[Kickstarter] Darkest Dungeon

[GreenGoo]

I've had random encounters spring up in corridors I had explored, as well as traps appear where I had walked before.

This must be "new", since when I played the EA I'm pretty sure once you had explored a corridor that was it.

I think random events chances go up the lower your torch level

That makes sense. One of the changes I've noticed is that torches burn faster. You need more torches to use them more often than in past versions of the game.

[Lordnine]

Certain events also have a chance to occur based on the status of your party/inventory. The Collector, for example, has a chance of appearing if your inventory is near full. The Collector is scary by the way, don’t take him lightly.

[Paingod]

The Collector is scary by the way, don’t take him lightly.

I've tangled with him a few times now, and won each time. Once that battle was the deciding factor for abandoning the dungeon.

I also found myself a Shambler and that was a hoot and a half. Thankfully, I had a small pile of Bleed and Blight to dump on him and the fight went better than it might have otherwise.

[LordMortis]

I often have a full backpack and have never see the collector. However, I tend to have a very well lit torch and I'm still primarily playing level one dungeons.

Hoping to have time to give this game again this weekend.

[Lordnine]

I also found myself a Shambler and that was a hoot and a half. Thankfully, I had a small pile of Bleed and Blight to dump on him and the fight went better than it might have otherwise.

You can summon a Shambler yourself.

Spoiler:

Place a torch in a purple sphere relic.

I did it once to see what would happen and regretted it immediately as my party was not prepared.

[Paingod]

I also found myself a Shambler and that was a hoot and a half. Thankfully, I had a small pile of Bleed and Blight to dump on him and the fight went better than it might have otherwise.

You can summon a Shambler yourself.

Spoiler:

Place a torch in a purple sphere relic.

I did it once to see what would happen and regretted it immediately as my party was not prepared.

That was how I was introduced, but while I was surprised, I was in the Cove and prepared for high Protect enemies. The Shambler was taking 12 points of Blight and 4 points of Bleed every turn and even spent a couple turns Stunned (despite his high Stun resist).

[dbemont]

The Collector, for example, has a chance of appearing if your inventory is near full.

I hadn't realized that. Interesting!

[LordMortis]

Spoiler:

Taking a bunch of bleeders and blighters against the 8 pounder is not a great idea.

[Lordnine]

Spoiler:

Taking a bunch of bleeders and blighters against the 8 pounder is not a great idea.

Spoiler:

Actually I did ok with that. You just need to make sure you have a reliable stun for the two back ranks. (plague doc is great for that) You need to either kill or stun the guy that lights the fuse every turn. I don’t think I went below half health in that fight.

[Lordnine]

I finally entered the Darkest Dungeon. Doesn't seem so bad, look how happy my new dancing friends are!

[morlac]

Your dancing friends have skill called Flesh wall. Sounds like fun?

[Lordnine]

I finished the game last night. The final dungeon is brutal and I don’t really agree with how they balanced the endgame. Basically, you need at the bare minimum 16, fully decked out level 6 heroes in order to finish the game. Once heroes enter the Darkest Dungeon, they are not allowed to go back.

I really loved the first half of my playtime with the game. For reference, Steam says I spent 45 hours with the game, which is probably a bit of an exaggeration since I left it running a few times, but let’s assume its close. That means that the first 20 hours of the game was brilliant, the next 10 were pretty good, and the last 15, I was ready for the game to be over. Mind you, I play games with the goal to complete them, and Darkest Dungeon is a game that doesn’t want you to finish it.

Ultimately, there is a bit too much grind involved to actually “complete” the game. That said, if you just want to play for an hour or two a day, get loot and level up, I doubt you will find a more compelling dungeon crawl experience.

[LordMortis]

I am discovering I might just suck at this game. Me second foray into the level 3 dungeon and another level 3 hero lost by the 3rd room. This time my heroes were all upgraded by 3 skill (I think. One below max) and upgraded by 2 armor and weapons and the battles were still brutal.


I still haven't finished all of the level 1 bosses because I need more Cove exploration and no easy cove exploration comes up.

Anyhoo, had my fun for the day.

[Lordnine]

The game is balanced in such a way that dungeons will always be difficult. As soon as your heroes are a level that they could defeat a dungeon easily, they are no longer allowed to enter a dungeon of that level.

My method of playing relied heavily on stun locking the enemies while applying damage over time. Plague Doctors with the tier 3-4 stun bomb were my MVP’s.

[Sepiche]

New update coming out that, among other things, adds a new class and, in an attempt to address the issue of losing high level characters, you can upgrade the stagecoach to allow for hiring high level heroes. Hopefully that will help with some of the late game grinding.

http://www.darkestdungeon.com/the-antiquarian-update/

[LordMortis]

Nope. Nope. Nope. I just bought two more games. I can't go back yet.

[Holman]

Weekend Deal! Darkest Dungeon is $16.74 (down from $24.95) on Steam.

You know you want it, and you really should.

[Lee]

Weekend Deal! Darkest Dungeon is $16.74 (down from $24.95) on Steam.

You know you want it, and you really should.

This game is easily worth that price. I haven't played it in a few months because I got frustrated with the difficulty/stagnation of the end game, but it was a blast getting there. The atmosphere generated by the voice over and graphics alone make this one great. Anyone even mildly interested should jump at this price and give it a try. Of course the Steam Summer sale is right around the corner as well...

[Holman]

I've thrown myself back into Darkest Dungeon in the past week and a half, and I think this time I might make it to the end.

It's week 72, and I have a full stable of heroes at all levels. I use the lower-level characters to farm gold to support the higher-level arms and equipment. Eventually I should have a roster of four or five full top-level teams.

My favorite team composition is this:

Plague Doctor in the back, specializing in Stun/Blight as the environment requires.
Occultist for healing and some damage dealing.
Two Hellions up front, maximized for bleeding and able to hit all enemy positions.

With the right trinkets, these guys can always get the job done.

[Holman]

I finally completed the game!

I got 88 hours out of it. While it isn't perfect, and there are periods when it feels a little like a grind, overall I think it's one of the most stylish and consistently enjoyable game experiences I've had at such a bargain price.

I played on the default settings, and at the very end of the game I used the wiki for spoilers. This made things far too easy: the boss fights in the Darkest Dungeon itself are incredibly difficult because of the special quirks involved, but going in with foreknowledge of the best tactics makes them trivial. Still it was quite a lot of fun to play them out.

[LordMortis]

DLC coming. If that means it's done, maybe I should get back to this.

[Sepiche]

Can't wait. I still haven't actually beat the game, but when I'm in the mood for some lite RPG dungeon crawling there is no better game.

[baelthazar]

DLC coming. If that means it's done, maybe I should get back to this.

I love the art style, but at this point I wonder if Mike Mignola is thinking about calling his lawyers...

[KDH]

[bigimg]http://cdn.akamai.steamstatic.com/steam ... 01b9e8.jpg[/bigimg]
RADIANT UPDATE - FULL RELEASE - BUILD #17400 ..

Spoiler:

(February 9 - redhookjohn)

Overview:
This update was built around two major pillars:

Radiant Mode: Radiant Mode is a version of the game that is intended to take less time overall to complete than normal (“Darkest”) mode. The mode is still challenging--monsters have the same stats and nothing about permadeath has changed. But some gameplay rules have been flexed or altered in ways that reduce some of the more time consuming mid and late game elements.
Improvements and Additions (to all modes): we’ve reviewed tons of feedback over the last few months and have added a bunch new features, content, revisions, and fixes.

We will be monitoring how the rollout of Radiant goes, and you can expect some more tweaks here and there as we see how the patch settles.

The build has been pushed to our live branch for all players. That being said we have a build getting prepped for deployment that will contain the first batch of localization for all the new strings. So keep an eye out for an update in a hour or so.

Thanks to your support, as we move forward toward the launch of our first major expansion, The Crimson Court, we’ll continue to update and improve the core game. Currently, we’re looking at a balance pass on trinkets and hero skills, so you can expect some changes in those areas in the coming weeks. As always, we appreciate your feedback, suggestions, and enthusiasm!

-The Darkest Dungeon Team

RADIANT MODE:

Never Again changed: heroes are now allowed to return to the Darkest Dungeon. However, they will undergo significant stress upon doing so, and are more likely to become afflicted instead of virtuous when in the Darkest Dungeon.
More Power Leveling flexibility: Heroes of up to Level 4 may enter Novice dungeons. Any hero may enter a Veteran or Champion dungeon.
Stage Coach can now be upgraded to allow the appearance of new recruits starting at up to Level 4. Increased chance of upgraded recruits appearing.
Reduced cost of Upgraded Recruits upgrades.
Accelerated hero XP progression
Hero upgrade and treatment cost scaling by level reduced
Returned provisions now give slightly more money back
Tweaks to Stagecoach:
Added another upgrade tier to Experienced Recruits (Lvl 4 Characters will now appear)
Changed Experienced Recruit requirements. (Lvl 1 now only requires Lvl 1 Blacksmith and Guild)
New Stage Coach population option to use a Deck based system. (This can be used on all modes). New Stagecoach generation method that gives a more even long-term distribution and also favors healers more, since they are the backbone of most parties. This can be toggled off in the Options menu if you wish to still ride the bittersweet wave of total RNG.
Higher Light conditions confer slightly more to party DEF bonuses.
Accelerated Region Progression
Town Events trigger more frequently to compensate for shorter playtime


STYGIAN MODE:

Renamed NG+ to Stygian
Stygian can now be selected when starting a new campaign, instead of requiring completion of Darkest mode first.
More stress, higher darkness penalties, more light loss per step, higher trap diff, enemy HP bump from 15% (prev) to 20%, slightly higher monster crits...overall slightly more deadly[/b]
Time limit reduced to 86 weeks and hero death limit dropped to 12
You can now continue playing after the time limit on your Stygian mode game after successfully completing the game


ALL MODES:

Added 4 new monsters (Bone Bearer, Hateful Virago, Swine Skiver, and Squiffy Ghast) that appear in Champion level Dungeons - BLAME DANA
Caw! Caw! Added New Trinket Recovery Quest
When a party wipe occurs, trinkets are no longer lost! There is a way to recover them. Exactly what that way is, we leave for you to discover...
Trinkets are no longer recoverable from fallen characters after retreating.
Two new Town Events
Added New Variations to Dungeon Map Generation!
Fix for users reporting increased cpu usage
ECONOMY Adjustments to Radiant and Darkest modes:
Economy was too gold starved across the board, including mid and late game.
Slightly reduced cost of Hero Treatment.
Reduced hero weapon and armour upgrade costs.
Reduced cost of upgrading hero skills final two levels
Increased gold drops and gold stacking from 1,500 to 1,750
(ALL MODES) Rebalanced gem drops and changed gem values. Net result is much higher values of gems dropping as difficulty of missions progress.
Gems now all stack to 5 instead of 4
Adjusted Antiquarian values to be in line with Economy changes to ensure she's still profitable.
Tavern and Abbey complete side-effects rebalance and some new side effects added. Goal is to make neither Tavern or Abbey preferable over another, and also add more interest.
Fixed Provision Discount Town Event description so all languages should show up correctly.
Quests that will trigger a Town Event: links are now clearly shown
The Cove Gather mission now triggers “Lost and Found” Town Event instead of “Supply Run” Town Event upon successful completion.
Hold SHIFT when purchasing Provisions to purchase a full stack.
Adjustments to chances of getting quirks at quest end. Slightly increased chances in both cases for interest.
New quirk: “skilled gambler”. Bad Gambler and Skilled Gambler functionality improved.
Stagecoach Upgraded Recruits: adjusted number of pos and neg quirks they start with to ensure they are still valuable. Reduced cost of the Upgraded Recruits upgrades.
Secret Rooms are no longer guaranteed in every dungeon.
Quest Trinket rewards: better logic for supplying trinket rewards in cases where the designated trinkets aren’t available.
Heirloom Chest now more profitable after using key
Added new treasure: "Jute Tapestry" (functions as a very rare gem worth 5,000 gold)
Added “Party” selection type to camp skills to help make the skills more clear.
Tweaked Roster sort so that Characters in Party are arranged in their party formation.
Added Skill Equip warning when trying to embark without all skills equipped
Added Food Embark warning when trying to embark without much food
Skills will now auto-equip when purchased and have room. (This will be most noticed with purchasing your 4th camping skill.)
After several angry phone calls from Vvulf, he is now properly tagged as a boss.
(Radiant and Darkest modes) Vvulf quest and Vvulf himself not quite as tough, and also won’t appear before week 40 minimum.
Veteran and Champion Skeletal Defenders now have the tools to live up to their namesake.
Tweaked Trinket Embark Warning to be % based. You are now warned on L3 and L5 dungeons when you have less than half equipped.
Adjusted cooldowns on town events up a bit, to reduce repetition
DARKEST and STYGIAN modes: Final battle tuned up some to give a bit more challenge. May require more.
Adjusted Nomad Wagon stock rarity (Rare trinkets are now more rare)
Added Town Event Description in the reward section for related Quests.
Fix for handling multiple monitors
Added 4k window resolutions to options.
Added Subtitle Location Option: Top or Bottom
Added border FX for Ancestral Trinkets and Boss Trophies
Added FX to Dungeon Region experience bars on increase
Added in new art for all missing Curio states. WELCOME ABOARD, TRUDI!
Added Date/Time to save slots
Added more save slots
Various UI tweaks
Exposed significantly more settings for future modding.
...and more!

there's been two updates since this one

[Holman]

Nice!

[KDH]

.
.. Darkest Dungeon: (DLC) The Crimson Court .. Available when it's ready ... Price unannounced

steam announcement:

Darkest Dungeon: The Crimson Court is the first expansion for the award-winning grim and gothic RPG by Red Hook Studios. The Crimson Court enhances any Darkest Dungeon campaign with the addition of a new playable hero class, new monsters, new bosses, the Fanatic wandering miniboss, new items, and a fresh and interesting way to upgrade...

from: darkestdungeon.com/if-it-bleeds-we-can-kill-it

We know there’s been questions swirling around the upcoming DLC:The Crimson Court, and today we wanted to give you all a little insight into the carnivorous chaos that will come to the Estate.

Crimson Court is a parallel campaign experienced alongside the main Darkest Dungeon content that will provide you with new challenges at every difficulty level. The narrative grounding sheds some light on the Ancestor’s early days, and will be presented in the same style of cutscenes you’ve seen elsewhere in the game.

As the Crimson Curse spreads unrelentingly over the estate, parties will battle new enemies in familiar regions, as well as setting foot in a completely new sprawling environment: the Courtyard. There, amidst unique curios, traps and obstacles, a complete faction of new blood-crazed foes lie in wait, overseen by three distinct boss encounters. These slavering enemies and epic encounters will introduce new combat mechanics, testing the limits of your favourite strategies.

As the infestation grows, and your roster begins to sicken, the Fanatic will emerge to roam the hallways, confusing friend and foe alike in his zealous quest to exterminate the Curse.

The odds are not completely stacked against you, however! A new playable hero class will be added alongside powerful new trinkets, town events, and a fresh way to expand and upgrade your Hamlet.

At Red Hook, we’re working as hard as possible to deliver an exceptional DLC experience – one that enriches and expands the core game. Our mantra is that the addition of Crimson Court represents the canonical way to experience Darkest Dungeon, and we can’t wait to deliver it to you. We’d hoped to get it out earlier this year, but opted to delay in order to pack additional value into the free ‘Radiant’ update. We’re looking at releasing the Crimson Court in Late May/Early June, and will keep you all up to date as work progresses. Quality is our first priority, hence why we cannot confirm an exact date just yet.

So, as you enjoy a glass of red wine this weekend, listen for the cries of your infected parties ring out from the time-shrouded mists of the Hamlet…

“The Blood! I must have the Blood!”

----> steam page




The rogue-like difficulty is effectively keeping me on the sidelines

[Jag]

The rogue-like difficulty is effectively keeping me on the sidelines

Same. It is a fun game, but too punishing for casual play. I'm not a fan of roguelikes.

[Holman]

Just realized that The Crimson Court comes out tomorrow.

[Sepiche]

Started a new game with the DLC and it's been a lot of fun so far. Just ran into the new fanatic enemy last night with my first group of level 5s and promptly lost 3 out of 4 of them. He's kind of a super powered version of the Hag it turns out.

The new Courtyard zone is great too. Once you do the Crimson Court intro quest, you will start encountering random Crimson Court groups in all the dungeons and occasionally get an Invitation drop that will let you make a new run on the Court Yard. When you go in you use up an invitation, and you can't camp, but you are supposed to go for as long as you can exploring the dungeon and when you leave it will put your next party back in exactly the same spot when you return, so it's basically a MAMMOTH dungeon you have to explore a bit at a time looking for keys to get access to the deeper parts, and eventually to the room with the boss you need to kill. I think right now I'm ready for my 5th run and just looking for the last key I need.

[KDH]

...

... ... (63m) .. Darkest Dungeon: - A Design Postmortem

July 8 2017

In this 2016 GDC postmortem, Red Hook Studios' Tyler Sigman covers what went right from a design perspective and what didn't during the development of Darkest Dungeon.

[LordMortis]

So, I didn't buy anything for the Steam Holiday sale and sure enough the day after the sale ended, I was like, I need something new. So I paid $15 for the DLC I could have had for $6 just a few days ago and started playing this for the first time since I don't know when. I would have been pleasantly surprised that Steam saved my game on the Internet, but the game had changed so much I wanted to start from scratch.

I need to remember to get back more beta games I enjoyed because I'm thoroughly enjoying this again. I'm playing in Radiant mode, which wasn't a thing before, nor were districts. We'll see how long it holds my attention this time.

Also don't let the level fool you on the Crimson Court. I took foray in to there with some level 2s, thinking "1st level challenge with awesome loot" and that didn't go so well...

Also they did some great AI improvements, like the trap checking and curio item use marking.

[LordMortis]

Started a new game with the DLC and it's been a lot of fun so far. Just ran into the new fanatic enemy last night with my first group of level 5s and promptly lost 3 out of 4 of them. He's kind of a super powered version of the Hag it turns out.

The new Courtyard zone is great too. Once you do the Crimson Court intro quest, you will start encountering random Crimson Court groups in all the dungeons and occasionally get an Invitation drop that will let you make a new run on the Court Yard. When you go in you use up an invitation, and you can't camp, but you are supposed to go for as long as you can exploring the dungeon and when you leave it will put your next party back in exactly the same spot when you return, so it's basically a MAMMOTH dungeon you have to explore a bit at a time looking for keys to get access to the deeper parts, and eventually to the room with the boss you need to kill. I think right now I'm ready for my 5th run and just looking for the last key I need.

Spoiler question for you

Spoiler:

When did you go in? I went in on a play through early and then got wasted by the croc.

Decided to start over. Beefed up some characters. Went in, had no problem with the croc but one character got the Crimson Curse. No problem. I run in to the courtyard with my first invitation and get pretty far and another character gets the Crimson Curse. I figure I have 8 blood stacked, no problem. I have time to figure this out. So I play lower level 2 characters hoping to advance the game and boom bloodsuckers hit me and to more characters get the crimson curse. So now I have to retire them or spend all my effort blood hunting or let characters die.

And now I'm ready to reset the board again and just stay away from the courtyard until I have enough power to basically blow through the dungeons to not have to worry about the long term effects of the curse so much.

[Sepiche]

Spoiler question for you

Spoiler:

When did you go in? I went in on a play through early and then got wasted by the croc.

Decided to start over. Beefed up some characters. Went in, had no problem with the croc but one character got the Crimson Curse. No problem. I run in to the courtyard with my first invitation and get pretty far and another character gets the Crimson Curse. I figure I have 8 blood stacked, no problem. I have time to figure this out. So I play lower level 2 characters hoping to advance the game and boom bloodsuckers hit me and to more characters get the crimson curse. So now I have to retire them or spend all my effort blood hunting or let characters die.

And now I'm ready to reset the board again and just stay away from the courtyard until I have enough power to basically blow through the dungeons to not have to worry about the long term effects of the curse so much.

Spoiler:

It's been a little bit, but I think my first successful run was using at least level 3 characters, but even if you hold off going to the Crimson Court, you'll encounter them in normal dungeons, and inevitably some of your people will get the Crimson Curse. The trick is once you defeat the final boss in the Crimson Court, all your heroes with the Crimson Curse will get cured, and then later in the game you'll get access to a Crimson Curse cure in the sanitarium.

If you don't mind further spoilers, this contains lots of details of the curse: https://darkestdungeon.gamepedia.com/Crimson_Curse

[LordMortis]

I read some of your link. If you went in at level 3 I wonder how the hell you survived unless you just characters die like crazy.

It's hard for me to let a bunch of level 2s that I spent time and no small expense on go with the premonition that there will be more to follow. So hard, I feel like I'm better suited starting over and avoiding Crimson Court all together until later in the game.

[LordMortis]

Took down the Baron this weekend. I'm starting to lose people. I'm not sure how I feel at this point. I've easily gotten my money's worth but I'm not sure there is any investment in the game when characters start to become disposable. Maybe when I play on a harder setting and there is a time constraint, assuming I want to finish the game (I'd guess I'm about 1/3 or less through) and try again.

At the same time, I've enjoyed the game enough that I'm likely to buy Cthulhu like farm expansion when it's released.

[KDH]

. ...
... There is a massive (30 page patch notes, massive) update and DLC release (Paid + Free) for this game releasing at approx. 10 AM, today

1) .. News

2) .. The Color of Madness DLC (no price as of this posting .. edit: $4.99)

3) .. The Musketeer (previously a kickstarter-backer perk .. reskinned arbalest character) = Free

4) .. 30 page patch notes (google docs)

[LordMortis]

I've been waiting for this to pick up the game again, which I never finished....

Assuming it's about $10 for new monsters and the never ending quest of madness and that's all you get. I'm in.

I don't much care about skins.

I haven't read the patch notes but I'm guessing they nerfed the self bleeding martyr class guy. I was just learning his value when I last set the game down for something shiny.

Looking forward to skimming the patch notes when I have time.

[LordMortis]

S5? That's a nobrainer for me tonight. I was getting frustrated with Templar Battlebots anyway.

[LordMortis]

Killed my 88 weeks into the campaign last night to add the new DLC from a fresh start and then proceeded to not play because I was researching stuff that made me angry. Ah well. There's tonight right?

[NickAragua]

Well, the steep discount pushed me over the edge.

I'll probably check it out once I finish plowing through Pillars of Eternity (not too far from the end: I've just got White March 2 to finish up, then the final fight).