Ultimate.
Some of the best items are not necessarily legendary.
I have a druid dual wielding Progenitor, I don’t really know if I will ever replace that.
For the rest of the legendary I found, I see it as an opportunity to make a new class for the legendary.
Yeah I finished Ultimate yesterday with a warder with like 50 points in coonning, died twice in Veteran (lol) and once when farming Cersei. Seriously mobs don’t hit THAT hard in Ultimate, you don’t need to go all out physique and sacrifice your first born child to Ch’thon to survive anymore.
Ok, you are right that for a lot of builds physique investment is the right way to go. I wouldn’t say 95%, however - more like 80-85% (full pet Conjurers, for example, still need spirit for the Empowered version of Og’Napesh 
).
Still, I believe that changes applied in 1.0.0.3. and 1.0.0.4. expanded the build diversity by a bit and this is a good thing. The fact that there are exceptions to the “all in physique” school makes me optimistic. The problem is many new players want to play top tier builds (i.e. all nemeses killed, Fabius in 6 seconds, 0 deaths, bla bla) and you can’t achieve those results without endless grinding for 1-2k hours+.
This in turn creates a “Scylla and Charybdis” scenario for the Devs because if you eliminate parts of the grinding process (e.g. Stormheart in the Tomb of Korvaak guaranteed drop), a vocal minority of hardcore players will say that the game has become too easy and has been “casualized”.
Drop rates are fine in this game. This is coming from someone who’s not usually lucky in these sorts of games. Between the gog + steam version, I got about 200ish hours in the game. Got 2 characters in Ultimate, beat Ultimate with one of my builds. I got enough epics and legs where I’ve had to use a stash manager mod to store all my loot. I got tabs full of legs of varying levels, most arguably being useless for most builds. But the fact of the matter is I got plenty of legs. I don’t have any top tier sets completed, but I got pieces of a few of the sets.
In an online only game, like PoE, in 200 hours after starting from nothing, I could have an end game build in the 90+ range with good enough gear enough to do all the game’s content. I’ve gotten to end game in PoE and running mid tier maps in as little as 80 hours, and that’s starting in a new league from nothing, and there are speed runners who can do it in as little as 24 hours or less. So compared to a game like PoE, Grim Dawn progression is around the same rate if not a little bit harder. The average player who’s been playing ARPGs for years should be able to beat ultimate in 200 hours or less.
Not getting “plenty of legs” isn’t the problem for most people, its that only 1-5 are useful/upgrades for their build out of the 200 available.
I’m going to stop right there.
You got 1300 hours played and you are going to tell us that the game is not good? Any game that can get you to play 1300 hours has to be pretty Fing good.
Clearly you have just finally reached a point you are no longer having fun and want to lash out, but dude, you played for 1300 hours before you got to that point. The game is obviously VERY good to you. You just played the hell out of it and it’s lost its luster.
I’ve got alts, renamed stash files and Mamba’s stash manager full of worthless blues, greens and purples. Doesn’t change the fact I never found an empowered tome for my pet build, or worthwhile pieces for my Blademaster.
Maybe this issue with the game is one of perception; If you happen to get lucky and get the drops you need/want, then everything is fine and other people just need to lern2playmoarbetterest. However, if you grind through a weekend or 2 and still don’t get anything useful for your character, then you get bored and/or frustrated, and the game is too grindy or not fun.
The overall point of a game is to have fun, and if people aren’t finding their time investment reaping worthwhile rewards, then they stop having fun. This is why I thought Everquest’s token drop system from boss mobs was such a good compromise – there was still the chance/excitement factor from the random loot element of drops, but you also accrued a special currency that you could then turn in for items after a decent time investment. This way you never felt like your time was totally wasted, even if you went through a very long dry spell of shitty rng.
Or he’s just been playing a long time through Alpha and Beta testing cycles… but I’m sure you know more about him and his situation than he does.
One problem seems to stem from the lack of satisfaction arising from being unable to use the few legendaries that you get from first 1-2 chars finishing the game leading to “unrewarding” as the outcome for casual play