Grim Dawn Grim Misadventures #97

A preview of the upcoming v1.0.0.4 patch and the Hidden Path content it'll introduce to the game awaits you in the 97th installment to Crate's Grim Misadventures series for Grim Dawn. It sounds like item drop rates and affixes will be getting a nice boost, among other things:

Faction Augments Rebalance
Faction Augments did not evolve dramatically towards the release of Grim Dawn, but the introduction of Ultimate difficulty had a dramatic impact on how players had to gear up and prepare for Grim Dawn's most challenging difficulty. Also as player levels increased, the value of % damage bonuses was equally diminished. This in turn meant that there were only a few truly valid Augment options, with all too many traps for beginners to make.

We took another look at Augments with v1.0.0.4 and made significant revisions, both to make the offensive options more appealing and to create new choices for defense. In general, this is an all-around buff to Augments which should round out some gaps in your gearing and make choosing what factions to support a little more difficult.

Rare Item Drop Rates
Previously, we updated our loot tables with better drop rates of Epics and Legendaries based on the game difficulty (Normal/Elite/Ultimate), but Rare item drop rates were largely unchanged with the exception of more frequent Champion and Hero spawns. With patch v1.0.0.4, we are looking to amend this by introducing independent loot multipliers based on the game difficulty, meaning more great loot on Elite/Ultimate and less junk.

Monster Infrequent Drops Rates
Monster Infrequents have the potential to roll some really powerful combinations, but that sounds great in theory until you actually try to find one. With patch v1.0.0.4, the drop rates of Monster Infrequents are going up. In addition, the quality of affixes found on Monster Infrequents will be significantly improved. This coupled with the aforementioned change to Rare Affix drop rates should mean finding a decent Monster Infrequent should take much less time.

Celestial Powers
When we originally introduced Devotion, certain skills were restricted from assignment for select Celestial Powers. This was primarily done due to balancing concerns at the time. Having observed Devotion in action for many months now, we are comfortable with loosening most of these restrictions, opening up new opportunities for skill/devotion combinations.