⭐ Top 20 Softcore builds in Grim Dawn (An Opinion)

I’ve attempted to change my warder build to the avenger warder listed on this guide and have a question about the dread skull component on the medal. Is that correct? Just seems odd when compared to the other builds using arcane spark or tainted heart?

Was used to reach attack speed cap. Overall spark is better to get out of disrupt pools. I’ve tweaked the build for 1.2 test (and it should work for 9.8 too):

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I really like the look of the Harbinger Conjurer build, however I cannot for the life of me figure out why it skips any points in Upheaval when the amulet provides such a massive bonus and conversions to it? Does Upheaval have some negative interplay with it that means you do more damage without it or something?

Upheaval procs on crits that are not already wps procs only. So it can’t proc when anything else procs.

The build has a 27% chance to proc Feral Hunger, 16% chance to proc Seal of the Void, 25% chance to proc Volley, and 18% chance to proc Blazing Fury, for a total of 86% chance to proc something, which prevents Upheaval from proccing, except for 14% of the time, and not every hit is a crit, so we’re probably looking at a 6 or 7% chance to proc Upheaval, if our crit chance is really good.

Since Feral Hunger is an amazing wps (the best skill based wps in my opinion) and Seal of the Void is the best (and IIRC the only) component wps, they really need to be in the build. The other two are somewhat less impressive, but solid. You could ditch the other two for Upheaval, giving you a 57% window for it, but keep in mind that it won’t proc without a crit.

Also, the amulet gives the same conversions to Savagery, so the ones on Upheaval don’t help this build, it’s just the bonus to flat chaos.

Upheaval had a buff to radius, which happened since 1.1.9.6, when this build came out, and IIRC there might have been a damage buff, too.

I don’t know whether it would be superior to play with Upheaval even with the changes, but either way would be viable, regardless of which is superior.

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Good explanation. Thanks.

Do wonder whether it would be worth taking a stray point from somewhere just to chuck in it ‘just in case’ but I guess it’s largely irrelevant in the greater context of the build’s damage output.

I’m curious if you tested @fordprefect Dual Wield Spam ABB Witch Hunter in this test. That was one of the stronger builds I ran in 1.1.97. But then again, I am not as frequent a player as most.

Spam abb builds are not nearly on the same power level as the builds in top20 or around top20 just merely based on the spam abb power and support around it. 15k hp melee Witch Hunter with 2 active casts with low casting speed also doesn’t help the case. I am sure it’s a fun build tho.

Great builds, I love them all! I would like to play some of the story on ultimate and my question is, how can I reset the story progress on these characters from saves? Can I delete some file or something?

delete their quest folder
*keep in mind this will enable the quests with skill or attribute points too, so might cause more points than “vanilla”
**also keep in mind there might be some slight potential conflict possible with certain quest tokens/triggers depending what might be stored internally like on some NPC choices

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is the archon build still a valid number one top 20 build?

We are making a new top20 and I am sure that Avenger Archon of mine will get mentioned there, but it won’t be top1 build anymore. But you have to understand that even the builds that are in the “honorable mentions” here are absolute beasts/content destroyers, light years ahead of what most players will play when they reach character level 100, so top1 or top25 doesn’t matter much, it will be very strong either way.

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thanks for the info! i played alot grim dawn but ALWAYS pet builds. i wanted to try something new and didn want bad thing to start with. i stick with archon. looks nice. :slight_smile:

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I’ve been playing this since 2019 but just signed up because i had in mind this post.

Some time ago i used to think those guys (who made the post and builds) were just some arrogant nerds ( i mean making their own top with some of their own builds), but after trying more than 20 builds in the forum (3 from this post), i can say this:

  • I’ve used only builds that claim they can do SR 75-80 or above.

15-18 builds struggled HEAVILY even on SR 65-70. I thought," god i must be dogshit" or handless. But no, the authors, i believe, did the runs while being high, and they did them on elite thinking it was ultimate, and with 10 pharmas stacked, or they managed to finish SR75 after 100 failed tries to get their YT video.

I tried 3 builds from this topic, ( EOR warlord and RTA acid sentinel, i dont remember the 3rd one) and every of them achieved what they said (Sr90, all celestials, etc), and i didn’t need to die 100 times.

3 Others builds outside this post i tired, also got the job done, but they were the few along the ones from this post.

So yes, most builds in this post are good, and most of the builds outside this post, aren’t that good.

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Guys, when will the updated version for 1.2 be released? At least approximately, a day, a week, a month?

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I’m also checking this every few hours to see when it’s updated :stuck_out_tongue:

It’s all done on voluntary basis and there are quite a few builds to test, and everyone has some kind of real life commitments, so can’t say for sure. I am hoping we can be done in a month or so tho, but no promises.

There also will be a new post probably.

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can you already suggest a top mastery combination without going into the details?

I wonder if the new mastery will impact on this, there’s a shitload of extra variables there.

Not really, this thread is about top builds, not top mastery combinations. Personally, I think Archon has the most amount of versatile top builds, but it all depends on what kind gear you gonna have available in the endgame and how you gonna optimize your build.

yeah. i just wanted to write that. without the gear, it wont work properly.