Lol
You amuse me mortal, a filthy mongrel like him couldn’t possibly be my most powerful champion. Grava’Thul on the other hand… :rolleyes:
Now I know which face and name need to be put on those Chthonian Warrants
Well you can actually save in the middle of a boss fight. This is especially helpful with timed missions. Not sure if that’s what you’re looking for.
I’m more interested in that tricky boi Korvaak. He made a good level 90 relic at least, that kind of thing is rare these days.
For a supposed Dead God, you sure are active a lot here on the forums! 
Maybe you could hurry up those end times and get us an expansion while you are awake… 
I think the Circle of Five fear Ch’thon, that’s what their missive refers to, and the captured Aetherial we free mentions him by name too. They all mention that he is awakening fully. I think what we saw and fought until now were just due to a rise in Bloodsworn activity, who are unchecked now without the Luminari and the Empire around, but the Void was not actively invading us, it was humans who summoned them here.
Shar’zul was the only enemy so far who gave my Cabalist a run for his money. He can actually kill pets fast! I am reminded of the bloody annoying Gigantes Dactyl thing that you can sometimes encounter on your way to Hades in TQ - I replayed the final level on Epic with my Nature/Dream summoner yesterday and had a reminder on how ridiculous that thing is. His attacks kill my pets in seconds.
Is it just me or you sound more like some celestial being who have been wandering around here at the forums:p
Heh, just got to the Malmouth Resistance in the sewers with my Cabalist and there were two totally different conversations there than with my Blademaster… Firstly, I could tell Nella that she hearing voices was not madness and that there is a place for “people like us” there - in Ugdenbog at the Coven. Oddly, you cannot offer to just riftgate her there.
And I had a funny yet tragic conversation with a little girl called Eraline who wanted to be a necromancer herself… so she can bring her dead family back to life.
Btw, what’s up with Thad? And that other girl next to him. Was it just dumb luck that two of the kids who survived are the biggest sociopaths in Malmouth?
They’re not so much sociopaths as traumatized children whose social filters are abraded. (Normally they’d never talk to an adult like that, although the young lad considers you to be lower class, so adult is less relevant.) It’s quite well-written child.
Generally speaking, if you want to plumb the depths of human evil, you skip the lightweights and go straight to the 10 year old girls. Saves time.
Edit: what Tycho said.
So, question. How evil are the Witch Gods, really? Solael seems fairly nasty, but maybe there’s a side to him I’m not appreciating. Bysmiel doesn’t seem particularly nice but she doesn’t seem like the most evil evil to ever evil. Dreeg, for all their plague-wreaking, actually strikes me as being substantially less evil than the other two, though not entirely non-evil. And some of their followers don’t seem so bad, honestly (Coven of Ugdenbog aren’t the nicest people around but they’re far from the worst, as Barrowholm demonstrates). Evil is kind of a subjective value judgment to begin with, but if we quantify evil as “hurts more than it helps” where do the Witch Gods fall on the Evil-o-Meter?
The Witch Gods seem more to be neutral, so neither good or evil. Don’t snoop around on their business and you’ll be fine (that’s the best way i can put it), but mess around with their shit and they’ll fuck you up badly.
Basically I think any class with Occultist combo will allow you to have a cover with Nella and tell her about the Coven refuge.
If you are a Necro then Eraline will talk to you so. And Kymon will spit allover your face I think :rolleyes:
Same thing if you are an Inquisitor, the Coven and Order of Death do not talk to you kindly.
Not sure what other classes unlock, but lore-wise this makes sense so far.
It’s always hard to distinguish Neutral from Evil-but-Disengaged. From the descriptions of the Witch Gods and their actions, it seems unlikely that they are concerned about any negative effects their actions might have on any “lesser” - read “other” - beings. Their “evil” seems limited by their power and their inclination to exercise it, rather than by any innate morality. If Cairn had attracted their attention to the extent that it has the aetherials and Chthonics, they might well rank just as high on the Evil scale as those two groups.
Philosophical aside: There are rabbit holes to be gone down here.
Amorality and immorality are definitely not the same and not on the same level, so I think that while torturing and killing for abstract learning is something to be avoided if at all possible, someone who tortures and kills because they get their kicks from it is utterly abhorrent on a level the amoral mad scientist cannot truly approach. Both make good villains in the right situation, but their resolution and comeuppances will look very different for a good reason. Then again, there’s nothing that says those two cannot overlap somewhat as well. To cause harm, pain, suffering for no greater end than shits and giggles is truly terrible. To some extent harm, pain and suffering are practically unavoidable, and often something else must die in order for another to live, so while I don’t like the “killing and torturing to learn” path, I can actually see some kind of reason (however horribly flawed) for it.
(Dig noted, but I never expressed any defense of Barrowholm - just implied that their true evil lies in the fact that they’re smugly sadistic murderers rather than what they eat - and Kymon hasn’t eaten anyone to my knowledge)
Right. See, I’m not going down those rabbit holes, I just wanted to mention that they existed and/or applied. I hung around with fine arts majors enough to recognize kool-aid, but never drank it myself. Thank all the gods and little fishes.
Do enjoy, though.
If Barrowholm’s evil lay only in what they consume they would be more pitiable rather than contemptible. When I eat the flesh of another living being, am I more or less evil than the wolf who eats similarly? No, Barrowholm’s evil is that they truly love what they do and are smug about it. I grew up on a farm and I got to see my meat go from figurative cradle to grave. I raised some of my meat with my own two hands, even - hiked out in torrential rain to ensure its well-being and reduce its suffering, carefully minded its hurts and eventually granted it the most painless swift death I had the power to do. There’s none of that in Barrowholm. There’s none of the humility that should result from knowing one is taking life in order to keep living. That is their true evil.
If your statement refers to religious zealotry, I would argue that surprisingly few hands are clean in Cairn on that charge. The Cult of Ch’thon is burgeoning and has done more tangible harm to Cairn and its people than most anyone else save the Aetherials, we have plenty of evidence that not all the Witch Gods’ worshippers were as benign as the Coven seems to be, the Luminari themselves would make Torquemada proud, Barrowholm’s an obvious murdercult and the ODV and KC are both fanatical. Homestead, DC and the Malmouth Resistance are just sort of caught in the middle, and the Black Legion are scary hombres but they at least don’t point their weapons at you now that the Empire’s gone and the world’s burning with aetherfire. You can’t hardly take a step without putting a foot into some of that nasty grayness everywhere. You read in the lore notes how innocent or virtuous people meet terrible ends and terrible people keep on truckin’ (at least until you show up and fix their little red wagons). Grim Dawn is a grimdark world and you’re one of the few bright sparks left. Or not, depending on how you play.
One of the most important things to remember: Not everything that is revolting is evil, and not everything that is evil is revolting. The latter half is so much more important than people realize.
Another thing to consider: Religious zealotry is (variably) repugnant to many in real life for any number of reasons, but what of a world where we have proof that gods are real? What happens when Russell’s Teapot actually provably exists and Pascal may have been taking a sure bet after all? Any game world that deals with gods and religious zealots opens this can of worms, unknowingly or knowingly, and it’s an interesting question (if uncomfortable, but Grim Dawn is frequently less than comfortable in that way).
My bad for the facile jibe. I seem to have hit a nerve I was not aiming for and would have avoided.
I was swiping out of old habit at people I knew who would turn on a dime to argue the intricacies of anything that came along without thinking about what any of it really meant in the real world.
Probably a bad tactic when online and talking to, you know, different people entirely.
So who is the Dark One? Clearly the Dark One set refers to Ch’thon, but the chained dude in the Temple of The Three called Solael the dark one, plothole?
Orrrr Solael == Ch’thon confirmed 
Consider for a moment that Ch’thon’s god-mind is probably shattered into a MILLION pieces of utter insanity for a moment. Ask yourself, then, what happens when one of the fragments decides it is an entirely different (well, maybe not THAT different, but you get the idea) entity. It’s sort of like a warped take on Theseus’ ship in reverse or something. Mind blown, dude.
Think about it though. Both Ch’thon and Solael demand blood sacrifice (though Solael might be more lifeforce sacrifice than blood itself, the difference could be considered to be semi-cosmetic), both specialize in Chaos and Vitality damage and both are scary as fuck (and both might be completely insane).
It all makes sense now
That also explains why one of his incarnation spends all day shitposting in this forum
(I get extra philosophical-shitposty when I imbibe liquor I guess)
