Journal of Hopeless, the non-equipment character

Grim Dawn General Discussion
1

Day 1, it begins:

Hangman Jarvis doesn’t have much hope for me. My arms are still dead and my body is covered with sores, so I can’t use any equipment. Luckily, I have the lastest hobnailed sneakers so I can run fast and I still have my wits.

Let’s see how far this future vindicator can go…

First problem: my fists can’t do a thing. Will this journey end before it even begins?
Solution: I found pages of lore, went up a level and now storm box is proving effective.

Second problem: Picking stuff up by accident and wearing them
Solution: Set things to legendary. I guess if I come across one now, it’ll be a divine sign.

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2

yassssss10charssssss

3

I offered to rescue Faldis, but he took one look at me and said he was better off where he was. I pushed him in the gate anyway. I won’t let the faithless get me down.

The reanimator went down like a kitten. Maybe this will be easier than I expected? Looking forward to krieg already!

John Bourbon was surprised to hear of my success. Or was that his twin?

The slith cellar was a cinch, didn’t even need to heal. Vindicators are made of sterner stuff. Barnabas won his bet with the hangman that i’d survive. He’s a perpetual optimist, that barnabas.

Level 9 and going strong. Maybe it’s too easy, I should have gone hardcore? Naw, I think I’ll leave something left for others to try.

Rescued Jasper, my reputation proceeds me. He hid. Maybe the rovers will recruit me, they are pacifists, but by choice, unlike me.

Ring? We don’t need no stinkin’ ring. I’m happy to do you a favor and bring you slith necklaces, but keep your ring. Besides, my finger is rotting off.

Had my first near death with a groble hero of storms. A dark cloud descended upon me, replete with sparks. It was very pretty, but nice try, my rune of hagarrad had your name on it.

My first pet! No matter how fuzzy those briars look, I don’t dare pet it or my rotting arms ill get stuck to it.

The wind devils have also decided to add their strength, soon I’ll be trading my inquisitor runes for the fabled storm totem.

I met a singularly peculiar individual named ulgrim. He just laughed and laughed at me. Is that fair? We shall see. I don’t think I’ll try his rock soup.

How’d it get burned, how’d it get burned? You can ask yourself that, Dimitri you witch. There’s no room in our prison for traitors.

People keep giving me things. I guess they feel sorry for me. I don’t need their gifts…charity is more like it.

I’m getting close to the warden, I can hear his laughter in the distance. We’ll see who laughs last.

I’m now despisted to aetherials. At last someone is taking me seriously. I propose a hug an aetherial day.

I’m at the warden’s door. We shall see!

Dodge and weave, that’s all it takes. The warden lies dead.

On to act 2!

4

Shanks down…just a road apple.

Saved stephen, should have let him burn his family, then I’d use my torch on me to end this, but no such luck. Have to keep going. Got to read an excerpt from the book of kymon. Look forward to joining my brethern.

Fetched an ancient relic for the rovers. They were suspicious of me. Wearing stuff is for cowards. I like to be light on the few toes I have left.

Traded my runes for storm totem, now I’m playing with power! Less buttons to deal with too.

Destroy some forges, a deadly bandit named money bags and their boss? No problem, I’ve got a storm totem or two for them.

Keeping a mining cart between me and moneybags sure helped. I always wondered, why are iron bits the currency if huge iron parts are everywhere?

Ready to take on the big whig of this operation. Will he live up to his reputation? 20 seconds later…nope. Storm totems rule so far. Maybe there’s an opening? Not sure if Burbon would like that. I’m suppose to save those who laugh at me, but why?

Maybe Elsa will be nice to me. I wonder if she’s the girl in the picture I keep seeing every time I travel. I’ve got to tell her not to wear so much mascara.

So now I’m “respected” at devil’s cross. I should have named myself rodney dangerfield.

Trying to get crab as soon as possible. It’s the one devotion I know I’ll keep. Got to train that asap to keep alive later.

This undead fellow wants me to kill other undead fellows. I only agreed because I know they have shrines. Can you think of a better reason?

Kind of funny seeing a reflective hero. Is he going to pinch me back if I slap him?

Respected with rovers now too. Maybe they’ll stop laughing.

Met elsa. Felt a bit underdressed in just my tshirt and jeans, but I pointed out she just wears lingerie to battle in her picture in malmouth.

Jumped by an undead monstrosity after I entered steps of torment. First time I’ve had second thoughts, but it went down quick.

Busy taking a selfie while fighting zarth. Got burned bad. Lesson learned. Now I can answer Nick Cage when he asks, how’d it get burned?

Voldrak is dead, if you look close you can see the plaque that reads, John Burbon was here.

5

So ulgrim is being nice to me. I remember his laugh, but I’ll be the bigger person now and help them out.

Finally got my crab proc. Who needs armor when you have the power of the crab to surround you? Not only that, but the ceo of levis says he’s never washed his jeans. Now I know why. The sweat and dirt on them is as good as armor.

Entered the homestead region. Socks, my briarthorn, is happy to be here. This is where his family comes from. Or maybe socks is a she? How can you tell with briarthorns?

It’s painful to clear out these insects after being treated like one. Maybe I should have renamed myself kafka. Probably not the last time I’ll think of a different name for myself.

Bone got me, hope this isn’t a habit, although I probably should have waited to come back to him.

Some troubles starting to surface are:

  1. Damage over time (DOT) effects seem to be my biggest fear, because I don’t know I’m taking damage until after the go into effect.
  2. Constitution is another, it drops so fast.
  3. although I seem to have enough mana, recovering it is another matter. Glacial ice moves faster mana recovery rate.

Got primal bond, we’ll see if this helps.

amalgamation lies dead, I will join my brethern, kymon.

I have taken a detour to pine barrens for the two shrines and lots of exp. Socks is very excited as we approach his home. Unfortunately, the briarthorn here aren’t very welcoming to socks. Maybe because socks is domesticated.

Socks drew my attention to a pile of rocks. I discovered an abandoned kitten. It’s a primal spirit. I will adopt it and call it Gloves. Together, socks and gloves will keep me safe. I just hope they don’t fight, but so far they seem to watch out for each other.

Not much trouble clearing Jagged Wastes and Tyrant Hold. Hope my totem doesn’t become obsolete.

Made it to kymon’s strong hold, even the unequipped need rest. Will resume tomorrow.

6

:smiley: Nice. Can you give a devotion progress update too so others know what you took and how you reached them?

7

Sure, I did this:
Blue cross road
Wraith
Undid blue cross road
yellow crossroad
crane
undid yellow cross road
purple crossroad
hammer
crab
undid purple crossroad/hammer
eel
working on harp now

This is the build I’m going for: https://www.grimtools.com/calc/q2m97E52

The divinities will be fluid. For example, before the loghorrean fight I’ll probably change it to be more focused on just the resists I’ll need for him and be sure to have light of empyrion.

Honestly, the only 2 fights I’m concerned with are Loghorrean and Theodin on Ultimate (possibly epic). All others are a single boss that I can evade and use my pets/storm totem to kill. Log and Theo are pretty much the same fight, ie in a small area that I can’t port out of and swarming with minions. It’s their minions I fear, not the bosses.

For normal and epic versions of those, I can just overlevel until I outclass them. I may even skip Theo in normal/epic since the goal is to win the game on ultimate, but he may be good practice on normal/epic.

8

With kymon’s blessings, I continued on my way.

Came to a taken about to be burned, she’s the first I’ve encountered who looked worse than me. Of course I saved her. I don’t need her gift, people insist on giving me things.

Rescued farmers who were actually grateful to see me. It’s nice to be respected.

Harp devotion is helping me greatly with the mana recovery issue. Nice! I think it’ll be a keeper, with lots of resists and a nice proc too. Any proc that’s “when hit” is good for me, since i get hit and don’t attack.

darkvale was a little nervewracking, as the final fight gave me trouble when I did my challenge without classes, but it went down in about a minute for both phases using my storm totem, wind devils and two pets.

Fairly uneventful journey to Fort Ikon. Did some Kymon quests, a few shrines to finish my harp devotion. Storm totem pretty much clears everything, with wind devil lowering their resists.

Kymon wants me to slay Bane’Gargoth. I told him to find someone else. I have my own quest. If there were a devotion shrine there, then I’d do it.

I am tasked with taking on commander lucious…lucius, I mean. I have heard he is going to be the most challenging boss to date. I enter his fort ready for the challenge, aided by my beloved pets, socks and gloves…oh and wendy, my saucy wind devil.

Wait, was that it? about 15 seconds of the totem, plus my crew, and he was dead. If this is any indication of my future, it should be easy pickings.

Planes of strife is a little tricky with its landmines. If I’m not careful, I’m liable to lose my leg. Good thing I have my sewing kit. I will be tricky and lead the enemies around to use their bodies to blow up the mines to clear the path.

Made it through with only a few scratches. Time to do the 3 shrines in this area, and then the final boss of normal vanilla!

Black sepulcher is a bit difficult for my pets, the bleed really hurts them. But, we pushed through and got our devotion point.

The best tactic seems to be to place the totem and wind devil, retreat and repeat.

Have the Ulo devotion now, tying the proc to grasping vines. we’ll see how that works. both slow enemies, so maybe they are a good pairing.

Finally returned the supplies and talked to the witch. I gave her the body parts and bone, but the outcast witch wants too much when she asks me to get the tome. I’m not going there unless there’s a shrine. when will they catch on? Put a shrine where you want me to go and I’ll go, otherwise, no soap!

One more shrine and i’m ready for the final boss.

Bastion of chaos is scary, but the grasping vines is really proving helpful against these obsidians. I notice a significant difference in how fast they move versus not having them. maybe this will prove the key to dealing with Log’s and Theo’s minions? I’ll soon know the answer to log. I’m pretty excited now, there is a ray of hope.

With only 2 deaths, both of which were just me being lazy, it’s been not much different from doing it with equipment. Took about the same time too, 6:32 hours. I probably would have died with equipment in those situations too. It’s not like I died because I didn’t have stuff, I died because I played dumb. I didn’t avoid the blood spike of the bonehunter (all you have to do is back up and they spread out, then they’re easy to dodge) and I stood in one spot taking a selfie while battling Zarth while he cast burn on me.

I don’t think equipment really matters until late epic and ultimate. We’ll see!

With the 3 wagons destroyed, the decision now is, push ahead to loghorean, or prepare more?

Options:

  • Get to honored status with Rovers to get my 28th devotion point. Then i can get 15% more poison resist from Ulo devotion.
  • Test myself on crucible and get more devotions
  • Level up until I’m so high level loghorrean is easy
  • Rework my devotions so I get Light of Empyrion and poison/chaos resist devotions. Not so easy with only 27/28 points, unless I do crucible too.
  • bite the bullet, grab some consumeables for resists and go forward
9

Was curious and tested myself against crucible. Got to lvl 40 and stopped, then did it again so I could get another devotion point. I might have made level 50, but didn’t think it was worth the risk.

Decided to go for it! going down into the pit of loghorrean. I loaded up with resistance and regeneration consumables. Let’s see if that is enough.

My plan:

  1. plant storm totems near him
  2. keep wind devils going
  3. Grasping vines to slow his minions
  4. Hope pets keep the minions off me
  5. dodge as much as possible

If this doesn’t work, I’ll choose one of the other options listed before.

Totally surprised how quickly and safely I beat the guy that gaurds Log’s door. He gave me tremendous trouble with my non-class build.

SUCCESS! In about 2 minutes I destroyed Log. I did not expect that. My totem killed the minions as fast as he could spawn them and I dodged his death spheres.

Plan now is to get shrines from expansion, but not finish it until later.

Current devotions:
crane, wraith, ulo, crab, harp, eel, and 2 points towards stag. 30 points total.

10

Pretty uneventful so far. Got the heart of carraxus with little difficulty, he attacked Socks the entire time and Gloves helped too. The fight took about as long as the Log fight. Never was at risk.

I personally find the first half of the expansion a lot of fun. The second part is more about the challenge.

Clearing the barrowholm mines has been a challenge, those bugs swarm me. I learned I have to be careful not to be pinned in.

Did what I needed to get the fetish, now headed to the altar of rattosh. This will be a challenge!

Was worried about ekket, but he went down fast. This is a walkthrough.

I really like Ulo. I never tried it before. Linked to grasping vines, it really slows them down. Only bad thing is when it wears off, it’s like they’re suddenly sprinting.

Finished stag, now I can work on ishtak. Beauty.

Made it to the malmouth sewers outpost. Time to break.

11

Cleared the wagons and killed some aetherials, rescued a crazy guy protecting some orphans…nothing special. Then, the gatekeeper aetherial. Nearly died a few times, especially when he trapped me in a corner and I only got past him after a few failed attempts. I hope this isn’t a sign of what’s to come.

Cleared the camp, sticking to ramps where they could not gang up on me. Easy escape route if things got too hot. Pets can get between me and the enemies to prevent them from attacking me.

Oddly, if you kill the enemy heroes, your allies will appear and say “the outpost is ours” even though clearly the enemies are still there and fighting all around us.

Third death…was looking at some skill descriptions, all was going well, then suddenly dead. I have a feeling it was that nasty hero Harrison or whatever its name is. my fault for not having my aetherial resist consumable going and especially for taking my eyes off the battle for so long.

Yes, it was Harraxis. Got him this time.

Made it to the malmouth crown rift and talked to ulgrim. A decision will need to be made soon whether to press on ahead to kill the final boss or wait. I’m pretty confident and may try for him.

I also want to get tempest somehow for my storm totem. It can be done by removing rat and staff.

I’ll change out stag to get tortoise as a safety net. All 3 of my deaths could have been avoided if I had tortoise. I’d have survived the attack and been alerted with the golden orb around me that I was in trouble and allow me the time to escape.

That leaves 2 points to get both health crossroads. I’m not sure about those, but I do know if I don’t strengthen my storm totem, which is my main way of killing, it’ll become obsolete and nothing else will save me.

Made changes: Undid eel and stag and completed tempest, tying it to my storm totem, then started tortoise. I’ll get eel again later.

Tempest does seem to make a difference. Hope it levels up to keep my totem relevant.

The vents are destroyed. Did the docks/respected quest. I’ll come back to finish Theo later after my devotions are more developed.

Time for Elite!

12

Started Elite. No negative resists. This time Jarvis is more polite. Reputation has that effect.

Fought 3 rifthound heroes who were joined by a 4th. Many close calls. Bleed seems the most deadly to me. Poison heroes are a close second. Burning are also hard, but don’t seem as common. Pretty much the DoT enemies get me as I discovered earlier.

Now have the Seal skill. 5 buttons to manage. That’s my limit of buttons to use and still be able to plan things.

A poison hero got me, I guess I should start using consumables for regular combat.

A bit of an unexpected problem has arisen. I probably should have anticipated as I had this same problem with my non-class challenge. I have 5 devotions that need to be tied to passive skills: Ishtak, Light of empyrion, tortoise, crab and harp. Yet, I only have 3 passive skills: modgrogen’s pact, primal bond and word of renewal.

I could get deadly aim, but there are no other options. I don’t even want to tie something to deadly aim, since the devotion will only have 5 seconds of time and only if something crits.

Two of them need to get the axe. Likely harp and tortoise. If only there were a way to get 2 more passive skills to tie my devotions to. Maybe there are other devotions just as good that tie to attack skills. This is a real issue.

I’ll have to think of this while I take a break.

13

Here is the solution: https://www.grimtools.com/calc/qNYDQLBZ

Harp was too valuable to give up, so ditched the proc and put a point into yellow for more health.

Sad that I can’t have tortoise as it would have prevented the deaths I’ve had so far and likely many of the future ones. The silverlining is I went back to Stag which gives bleed resist, which is sorely needed as bleed is the most deadly to me so far.

Skills have been changed as well and will continue to change as I explore how valuable each is (another reason why I don’t like using consumables until I understand my character’s strengths and weaknesses…I won’t know if a skill is strong because it really is strong, or because of a consumable. I might even think a weak skill is strong and a strong skill is weak, then drop the good skill and keep the bad. I won’t know what resists need work either).

I think grasping vines will be the key to dealing with Theo’s and Log’s minions. Combined with Ulo, it should really slow them down and negate their threat.

I had briarthorn and primal spirit with lots of points, but decided I can’t afford to do both. I dropped briar to 1 point and kept its aura while maxing primal spirit. Besides, this is mainly focused on storm totem and not pet damage.

Storm totem + tempest + wind devil’s lower resists should hopefully clear the minions as fast as they are summoned, plus storm totem stays where I put it. That was the problem with regular pets against these bosses - they’d be attacking the boss, but when he summons minions, the pets scatter trying to chase them. Using the pet attack button doesn’t work, because as soon as I move away from the boss, they leave the boss and follow me (reminds me of the WW2 story when they trained dogs to carry bombs and run to the enemy tanks - they ended up running back to their owners and blowing them up instead). A stationary pet is how I beat Theo with my non-class character, and I hope to learn from that experience and do it better with this guy. All that’s left is for me to keep my distance from the bosses and dodge their attacks.

14

Fairly uneventful getting from warden’s cellar to Krieg. I’m learning to respect all enemies, not just heroes. I’m hoping others start respecting me. I keep my distance and never let any get behind me. Let the pets take aggro while I manage my squad.

I’m getting better at using seal, casting two and taking advantage of them as safe spots. It is taxing my mana pool a lot though. I’ll need to put more points towards spirit.

For the moment I’m keeping tortoise for protection until I get ishtak and light of empyrion who will need the skill slot. Tortoise has saved my life from certain death twice. Maybe I should reconsider which proc gets the axe.

I will get my revenge on bonehunter before I proceed to act 2.

Got him, despite being 12 levels above me, paying attention and dodging his blood spikes, getting terrain between us and letting pets block him were what it took.

Onto the rovers…trying to get rep to honored so I can go back to get the last shrine from normal mode.

Journey was fairly smooth, no close calls. Krieg went down quick. The real challenges are far ahead. For now, it’s just testing to learn what is the optimal build of skills and devotions.

15

Making a quick detour back to normal now that I’m honored in Rovers to get the final shrine from here. I could cheese it and get the stuff to give to elite, but I shouldn’t need to do that. Maybe if I still needed to get another shrine in ultimate, but I’ll be done long before I had to face that temptation.

The rift for blood grove was close to the portal and found the stone in a couple minutes. Now on to the mine fields.

This is proving more challenging, had two very large aetherials nearly kill me while landmines were going off. I barely got a heal in before I nearly died.

Seal and renewal are proving useful against cthonics, they hit a lot less hard than the aetherials I faced in the mine fields. They go down easier too. Obsidians are easy to dodge, their moves are telegraphed and slow, but too many or if other kinds attack, they can get me and hit hard.

got the second stone. now for the final shrine of normal mode.

Met mogdrogen. He was a bit surprised, but polite. No chance I’ll fight him!

Now, I think I’ll revise my plan again. Since I can’t do turtle because its proc has no skill to tie to, I figured I’ll use dryad as my safety net. It will heal me plus I can tie it to grasping vines. I’ll have to drop ulo, but that’s ok.

I currently have 42/55 points: crab, crane, inspiration, eel, wraith, hound, dryad, tempest, and 4 points towards ishtak.

Still outstanding: Light of empyrion and sailor.

Back to elite to continue…

16

Back in elite, starting with getting the shrine in arkovian undercity.

While it’s a good idea to run past the endless mobs of skeletons, now and then I need to clear an area so I have somewhere safe to retreat to.

I usually walk along the edges, out of sight of kilian, to get all his ghosts to appear before I take him on so I don’t get mobbed. He’s surprisingly safe to fight as long as i don’t stand in his blue circle of death.

one more shrine until I finish ishtak…on to steps of torment.

Lutra took a while to beat, maybe because she was lightning based. Not too threatening though.

Running through steps of torment was a bad idea, got blocked on all sides. I will need to proceed more cautiously. Death #5…again avoidable, lesson learned. I will need to be in top form when I get to ultimate. This is just practice for that.

One of the weird things about this game, is that how well you do in normal and elite is of no indication of how well you’ll do in ultimate. you could shred everything in the first two difficulties and get destroyed because your defense doesn’t cut it in Ultimate. Sure, you could farm the best stuff, but you’re fundamentally weak compared to another character who can handle it without using top tier gear.

On the other hand, you may be sluggish through the first two difficulties and continue to be sluggish in ultimate. Not the fastest, but you can handle it.

seems like all the skeletons from the parisian catacombs decided to show up in steps of torment, but the cautious approach is working. I don’t think I’ll run through things often again, that worked in normal, but not elite.

seal is really proving its worth. I notice a big difference between being in it and not. I’m happy with my choice of inquisitor.

A lot of close calls with the steps of torment shrine, but pulled through. It was probably the most thrilling fight to date.

Ishtak is now complete! Almost done with the shrines and then I can start skipping shrine quests.

Killed voldrak. I remember when he was new. Trying to get the blueprint for mistborn. john burbon just beyond him saying i could go no further. One thing I miss from then, was how chains of oleron gave +1 to all skills in a random class. I wonder if anyone else wanted that to stay.

Made honored with homestead, when I get a chance I’ll head back to normal to get some exp from that quest.

Pretty uneventful clearing out the insect nest and amalgomation. Will do the two shrine quests in the pine barrens area tomorrow.

17

Popped back to normal to do the honor quest for homestead. The reward was barely a blip on the exp bar. It was probably not worth the time.

Pine barrens. When I think of this place I think: two shrines (only one for elite/ultimate), high exp quests and the ancestral home of my pets.

Avoided ol’bloodbriar’s blood spikes, just stayed back and went between them. Place totem and wind devil, fall back and retreat. Keep things between us. Didn’t get scratched.

The dranghoul enforcers are pretty scary, i need to keep my distance. I treat every one of them as a hero.

Kind of funny to lead enemies down a hall, then come back and find all the healers stranded behind, wondering where their tanks have gone. Like shooting fish in a barrel.

Bloodfeast was overwhelmed by my faithful pets.

Almost 1 level worth of exp. Well worth the diversion.

quick trip back to rovers camp to get the honored quest request and now I’m ready to get the first stone for that shrine.

Level 60. A big milestone, but Lvl 75 will be important so I can use some powerful consumables. I seem to have more than enough mana for my needs, so the rest will probably go to physique. I will probably redo my stats and transfer points from spirit to phys.

Bolvia was pretty tough, probably because my consumables had run out.

Got the first stone for mogdrogen’s quest. It was near my arrival spot and found the exit soon after. It wouldn’t be sporting to quit out once I get the stone.

I will be recusant and not continue the kymon quest. i just want to get to Log and finish the shrines, then I’ll go back to normal and try Theo.

About to enter the chamber of the darkvale boss. A little nervous, but as long as i avoid his sphere, projectile and pets I’ll be ok. Easy.

Took some time, especially the second phase. One close call, but persevered. I’m getting closer every moment to Loghorrean!

Now I’m hated with beasts, well I don’t much like them either.

Probably will do the hidden path quests when I’m lvl 80.

Time to do lucius again…we’ll see how well i dodge, if i can do it without dying again.

Some hero is in here, that’s a first…faldrik. Dispatched him and now for lucius.

Got him, not much different than in normal. Now I have to return the supplies, get to the gates and get the second mogdrogen quest stone…then two shrines and destroy the wagons. Not far to go.

I don’t know what did it, maybe a combination of things, but I was down to a sliver of life. retreated and healed in time. Luckily i wasn’t hit by a DoT.

Made it to the gates. I have 50 phys and 12 spirit, I’m going to shift to 57/5. If i still have enough spirit for my skills, i’ll shift everything to phys.

Now I have to go back to the minefields and find that rift. The minefields is in my top 10 list of least favorite places. If i’m wounded and retreat…then hit a mine. or at full health and hit a cluster of mines, then get attacked.

and yes, got chased by a hulk and ran into some mines. I did not see the mines and thought I was running into a cleared area. I’m not sure what I can learn from that, other than get better at spotting mines. Maybe terrain blocked my view. I miss the tortoise’s emergency absorption, not for the last time. Death 6.

returned supplies, talked to the witch, now I’m going back to get my body and find that rift.

Got the final stone for the mog quest, one close call when I was swarmed, but i escaped and healed.

The shrine went surprisingly easy, probably because I’m getting better at the seal.

Only two shrines left before I face Log. Those two will go towards light of empyrion. I think I will give up ishtak for the fight with Log and shift my devotion points to complete LoE, then switch back after.

Will take on the final stage of vanilla after a break.

18

Completely forgot about the shrine in the Tomb of Archon. Maybe it would have been better if I had not recalled, because something stunned me and I went down fast. My guess is it was a storm revenant. I will need to be more watchful of that.

The rest went smoothly and the lost tomb was a breeze. None were resistant to my lightning and I have 70% bleed resist.

Now, back to the final leg of epic/vanilla…

First thing I did was shift ishtak’s 6 points to LoE to finish that. Will change back after the Log fight.

Now to get the other two shrines, wagons and get Log.

First shrine went well, not much different from the Lost Tomb.

Got stuck in a staircase for the first time and had to teleport out and back. Glad i didn’t fall into a void or something, definitely a bug.

Second shrine down, one of the chthonic heroes cast 3 red orbs that nearly got me, but I have feet and dodged them.

51 devotion points, 4 more to go until I complete them.

Took out the wagons fast, now I descend to Log. I was sure to get my last will in order first.

As I descend to the Seal level, I know by his howls Log is very close. Nothing will humiliate him more among his fellow chthonians than to be beaten by me.

Bloodlord Thalonis was a challenge, but I kept my eye on his red orb and avoided certain death.

Now, time for Log…

Got him down to 1/10th of his health surprisingly quickly, my 450 second consumables hadn’t even run out, and then disaster…he either stopped taking damage or he regenerates as fast as I do damage. I will need to get some consumables that boost my damage.

The arena is so tiny and it fills up with tentacles, 3 orbs and minions. This game is a quantity game, so I need to clear them faster.

Remembered arcanum oil which boosts my elemental damage 50%. Died a couple more times, then finally triumphed. I died as many times to this boss as I have up until him.

I will need to learn my lessons for ultimate, which I now have access to.

I will take a break and then see whether to go back to normal to kill Theo, get shrines from elite expansion, or start on ultimate.

19

I think I’ll get the two easy shrines from the elite expansion, the grove and undead tomb, then go to ulitmate for 2 more, and then go back to normal to kill theo. I might also do the normal hidden path too.

Carraxus took a while but kept his attention on my pets, making him an easy kill, thankfully. Those two shrines are as good as done, nothing else is a threat.

These elite beasts are no joke. I wouldn’t say they hit hard, they seem to hit medium if that’s a term, but they take as much damage as if they were made of stone.

Got the shrine from the grove, and now the long journey to barrowholm’s portal and the undead tomb nearby.

Got to the tomb relatively safely and freed ugdall. I’ve never killed him to find out what happens. Probably lose rep with coven and gain with barrow. I’m not really interested to find out.

Now on to ultimate for 2 more shrines…

ULTIMATE difficulty, finally! this is where it truly begins.

Hangman Jarvis fell to his knees and would not look up at me, but I forgave him.

As I stand at the bridge, I recall all that has happened since I started…especially how I almost gave up when I did no damage with my fists. Enough of that, that was all practice, ultimate is the real run.

saved faldis and on my way.

No negative resists (with consumables). My highest is lightning at 75% and lowest is slow at 0%. Poison is 2% which is a big concern.

Deadly poison…that will be my bane. First death on ultimate.

Wow, he got me again before I killed him. I wonder if there are other sources of poison resist or if I need to adjust my devotions for more poison resist.

Ran to bonehunter’s shrine without incident…only to discover I didn’t have a mistborn talisman, so I had to go back to normal, buy the club from the hidden vendor and make one. And wouldn’t you know it, the bridge to get to bonehunter was clogged with oversized trolls. Tried running by, but got swarmed and died. They are all 9 levels above me. The third try i cleared them slowly and got it. Another point to ishtak, 25% poison resist and 300 health! I now have 27% poison resist. That will help a lot, couldn’t have come sooner. one more devotion point to go. I will try to get to the underground transit shrine asap.

Got to the transit, completing all 55 of my devotion points. Ishtak is complete. I hope this will be a game changer.

I will take on Krieg tomorrow.

Things to consider for the future:
How to make my damage greater? Look at different devotions, consumables or maybe making my wind devil stronger.
How to get more poison resist? Other than devotions, there is no other way.
How to focus my devotions/consumables better for the ultimate Log fight. I know there is one that lowers their resists, that may be a key.
For the ultimate Log fight, maybe look up what damage types he and his minions do and only get devotions that resist those.
What should I do next? Hidden paths for sure, but maybe take time to level up, go ahead with ultimate or take on normal theo?
Many options…

20

Started hidden path on normal. It’s nice for a change to be higher level than my enemies.

The trick with the sentinel is to lead him away from his healing green crystals. He gave very little trouble, but this is normal. I’ll wait until I’m lvl 85 before I attempt him on elite.

I think I’ll level up some more before I take on normal theo. I’m not even lvl 70 and I want to get my devotions leveled up too.

I’ll push on as far as I can on ultimate.

I think I’ll shift points out of primal spirit since he’s not really my main source of damage. I’m not really doing a pet build, so those points are probably better spent on wind devil. If I’d gone occult instead of Inquisitor I’d be able to make a proper pet build, although I doubt I’d have the points to do both classes justice.

Usually I pick a main class I put lots of points into and a support class that just has one or two skills. Occult and shaman are both main classes, so there wouldn’t be enough points for me to do both.

One trick with seal is to place totem inside it so it gets extra damage. That may help, but it takes my attention away from dodging. I’ll have to get better at it so it takes less attention.

Krieg lies dead. A couple close calls, but nothing really out of control. I got hit because I’m trying to find the easiest way to get totems onto seal. Maybe if I place the seal button to the left of totem, i can place them at the same time. This will take adjusting, my fingers need to learn where the other buttons are.

It seems to work, 0 distraction doing this. A simple shift of buttons makes all the difference. I am getting storm totem on the seal for bonus damage, but I’m still not putting out the damage I need to. If I had equipment, items would easily multiply my damage by 10x. I will first try to see how much impact there is to shifting my points from primal spirit to wind devil. If it doesn’t help, I may have to sacrifice defensive devotions for offensive ones and rely more on dodging to survive than taking hits.

I’m going to have to learn every trick if I am to hope to kill ultimate log, let alone theo.

My character still has a lot of growth, with 30 more levels to put points. I’ll keep leveling before I decide to axe my devotions. There are also some lvl 75 consumables I haven’t used yet and some others available now I haven’t resorted to, like the one that lowers their resists. I’m not tapped out yet!

I noticed wind devil has impaired aim. It may be better than grasping vines’ slow enemy attack. It lasts longer, the chance increases and wind devil also adds damage. Both would be ideal if i can manage it.

Cronley’s gang are pretty easy to dodge, but they hit hard if I mess up.

Regular enemies are like heroes, heroes are like bosses, bosses are end game bosses and end game bosses are like ravager/mogdrogen. I shudder to think what it’d be like fighting those two without equipment.

Cronley was very easy to dodge and thankfully his minions died to my totem quickly, otherwise that place would have filled up. Maybe it’s my new trick of placing the totem inside the seal. I also used aetheward and arcanum oil which helped.

Made it to twin falls, time for a break.