Darkest Dungeon

[Taem]

Seeking some advice on this excellent game; getting my ass handed to me in spades... on the easiest mode!

Q: Is it wise to keep a select group of 4 favorite characters to level up and give trinkets to, and do suicide missions for the rest to earn some quick gold?

Q: Am I supposed to fail like 50-75% of the missions?

Q: How in the hell do you heal? I can't even count the times battle draws close to ending and I haven't even had time to heal with my cleric-types and the final monster perishes and nobody is healed yet...

Q: Is there any easy way to earn some gold to remove the Quirks? The "Stress" is already costly enough to deal with, but Quirks makes it so I'm constantly broke beyond broke, and leaves my heavy hitters out of most dungeon runs.

ANY other hints MUCH appreciated! This game is so much fun, but good lord is it difficult!

Q: How can you tell if a creature is UNHOLY or not?

[Jester]

Q: Is it wise to keep a select group of 4 favorite characters to level up and give trinkets to, and do suicide missions for the rest to earn some quick gold?

You'll want to broaden your roster and do the lowest level quests you can until you have a pool of characters able to rotate into higher missions. (Hint: train a couple more healers than you absolutely need...)

Trinkets can be removed and reassigned every run, so there's no need to worry about who to give them to, except tactics.

Q: Am I supposed to fail like 50-75% of the missions?

Seems a little high, but not totally crazy. Be conservative, do the missions you can accomplish rather than what you can attempt. It gets better as time goes on. Don't be afraid to retreat from combat or even the whole mission if the obvious alternative is a party wipe.

Q: How in the hell do you heal? I can't even count the times battle draws close to ending and I haven't even had time to heal with my cleric-types and the final monster perishes and nobody is healed yet...

Try to string out combats with stuns and heals, though the game will notice if you're doing this too much and punish you with a little stress, then a turn later, reinforcements. Nevertheless, a little sandbagging is a good idea, try to make sure each character has at least one ability that doesn't damage enemies.

Q: Is there any easy way to earn some gold to remove the Quirks? The "Stress" is already costly enough to deal with, but Quirks makes it so I'm constantly broke beyond broke, and leaves my heavy hitters out of most dungeon runs.

In the beginning, you just have to deal with being a little crazy. For quirks: I ignore quirks that don't cause me grief in dungeons (notably, I dislike the -mania ones that cause curio interactions). Once I'm in the midgame, and have a little bit of money to play with (you'll only have a lot at the very end), I try to deal with quirks before they become "locked in", because that makes them very expensive to remove. Locked in quirks, I just live with.

Once you can safely adventure in the Cove, bringing lots of medicinal herbs and hoping to find the coral that cures quirks can be a very effective method of treating mental illness. (Yeah, weird, but it works, and if you use it on someone with lots of locked in quirks, you can cure them for practically free.)

Q: How can you tell if a creature is UNHOLY or not?

It says on their stats when you mouse over them - eldritch, human, unholy, beast, etc...

-Jester

[Taem]

It says on their stats when you mouse over them - eldritch, human, unholy, beast, etc...

I'd of thought so, but I keep checking and I can't seem to find where it says that. Most of my priest-types have skills that do extra damage to "Unholy", yet I seem to be failing to locate where this stat is on the monster hover.

RE: stun/heal, can we talk strategy for a moment?

I've found these tactics work best so far for me:

1. Characters with a "pull" mechanic; use it first to pull other casters/missile-types to the front, not only stopping front-based attackers, but also the missile types so kills 2-birds with 1-stone.

2. Definitely utilize stun on the most dangerous foes first.

3. I like having at least one-healer at all times, but it seems sometimes you just get whooped handily and having a front-line cleric/healer and one in the back who can also heal seems to work well. I found a cleric that can heal the entire party with her skill so I'm planning on keeping her alive no matter what!

4. When ALL of your best characters with these three listed abilities are incognito due to stress relief, that's when the battles become decisively lopsided (in the monsters favor), which seems to be the point I'm at. I guess since it's my first run through, I didn't realize there was a "retreat" option, and consequently lost most if not all of my characters with these three abilities, save for the one cleric, lol. So strategy wise, I've been trying to send 0-levelrs in to collect enough gold to relieve the stress from my main heroes.

5. Marking a target is essentially a death sentence for that monster, as at least half the rooster seems to have skills that double their damage to marked foes, however of all the characters in my rooster, only one has ever had the ability to mark a foe... and he died. I wonder if this skill is hard to come by for a reason?

6. Slimes.... how in the hell are you supposed to kill them? I went all the way to round 14 and there were more slimes that when I started so I just retreated. Is there some type of strategy to defeat slimes, because they seem impossible - you kill one and two more pop up; a potentially broken mechanic?

7. With my limited resources at the start, where would you recommend placing my money and building funding? I've been giving every building a 1-point upgrade at the cost of shields and family heirlooms, but I'm not sure that's the wisest use of my items at this point. And I'm always so broke removing stress that I just never purchase food anymore; only bandages and torches. I wonder if you know you're sending off your 0-levelers to a suicide mission to collect money, if it's best to just dismiss them for new adventurers instead of trying to reduce their stress and utilizing them for future missions?

[Jester]

I've just started in on Stygian mode; we'll see how brutal that gets!

I'd of thought so, but I keep checking and I can't seem to find where it says that. Most of my priest-types have skills that do extra damage to "Unholy", yet I seem to be failing to locate where this stat is on the monster hover.

For me, it is literally right below their name, on the left hand side of their info box.

1. Characters with a "pull" mechanic; use it first to pull other casters/missile-types to the front, not only stopping front-based attackers, but also the missile types so kills 2-birds with 1-stone.

My understanding is that this can be quite powerful, though I've never used it much myself. I will often bring characters that can either nuke down the back rows, or stun them - plague doctors are really excellent for this.

3. I like having at least one-healer at all times, but it seems sometimes you just get whooped handily and having a front-line cleric/healer and one in the back who can also heal seems to work well. I found a cleric that can heal the entire party with her skill so I'm planning on keeping her alive no matter what!

You do know you can buy new skills at the guild and switch them around? Including within dungeons? It's expensive to train up multiple skills, but sometimes it's handy, especially if your roster is limited.

4. When ALL of your best characters with these three listed abilities are incognito due to stress relief, that's when the battles become decisively lopsided (in the monsters favor), which seems to be the point I'm at. I guess since it's my first run through, I didn't realize there was a "retreat" option, and consequently lost most if not all of my characters with these three abilities, save for the one cleric, lol. So strategy wise, I've been trying to send 0-levelrs in to collect enough gold to relieve the stress from my main heroes.

Yup, that's about where it gets to, if you're broke. It gets better! Slowly...

5. Marking a target is essentially a death sentence for that monster, as at least half the rooster seems to have skills that double their damage to marked foes, however of all the characters in my rooster, only one has ever had the ability to mark a foe... and he died. I wonder if this skill is hard to come by for a reason?

I think you answered your own question there. Marked targets can be wiped out by bounty hunters, grave robbers, highwaymen, arbalests, etc... but if marking targets was easy, those characters would be overpowered. Either build your party around them, with multiple dedicated characters for marking (occultists and arbalests, usually) and others for taking advantage of marked targets. Or, ignore the ability entirely - it's almost never worth it to have a single character both marking and hitting the marked target.

6. Slimes.... how in the hell are you supposed to kill them? I went all the way to round 14 and there were more slimes that when I started so I just retreated. Is there some type of strategy to defeat slimes, because they seem impossible - you kill one and two more pop up; a potentially broken mechanic?

High damage to burst them before they multiply, stuns to stop them from multiplying, or whittling them all down to low health before killing them all in one fell swoop. But they are frustrating, for sure. If you can't kill them quickly, they feel unbeatable.

7. With my limited resources at the start, where would you recommend placing my money and building funding?

In approximate order of priority for building upgrades: Upgrading the stagecoach and roster is critical early on. Get at least one cheap 2-slot stress relief in each of the abbey and the tavern. Keep the guild and blacksmith as high as you can, but not higher than your best heroes (which is almost impossible to do anyway.) The sanitarium should be fairly low on your priority list, but gradually upgrade it as you have spare heirlooms. You can safely ignore the survivalist and the trinket vendor.

In terms of money: Make sure you have enough to go on a mission or two. Selling trinkets is painful, but sometimes necessary - try to only sell stuff you don't really use. (Low level trinkets are eminently replaceable. Higher level ones are harder to replace.) Keep your armour and weapons as high as you can without running out of cash; healer armour is pretty important. Upgrade the abilities you use regularly to top level where possible. It makes a big difference.

Don't worry about healing stress below about 30, but above that, you probably want to de-stress your characters, but that can wait until you have money, unless they're needed in the field. Heal diseases, because they're awful and curing them is cheap; mostly ignore quirks unless they're particularly bad for the character's role.

-Jester

[Taem]

You do know you can buy new skills at the guild and switch them around? Including within dungeons?

I did not know either of those. How might one get new skills while in a dungeon, might I ask? And, I might add, I just found out about camping... I had no idea until just right now - from reading a guide - that this game even had a camping mechanic. I love jumping into games, but this one could use a mini-tutorial on some of the basics imo. BTW, thank you for your insight so far; it's much appreciated!

[Jester]

I did not know either of those. How might one get new skills while in a dungeon, might I ask?

You can switch among abilities you've already trained - you can't train new skills. But just bring up the character menu, and click on and off the skills you want.

Glad you're enjoying it!

-Jester