When comparing Company of Heroes 2 vs Grim Dawn, the Slant community recommends Grim Dawn for most people. In the question“What are the best singleplayer games on Steam?” Grim Dawn is ranked 97th while Company of Heroes 2 is ranked 118th. The most important reason people chose Grim Dawn is:
Basically you choose 1 class and select skills as you level up. At level 10 you can select a second class, which already gives you 5x5=25 character type possibilities. Each character has dozens of skills, plus you have this additional passive skill tree that you unlock through cleansing shrines. Then there is item customization with crafted "modifiers", adding additional unique stats and skills that you can use, all this adds literally to thousands / millions of character possibilities. Do you want to use a double weapon shooting lightning bolts? You can do that. Do you want to summon your creatures and support them with fireballs? You can do that as well, you can push it wherever you want.
Specs
Ranked in these QuestionsQuestion Ranking
Pros
Pro Great multiplayer
The multiplayer of the game tends to be where the majority of the core experience fun can be seen. With the ability to fight both AI and human adversaries, you command large armies, positioning them in cover and strategic choke points, with the main goal overtaking key economic points to give yourself a military edge. The included Multi-Player contains a plethora of competitive maps, as well as a section of Co-Op maps that are similar to the campaign mode (though not as plentiful).
Pro Focuses more on smart planning rather than brute force
Company of Heroes 2 is an RTS that focuses more on smart decision making of micro-unit control over macro-control and actions per minute. Players will most likely have fewer units under their command during the beginning of each match, making strategic and tactical placement of each unit necessary, rather than focusing on training many units and attacking head-on. This allows for more deep strategic gameplay to take front and center, as players will need to think aggressively and quickly, keeping units in cover and finding defensible positions, as the loss of even a single unit can turn the tide of a battle.
Pro Top of its class in graphics for an Real-Time Strategy title
While not a huge improvement over the first game in the series, the graphics and art style found in Company of Heroes 2 are still quite astounding for an RTS. The animation quality of each unit is incredibly well polished, with infantry moving with fluid realism, and vehicle movement being heavy and slow. Also, to give an added depth of realism, particle effects and quality are nearly unrivaled, as each mortar blast and each grenade detonation casts large chunks of earth into the air in a billowing cascade of terrain destruction, leaving large craters in the ground. Adding greatly to this is the equally gratifying smoke and spark effects one can see when a tank fires a round from its gun, or when bullets ricochet off armored vehicles. While the gameplay in COH2 is second-to-none, the great graphical fidelity adds an immersive aspect that has yet to be matched.
Pro Control large amount of units
Upped from the original game the player is able to control up to 135 units, which is quite a lot of micromanagement for those that are interested.
Pro Tons of replayability thanks to Downloadable Content
While DLC has the potential to introduce imbalance, with purchased items that give advantage, so far Company of Heroes 2 has not had this issue. New campaigns, featuring other allied nations, as well as different commanders with their own powerful abilities are proudly highlighted through this additional content. This allows the player base to have more to do and see, added increased longevity into an already brilliant addition to the Company of Heroes franchise.
Pro Mod support
User Created Content makes every game better. There is a big variety of nice user created maps and mods.
Pro Complex leveling system with thousands of possible builds
Basically you choose 1 class and select skills as you level up. At level 10 you can select a second class, which already gives you 5x5=25 character type possibilities.
Each character has dozens of skills, plus you have this additional passive skill tree that you unlock through cleansing shrines. Then there is item customization with crafted "modifiers", adding additional unique stats and skills that you can use, all this adds literally to thousands / millions of character possibilities.
Do you want to use a double weapon shooting lightning bolts? You can do that. Do you want to summon your creatures and support them with fireballs? You can do that as well, you can push it wherever you want.
Pro Great homage to old school ARPGs
This game is very dark, and grim. It harkens back to games like Diablo 2 or Titans Quest. While other ARPGs have come out since then, none have hit all the marks of what fans of the genre have been asking for. For those that wish for an updated version of Diablo 2, Grim Dawn is the game for them.
Pro Exploration
Pro Highly modifiable
Relevant in modern gaming because the community can keep products like this fresh and varied, even if the developers eventually decide to slow down their updates (which they have not!). The possibilities are great with modding, while the experiences in Diablo 3 and Path of exile are a lot more static.
Pro Drop-in co-op (online and local)
Co-op is pretty convenient as players can drop in and out of your gaming session at any time. This way there is no wasted time jumping out of ones game in order to find players to play with.
Cons
Con Very poorly optimized
When there's a lot going on, it runs bad even on the best latest systems.
Con Gameplay can be quite hectic
Some missions can require the player to control up to 135 units at once, on three separate fronts , which can be difficult to manage. While not completely unmanageable, this is something to consider for those that want something a bit more simplistic out of their RTS.
Con Poor quality cutscenes
The cutscenes, while not animated with the in game engine, look pretty abysmal. The animation and graphical quality of each cutscene is immersion-breaking and can take the player out of the game in an instant.
Con Flame weapons feel over powered
When facing off against units or vehicles that use flame weapons, infantry units can be killed almost immediately. The sheer attack speed and ferocity of these flame-based weapons can reduce a player's fighting force to zero. This is especially notable with vehicles that use flamethrowers, as they can roll in from the Fog of War and overwhelm infantry in an instant, leaving players with the feeling that these weapons are overpowered.
Con Only some builds are fun
There is a definite meta, with superefficient vs non-viable builds.
It's easy to mess up a build, and attribute and spec-bar points are non-respeccable (you can use a cheat editor, but devs want you to reroll a new char).
Con Difficult to move when fighting, especially when you are ranged
Con Static pre-rendered levels
This may cut down on replayability a bit as all the levels in the game are pre-rendered, meaning that each playthrough will have the exact same layout, making for something that can get tiring and too familiar. Similar games have gone with randomized levels, which can keep the game fresh. While Grim Dawn is meant to be a throwback to earlier games in the genre, some newer features found in more recent released would have been welcome.
Con Lots of trips to town
The majority of loot in the game can be useless, with odd stat restrictions or repeats of vendor items. This means the user will need to make many trips into town to sell it all off in order to have room for even more loot they will not necessarily need.