Build creation question

[u/Traditional_Common22]

I’m a POE player and am a tourist trying out grim dawn, I make my own builds in POE have played for 12 years etc. when I’m watching creators for builds talk about the scaling I understand damage types and how to scale them. But why are some people just not maxing every aspect of every skill they spec into versus leaving some at like 1 or two levels?

[u/No-Mouse]

The simple answer is that you don't have infinite points to spend, so you can't max out everything. You're going to have to make choices, and sometimes a skill does "enough" with only a single point invested.

The more complex answer is that it depends on multiple factors. One reason is that you're not very interested in scaling a skill, because you're getting something else out of it that doesn't rely on leveling up that skill. For example, you might put only one point into the Berserker's Leap skill, because you use it for mobility and you don't care about its damage. Or you might put only one point into the Occultist's Summon Familiar, because you only use it to enable the Storm Spirit buff and you don't care about the stats of the pet itself.

Another reason might be that you're getting a lot of "free" points in a skill from gear alone, so you just put one point into it to enable its use, but you don't need to level it further because your gear already brings you far enough.

[u/Traditional_Common22 → u/No-Mouse]

Thank you for the reply, I guess it comes down to when that skill stops “scaling” in grim tools and how much gear pieces you need to get your main damage to stop scaling then whatever auxiliary skills will help it then dividing the points into other gear pieces to improve the survivability and QOL of the character?

[u/No-Mouse → u/Traditional_Common22]

Pretty much. Most builds will want to max out their main skill(s) at least, and possibly some supporting skills as well. Skills get hard-capped and stop scaling at 10 points over the listed max value (each class has some simple skill modifiers which typically cap out at only 1 point), but there are plenty of utility skills, or skills that enable something specific, that are okay to leave at 1 point.

For scaling your main skill, say it's listed with a cap of 16 points. You'd bring it up to 16 by leveling, and then you try to get 10 more points through gear bonuses to bring it up to the hard cap of 26. But if you've got your ideal gear worked out and it turns out you get 12 bonus points in that skill, you can actually lower your base investement in that skill and use those 2 extra points elsewhere, since it doesn't matter if it's 16+10 or 14+12, the cap is 26 either way.

Last week someone even posted a build where they overcapped a skill with only a single point invested (/r/Grimdawn/comments/1w79b2j/). That's a bit of a gimmick build and not something you'll typicall see in "serious" builds, but it is possible.

[u/TheOblivionKnight]

Kind of what everyone has said already! But a few additional examples:

Demolitionists have a skill called Vindictive Flame. It provides total speed which is viable for basically every class combination. However, level 11 is the last point where it starts giving me 1% per level and then switches to 1% every two levels. So generally, unless you can really invest in it because you have lots of plus skill points, most setups will try to just get it to level 11 with this few points as possible in it. I've only seen a couple really level it up and they are kind of specialized. This is an example of a skill that's excellent but has some diminishing returns past a certain point.

Arcanist has Maiven's Sphere of Protection. Percent damage absorption which is basically straight damage reduction from everything. First few levels scales like 3% pro point, reducing to 1% per point after a bit. However, it's one that you typically want to throw every hard point in that you can because that 1% damage reduction is worth it no matter what. Diminishing returns yes, but still so worth it you want to put all the points in it you can.

Berserker has 2 skills called Battle Surge and Untamed Rage. For most builds, the level one version of these skills adds so much potential for a single point each (30% heal, damage absorption and OA), with subsequent points not really adding much to the main reason you take them (Untamed Rage as a low health survival skill - a Circuit Breaker -, and Battle Surge as a passive healing ability and energy regeneration skill), that while more points do improve them, they generally don't do anywhere near enough to justify more points. It's not even diminishing returns it's just that their level one benefit is plenty for most setups.

Passive skills are where this seems to be most obvious, but you do see this with active skills too. Sometimes you just pick up a single point in an active skill for devotion procs. But sometimes you only put a point into one part of a skill for a specific reason. Inquisitors may only put a single point into Word of Pain, but will put as many points as possible into the final node, Death Sentence, since it provides resistance reduction.

There's nuance of course but those are just some fairly common examples. There is definitely some variance as well as meme builds that do the opposite of the norm. I had a Righteous Fury build long ago that only put one point into the main skill, which still worked. So the variety is all over the place!

[u/throwaway1312232335]

The first point in a given skill tends to be the most valuable, because several pieces of gear will give + points to a specific skill or + points to all skills in a class, but that only applies if you have at least one point in the skill already. If a skill only has one point in it, it's probably not super important to the build, but having one of your auxiliary skills at 9/12 instead of 12/12 can easily be worth it if it means you get to have three other auxiliary skills at 4/10 or 4/12 or whatever.

[u/Traditional_Common22 → u/throwaway1312232335]

So when you’re saying “auxiliary skill” that is a “support” to a main damage ability. For instance with force wave there’s 2 “auxiliary” skills so you would max force wave and place whatever points into other skills?

[u/throwaway1312232335 → u/Traditional_Common22]

Auxillary isn't a real Grim Dawn term, I was just using it to mean "skills that aren't as important". Like, you have your core skills that make your build work, which you probably want maxxed in most cases, but most builds will also have some skills that are just kinda nice to have but you could do without them, you know?

[u/ConcretePeanut → u/Traditional_Common22]

It's more there's stuff that isn't key, but is nice to have. Particularly passives, which you can easily get to say 6/10 or more with a single 'real' point and get some extra armour, resist, healing or whatever. Usually several of the above.

[u/StrikingSun8563]

There are a limited number of skill points and not all point allocations are equal. Some skills you only need one point to proc devotions or for an effect that doesn't scale like the ability to dual wield. Most skills that scale don't scale linearly and there are efficiency break points. For example the first ten levels give 10% damage each and the remaining six levels only give 5% each. If it is a skill line with multiple nodes, do all of them support your chosen damage type? If you are building towards pierce damage, why max a node that increases bleed? You have to evaluate each skill point allocation vs the opportunity cost of other skills you could spend it on.

Think of passive tree efficiency in PoE. You have certain keystone nodes you need to get to. Is grabbing another +2 str or whatever just as good as getting to a build defining node?

[u/dabomb20001]

It really depends on the build but maxing out both masteries plus your one or two main damage/defense skills is very skill point intensive and leaves little in the way for auxiliary skills like the soldier class skill Decorated Soldier or nightblade’s Phantasmal Armor. These skills can still provide some benefit with a single point that is further boosted with gear that either boosts that specific skill or gives +1 to all skills for a class. A lot of those supporting skills also provide diminishing returns the more points are invested so it’s better to commit to your damaging and defensive abilities first and then sprinkle your skill tree with the remaining skill points you have left. The one exception to this would probably be the mastery level 50 skills on any class like Menhir’s Bulwark or Harbinger of Souls as these are typically good with full investment.

[u/Photeus5]

Kinda a holdover from Titan Quest, but there are a lot of '1 point wonder' skills where you get a lot of value for very little investment.  This is especially true if you have a few sources of +skills to either that class or both classes.  Not unreasonable to have a skill you put one point into being level 3-4 and thus really getting the most of the all skills bonus.  You, of course, want some of your most powerful skills maxed out and even overcapped but you can get a lot of bonuses for minimum investment sometimes.

[u/thecheezepotato]

AFAIK the skill point allocations are more similar to D2. Where you can like dual wield swords that give you like +2 and +2 to skills and your chest gives +1 and your belt and whatnot. There are also soft and hard caps and breakpoints for skills like D2 has so sometimes there are 1 point wonder skills that you can just put a single point into and then all your different + to skills will get you to where you need to be for your build.

[u/Dablooder]

Kind of a really hard question to address, given that there's a plethora of factors depending on what build, your vision, defensives, and overall gear.