Grim Dawn : Beginner Wind Devil Druid

Beginner Wind Devil’s Druid (Patch 1.1.9.4) The Druid (Arcanist and Shaman) class is a top tier class due to the synergy both classes provide. Our main skill will be Wind Devils, supplemented by Storm Totem and Chain Lightning Skill as support. Our build will be focusing on CDR (Cooldown Reduction) for maximum uptime for both offense and defence. A very important disclaimer; this is a very cast intensive gameplay; it might not suit your playstyle. The gear can be farmed relatively easy and is very straight forward. Our focus on this build will be on lightning damage and requires gear from monster specific items, known as Monster Infrequent (MI’s) in Grim Dawn’s terminology. The Grimtools link provided does not contain good suffix for my pants and belt, so you can definitely improve this build even further.

Fettan Mask: Found from a vase in the Korvan Sands. Gives +1 to all skills. A true budget build BIS. Before Level 94, use a Fleshwarped Casque for 6% OA to IEE. Gives you health and cover your resistances too.

Coven Sky Seals rings: Purchase from the Coven faction. Gives good percentage of OA, DA. Try to vendor farm for 4% OA. Wendigo Sky Pendant: Gives +2 to Wind Devils and TSS, provides stun resistances and 4% CDR. Yeti Horn: Farmed from Yeti’s in the Asterkarn Valley. Get “Sandstrom prefix” and “of Thunder” suffix for physical resistance and high CDR. Elite Bysmiel Stormshroud Mantle: Purchased from Bysmiel faction. Gives health, resistances and +3 to Maelstrom.

Kymon’s Chosen Badge (MI): Farm this vendor in blood grove to get the desired resists and stats like OA and DA. This also covers your Chaos resistances. Or you can farm / use any other medal can gives you good OA, DA and fixes your resistances. Flexible item slot.

Eye of the Storm Relic: Blueprint that drops from Totems in Elite difficulty or quest rewards.

Watcher Brandis Belt: This belt converts vitality damage to lightning and will improve our healing on Twin Fangs. Might take awhile to farm some really good prefix and suffix.

Elite Bysmiel Flameshroud Cuirass: Gives us +3 to Wind Devil, health and resistances.

Gloves: Farm item vendors in multiple locations to get good resists, casting speed and OA/DA/increase lightning damage. Alternatively, craft some heavy gloves with Angrim, a blacksmith that you can rescue during a questline. Craft the heavy gloves with him for highest armour, or Emberguard Gauntlets once you get the blueprint. This is a flexible item slot.

Pants: Another flexible item slot. I went for Solael-Sect leg guards for Aether and Bleed resistances. You can farm for other pants that gives you good OA/DA or fix your resistances / increased lightning damage. Dreeg-Sect leg guards are nice too, for % to OA and stun resistances. You can also craft StormGuard Chausses once you get the blueprint.

Totally Normal Dawn shard: Drop from Ancient Grove Dungeon, requires a skeleton key. Confirmed drop from a broken vase. Gives +1 to all Arcanist skills. Location can be found here.

Elite Legion Greaves: Purchase from Legion faction. Gives health, physical resistance and stun resistance or farm item vendors again.

Alternatively, while farming, you can craft Stoneplate Greaves. Flexible item slot.

To “farm” a vendor and change their inventory stock, visit two other vendors and then return to the vendor that you were originally shopping from. In Dungeons, “farm” a vendor by returning to the previous level, wait for ten seconds and then re-visit the vendor again. This resets their inventory. Set aside an hour or so for doing this. Monster Infrequent/Green items can be really powerful if you are willing to spend some time farming.

Passive Skills Mogdrogen’s Pact. We will invest one point in it and then max out Heart of the Wild and Oak Skin for bonuses to Health, Defensive Ability (DA), Armor and Resistances. Toggle it to activate it permanently.

IEE (Iskandra’s Elemental Exchange). Though we will not be maxing out the main skill, we will max Overload for the flat Offensive Ability (OA) and Aether Resistance. Toggle it to activate it permanently.

Maiven’s Sphere of Protection. A good defensive aura that absorbs damage by 20% at 12/12. Toggle it to activate it permanently.

Star Pact. Our main exclusive skill. In Grim Dawn, only one exclusive skill can be active at all times. Star Pact provides CDR and percent damage bonuses to lightning and electrocute damage.Toggle it to activate it permanently.

Hell Bane’s Ammo. Gives + 100% to our lightning damage. Craft and imbue on your offhand weapon. Toggle it to activate it permanently.

Storm Callers aura from Eye of the Storm Relic. Toggle it to activate it permanently.

Active Skills Wind Devils. Our main skill. The second node in this skill tree, Raging Tempest, will give us plenty of elemental resist reduction to enemies. The electrocute damage from Maelstrom stacks, but not from the main node.

Trozan’s Sky Shard. We invest one point in it to proc Reckless Tempest.

Nullification. A de-buff that reduces enemy’s elemental damage and removes all auras that they have. With practice and skill, you can nullify both yourself and the enemy for maximum efficiency. Max this out 10/10.

Mirror of Ereoctes (MOE). When activated, you are immune to ALL damage for 3 seconds.

Chain lightning. This component randomly drops from Totems in Ultimate difficulty. Craft it and imbue it to your main hand weapon. Spam this skill while Wind Devils are on cooldown. We will slightly benefit from life steal at 70% efficiency of our life steal stat.

Storm Totem. Supplements our Wind Devils. Bind this to Twin Fangs and it can heal you very well.

Grasping Vines. Invest 1 point just to proc devotions.

Devotions Devotion is another aspect of character development. Players earn devotion points by restoring shrines found throughout the game and spend those points to unlock various bonuses and abilities from a number of constellations to buff offense and defence. Your devotions can level up, so always remember to bind to a skill. You can remove your devotion points at Devil’s crossing Spirit Guide, she’s at the top right-hand corner of your camp. After starting AOM DLC, you can find another spirit guide at Coven Camp or you can go to Conclave of the Three.

The devotion path was taken to favour our high CDR, increase our physical and stun resistances.

1. One point in Green Crossroads → Max out Bat then Quill → Remove the point in Green Crossroads.

2. One point in Purple Crossroads. Max out Rhowan’s Crown. We don’t benefit from the flat elemental damage but we benefit from the % elemental damage. This devotion reduces enemies’ elemental resistances. While levelling, bind this to Wind Devils.

3. Max out Spectre of Death. A good devotion that gives us armour, defensive ability, stun resistances and offensive ability. Bind to any passive skill.

4. One point in Blue Crossroads → Max out Sailor’s Guide, Widow and Reckless Tempest. Bind these to your active skills.

5. Four points in Ghoul and max Giant’s Blood. Druid lacks physical resistances and Ghoul will provide us that together with life steal.

We won’t benefit from the life steal much during levelling. Giant’s blood gives us healing. Personally, I prefer a more constant uptime so I bind it to any passive skill except Arcane Will. Most players bind it to Arcane Will so that it procs when you need it the most.

6. Five points in Ultos. Further reducing our enemies’ elemental resistances and gives us good percentage to lightning damage and OA.

Gameplay Offensive Gameplay: Remember that you are a caster. Keep a distance, summon Wind Devils and Storm Totem up at all times and kite if you have to. Don’t be afraid to use MOE offensively. Knowing when an enemy / nemesis does his most powerful attack is the key to use MOE effectively. Be aware what is on cooldown.

Defensive Gameplay: Nullification removes an aura or buffs that enemies have, and in Grim Dawn, most if not all enemies, including bosses and celestials have “hidden” buffs. If you see an enemy that has a reflective aura, you can nullify them (For example, on Mad Queen). You can also use it on yourself to remove debuff’s and DOT’s (Damage over Time) effects. Wait for Giant’s Blood to proc, then Ghoul, use a potion, MOE, rinse and repeat. Spectre of death comes in handy in between the rotation.

Factions: Remember to always fix your resistances via gear drops, components and augments. You must purchase them at Factions as soon as possible. Component list can be found here. We want to side with all factions, including Barrowholm however for Anasteria. you can wish to be nemesis if you want to. In Act 4, side with Kymon’s Chosen They sell the Chosen Flame Seal ring which gives +2 to Storm Totem. You can use them until you get Coven Sky Shard rings at Level 94.

Item Suffixes: Understanding items suffixes for this game is crucial when it comes to MI’s. For this build, you should try to get something that gives you lightning / elemental damage, such as “Thunderstruck”, “Magestorm” or “Celerity”. If you need more OA and DA, farm for something that has “of readiness”, “Aggressive”, or “Stalwart”. Grimtools has a whole list of item suffixes for you to view.

Some of them give you additional skill points to your class. For example, an “Arcanist’s” prefix on your medal may give you +2 to Maiven’s Sphere of Protection. For your offhand, it is highly recommended to get “Sandstorm” prefix for physical resistance.

Strength: This build literally rains lightning from the sky and does very good area of effect damage. It has good single target damage with good survivability. This build clears all four main dungeons (Steps of Torment, Port Valbury, Bastion of Chaos and Ancient Grove), clears SR 35 and Path of the Three Questline for additional skill and attribute points on Ultimate difficulty and can farm Totem very effectively.

Weakness: Like all caster builds, arcane enemies (Purple coloured mobs) are the bane of our existence. They can remove all your passive and existing buffs within a second and you can die instantly. Prioritize killing them as soon as you see them. You may find yourself running low on energy; feel free to use an energy potion from time to time. Generally, Arcane Will fixes this issue. Our petrify ,physical resistances and skill disruption protection is very low as well , so be mindful of that.

Levelling Guide

To keep with the theme of the build, we will level up as a lightning caster druid instead of using Primal Strike. Invest all attribute points in Physique during levelling. Items underlined are linked to Grim tools. During levelling, prioritise resistances, lightning / elemental damage and armour. Every 10 levels or so, change your gear for better armour. For normal difficulty, aim for 50% resistances, of course 80% is always the best. For Elite and Ultimate, it is non – negotiable; 80% minimum resistances are a must. Grimtool links provided below for reference and a guide; you will find better gear along the way so feel free to use it! Change the difficulty in Grimtools to Normal / Elite / Ultimate to see my resistances. I will not go through the entire levelling process as there’s too much work. I’ll provide guides until Normal / Elite difficulty at most so you get a rough idea of levelling.

Level 1 – 15: Invest one point in Savagery, keep devouring Swarm 7/16, invest one point in Mogdrogen’s Pact. Do the Fabric Quest and receive the chest armour for energy regen and get a Karvok’s Conjuring Bone. Complete the Good Old Slith Charm Quest. The ring you get as a reward gives you good energy regen at early levels and good resistances. Always side with Angrim when you do the rescue the blacksmith quest. GT Link: https://www.grimtools.com/calc/xZyKdMe2.

Level 16: Respec to Wind Devils like this: https://www.grimtools.com/calc/q2M3DY7Z . Use a cracked lodestone component on your weapon and bind the skill to your hot bar. If possible, farm Narbagal to get Groble Sky Effigy and insert two ectoplasms in each of your rings for the energy regen. As soon as you kill Warden Krieg, go to Forgotten God’s and get a movement augment by choosing any faction, preferably Bysmiel, as we need their items as soon as possible.

Level 16 – 25: Continue pumping points in the mastery bar and into Raging Tempest, Maelstrom, Wind Devils, Storm Totem, Heart of the Wild and Oak skin. Lie during the Search for Elder Quest to keep the relic. It’s a good proc when you are running out of energy.

Level 25: https://www.grimtools.com/calc/RVveK8G2. I crafted Hell’s Bane component, 2 x Scaled Hide and you can craft 2 x Ward Stones; however, I went for attuned lodestone and corpse dust for health and health regeneration, although the former is a much better choice for movement speed. Scaled Hides are important so that armour can absorb damage. Craft an antivenom salve and use it on your belt and helmet if you need more poison resistances. Craft Amber component and replace cracked lodestone with it.

Level 35: https://www.grimtools.com/calc/wV1kPyYN. We want to rush Star Pact as soon as possible. I took the Fleshwarped Shield and Fleshwarped Helm, purchase a gun from random vendors to insert Hell Bane’s Ammo, and focused on gear with good armour and resists. Invest one point in IEE, Inner Focus and MOE. You’ll find yourself short of Chaos resists at this point for Act 3 and 4. Not to worry, once you reach Blood Grove rift, purchase the medal from the vendor to cover your chaos resistance. Continue the main campaign while investing points in the Arcanist skill tree. I killed Logherrean at Level 40. Feel free to go Port Valbury and farm for Brandis Belt before killing Logherrean.

Level 50:https://www.grimtools.com/calc/mN4oWdRZ. From Level 35 to 50, I did bounties and farm Cthonic totems to become Honoured status with Kymon’s Chosen and Homestead, bought their gear and Augments, started AOM DLC, went into Ancient Grove Dungeon to get a Totally Normal Dawnshard, ditched the shield, farmed for Yeti Horn offhand and maxed out Star Pact. I also completed Path of three quest. It is a hidden quest to get 1 attribute point and 1 skill point on each difficulty. Enjoy spamming Wind Devils. We will complete AOM DLC, start Forgotten Gods after that and begin Elite difficulty sometime around Level 60.

Level 60: https://www.grimtools.com/calc/RZRL4p42. From Level 50 to 60, I completed AOM DLC, FG DLC, reached Honoured status with Black Legion, Anasteria, Bysmiel, Coven and Malmouth factions and killed Morgoneth. I am about to start Elite difficulty after finishing up a few quests. We also pick up some nice upgrades to our gear to increase our armor and resists. The conversion from the shoulder piece would give you a little more heal since we took Bat devotion.

From here on out, you must farm for Watcher Brandis Belt (if you have not), gradually min-max your skill points as you level up, re-play the game on Elite difficulty. Always swap your gear out for higher level/armour and keep your resistances at 80%. Remember to reach revered status with Malmouth faction so you can buy their EXP potions. This is doable on Elite difficulty. You should reach at least Honoured / Revered status with your factions before entering Ultimate difficulty. Don’t forget to complete The Hidden Path quest for skill and attribute point on each difficulty, and cap your resistances at 80%. Feel free to use ointments to patch up your resistances for certain situations, because Ultimate difficulty in this game is not forgiving at all.

End-game Builds The forums have an end game build that you can refer to. Generally, it revolves around TSS as the main skill instead of Wind Devils.

Together with the Mythical eastern set and Trozan set, it becomes a very powerful build. Full credit goes to the author, DmT.

Special Thanks Special thanks to Maya, Ulvar, Nery, Banana Peel, Armored Otter, Alkamos Hater, Space Spice, Stupid Dragon, DmT, Mad Lee, RektbyProtoss, Gnuffi, Malagant, Malawiglenn, Duskdeep86, Mordecai Mike, RPG Community College and certain Japanese / Chinese/ Russian Grim Dawn players who inspired me to make a beginner build for new players to experience this amazing game!

Stupid Dragon, Ulvar, Maya and Nery have awesome beginner guides that I highly recommend checking out, with good explanation of the game (or pet) mechanics. RektbyProtoss has really good levelling / playthrough videos that you can watch on YouTube. And lastly, sincere thanks to Dammit, who is running Grimtools and is ever so efficient to update all the latest patch changes. Dammit has done us a huge service and favour. I sincerely apologise for missing out on anyone, it is purely unintentional.

RektbyProtoss YouTube Channel : https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCdOnAU7RhWpjiQmy-HNkCvg Grim Dawn Beginner Guides : https://forums.crateentertainment.com/t/beginner-build-guides-compendium-for-aom-fgexpansions/106137 Valera MXM : https://www.youtube.com/user/LudkinMxM Maya Pet Carnival Guide: https://www.reddit.com/user/MayaGD/comments/qel59g/mini_carnival_pet_guide_reddit_edition/ Malagant You Tube Channel: https://www.youtube.com/user/Malaganted Space Spice: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCOBph_AwF-MC9YzHWMB6HWA Mad Lee You Tube Channel: https://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=georgy+li Armoured Otter Youtube Channel: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCepA2xmwvW8YLyD_OPBGQyA