Darkest Dungeon : Blogroll Edition, Part Deux

Here is to hoping a lot more bloodshed joy and craziness treasures for our merry band of adventurers. Let’s see how BlogNation’s second foray into the Ruins turned out!

[note: clicking on the graphics will open them larger in a new browser tab, they scale automatically in the body by webpage and I’ve noticed they can be hard to read in some.]

The above graphic shows the status of my roster, the four chosen individuals for the next mission, and which dungeon we are going in. Murf is clearly still not ready to leave his prayer time at the Abbey. I accept his weakling pleas and decide to bookend two experienced adventurers (Aywren, WelshTroll) with our newest bloggers to the team (Syp and Dr. Raph). I like this setup as there is good internal “aoe” with the Grave Robber and Jester (they can attack two mobs at once) the solid Crusader tanking, and Vestal healing. Guaranteed win, right?

The provisioning screen is what you can buy to bring with you on the adventure. For longer adventures there are wood bundles for campsites. There are always bandages to stop bleeds, antidotes for poisons, etc. You can fill your packs (and blow your cash) quickly this way, so just stick to the basics. Eight torches and food plus a shovel for short adventures, double it for medium.

Traps can be found by characters that are good at the ‘Scouting’ skill – and if noticed you can attempt to disarm. Aywren has found the more traditional way to disarm a trap. Traps cause damage, apply bleeds, and sometimes trigger poisons.

This graphic shows a stress gain to the characters as a result of a critical hit from the enemy team. The stress mechanic can hit many in your group depending on the action and oftentimes, the reaction of your group. When people start verbally abusing each other (or rather, “if” they do) it can also affect stress levels between the individual party members.

Conversely, critical hits by YOUR team and critter kills can lower stress levels. Oddly enough, by the look of the past two screenshots Dr. Raph isn’t one to be affected on the stress meters much (either way). So far.

Early on, things are looking grim. Our main tank is out of health and high on stress, and most are banged up. There is no in between fights way to heal except for camping (which can’t be done on short missions, and can only be done once on medium ones) and eating food. Eating food adds 1 to 2 points and isn’t cost effective. Normally you just go into the next fight and focus on getting heals on during the fight.

This screen shows what happens when you burn your torch down. It’s safer for traps (and stress) to keep those burning bright. Light is just a right click in the inventory away – as long as you have torches. Some spells and attacks add to the torch level, but not too effectively.

Remember when I thought Dr. Raph seemed to not be affected by stress situations? A critical hit that results in a stun (yellow halo effect) is enough to push Raph over the edge! At zero health your hero doesn’t die automatically, it puts you in a “Death Blow” situation – where any additional damage triggers the chance for the character to die off. Dr. Raph is in one at this very moment. (finally.. someone snaps…)

Raph fails the psyche check and becomes irrational. This is a semi-temporary state for as long as the stress level is high. The only way to lower stress in a dungeon is to camp (medium and higher length only) and/or have valiant things happen. Some effects can go away in the Hamlet (via the Abbey or Tavern) but for the most part, these can stick around. What does an irrational character do?

Start talking silly during battles, for one. I suppose close to death and high stress may make you recall a kinder time with teacakes.

Maybe some moments of delusion as well. The sad/funny part is that her getting super high stress levels set off a chain reaction for the party as a whole…

And Syp becomes hopeless…

.. and a bit snarky.

While the rest of the group goes bad, the psyche test on Aywren turns the other way – she gets stronger, more vigorous! I knew I liked her for a reason!

Her Vigorous attributes and positive power of speech helps lower the stress of the entire group.  Looking at the state of the group above, and with one guaranteed fight left, I abandon the dungeon. You can abandon the dungeon at any time (and can run away from any fight) but quitting means you don’t get all of the rewards and the stress levels of the adventurers raise because of being a failure.

Not a bad haul, considering the early exit.

The team picks up a lot of bad along with the good. Syp and I are going to be married at the hip with our shared issues. Poor Dr. Raph is going to not be as useful in the Warrens (the next dungeon) as the Ablutomania issue will come forward as it is inhabited by pig-folk and tends to be pretty messy.

Murf still has three levels of stress so he is going back to rest – time to gamble! You can improve the quality and power of those stress relieving activities by investing in the facilities. I’ll be without Murf another adventure. Aywren refuses the Brothel (red X) and there was no room left in the Abbey. I can’t afford to upgrade any of the facilities (the failed dungeon doesn’t help) so I’ll just have to leave her on the bench until I can find an activity she enjoys. Shame too, as she has been a rock so far.

With people stressed out and/or recovering I have to beef up the team – need 4 for the dungeons! The Blogroll adds Grumpy Elf (Bounty Hunter) and Leo (Vestal) to the team. GrumpyElf comes with some baggage as he believes he is posessed by demons. Syncaine is going to get his first taste of tanking for our next adventure.

What happened in today’s run is typical of the game so far – things can go downhill very fast and very hard as negatives chain react off of one another. I have gone through most of the basics of the game in the first two dungeon play throughs and future posts will focus more on major things – deaths, craziness, new adds (etc.) I just wanted to show the parts of the game and how it plays out – we’ll stick to major and impactful events going forward!