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Grim Dawn Ideas and Feedback
22

@Travis_Sullivan i just realized i might have phrased things extra poorly even by my standards/“talking about different things”

The way i see it is,
on a SSF/new char we should hit Honoured on Normal, this can currently be done with most factions, except DC, “decently”, (because bounties suck to make up for the rest on Normal/Vet).
I expect to hit revered in 1 playthrough with a mandate, but i don’t expect to/don’t think we should expect to hit Revered that fast without a Mandate, when skipping stuff/just doing the bare minimum quest; that’s what the Bounties are for with a Writ (on elite or Ult), to push that final piece super easily (high(er) rep rewards = 12 bounties or so past Honoured)
On a SSF char i don’t generally find it unreasonable to hit those rep thresholds in time aside from DC, because natural kill rep/progression gets it there (killing clearing the actual game/after the quests).

Maybe i’m too hung up on bounties, but i feel they should be utilized for rep accordingly atleast, because they do solve it, (even if Normal bonties are general unsatisfactory and extra so for DC)
If you’re skipping with a SSF char, you should “not” expect to then skip bounties/rep interactions on Elite/Ult, imo that’s what Mandates are for, to finalize that bigger skip potential.

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23

I’m saying skip elite. Finishing act 4 now unlocks both elite and ultimate for the design purpose that only 2 difficulties are used rather than all 3. That is what I mean by skip.

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It was on the post where they made act 4 in normal unlock both elite and ultimate a long time ago where they started doing updates again.

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Yeah, even with doing bounties in ultimate, it is still a drag to get the last 5k rep for rovers (after doing elite to ensure I got honored before entering ultimate to have the writ). DC was fine with an additional cronley run and one bounty (after doing elite act 1 and 2) before jumping to ultimate, but if their overall goal is to make it 2 difficulties, then that should not be a requirement. Without going into elite and not having the writ before doing the ultimate quests, DC is about 10k short of revered on the playthrough.

Even without playing on vet, you still hit 100 when skipping elite on a fresh start, so going into elite is essentially just a waste of time to farm up those quests for rep.

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Not that long; November 2023 with v1.2.0.

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27

I’m talking about doing every quest in normal, and every quest in ultimate. Elite is pointless now with the new changes that came when they started updating again.

You can’t hit honored on rovers, DC, Barawholm or the 2 other factions in FG on a single playthrough in normal. You have to farm a bit to get Coven to honored in normal, same with Malmouth.

You should be able to hit honored on normal, maybe one or two bounties/one or two farming things to go out of your way to do it before jumping past elite and into ultimate if you do all the quests (I’m not talking about doing the dungeons in normal because that is essentially what you have to do if you want rovers, baraoholm and fg rep, and even then, once is not enough on normal to get honored and you still won’t be revered after you do them on ultimate)

On my current ssf fresh start, I’m still about 5k from revered on Rovers despite almost being done with the campaign and doing A1 and 2 in Elite, ensuring I hit honored before going into ultimate.

Again, by skipping, I mean going from normal to ultimate because that is what is in the game now. 2 difficulties. Bounties, dungeons or specific farming should be the final step, not a whole step in the process.

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that’s just simply not true, that’s what i keep saying, you’re skipping stuff or “rushing”

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this char only has FG left and is “almost” Revered with Rovers, 0 bounties done, on first playthrough/no elite or Ult entry yet.
It’s going to get Honoured with Coven while clearing the beasties in FG, and near Revered with Homestead
Malmouth will require a rehit for the final 1k rep, (or 2 bounties), which should probably also automatically happen when returning for the “other you” quest in fleshworks by virtue of hitting Honoured with Coven

not saying it’s the whole step, my overarching point is the more you skip the more you should expect to make up/have to make up later. Because, unsure if so/i get the perception you are drastically underestimating kill rep, and the amount of kill rep/bounty rep we can get vs quest rep
(and quest rep doesnt’ scale/it’s fixed, so going into Elite to clear X quests, is the equivalent of clearing 2 bounties on Ult :sweat_smile: - which is also why i want bounties sorted to not be penalized outside of Ult)

*and before you jump in, it’s not a Mandate, the + is just the Writ applied at Honoured, and Honoured was obtained around Necropolis

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Grim Dawn Screenshot 2025.06.23 - 08.45.35.63
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Here is my level 77 fresh start SSF Ritualist in Ultimate having just finished Karros - so at the riftgate after Darkvale Gate - Asterkarn Mountains rift. As you can see, the character has a little more than 10000 rep to go for Rovers at this point in the game. Did all quests in Normal and skipped Elite altogether. From here on there is very VERY little undead to kill in main campaign so without some serious bounty farming for Rovers will NEVER reach Revered with them. More details: did not do dungeons in Normal but did go to SOT level 3 to get shrine. Did Black Sepulcher to get shrine. Hit all totems that were seen. Also did entire Arkovian undercity in both Normal and Ultimate.

I am not seeing how you can possibly get Revered with Rovers (and DC) without doing some major Bounty farming. Rovers maybe isn’t as bad because you can at least farm Spirit Totems with one always available at Twin Falls riftgate. But unlike the other factions you have to specifically go out of your way to farm reputation for DC and Rovers.

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that’s my point?, you should hit bounties on Ult, almost “immediately”, because they are your 2nd best source of rep to hit revered and do so fast/past honoured (quest rep does not scale)
And i think it’s reasonable to do that/expect to do bounties to finish the last bit, because they are there and solves that splendidly (my personal gripe is i feel they should be available before so players can optionally use them if they feel the need/got cut short elsewhere)
With a Writ it’s going to take you like 10 bounties(good ones) to get that final rep, which isn’t bad (imo), and is largely only let down by how the bounty system currently makes you reset and not actually do more than 5 per session let alone choose, but it’s way better than running around for 100-200 rep for a regular/non final main quest, as per the bounty rep “diagrams” earlier

but for some reason people are refusing to interact with it/use that mechanic :sweat_smile:

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I will give you that – and I understand the complexity of balancing game with bounties, reputation, etc. Removing the necessity of doing Elite just causes this seeming imbalance because other factions do not require the many bounty mechanic that DC and Rovers now requires with the legitimate skipping of Elite. Certainly not refusing to interact wtih bounty mechanic - I actually like the mechanic and used it on this character in Malmouth to get Mortality relic in Normal. It just seems that DC and Rovers particulary could use more rep in main campaign or maybe another ‘official’ quest or two to balance them with the other factions regarding reputation (unfortunately only if skipping Elite).

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32

The main reason DC is ultra scuffed, despite actually having more quest rep than rovers iirc?, is they have very little actual/“natraul” kill rep, having so few enemies.
Rovers you get thousands of kill rep outside of the rover quest because 2 large areas (Undercity/SoT) you natively go through via quests anyway, and then additional stuff sprinkled in in the tombs later, and ofc undead Totems. - which might also display as “disparity” whether one then actually cleared those side areas
But also DC get none of that, which is also why i’m extra miffed bounties doesn’t let us fix it without going the (imo) worse way of just baking in rep multiplier from the start so you hit revered with “everything” way earlier already on Normal long before 70 and hics up the pacing.
Bounties being fixed doesn’t just keep it optional but makes it intractable instead of passive, didn’t clear SoT because dead/afraid; compensate with a bounty. 1k short because stiffed on totems or whatever, here’s a bounty, feel desperate for that 1 revered augment before even entering Ult, clear a couple bounties for that specific desirable.

on that same char that has Rovers sorted no problem on first playthrough, it still only has 7k/25k rep, 3k short of Honoured, that’s how huge the difference is in kill rep and “natural” available kill rep without refarming low lvl areas on Normal

Meanwhile backcounting? the Writ (and Mog quest) the Rover rep is still 2000 past honoured, just clearing quests and quest+boss zones, so that’s 5k more than DC from largely kills(wiggle room i underestimate rover quest tally)

2 Likes
33

Depends on how old you are. I think it’s quite recent :rofl: but for young people I guess 1,5 years is an eternity.

DC is super annoying for the reasons you mentioned. Also half their bounties are not in the area you get kill rep for them.
I think most of the rest is fine. Homestead is super easy, same with Coven (beasts are everywhere). I sometimes have some trouble with kymon/death vigil as I usually ‘rush’ past them and can’t be bothered to finish all their quests. But it also doesn’t really matter, you don’t usually need anything from them.
The Outcast I really don’t understand. I’ve never used anything from them. Getting rep is slow and/or so late that any items they have are already way below your level when they unlock. And I’m not aware they have any useful end-game stuff. :sweat_smile:

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Re: Outcast - the other advantage of going hostile with them is speeding up Black Legion rep to get to Man Vigil quicker. Man Vigil is a wonderful augment especially for Ultimate.

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I did some reputation grinding on my latest character. I wanted to hit Revered with Kymons Chosen before leaving Veteran. I was getting about 5k rep per hour doing Bastion of Chaos. That’s with a writ.

When entering Ultimate, all factions were at least Honored, except for Devils Crossing. Total grinding done was 2 Bastion runs, 1 Grove run, 4 spirit totems, and 30 minutes in Malmouth to hit Honored with them.

I tried one bounty with Malmouth, got 125 rep for it, and decided to never do them ever again.

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If you don’t do elite, which is what they wanted the game flow to be, you can’t unless you go into SoT (not the quest leading up to it).

If that is your rep entering elite, then you used a mandate, did at least 2 SoT runs or did a full playthrough in elite. Doing the dungeons shouldn’t be required to progress your rep as much as it is, and based on what they wanted, neither should a trip to elite.

What rovers quests would you ever skip? And by rushing, you mean pushing through the game without sitting around and restarting over and over to farm totems in normal? If that’s the case, yeah, I didn’t specifically go out of my way to farm rep for them other than a few totems here and there extra and a few bounties in normal, when I do most playthroughs. Rovers, Devil’s crossing, Barrowholm and the other 2 cults need their quest rep adjusted to be based on the 2 difficulties.

Devil’s crossing and the other 2 cults are fine if you do their quests in Elite, which only adds about an hour to the playthrough because rushing through A1, 2 and the first half of 7 isn’t that bad. But I still don’t think it should be required, when you hit 100 without ever stepping foot in elite or using vet, have revered in malmouth, coven, main cult, homestead, DV/KC and Black Legion without doing anything extra but their quests through two difficulties.

I did elite A1, 2 and 7 on my mage hunter playthrough as well as a few bounties in normal and a few bounties in ultimate, plus one additional cronley run, and this is where my reputation ended after killing lokkar and finishing everything else:

Barrowholm rep
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Barrowholm is way off, but I didn’t do elite Barrowholm, or go back to normal and finish the hearts/ravag quest, but that still wouldn’t put me close to revered with them.

I’m also short of revered with the 2 other cults, but not by much, but I did do the first half of act 7 in elite, and if I hadn’t, I’d be only about half way through honored due to not entering ultimate with a 50% honored writ.

Rovers rep end
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Rovers is still 2k short of revered even after doing elite. If I did an SoT run, I’d probably his revered, but this is also taking into consideration that I did elite act 2, which again, the game was supposed to be balanced around skipping elite now.

Devil’s crossing rep hit revered with an extra cronley run and a few bounties if you go through act 1 and 2 in elite, but again, if they want to balance the game around 2 difficulties, players shouldn’t be expected to do this.

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As I said, if you are restarting the game over and over to hunt totems, and doing SoT in normal, sure, I could see you getting that without a mandate, but unlike AG, there is no quest that leads you into SoT, it’s experience isn’t necessary, and unless your build calls for it, a base component of the game shouldn’t require you to go in there.

also, your ‘rushing’ comment makes it sound like I’m skipping everything rather than doing a full normal playthrough minus the dungeons, which I don’t believe the rep should be balanced around.

Pull up a fresh start game, go through like you are now, just through normal, don’t do the dungeons, and tell me where you end up.

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This is what I’m saying. From what it sounds like, he farms the dungeons, and that is where he gets his rep from.

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What do you mean refusing to use the mechanic? I’ve clearly said that I use them, but even doing them, you are still so far short on rep. Without an elite run/farming SoT, you will need more than 20 bounties to get to revered.

IMHO, it should be max 5 bounties (which is all you can pick up in one playthrough without resetting) required to hit revered if you don’t do SoT, or doing SoT eliminates the need to do bounties. The quests in normal should give more rep than they do, as well as the bounties, so that one run through SoT or 5 bounties on normal will push you through honored, and the same thing in ultimate will push you into revered if you started ultimate with the writ.

But it doesn’t.

I did a lot of bounties, on normal and ultimate, on the playthough without going into elite, and was still short by a lot.

I did bounties on normal and ultimate and did act 2 in elite, and I’m still short on that playthrough.
-Without the elite playthrough, it would have been even worse.

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Exactly this. I actually like the bounty system overall, especially when you need to farm a specific type of mob and it adds an extra hero to kill, but the baseline rep of rovers and DC (and barrowholm/the other 2 cults that you don’t select) is way too low.

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wow, i dont’ even know where to begin
i already told you how it worked, and when it reached honoured Necropolis/clearing Black Sepulcher
i also clearly told you there was no mandate, and i clearly told you this char hadne’t even entered Elite since it was not even done with first playthrough yet/still missing FG
There was no refarming, besides entering steps of torment twice, since you do get a 2nd quest sending you there; but i was already honoured before that

that’ is simply not true
not only is there are quest, there are 2 separate ones, one which even outright demands you go past the skeleton key dungeon

why would i A, skip content, B skip quests?
i already explicit told you earlier, this happens if you don’t skip stuff

then i think you’re misunderstanding what i’m saying to do, or rather how to use the bounties?
because as i’ve explained, you should to bounties on Ultimate, not normal
With a Writ you get 600/675(+kill bonus)-1200 Rep for the worthwhile bounties
so even at just honoured, 0 elite/ult quests done, you would not need 20, less so with the Ult quest done ofc

same for the 2 non mained cults

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*and that was even when accidentally selecting Solael + malmouth bloodsworn which costs small rep from getting ch’thonic boss

you get a quest to go into Tomb of Heretic, and might either get Honoured before or atleast during (i got honoured handing in the Main quest)

i think you misunderstand
if you’re getting 15k rep with all those, well before level 70, you would get revered with them on Normal, by lvl 50’ish with a default baked in x.Writ multi.
While barely solving the issue with DC/barrowholm because they are so far behind
It’s just not the right solution there imo - bounties could solve that (assuming we’re not direct touching up individual final main quests to compensate for less quest amount)