Getting a friend the game need some help!

[Dadinareasonablypricedcar]

Basically it will be the first time im playing grim dawn multiplayer and need to know how easy it is to play with friends and only friends. Do you set up a private lobby and invite (if its as simple as that) and do your character levels and data all save for multiplayer? Basically im asking multiplayer related questions, i have no issues with single player as i love that to bits.

Just simply want to know how multiplayer friendly it is for steam friends, will it track each others quests (as long as we both finish a quest and claim rewards i suppose). Is there port forwarding or anything crazy like that i need to know about. I just literally want to invite and for us both to make a new character. Last question is will there be an option to play SC or HC (soft core no perma death and hardcore perma death), as my friend will definitely not want to lose a character early on lol
Thank you ;)

[andrew.thiele]

Multiplayer is very easy to setup for Steam friends as they show up in the server window and you can just select your friends name and click join. So, obviously one of you has to host a multiplayer game (likely with a password and likely with Instanced loot selected so you both get your own loot) while the other joins said game. I believe there is a server that facilitates the function of portforwarding or uPnP for those that don't have one of these solutions enabled. If this server goes down then yes, multiplayer will not function for you if you don't have ports open or uPnP enabled. It is pretty rare for that server to go down though.

The choice of SC vs HC is done when you create the character. SC and HC characters can not play with each other. So you would either both create a SC or HC character.

In multiplayer, almost every decision (outside the Homestead faction choice for Death's Vigil vs Kymon's Chosen and the FG faction choice) made in the game together (provided you are at the same point in the story/have the same quests available) is made for both of you. So whatever decision one makes for a quest will have the same impact on the other player(s) in the game. This includes fairly big decisions such as which Blacksmith you're going to choose, if you save the Devil's Crossing or Homestead vendors, and whether you become hostile with Anasteria (the Outcast faction) or Barrowholm (and thus it's faction).

In multiplayer, if there are latency issues, there can be unexpected results during gameplay. This includes, but is not limited to, not seeing each others current location in game, not being able to loot items, not being able to kill monsters and possible dying when the game synch's back up. HC multiplayer is certainly more challenging, if not impossible, if there are latency issues so I'd stick to SC personally for multiplayer.

Lastly, Monster Infrequent items (be it Rare, Epic or Legendary) will only drop for one player in the game unless that enemy can drop multiple MI's at a time, in which case it is possible for both players to receive a separate MI item of that enemy. So, if you don't know what MI's are this link shows all the monster infrequent's in the game; https://www.grimtools.com/db/items/mi
I only say this because if you're both trying to farm the same MI item, it will not be faster as a group unless you literally can't farm it solo.

EDIT: A lot of great additional information from ehyder below, but I'll add on to these a bit.
(3) Yes, the Lokarr pieces are MI's and thus only one drops per session for one player (randomly) in that session.
(6) This is what my friend and I did to avoid problems with this quest. Both players need to have the quest active. Have only one player pick up the pieces for the quest (Spirit of Mogdrogen, etc.). Then have all players at the Shrine when it is turned in by the person with all the materials. Everyone should get the rewards. I haven't had issues performing it like this, but otherwise I could see problems occurring.

[ehyder]

@andrew.thiele is pretty thorough but a couple of other comments:
1. You should know that even though you make the decision about Kymon's vs Death's Vigil separately it does not make a lot of sense to choose separate factions since the other faction will become hostile to the player. Also make sure you select your factions at around the same time or you may have to go into your own game to make the selection.
2. Only the player interacting with the quest giver sees the dialog.
3. As noted above for MIs, to get the drops you might have to switch out hosting, e.g., farm Lokarr's set. I think that is one of them since only one of us ever got the drops.
4. If latency is consistent, reboot! including routers. That usually took care of the issues we had in MP.
5. I concur on HC vs SC for MP. Although one advantage of HC MP is that you can ping pong back and forth with advancing your characters. After death the player with the lower level character can hang back and accrue xp while the higher level player lays waste to the landscape. It is painful to lose the character, and make sure to keep everything in your shared stash not the character's stash, but kind of doable.
6. There is one major bugged quest in MP, the Mogdrogen shrine quest. You will have to go get some of the items on your own, it seems like (over the multiple games I have played with different people) only one item drops in the rifts, not one for each character. Whoever picks it up gets it, and the other player(s) are out of luck. It is also a good idea to clear the shrine in solo, some play throughs the other player has lost out on points. Once everyone else has cleared the shrine all players can participate as the final (hosting) player finishes the shrine and can enjoy the drops.
7. Your MP game is saved personally for the character you create. which means you can fire it up in SP if you want to do some solo farming, or run into timing issues that messed up quests.

[Dadinareasonablypricedcar]

Originally posted by andrew.thiele:

Multiplayer is very easy to setup for Steam friends as they show up in the server window and you can just select your friends name and click join. So, obviously one of you has to host a multiplayer game (likely with a password and likely with Instanced loot selected so you both get your own loot) while the other joins said game. I believe there is a server that facilitates the function of portforwarding or uPnP for those that don't have one of these solutions enabled. If this server goes down then yes, multiplayer will not function for you if you don't have ports open or uPnP enabled. It is pretty rare for that server to go down though.

The choice of SC vs HC is done when you create the character. SC and HC characters can not play with each other. So you would either both create a SC or HC character.

In multiplayer, almost every decision (outside the Homestead faction choice for Death's Vigil vs Kymon's Chosen and the FG faction choice) made in the game together (provided you are at the same point in the story/have the same quests available) is made for both of you. So whatever decision one makes for a quest will have the same impact on the other player(s) in the game. This includes fairly big decisions such as which Blacksmith you're going to choose, if you save the Devil's Crossing or Homestead vendors, and whether you become hostile with Anasteria (the Outcast faction) or Barrowholm (and thus it's faction).

In multiplayer, if there are latency issues, there can be unexpected results during gameplay. This includes, but is not limited to, not seeing each others current location in game, not being able to loot items, not being able to kill monsters and possible dying when the game synch's back up. HC multiplayer is certainly more challenging, if not impossible, if there are latency issues so I'd stick to SC personally for multiplayer.

Lastly, Monster Infrequent items (be it Rare, Epic or Legendary) will only drop for one player in the game unless that enemy can drop multiple MI's at a time, in which case it is possible for both players to receive a separate MI item of that enemy. So, if you don't know what MI's are this link shows all the monster infrequent's in the game; https://www.grimtools.com/db/items/mi
I only say this because if you're both trying to farm the same MI item, it will not be faster as a group unless you literally can't farm it solo.

Appreciate the detailed response :)

[Dadinareasonablypricedcar]

Originally posted by ehyder:

@andrew.thiele is pretty thorough but a couple of other comments:
1. You should know that even though you make the decision about Kymon's vs Death's Vigil separately it does not make a lot of sense to choose separate factions since the other faction will become hostile to the player. Also make sure you select your factions at around the same time or you may have to go into your own game to make the selection.
2. Only the player interacting with the quest giver sees the dialog.
3. As noted above for MIs, to get the drops you might have to switch out hosting, e.g., farm Lokarr's set. I think that is one of them since only one of us ever got the drops.
4. If latency is consistent, reboot! including routers. That usually took care of the issues we had in MP.
5. I concur on HC vs SC for MP. Although one advantage of HC MP is that you can ping pong back and forth with advancing your characters. After death the player with the lower level character can hang back and accrue xp while the higher level player lays waste to the landscape. It is painful to lose the character, and make sure to keep everything in your shared stash not the character's stash, but kind of doable.
6. There is one major bugged quest in MP, the Mogdrogen shrine quest. You will have to go get some of the items on your own, it seems like (over the multiple games I have played with different people) only one item drops in the rifts, not one for each character. Whoever picks it up gets it, and the other player(s) are out of luck. It is also a good idea to clear the shrine in solo, some play throughs the other player has lost out on points. Once everyone else has cleared the shrine all players can participate as the final (hosting) player finishes the shrine and can enjoy the drops.
7. Your MP game is saved personally for the character you create. which means you can fire it up in SP if you want to do some solo farming, or run into timing issues that messed up quests.

Thanks for the info and advice!