So I’ve been playing GD for a while and I’m not very good. I seem to have hit a wall where I can no longer create more powerful characters. I’m lacking MANY of the craftable item blueprints so a lot of builds are not possible for me at the moment. I managed to create a decent Lightning Archon that can farm SR 75-76 comfortably on Normal, but even on Veteran I get owned. I no longer get any blueprints from farming SR 75-76 normal. I’ve tried to push the build but it really can’t do much higher than that reliably. No matter what I do, no build will survive SRs in Ultimate, and forget acquiring the Shattered Guardian set, that seems totally out of my reach. And there are still SO many things I lack blueprints for that it makes everything more frustrating. I’m just not sure what to do anymore. I’m to the point where I start creating a new character, and then think “Well what’s the point? You’re not going to get anywhere.” I’d really appreciate any suggestions anyone has on how I might be able to get past this problem.
For the moment my build is as follows (Apologies for using the images - I tried to use Grim Tools for the first time. Tried to add the Cyclone Mask and it just stalls at “building database” whatever that means):
This is everything I’ve documented so far but if someone can assist me with Grim Tools I’d be happy to display it that way. In any case, I really hope some of the pros out there can give me some useful tips on beefing up this and other builds.
It’s very difficult to judge a character / build in its entirety while not being able to see the full Grim Tools.
For example, from your post there is no way to know your devotions and augments. What I can see is that you are using some subpar components like antivenom salve.
Comparing your character with my lightning EoR / WD cyclone Archon, you seem to heavily lack in the OA / DA compartment. This makes your character be both more vulnerable and slower at killing foes.
To really help us giving you some kind of direction in what to improve first, you should try to upload your character in GT.
Step 1: open GT’s build calc.
Step 2: Load character from your save file (clicking the arrow up thing in the upper left corner)
Step 3: follow the instructions to locate your specific archon file and import it in GT
Step 4: post it here
Step 1: To upload your character to https://www.grimtools.com/calc/ click the ‘up arrow’ button in the upper-lefthand corner. If you have cloud saves enabled (enabled by default) your save file will be in \Program Files (x86)\Steam\userdata########\219990\remote\save\main_{character name}\player.gdc
Otherwise it will be in \Documents\My Games\Grim Dawn\save\main_{character name}\player.gdc
Step 2: Click on the arrow shown here and then follow the instructions above to navigate to where your characters are stored and choose the player.gdc file you want
As to why I tend to use anti-venom salve (I assume the question is why not use UL instead) is that I’ve been prioritizing health regeneration lately. I’m never certain how much to weigh things like buffing DA vs buffing health regen. It sounds like maybe I’m focusing on the wrong aspects, so that is very good to know if true. I picked the boots for the life leech, phys and slow resists - also picked belt for its resistances and chance to avoid. I know I could be pumping out more damage but lately I’ve been focused on defense. Anyway, this has already been helpful to me so thank you! I’m very open to any other feedback.
Ok, now the picture is complete, so I can try to give some advice.
Since your build is lightning based, you lack some key devotions to make it function properly, especially RR ones, which in your case are Widow and Rhowan’s crown.
For this purpose - and this is a general concept which is true for all kind of characters, not only this one - there are three types of RR on gear / devotions in the game.
I. Negative RR (-x% resistance): the most important one, because multiple different sources of this one stack. Widow’s devotion is an example of this one.
II. (x reduced target’s resistance): it stacks with other RR types, but multiple sources of this one don’t stack, only the highest one is taken into account. Rhowan’s crown, Revenant or Manticore devotions are examples of this one.
III. (x% reduced target’s resistance): same with II, it stacks with other types, but multiple sources don’t stack, only highest one is considered. Ultos’ devotion is an example of this one.
TLDR; you need Widow, Rhowan’s crown AND Ultos to get a full RR (less enemies’ resistances = more damage for you) potential on your build.
Since your character is based on EoR, which is a spammable attack skill, I think that you have too many buttons to press which really reduce your spinning’ uptime and so nerf your real DPS. I would remove both Judgement and Storm totem from the build, for example. And I would also remove Chain Lightning (from Seal of Skies component) because there’s really no profit in spamming it in a EoR build.
Some skills / skill empowerments have diminishing returns with more points invested, so we can say there is a “soft cap” for them which is enough to take advantage from them. For example, Clarity of purpose (Ascension’s powerup) has the first breakpoint at 9/12 and the second one at 12/12. Same goes for Resilience, which has the first breakpoint at 5/12 and the second one at 11/12, for Haven, 5/10, and for Heart of the Wild, 10/10. You should consider this fact and rearrange skill distribution properly.
Components and augments usage is really sub-optimal. This impact your chacacter’s performance dramatically. For example, in shoulder, body armour and head slots there are very powerful components which are strong for both offensive and defensive purposes, like Prismatic Diamond in the head slot, Sanctified Bone / Chains of Oleron in the body armour slot, and Living Armor / Sacred Plating in the shoulder slot. Ugdenbog leather can go in belt / boots and even gloves slots, and it is always better than Antivenom salve. Armor absorption is a key factor too: your build has about 2k armor and a value of at least 92% absorption is recommended, so you are going to need a scaled hide component in Pants’ slot. In the amulet slot, since you are not attack speed capped, you’ll probably need a seal of annihilation. In rings slot, Mark of illusions is a decent choice, keep in mind that there are other good components like Bloodied crystal or Runebound topaz which can be handy to increase your armor / health and DA. Your medal component choice is nice, just consider that, if you are in need for some resistances, options like Tainted Heart are always good, and if you need a nice damage reduction proc, Attuned lodestone is good too. About weapon components, since your build uses an off hand, Hell’s bane ammo is a powerful choice, Seal of resonance / Seal of corruption are both good choices for pure damage and some cc resists, Seal of Blades is needed if you want more leech, racial damage components (like Purified salt or Imbued silver) are always good. Same goes for augments: you have to farm related reputations and use lightning / elemental oriented ones or eventually defensive ones to arrange your stats.
Values to aim at: I would try to reach at least 2700 DA and 2900 OA before even attempting medium SR shards. Play with components / augments / devotions to reach that goal. And remember that resistances must be capped (and the majority of them need some decent overcaps too), physical resistance is very good to have too. CC resistances are super important, especially stun and slow ones.
Leech: since you didn’t spec on devotions which grant a life return, 7% is super poor for Eye of Reckoning because leech is proportional to weapon damage, and EoR’s weapon damage component is low. You need 15%+ (the more, the better) to feel comfortable in endgame content if no other sources of leech are available.
Life regeneration is good in Grim Dawn when you can stack a lot of it, and you did it pretty well but in theory you are playing a build which can leech very well too, so the life regen factor becomes of minor importance. Try to focus more on leech than on regen.
Ok, I think this tedious wall of text is more than enough to have a starting point to improve your build, let us know how things are going and if you need to know more, just ask, the community will always help.
Hey so I’ve got a question. When you talk about skills and empowerments sometimes having diminishing returns - what do you mean by a breakpoint? This is a concept I am unfamiliar with.
Take Heart of the Wild for example. Going from 9/10 to 10/10 (soft capping) gives 3% extra health. Any point above 10/10 only gives 1% extra health. This is an example of diminishing returns, and 10/10 can be considered a breakpoint. Other examples are Demolitionist’s Vindictive Flame 11/16 and Thermite Mine 10/16. You should take a look and see why you think that is the case.
I’m not sure if there is such a guide. Grimtools is a great tool because it lets you theorycraft builds beforehand. I can recommend doing this and try to invest skill points as minimal as possible (i.e. finding points of diminishing returns) at first. Usually you have some skill points left at this point. Then consider for yourself what you think/have experienced is most important. It not necessarily bad to take Heart of the Wild above 10/10 if you characters lacks health. Just try out some different things and see how it affects your playstyle.
