Grim Dawn[Early Access]

[Weren]

Introduction

Grim Dawn is an action role-playing game intended for digital distribution on the PC. It is being developed by veterans of Iron Lore entertainment, the makers of Titan Quest. Grim Dawn is being built with Crate's own improved version of the Iron Lore engine and toolset; the same technology used to create Titan Quest. As a spiritual successor, Grim Dawn will attempt to better perfect the magical formula of exploration, character advancement, and loot collection pioneered by Diablo.

Players will be thrust into the dark, war-torn world of Cairn where a once proud empire has been brought to ruin and the human race driven to the edge of extinction. Cairn has become ground zero of an eternal war between two otherworldly powers, one seeking to use human bodies as a resource, the other intent upon destroying the human race before that can happen. This cataclysmic war has not only decimated human civilization but is warping the very fabric of reality and, in its wake, giving life to new horrors.

For humankind it is the dawn of a grim new age where iron has replaced gold as currency and the importance of salt as a weapon makes it far too valuable to waste on food. Small enclaves of human survivors exist scattered throughout the world, holed up in hidden refuges. These humans have quietly watched the warring invaders destroy one another and
have become wise to the strengths and vulnerabilities of their otherworldly foes. A few survivors have begun to exhibit strange new abilities after surviving possession or exposure to the warp. These unnatural powers are feared by some but give many new hope of launching a resistance to fight the "outsiders" and reclaim what's left of their world.

So it's early access on Steam right now. I was ecxited to hear about this game initially long time ago and I am now interested to see how they will finish it up.
Already bought it, but I dare not play it before the whole campaign is out. :P

Discuss!


   

[Molly]

I started playing it a few months back and it was back then (early alpha) already at least as good as Titan Quest - which I personally loved and played like hell - and that they delayed the release for some time cuz they already the first act like 12-15 hours long is certainly a good sign (considering they also said that their money nonetheless will last easily for the whole development). Things you love to hear from a project you backed

[Radament]

absolutely  buying when more acts are added. i hate to play 1 act all over :/

[Molly]

Act 2 has been added today!

[Radament]

this is gud !!! 

[Molly]

New build online with a massive changelog (B18)

Crafting is now available! (Build 18 Changelog)
We are very excited to announce that another major game system has come online: Crafting!

This system is now available to the public with Build 18, patch notes below.

Development News:
We've made significant progress with multiplayer after having to rewrite a lot of the existing code that was originally written for GameSpy (which is shutting down). The last tricky component is designing a system to resolve differences in player's quest progress and quest choices. Allowing people who have made divergent quest choices to play together is particularly difficult but we think we've arrived at a reasonable solution and have begun implementing it. We're currently estimating that multiplayer may be ready in late July but we'll have a better idea once we finish the quest syncing and do some testing to see how well it is functioning.

Two-handed melee weapon animations have been finished and the last of the common item art is almost done. You can expect to see them in the next build, which shouldn't be long.

The lower floors of Steps of Torment will also be included in the next build and introduce a new "Rogue-like" mechanic where a key must be used to enter and then, once inside, portals do not work and the only way out is by death or surviving to the end. New varieties of traps will make reaching the end especially challenging.

The first section of Act III, the Jagged Waste, which leads into Homestead, the Act III "town," is nearly finished but missing quests and points of interest. The basic layout of the survivor enclave in Homestead is done and build-out has begun on the farmland around it. We should be able to show off some early screenshots in the next month or two.


Build 18

Major New Features:
Crafting is now available! A new quest that begins in Burrwitch Outskirts will have you choose between two rival blacksmiths vying for control of a sacred hammer. Each blacksmith has their own unique style that will be imprinted upon every item they craft for you.

Over 150 crafting recipes have been added to the game.

The character sheet has been overhauled to provide a much more detailed view of your stats from gear and skills. Offensive and Defensive Ability rollovers now display the chance to hit/crit based on your last target/attacker.

Normal difficulty now has "Veteran" mode, which boosts various enemy stats, notably damage and also increases the number of champions and heroes that can spawn. Veteran isn't meant to be brutally challenging but should be enough to make normal difficulty more interesting for skilled players, while allowing us to balance the default for the average player. Veteran can be turned on and off from the character selection screen. Characters who play through normal difficulty on veteran mode should end up a little better equipped to tackle epic difficulty once it becomes available.

Increased randomization of enemy spawns - a new method of placing spawn proxies allows us to provide much greater randomization in terms of how enemies are distributed. You'll now find that the location of enemies is more random and that they can sometimes appear in much larger and more diverse packs.

Dual wielding of pistols is now possible via skills granted by items. One such item can be crafted with the new blacksmith.

Art:
Improved default lighting in outdoor environments.
Increased the distinctiveness of some enviroments a little bit by adjusting textures, colors, fog, lighting and asset use.
Updated Item art for Curse of Burrwitch, The Eye, Blood Carver, Bloodreaper's Claw, Outlaw's Retribution Blackwood Wand and Malformed Effigy.
Resized 1-handed melee weapon bitmaps so maximum size is now 1X3 (some 1X4 bitmaps existed).

Animation:
Dual-wield pistol animation set for player characters (12 animations).
New item granted skill "Ground Stomp" animations for all weapon types.
"Lethal Gambit" plays proper animation for all melee weapons.'
"Blitz" plays proper animation for all melee weapons.
"Shadow Strike" plays proper animation for all melee weapons.
"Blade Arc" plays proper animation for all melee weapons.
Player character ragdolls were redone, as the old solution was contributing to long respawn times.
Boars now have a new "Ground Slam" skill and animation.
Spiders now have a new "Spawn" animation.
Zombiehounds have a new "Breath Attack" animation.

Tech:
Quickbar keybinding text now reflects the actual keybinding.
Newly acquired items now display a flashing highlight in the inventory window.
Fixed a bug where conversation text would be incorrectly split in non-english localizations.
Added Render Device option to Video Options.
Added UI Scaling option to Video Options.
Cunning and Spirit rollovers now display Bonus Damage.
Quickbar skills now play skill cooldown and low mana voices.
Potions now play an item cooldown message when on cooldown.
DPS and Average Damage equations updated.
Inventory highlights now properly clear when moving cursor off of the grid and when inventory is closed.
Improved character saving performance.
Stat increment buttons are no longer shown when no stat points are available for spending.
Added quest reward window which summerizes quest rewards when a quest is completed.
Reworked skill use logic to make skills feel more responsive.
Fixed a bug where clicking on signposts would cause incorrect movement.
Added debuff status effect icons to the player HUD.
Adjusted pet AI to remove some strange movement situations and long range chasing behavior.
Fixed a bug where pet completion bonuses did not appear in item tooltips of attached relics.
Fixed a bug where mouse events outside the game window were processed by the game.
Fixed a bug where tooltips would appear for the player HUD when covered by foreground windows.
Fixed an issue where UI button text was not correctly centered.
Fixed a bug in LocalizationManager where tag reordering would effect all subsequent tags.
Added "gender of target" localization codes for conversation/quest text.
Added challenge mode/hardcore indicator text to upper left corner of game screen.
Always show loot option can now be limited based on item quality.
Riftgate map labels can now be localized.
Improved rendering or korean and chinese fonts.
Added faction indicators to the conversation window. Shows the faction of the npc in the conversation.
Pets now contribute to Monsters/Champions Killed and Greatest Monster Killed.

Game:
Experience formula that determines how much experience is gained from killing enemies has been adjusted to slow down leveling. Based on the results, further adjustment may be required. This change shouldn't affect current character levels.
Compass north indicator is now correctly aligned to world map north direction.
Killing Direni for the Lost Journal quest now has additional rewards.
The Warden's one-shot chest now also always drops a rare crafting material.
Updated the stats on the Ground Stomp and Life Cascade item skills
Chaos Bolt and Fireblast item skills now properly target Overseers.
The Marauder Set's pistols now grant skills which allow you to dual wield them.
Adjusted the base iron bit value of all items.
Slightly increased the drop rate of double rare items
Slightly increased the drop rate of scrap and components
Updated stats on Headhunter's Trophy
Updated stats on the Mark of Dreeg, Hell's Bane Ammo, Deathchill Bolts, Flintcore Bolts and Venom-Tipped Ammo components
Reduced Attack Speed bonus values on weapons and gloves slightly
Base energy regeneration on caster torsos now scales up with higher item tiers
Focus items are now their own item type (off-hands) and no longer provide the benefits of a shield (ex. You cannot cast Forcewave with a Focus item)
Focus item absolute damage stats now affect your main hand weapon.
Reduced % damage bonuses on Focus items
Fixed an issue with Pets summoned by items not benefiting from pet modifiers on items/skills (ex. Bonds of Bysmiel)
Salazar's Harbinger summon now has a status display, just like the Rifthound and Familiar. This will also apply to many future item summons.
Bleeding and Internal Trauma duration damage is now affected by Cunning.
Base Physical and Pierce ratio damage is now calculated in the proper order to remove double dipping.
Pierce ratio damage now benefits from Cunning.
Bonus pierce damage now benefits from Cunning.
Bonus Physical damage now benefits from the same equations and modifiers that other Physical damage does.
All damage attack types except Retaliation can now crit (spells can now crit).
Due to the effect of bonuses on physical, pierce, bleed and trauma damage, various skills have been or will be adjusted to bring them back into balance.
Soldier: Overguard modified to offer much better damage mitigation but with a shorter duration and longer cool-down.
Demolition: Firestrike fire damage improved at lower levels.
Occultist: Witchfire damage bumped up slightly across all levels.
Occultist: Dreeg dmg buffed slightly.
Nightblade: Lethal Gambit buffed a bit and expanded to hit three targets. Modifier now has a chance to freeze enemies.
Nightblade: Cold damage added to Execute in exchange for some of its %weapon dmg, which was scaling up too quickly.
Hellhound should now tank better in defensive mode.

[Fredom]

Looks funny, maybe I'm gonna try it!

[Molly]

Build 19 is now live! (Changelog)
The wait is finally over. Build 19 has just been released! With it comes a series of exciting new content and features, including the challenging new floors within the Steps of Torment!

Massive patch notes below:

Build 19
Note: This build includes many behind-the-scenes changes to quests in preparation for Multiplayer. As such, you may notice that some quests have had their progress reset and can be completed again.
All quests should continue to play out exactly as they did before B19, so if you observe any quests behaving incorrectly, please report it as a bug.

Major New Features:
The Rogue-like Dungeon in Steps of Torment is now available! To unlock access to this dungeon, you must complete a quest line, which begins in Old Arkovia.
Two-Handed Melee Weapons are now available.
Tooltips have been overhauled to provide a cleaner overview of item and skill attributes.
Out-of-Combat Regeneration is now limited by a new resource: Constitution. This new healing mechanic is still experimental and will likely need further changes and / or balancing. We're not quite sure we're happy with it yet but we felt it was important to get B19 out, both so you all could start swinging those big two-handers but also so we can gather feedback on the current changes and begin the next phase of multiplayer implementation.
Constitution is an overlay on your health bar which indicates how much out of combat fast-regeneration you have remaining. If this pool runs out, you will no longer regenerate rapidly outside of combat.
Constitution is refilled via Food Rations and Vital Essence, which can drop from enemies, breakable objects and chests. It is also reset upon gaining a level or dying.

Art:
Updated Item Art on Salazar's Sovereign Blade.

Animation:
Two-handed melee animation set for player characters (20 animations)
New PC "Channeled Spell Attack" animations (begin, loop, end)
Updates to the PC "Run" animations for all weapon types
New NPC "Chat" animation
New Dranghoul "Run" animation
New Dranghoul "Walk" animation
New Groble "Walk" animation
New alternate Ghost "Spawn" animation
New Zombiehound "GetUp" animation

Game:
Increased Warden's physical melee damage and reduced delay of phase 2 spike projectile attack
Reduced enemy OA in normal difficulty
Increased the quality of Gutworm's loot chest
Bumped up difficulty on veteran a touch
Skeletons and Ghosts no longer bleed on death
The Depths of Old Arkovia side-quest now has an additional reward
All Armor now also states what type of armor it is (Light, Heavy, Caster) in order to clarify the variation in protection value and stat requirements
Shield block recovery time was reduced and block chance scaling increased.
Shield damage blocked increased.
1h Melee weapon damage given a slight boost from tier 3 up.
Physical damage bonus from cunning has been equalized to match the magical damage bonus given by spirit. Physical was previously higher as an effort to offset enemy armor, however, it was decided that because physical damage is also much easier to amass, it didn't need the stronger bonus multiplier.
Reduced the Scrapmetal and Iron Bits crafting cost of Enchanted items
Increased the quality of items generated from Enchanted blueprints and updated the description to better clarify that these recipes can generate items of Rare quality.
Increased the chance of getting rare affixes on Rare quality blueprints (ex. Ranger's Badge).
Reduced the crafting cost of consumables
Increased the duration of crafted consumables, but also added a cooldown on their use
Revised what items can grant active skills (skills that are placed on your skill bar to use) in order to reduce skill bloat. In accordance with this, many granted skills were turned into auto-cast skills or moved to different items.
With a few rare exceptions, granted item skills can be found on: 2h-ed Guns and Melee Weapons, Amulets, Head Armor and Relics
Updated stats on Aethersteel Alloy, Bindings of Bysmiel, Corpse Dust, Dense Fur, Ectoplasm, Focusing Prism, Frozen Heart, Kilrian's Shattered Soul, Leathery Hide, Molten Skin, Radiant Gem, Rigid Shell, Runestone, Sanctified Bone, Scaly Hide, Silk Swatch, Soul Shard, Spined Carapace and Viscous Venom components
Converted Vicious Spikes to be usable in All Weapons and changed its stats to be more appropriate for Pierce and Bleed dmg. Vicious Spikes now provides a new skill: Piercing Aura II
Venomous Fang component has been removed from the game. All crafting recipes that required a Venomous Fang now require a Vitriolic Gallstone.
Vitriolic Gallstone has had its stats updated to also appeal to melee Poison users. Acid Strike has been replaced with Poison Aura.
Wrathstone and Riftstone now grant new abilities: Aether Aura and Chaos Strike
Reduced the item level of Hallowed Ground and Dread Skull, making them more accessible in high-end areas such as Steps of Torment
Updated the crafting recipe for Radiant Gem
The following components are now primarily acquired via crafting (new blueprints have been added to loot tables). They can still drop as loot, but are much more rare: Aether Soul, Ballistic Plating, Blessed Steel, Focusing Prism, Haunted Steel, Leathery Hide, Mark of Mogdrogen, Restless Remains, Rotten Heart, Runestone, Sanctified Bone, Spined Carapace and Vengeful Wraith.
Adjusted stats on some Rare affixes
The Bloodreaper's Glory set has had its stats adjusted
The Ornate Chestguard has been renamed to Nightstalker's Chestguard. Its stats have been redesigned.
Slightly increased the effectiveness of dmg stats on 1h melee weapon affixes
Increased absolute Energy bonuses on gear
Increased absolute Energy Regeneration bonuses on most items, particularly on Magic items.
Increased the chance of generating % dmg bonus Suffixes on Off-Hands
Mastery Prefixes (+1 Skill) now also grant a small bonus relevant to the mastery they are boosting
Troll MI maces are now 2h-ed weapons. Existing 1h-ed versions are now legacy items and will never drop again. Troll Talisman blueprint has been updated to use the new 2h-ed version.
Demolitionist: Rebalanced Firestrike and Explosive Strike to make the base skill more desireable and tone down the mod's AoE a bit. Firestrike got a %physical and flat fire damage increase and reduced energy cost. Explosive Strike %wpn dmg was scaled back and energy cost increased. Explosive Strike burn chance no longer scales but has a high base value and physical dmg slightly reduced.
Demolitionist: To emphasize fire damage more on the Firestrike line, the %fire dmg on Splinter was moved to Static Strike and flat fire damage was added to Splinter.
Soldier: Mehir's Will now has increased regen scaling and the %health restored begins lower but scales up quickly to encourage more investment.
Soldier: Overguard's bonuses begin a little lower and scale faster in the first few levels to encourage investment.
Soldier: Block Chance was removed from Overguard and Block Recovery removed from Veterancy to reduce redundancy and strengthen the role of each skill.
Soldier: %Physical damage scaling increased for Veterancy and it now also raises constitution.
Soldier: Slightly reduced flat physical damage on Cadance while increasing bleed damage on Fighting Form and reducing duration, so that it does more bleed damage over a shorter period.
Soldier: Markovian and Zolhan chance to be used starts higher and skill stats scale more significantly with levels.
Soldier: Reduced energy cost on Blade Arc.
Soldier: Cadence %wpn dmg now scales higher and physical scaling has been reduced to help create a more pronounced difference when using two-handed melee weapons.
Occultist: Increased Raven's healing cooldown by 1 second
Occultist: Added 15% heal to Blood of Dreeg so that the Occultist has at least a modest emergency heal available from a directly controllable skill (as opposed to the sometimes clutch but not always reliable raven healing).
Occultist: Moved all %chaos dmg in Witchfire to the modifier and added %poison to the base skill to create a synergy with Dreeg's Evil Eye. Increased flat chaos damage in the base skill.
Occultist: Bumped up poison and acid damages on Dreeg's Evil Eye and modifiers while changing base skill physical to %weapon dmg. Removed poison from Vile Eruption and increased acid.
Occultist: Reduced Sigil of Destruction cooldown from 15 to 12 seconds.
Nightblade: Veil of Shadow and Nightchill have been reworked to hopefully make these skills more worthwhile. Veil has been reduced from 16 to 10 points max, OA reduction scales faster and higher and it now reduces total attack speed. Nighchill damage has been almost doubled and it now reduces pierce and cold resist.
Nightblade: Dual Blades now has a max level of 16 and allows damages to scale to a higher level.

[Radament]

this game is turning out a great arpg , the only complaint is the lack of skill customization but maybe it's me that i'm playing median xl with tons of possible combinations.
i need to try crafting before judging , it seems pretty easy , not sure if it's good or not.

[Radament]

50% discount --> http://store.steampowered.com/app/219990/

[Molly]

Posts in "All News" channel about:

Build 20: Multiplayer and Transmuters are now available!

The age of multiplayer has arrived. With the release of Build 20, you may now host and join multiplayer sessions in Grim Dawn!

Please be aware that this feature is still being improved upon so while it is playable enough to be fun, it is very likely that you will encounter performance issues, crashes, and bugs. As always, please post your findings at our forum.

Multiplayer is just the tip of the iceberg however. There are tons of amazing changes that should enrich your experience, even if you are a fan of singleplayer.

[korppis]

I was thinking of re-installing TQ... has anyone tried this mod: http://www.moddb.com/mods/soulvizier?
The original TQ was too easy but this promises more challenge... I'd love to hear any experiences about it.

[Radament]

I was thinking of re-installing TQ... has anyone tried this mod: http://www.moddb.com/mods/soulvizier?
The original TQ was too easy but this promises more challenge... I'd love to hear any experiences about it.

sure i tried it and it's a good and solid mod.
it's based on the old underlord mod , it's challanging and you won't regret it.
if  you can play tq without rubberbanding , it's a must.
i used the Ramdisk trick to play it smoothly.