Grim Dawn Guide

Grim Dawn rewards system knowledge more than reflexes. Crate Entertainment's ARPG buries critical mechanics behind layers of tooltips, and understanding how damage conversion, resistance reduction, and devotion constellations interact separates players who breeze through Ultimate difficulty from those who brick-wall at Elite. This guide covers the core systems that drive every successful build.

Mastery System

Grim Dawn uses a dual-mastery system. You pick your first mastery at Level 2 and unlock a second mastery at Level 10. The combination of two masteries creates your class identity. Soldier + Occultist = Witchblade. Soldier + Necromancer = Death Knight. There are 36 possible class combinations across 9 masteries (counting the two expansion masteries, Inquisitor and Oathkeeper).

Each mastery bar has 50 levels. Investing points into the bar itself (not individual skills) unlocks higher-tier skills and grants passive stat bonuses. Pushing your primary mastery to 50/50 is almost always correct because the stat bonuses per level increase significantly after Level 40.

Skill points come from leveling (3 per level from Level 2-50, then 2 per level to 85, then 1 per level to 100) plus quest rewards. You'll have roughly 244 skill points at Level 100 to split between two masteries and their skills. Respeccing individual skills costs iron bits at the Spirit Guide NPC, but you cannot un-choose a mastery once selected. Plan carefully. Our Best Grim Dawn Builds page has tested allocations for every major class combination.

Devotion Constellations

The Devotion system is Grim Dawn's most unique feature and its most confusing one. After restoring Devotion Shrines scattered across the world, you earn Devotion Points (55 maximum) to spend on a celestial constellation map.

Each constellation requires specific Affinity prerequisites (Ascendant, Chaos, Eldritch, Order, Primordial) and grants its own affinity when completed. This creates a chain: completing Sailor's Guide (requires 0 affinity, grants 3 Ascendant) enables Scholar's Light (requires 3 Ascendant). The system encourages planning your devotion path from Level 1 to end-game.

Celestial Powers are the real prize. Many constellations grant an activatable ability that you bind to one of your existing skills. Dying God grants a massive offensive buff. Behemoth grants a healing proc. Tree of Life provides party-wide regeneration. These devotion-granted abilities often contribute 20-40% of your total build's power.

For specific devotion paths matched to builds, check our Best Grim Dawn Builds and the Grim Dawn Tier List for class rankings.

Damage Types and Conversion

Grim Dawn has 15 damage types split into base and DoT (damage over time) variants:

| Base Damage | DoT Version | Common Sources | |------------|-------------|----------------| | Physical | Internal Trauma | Soldier, Oathkeeper | | Pierce | Bleeding | Nightblade, Inquisitor | | Fire | Burn | Demolitionist, Oathkeeper | | Cold | Frostburn | Nightblade, Arcanist | | Lightning | Electrocute | Shaman, Arcanist | | Acid/Poison | Poison | Occultist, Nightblade | | Vitality | Vitality Decay | Necromancer, Occultist | | Aether | - | Arcanist, Necromancer | | Chaos | - | Occultist, Demolitionist |

Damage conversion is the system that makes or breaks advanced builds. Items and skills can convert one damage type to another (e.g., "100% Physical converted to Fire"). Conversion follows a strict order: skill-specific conversion first, then item-granted conversion, then buff conversion. Conversion only happens once per source, so you can't chain-convert Physical to Fire to Aether.

The practical takeaway: focus your build on 1-2 damage types and stack resistance reduction (RR) for those types. A build that deals Fire + Lightning + Physical spreads its effectiveness thin. A build that converts everything to Fire and stacks -130% Fire resistance on enemies melts bosses.

Resistance and Defense

Survival in Grim Dawn requires hitting resistance caps. Each resistance caps at 80% by default (some gear raises the cap to 83% or higher). Ultimate difficulty applies a -25% resistance penalty, so you need 105% on your gear to actually have 80% effective resistance.

| Priority | Resistance | Why | |----------|-----------|-----| | Critical | Aether, Chaos | End-game bosses deal massive Aether/Chaos damage | | High | Fire, Cold, Lightning | Common enemy damage types | | Medium | Vitality, Pierce, Bleeding | Less common but deadly when uncapped | | Lower | Acid/Poison | Fewer enemies use this type |

Beyond resistances, Defensive Ability (DA) determines whether enemies can critically hit you. You need roughly 2,800 DA for comfortable play on Ultimate difficulty. Below 2,500, bosses land critical strikes that one-shot most characters. The Soldier mastery provides the most DA through passives and skills like Decorated Soldier and Scars of Battle.

Factions and Reputation

Six friendly factions offer vendor items, augments, and crafting recipes at Honored and Revered reputation levels. The Augments (attachment components for gear) from Revered factions are essential for capping resistances in Ultimate difficulty.

Two faction choices force permanent decisions: Kymon's Chosen vs. Order of Death's Vigil and Barrowholm vs. destroying them. Kymon's Chosen offers Aether-focused augments while Death's Vigil provides Vitality-focused ones. Check which augments your build needs before choosing. Most builds align with Death's Vigil because their augments cover more resistance gaps.

End-Game Content

Grim Dawn's end-game centers on Shattered Realm (endless dungeon with scaling rewards), Crucible (wave-based arena), and Super Bosses (optional bosses designed for min-maxed characters).

Shattered Realm Shard 65-66 is the standard farming benchmark. Clearing this efficiently requires a build with both strong AoE for trash clearing and single-target damage for bosses. Our Grim Dawn Walkthrough covers the progression path from Normal to Ultimate and into end-game farming.