Grim Dawn’s Ascendant Mode sounds like an ARPG fan’s dream come true

Grim Dawn is about to undergo a bit of a renaissance in the future, from the look of things. Not only did the game receive a massive modernization update late last year, but it’s also getting the big Fangs of Asterkarn DLC, with Ascendant Mode being one of its highlights.

As per the developer Crate Entertainment’s claims, Ascendant Mode will be the “crowning system” of the whole DLC. The studio took a deep dive on the mode in a recent developer blog, and we finally have a solid idea of what it’s all about. In short, Ascendant Mode is an extra modifier applied on top of Grim Dawn‘s baseline Ultimate difficulty, like adding extra chili flakes to a Carolina Ripper salad. Its goal is to “enable a number of new mechanics intended to spice up your campaign experience and make running through the world exciting again,” essentially turning the Campaign itself into an endgame system. It’s not all great news, though: Fangs of Asterkarn is being pushed back until 2025.

Grim Dawn reveals what makes Ascendant Mode so special

Aside from the added difficulty provided by Ascendant Mode, players enjoying its spiciness can also count on some extra zesty loot: “Ascendant Mode will grant all common items a chance to Ascend. Ascended items will roll a third affix that comes with many powerful and unusual bonuses,” says the blog post. This will make rare items meaningful and important once again, which generally isn’t the case at all in Grim Dawn‘s higher levels of play, as most characters rely on Monster Infrequent drops for meaningful power upgrades.

Further, in Ascendant Mode, all Totems have a chance to upgrade into Tempest Totems, which spawn high-level enemies and a mini-boss, with the reward for taking them down being “some unique items that you will struggle to find anywhere else in the game!” So, again, not only are we getting more powerful loot, but it’s also going to be more interesting by default.

There’s more, though: Ascendant Mode also opens up Resplendent Troves: massively improved versions of Treasure Troves that, much like Tempest Totems, have a chance to spawn on top of their basic, vanilla variants. Crate Entertainment does warn players that they’ll need dynamite to access some of them, however, so they may well end up being very creatively tucked away, too.

Ascendant Mode’s fourth major gameplay feature is the Marked by the Void status effect, which may randomly get applied to any of the game’s treasure chests. “When this occurs, opening the chest will attract fiends from the darkest depths of the Ch’thon’s domain to your location. Defeat them to earn additional loot and some of the new crafting materials from Fangs of Asterkarn,” explains Crate. This, however, may end up bringing in some unwanted attention, as Ascendant Mode features the Dread: an immensely powerful Nemesis-type boss that spawn as players take down particularly large groups of enemies.

All of these features combined practically ensure that Fangs of Asterkarn will be a must-have for all Grim Dawn players, but there’s one more gameplay mechanic tied to the DLC, and that’s the Ascension Altar, as depicted in the image featured above. Upon reaching the Kurn settlement in Asterkarn, players can leverage various modifiers to tweak Ascendant Mode this way or the other, tuning it precisely how they want it to be. The kicker? Ascension Altar is available across all of the game’s modes, which means none of Ascendant Mode’s features will be truly exclusive to Grim Dawn‘s highest difficulties. Instead, it’s a pick-and-choose system unless you want to “enjoy” the full brunt and challenge of Ascendant Mode proper.

For more details on how this all works in practice, be sure to check out Crate Entertainment’s full post on Fangs of Asterkarn‘s Ascendant Mode. It’s a doozy.