Darkest Dungeon EP5 – We Hit a Stride

Something crazy happened after Murf’s death. We hit a huge string of good luck and prosperity. Now, I am not saying that he was sacrificed, or anything absurd like that, but the crew did use it as a rallying cry. Episode 5 largely has our group prospering, collecting treasures, and looking and acting like a well knit group.

Wanted to show you a detailed Character screen. You see I have racked up quirks on both sides of the spectrum and how that affects my base stats. It also shows where I prefer to stand, what combat skills I have available, and what Camping skills I have available. It also details my resistances and scores for disarming traps (among others.). Equipment is upgradeable through the blacksmith and there are two ‘trinket’ slots for items you can find. I haven’t equipped many of the ones I have found as they always have a boon AND a negative. This game is about balancing the power.

Like I said, a lot of quest completes, no deaths, lots of success. The team is rallying along! After my first experiences with this game I felt it was hard to get good squads and whatnot – but I am quickly learning that I am a capable general and my team is holding up really well under the various stresses they are exposed to.

Even the random items, which are normally cesspools for bad luck, are bestowing gifts. EVERYTHING IS GOING RIGHT.

Time to enter a new dungeon. The Weald has a lot of fungal type creatures. I still haven’t unlocked the fourth dungeon but assuming that will occur once I clear enough of the three I can enter.

We are still getting various negative states, such as Masochistic here on me. It’s adding nice flavour and character to the dungeon runs. I am still finding it comical when party members argue back and forth under various negative quirk-states. It hasn’t grown old (yet?).

WelshTroll gets a boon – this is only the second one I have received on this campaign, and they really make the dungeon run easier when you do. (compared to the 2-3 negative perks per run, so its around 30 negative, 2 positive. Nice scale of balance!). One character with a postive halo over them can keep the stress level of the entire group down. WelshTroll here is becoming my favourite healer. Aywren has some competition for “bestie”.

I am just glad they don’t have a sound effect for that ([creepy grunt]) yet equally curious what that would sound like.

Here is the camping screen – two things happen. Eating, and then secondary camping skills. Some are to lower stress (group wide or individual) some to gain health (group wide or individual) some to guard from a nighttime attack. Some even help yourself (but hurt others in groups – such as the Leper removing his mask. Lowers his stress, raises entire group stress). There are also buffs. There are some synergies in camping and a lot of options per character. You get 12 ‘Respite’ points and each use costs a number of points depending on effect and who is doing it.

I get a lot of extra roster space with all of these good fortunes so welcome JessicaCook and J3w3l to the team! I also notice above I lost Tesh as he left in search of a holy vision. I hope that isn’t permanent – we shall see if he returns. End state for me is when all Bloggers are dead, of course. Right now we have several level 2s, a level 3, and everyone has been incredibly successful.

Writing that in such positive terms will not ruin my next few play throughs though, right? I mean, I feel like I have pretty much mastered this game*

[*foreboding foreshadowing]