Darkest Dungeon II

[Infinitron]

https://www.darkestdungeon.com/news/hero-paths-the-grave-robber/

Darkest Dungeon II - Hero Paths: The Grave Robber

The Grave Robber.
"Agile, graceful, and singularly surreptitious."

Deadeye or Nightsworn?
The Deadeye Path hones in on Grave Robber’s keen eyes to enhance her ranged precision. This allows her to keep her distance while still effectively taking down enemies, but it comes at a great cost to her melee damage and resistances.

If you enjoy running a Grave Robber’s ranged kit, then this is the Path for you. While the damage penalty to Melee skills is severe, the ranged bonus enhances many of her options. The Path’s CRIT bonus, coupled with the Combo bonus on skills like Thrown Dagger+, can put the Grave Robber close to a 100% CRIT rate!

The extra ranged damage makes Pirouette an excellent opener, makes Thrown Dagger+ CRITs all the more crushing, and makes it easier for Glint in the Dark to score kills that bypass Death’s Door.

Did You Know: Her relationship joint/retaliation attacks are considered melee, so they are also subject to this Path’s penalty.

With Lunge’s efficacy reduced, the Grave Robber will be doing less intentional rank dancing of her own but the Deadeye Path leaves her susceptible to being moved by enemy skills. Fortunately, Pirouette can quickly get her back to a proper Ranged strike position.

The Raven’s Reach line of Trinkets are obvious picks for supporting the Grave Robber’s ranged damage output, while the Heartseeker line can close what little gap there is to the 100% CRIT mark on her Combo hits. The Foreclosure Notice can then use that high CRIT rate to grant bonus turns.

Alternatively, Trinkets like the Sneaker’s Standard or Covert Cloak can grant the Grave Robber bonus Stealth, further enhancing her Glint in the Dark and Thrown Dagger skills or enabling fast access to Repartee.

Spoiler

With The Nightsworn path, the Grave Robber disappears into the shadows until the opportune moment. Her stealthiness increases her Lunge and Pirouette damage, allowing her to quickly strike down unsuspecting enemies. Additionally, concealment allows her to still avoid damage despite her Max HP being reduced.

The Nightsworn Path is for Grave Robbers who love to dance between the ranks, retreating with a Pirouette or Shadow Fade before punching forward again with a powerful Lunge.

While all of her skills gain bonus damage under Stealth – making skills with inherent Stealth bonuses such as Thrown Dagger or Glint in the Dark even better – both Pirouette and Lunge gain significant additional damage bonuses of their own. With the buffs stacked, these two skills gain a crushing +100% damage!

However, the significant HP penalty can make it dangerous for the Grave Robber to operate near the front ranks. If you have nobody to cover her or aren’t comfortable putting her at that risk, a Nightsworn Grave Robber can still remain in the back rows and focus on the Stealth damage bonus alone.

It’s also difficult for Pirouette to gain the Stealth damage bonus without Trinket assistance, as Shadow Fade moves her too far back to use it. You can try pairing her with a Jester, whose Battle Ballad can move her back to Pirouette position after Shadow Fade while also granting a Strength Token for a total +150% damage bonus!

Did You Know: From Stealth, Glint in the Dark can kill monsters with Death’s Door before they even reach 0 HP. It is currently the only skill in the game capable of doing so.

With the Grave Robber’s damage bonuses affecting both melee and ranged alike, the Sharpness Charm Trinkets can be good picks for an all around boost. If you’re staying back and relying on the Stealth bonus alone to fuel your damage, then the Raven’s Reach Trinkets are slightly better options.

However, with so many damage bonuses involved in the Path already, you can really get away with doing other things for her Trinkets. If you use Pirouette often, Trinkets that apply bonus negative effects such as the Disarming Dagger can assist the rest of the party. The Sneaker’s Standard or His Rings can help net the Stealth bonus without expending a turn. The Foreclosure Notice is a solid pick if your Grave Robber is paired with a Hero that can set her up for Combo hits.

For the cautious, the Hag’s Hoard will almost entirely offset the HP penalty.

Community Impression
The community’s preferred path was split between Twitter and Discord. On Twitter, it was a close call with Deadeye at 55.5% votes and 44.5% for Soloist. On Discord however, Nightsworn won by a landslide with 147 votes versus 67 votes for Deadeye.

Nightsworn is very fun with a mobile party. Using grave robber with highwayman to have the revolving door style constant high-damage output just feel so good (as long as you have someone protecting her). Probably my best run to date was carried by constant 40+ damage lunge crits. - @crowboyo

Love nightsworn for the fun more than anything. Built with a team that can run things from any position and suddenly no matter the shuffle you're dealing heavy damage and feeling free - @Britishbrat

Nightsworn Graverobber with the Dreaming General Trophy that locks everyone into place is so much fun.. - @AcidSeth

I think both paths are really good, but deadeye is easier to use. The game doesn't have many dedicated backline heroes so deadeye helps with that. Nightsworn also requires hero shrine unlocks which means it doesn't do much for you until you play GR a lot. Otherwise both are good and fun to use. - ShuffleFM

I personally find Nightsworn to be a little awkward, and not at the fault of the stats itself mostly; Lunge and Pirouette are already fun to use (other than 4 damage Lunges) and this build encourages their use, which also lets players build around the rank 4/2 Grave Robber who will be pushing at least two other heroes into new positions…
Deadeye is what makes me think of DD1. Crit, Damage, big bold numbers make me happy. It's very simple, it's very effective, and with Glint in the Dark it's also not awkward for her when she's forced to rank 1 or has to target a rank 1 enemy. I actually feel like Deadeye is just a natural buff to her normal playstyle, although for people who like to use Lunge and Pick to the Face, it is not for them. I personally don't mind the melee nerf, it makes hardly a difference to me. - Koffee

Deadeye encourages range attack with bonus dmg and crit in exchange of melee dmg. Surely adorable paths bc 5% crit up is surely good.
Nightsworn paths sacrifice her health and get her dmg buff when stealthed or lunge, pirouette.
Unlike soloist, warlock and alchemist, GR can survive well with absinthe, eating tombstone or shadow fade. This can help her survivality.
Currently, deadeye is more attractive than nightsworn. - Karyuen

Nightsworn OOZES style and that's the sole reason it gets my vote.
But I think Deadeye is generally more consistent because GR lacks consistent stealth abuse. - Chibi


If you would like to vote on which hero we write about next, come over to our Discord server!

We would also love to hear your thoughts on the Leper’s paths, how it’s changed your playstyle, what trinkets you use, and any suggestions you may have. The best way of providing feedback is to join our Discord server where we have a dedicated feedback channel.

To join our Discord server follow the link below:

https://discord.gg/darkestdungeon

Thank you everyone for being a part of the community and taking a part of this ride through the crumbling chaos of the world.

 

[FriendlyMerchant]

So when does it come out?

 

[Generic-Giant-Spider]

Hopefully not for awhile if they don't fix that hyper gay relationship system.

Guarantee that shit was suggested by some bitch. I smell the bitch from here. Yes I do.

 

[InD_ImaginE]

The last I played the Russian version, the relationship is kinda a failure spiral kind of thing that's insanely annoying. To the point that 100% you want to always pick plague doctor to artificially boost your morale early and then avoid all and any combat

Most combat reward resources and trinket, but the upgrade you gain from trinket is not worth taking morale and relation damage. You get stronger on paper but when you lose half of your turns in combat due to bickering, the weaker but high morale party will essentially perform the same or plain better. So player ended up avoiding all combat just to beeline as much as possible to final objective. Resources can also be gained from non-combat node so no reason at all to take combat.

 

[Infinitron]

https://www.darkestdungeon.com/news/hero-paths-the-occultist/

Darkest Dungeon II - Hero Paths: The Occultist

The Occultist.
"Witness the infernal and blasphemous power of the void!"

Warlock or Ritualist?
The Warlock path takes advantage of the Occultist’s ability to wield occult energies, allowing him to keep his distance from enemies while dealing increased damage. However, he must be wary of any incoming ranged attacks, as his focus on conjurations tax his health.

Warlock Occultists lean into the glass cannon role, having significantly reduced HP and an excellent boost to their ranged – Abyssal Artillery, Daemon’s Pull, The Burning Stars – attacks. Their curses count as ranged attacks as well but 50% of nothing (or nearly nothing) is still nothing.

The 33% chance to gain Unchecked Power at the start of each turn presents an opportunity to make frequent, repeated use of The Burning Stars, particularly if you feed the Combo token it generates to Sacrificial Stab or Binding Shadows, though the latter may move you out of the safer back ranks. With a little luck, you can roll out The Burning Stars on every other turn. If you add Chaotic Offering to the mix, there’s a chance you can use it several turns in a row!

If you haven’t unlocked The Burning Stars, Abyssal Artillery still gains a reasonable back row damage boost on this path and it can use the Unchecked Power to become a double Stun.

Did You Know: The Burn DOT associated with Unchecked Power cannot be resisted, so letting unused Unchecked Power accrue can become a serious issue! Try to keep at least one skill equipped that can easily consume it before your already limited HP pool goes up in self-inflicted flames.

Raven’s Reach Trinkets are an obvious pick if you want to focus on maximizing damage but that low HP and chance of self-immolation means you might want to consider something like the Hint of Home or Befuddling Sundial to reduce the odds of your Occultist’s life reaching a sudden and fiery conclusion instead. The Buttressing Band will help him weather some attacks if you don’t have a Hero who can Guard him. Sparkleball is a solid pick if you’re focused on Abyssal Artillery, while Adrenalizing Ash can drive that first strike of the fight (turn 2 Burning Stars?) to even greater heights.

Spoiler

With The Ritualist path, the Occultist turns to incantations, simultaneously increasing curse damage and healing skills. The Ritualist Occultist's flexibility makes him a valuable addition to the team, but unfortunately this also makes him more vulnerable to oncoming attacks.

Whereas the Warlock Path focused on ranged attacks, the Ritualist Path is all about the strength of your blade at first glance. Sacrificial Stab gains a staggeringly large enhancement, making it all the easier to generate Unchecked Power off of kills, which conveniently feeds into Wyrd Reconstruction’s buffed healing.

If you’re the type that likes to run your Occultist as a primary debuffer, his curses – Weakening Curse and Vulnerability Hex – can provide useful Tokens. While Strength will only have value if you’re weaving in damage skills, CRIT Tokens will allow his debuffs to penetrate resistance and Dodge+ Tokens are excellent for keeping him out of trouble, particularly if he’s further forward in the ranks to make use of skills like Anamnesis.

Did You Know:Effects that further buff the damage of Sacrificial Stab, such as Strength Tokens, will provide their buffed damage based on the original base value of the skill. This means that a Strength Token on base Sacrificial Stab has 8-15 DMG (3-6 [base] + 3-6 [100% Path buff] + 2-3 [50% Strength Token]) rather than the 9-18 (6-12 + 3-6 [50% for Strength Token]) that you might have expected. This is currently applicable to all similar buffs.

Vulnerability and Block Tokens like to cancel each other out, so the negative side of the Ritualist Path can potentially be avoided through use of Trinkets like the Bouncer’s Belt. If your Occultist is a debuffer, Wolfsblood Trinkets will keep him in prime initiative order.

Gnarly Knuckles Trinkets are clear picks if you just want to land Sacrificial Stab damage but the Unchecked Power you produce can also fuel Anamnesis, which is an excellent skill to use in conjunction with any Trinket that applies additional effects – the Dead Ringer would get 4 chances to roll Stun!

Community Impression
The community agreed that the Warlock path spoke to them the most. On Twitter, Warlock had 55.8% votes and 44.2% for Ritualist. On Discord, Warlock was favored with 108 votes versus 49 votes for Ritualist.

Warlock is really fun, but I find him to be unreliable and quite the liability if there's no one to protect him. 33% HP is a LOT. Ritualist just fits my preferred playstyle of doing more healing and better debuffing. And if I have to panic sacrificial stab, double damage is nice. - @crowboyo

Both here I think are very unique and fun play styles. - @Friendlybot9000

I love both of the paths but I love Ritualist even more; the idea of his cursing skills granting tokens is super interesting and fun. The Sacrificial damage is wacky (in the good way) and presents him viability in rank 2, which I have been taking advantage of whenever possible, although I wish it also translated somehow to Binding Shadows as it is a somewhat underwhelming skill (or at least to me it is)
Warlock just kinda puts him in rank 4 and makes him the Anti-Backline. Not really a bad thing because it's so fun to hit so hard, though.
I think Ritualist could probably have some interaction with Chaotic Offering, but that's just extra. - Koffee

Occ has two fun, almost balanced paths. Ritualist is very strong and has an honestly very minimal downside. Having an attack that does leper damage that can hit rank 3 is extremely powerful and the healing skills are just the cherry on top. Warlock is... interesting, you could say, since -33% max hp on a character that requires him to damage himself to get the value from ranged damage buffs is pretty crippling, and I honestly have no idea how they looked at ravager and then back at warlock and said "yeah this is balanced." but I digress, +50% damage on burning stars - also very powerful, up generation is very good. If you get even one power passively generated on round 1-3 it allows you to stars twice in a row if you offering round 1. Overall, ritualist fun, warlock more interesting in a game flooded with op paths, since it has an actual downside. - Halltaker

I feel like, with +dmg on Melee attack and +healing, Ritualist is too close to Surgeon PD. - Exurciel

Ritualist offers a lot of flexibility in what you want an Occultist to do - Sac Stab's an effective and flexible damage option (and when upgraded can even enable Untapped Power abilities with one lethal stab on a marked target), his already useful debuffs can get you additional value in positive token generation, and even Wyrd can heal more if you performed the proper rites before you booted the game up today. - BeardBroken


Two heroes are left! If you would like to vote on which hero we write about next, come over to our Discord server!

We would also love to hear your thoughts on the Occultist’s paths, how it’s changed your playstyle, what trinkets you use, and any suggestions you may have. The best way of providing feedback is to join our Discord server where we have a dedicated feedback channel.

To join our Discord server follow the link below:

https://discord.gg/darkestdungeon

Thank you everyone for being a part of the community and taking a part of this ride through the crumbling chaos of the world.

 

[1451]

While I enjoy the updates I have to admit that I don't think they can finish the game by October.
They add act bosses at a much slower pace than I had anticipated.

 

[Serus]

Hopefully not for awhile if they don't fix that hyper gay relationship system.

Guarantee that shit was suggested by some bitch. I smell the bitch from here. Yes I do.

Spiders have a sense of smell?

 

[Infinitron]

https://www.darkestdungeon.com/news/darkest-dungeon-ii-the-shroud-of-the-deep/

Darkest Dungeon II: The Shroud of the Deep Update

“Propriety floats listless on the tide, brined in noxious degradation.”


We are excited to release the next update to Darkest Dungeon II!

"The Shroud of the Deep" will be available on the Experimental Branch Wednesday May 18th. It will be moved to the Live Branch after we have verified there are no critical issues. Patch notes below:



The Shroud
Your coach will find no easy purchase on the rotted, salt-soaked planks and jetties that connect the waterlogged homes of the Fisherfolk. Driven to a debased worship of the sea, the denizens of the coastal regions have taken to the water…and been changed by it.

The Shroud is a new full-sized region packed with a complete faction of amphibious horrors and a terrible threat from the lowest depths of the sea floor.

• 7 new monsters, from the gestating Cabin Boy to the imposing Docker
  
  
• A New Lair Boss lurks just beneath the tideline
  
  
• 2 New Lair Boss trophies
  
  
• 6 New region-specific trinkets
  
  
• All new combat score by the inimitable Stuart Chatwood
  
  
• New narration - the Academic (Wayne June) reflects on the decline of the coastal population

Spoiler

New Confession: Resentment
Redemption demands an acknowledgement of failures past. Sign your confession anew, and face the personification of your second sin.

This milestone introduces the next Confession/Act 2, with new story content and a new final boss.

Narrative presentation has also had an overhaul:

• Main story narration has been moved from the Valley to the Void
  
  
• Each Confession now has an intro, repeatable lines, and an outro that tells the game story at run start and upon successful final boss kill
  
  
• Art panels have been added to support the main narrative
  
  
• Reformatted the Denial narration to match the new presentation
  
  
• Added the Resentment narration and artwork
  

Ordained Monsters
Monsters now have a chance to spawn as “Ordained”, which means that they are blessed with extra power by the end boss for that Confession/Act. The blessing increases the monster’s damage, health, speed, and some other stats. These powers vary based upon which Confession you signed at the outset of your journey.

The chance of a monster being Ordained increases as you approach the Mountain.

• When in the first full region past the valley, 10% of monsters will spawn as Ordained
  
  
• When in the second full region past the valley, 40% of monsters will spawn as Ordained
  
  
• When in the third full region past the valley, 80% of monsters will spawn as Ordained
  
  
• Lair bosses and corpses will never be Ordained
  

Related: we’ve lowered base monster HP and damage by 20%. Thus, monsters should be a little easier than before when you are in the first region. By the third full region, they should be mostly harder than before.

The goal of this feature is to establish power scaling and threat escalation as you approach the Mountain, while also slightly lowering region 1 difficulty so it’s easier to get your expedition started.

Food Redesign
The function of food has been redesigned. Before, food was used primarily to heal HP at the Inn. Now, HP is always fully healed when arriving at the Inn. Food is instead used to buff Max HP and also buff other stats. Those buffs will last for the entire next region.

Each hero can only eat one meal (consume one food item) in each Inn. So choose your best food item to feed them. The exception being the Roast Pig. You can always add a Roast Pig feast on top of everything else.

Hero base HP has been lowered by 10% across the board, to adjust for food being used to buff HP. (The worst food item buffs 10%.)

Driving
A comprehensive look at Stagecoach experience/driving/route selection/preparation will be the focus of an upcoming milestone. Meanwhile:

• Crack the Whip! Stagecoach speed now increases once you are clear of intersections and nodes, reducing travel time between nodes!
  
  
• Visual improvements to many nodes
  
  
• Adjusted road object loot table (slightly bigger chance overall; more relic than anything else)
  
  
• Infernal Torch can no longer be swapped between open stagecoach slots. Once equipped in a slot it is locked until the run is over.
  

Resist Encounters

• Resist Encounters will give parties with less than 4 Heroes new options for buffed Engage and Avoid choices.
  
  
• Fixed several small errors related to effects and glyphs.
  

Assistance Encounters

• Assist Encounters are now split into 3 variants and have new loot tables as appropriate:
  
  • Standard: The party receives Flame primarily
    
    
  • Combat: The party receives combat-related supplies
    
    
  • Provisions: The party receives Inn items and other useful non-combat items
    
• [COMMUNITY] Robbery variant Assistance Encounters de-emphasize food in exchange for more supplies/items.
  
  
• Fixed several small errors related to effects and glyphs.
  

Academic Study Encounters

• [COMMUNITY]New Avoid options for stressed Heroes
  
  
• New Low Relic/Low Inventory Interact options for greedy Heroes
  
  
• [COMMUNITY]Fixed Shambler Altar issues
  
  
• Fixed several small errors related to effects and glyphs
  
  
• Fixed party torch misapplication as rewards for Caged Creature and Thing in Corner variants
  

UI

• [Community] Skill Upgrade ALT view now available on Character Sheet
  
  
• [Community] Disease indicator on driving portraits
  
  
• [Community] Affinity preview on encounter choices
  
  
• [Community] Show equipped skills on mastery
  
  
• [Community] Space bar to enter nodes
  
  
• [Community] Patch Notes viewable in options menu
  
  
• [Community] Combat Skills tab now default on Character Sheet
  
  
• [Community] Added Random Party button to the Crossroads.
  
  
• [Community] Hero Story recap tab at Cross roads
  
  
• [Community] Slide out panels (map, character sheet, inventory, etc) can now be closed by right-click and ESC
  
  
• [Community] Show discounted prices in stores
  
  
• [Community] Double click to auto drive Stagecoach
  
  
• [Community] New Cinematic section on main page
  
  
• [Community] Autosave indicator
  
  
• [Community] Feedback on quirk removal when using a rest item or an inn effect.
  
  
• Updated all instances of RED being used as enemy target indicators to now be BLUE, to match the game’s general color scheme
  
  
• Inn tooltips now anchor more consistently to the placard
  
  
• Enter Node text sheen is now less boxy
  
  
• When a character's name is changed in combat, the portrait tooltip should update correctly
  
  
• Fixed the ability to open UI elements before the game was finished loading
  
  
• Extended health bar on driving rosters to match stress bar width
  
  
• Max health modifiers from Inn items and quirks are no longer incorrectly combining under the Conditions tab in the Character Sheet
  
  
• Corrected The Good Doctor tooltip to correctly state it heals a disease and not a quirk
  
  
• Fix for Restorative Herbs tooltip incorrectly listing its two effects. It should now correctly list +10% healing from traveling & the +20% healing from skills.
  
  
• Raised the Inn select receipt banner to not block hero bark bubbles
  
  
• Users can no longer open the Stagecoach screen when making a choice at an encounter
  
  
• Minimap scout ping correctly waits for the encounter screen to close first before animating
  
  
• Stealth token icon color is no longer gold and now better matches its effect text color of purple
  
  
• Newly added items now get added to the bottom of your Inventory
  
  
• "Discard items for Hope" message is now more visible on the screen
  

Heroes

• Hero base HP reduced by 10% to account for new Food Design
  
  
• Fixed an issue where the effects of Quirks like Thanatophobia were applied when a Hero corpse “dies”
  
  
• Fixed an issue where Heroes could receive stress damage when a Hero corpse was CRIT
  

Hellion

• Fixed an issue where Bloodlust could be blocked by Denial of Reason
  

Monsters

• Reduced the base health, damage, and speed of most monsters to account for Ordainment (see earlier)
  
  
• Several types of Quirk/Trinket effects are no longer applicable when striking/killing an enemy corpse
  
  
• Champions now have a low chance of spawning in Guardian fights
  
  
• Champions now have a low chance of spawning in Lair fights
  
  
• Adjusted the pool of Diseases available to several monster skills
  

Creature Den

• Webber and Spitter Bite attacks can now inflict the Tarantism Disease
  
  
• Spitter Spit attacks can now inflict the Tarantism Disease
  
  
• Fixed erroneous glyphs related to food costs
  
  
• Fixed incorrect effects on certain choices
  

Cultists

• Fixed an issue where the Cultist Deacon did not receive the Cultist Cardinal’s passive RES Buff
  
  
• Removed the ability to retreat from Cultist Node Choices, except with the appropriate quirks
  

Dreaming General

• Dreaming General now spawns with a permanent Immobilize Token
  
  
• Tap Root now spawns with a permanent Immobilize Token
  
  
• Rewards now drop proper region trinkets
  

Librarian

• The fidelity of Librarian’s books better matches the characters
  

Harvest Child

• Rewards now drop proper region currency and trinkets
  

Shambler

• [Community] Improved rewards and are now guaranteed
  

Combat

• Combo Tokens now last for an additional round; this change affects Heroes and monsters alike
  
  
• The permanent version of the Immobilize Token has an updated color and description to differentiate it from the standard version
  
  
• Fixed an issue where Start Round skills (e.g. Denial of Reason) were subject to Daze/Stun
  
  
• Fixed an issue where Start Round skills were unintentionally triggering Extra Action effects
  
  
• Character movement in general has had a polish pass and should now be cleaner and snappier
  
  
• Combat Consumables now fire all vfx, tokens and numbers simultaneously, making them more responsive to use
  
  
• Guard tokens are removed when a guarding actor is captured.
  
  
• Added Combo Token to poptext when it's consumed
  
  
• Changed CRIT poptext to now read Critical!
  
  
• Heroes now only say their Move barks when affected by non friendly skills.
  
  
• Shuffles shuffle better now. Algorithm gremlins were exorcised
  
  
• Fix for Dreaming General hit reaction delay
  
  
• Fix for exploit with Riposte that would reveal kills via token highlights
  

Quirks

• Sunny Disposition and Curmudgeon quirks now affect affinity ticks for the party (pos and neg respectively)
  
  
• New Heavy Handed quirk: 5% chance of moving an opponent via melee attack
  
  
• Punch Drunk's Stun can no longer trigger off of DOT damage
  
  
• Cowardice quirk update: Take 1 stress damage when hit (5%), Move to back when in the front rank (15%)
  
  
• Pyromaniac and Field Surgeon now have token-driven bonus item skills for Fire Bomb and Healing Salve
  
  
• Various Fisherfolk and Shroud-related quirks added to reflect the existing other Biome/Faction quirks
  
  
• The Runs is now a disease, not a quirk
  
  
• Added Disarmer quirk, 10% chance of giving a weakness token to the enemy that hit the Hero
  
  
• Tarantism Disease added (chance for forced Move), exclusive to Spiders
  
  
• Algal Bloom Disease added (chance of proc’ing Barnacle or small damage per turn), exclusive to Leviathan boss
  
  
• Slugger quirk now has a chance to add Stun, which replaces the damage bonus
  
  
• Removed Strength token possibility from Vicious quirk
  
  
• Various quirk corrections and adjustments for balance and bugs
  
  
• [Community] Fixed an issue with The Jinx consuming CRIT tokens when the Hero was hit
  

Items

• [Community] Sneaker's Standard: Trigger change from Turn Start to Round Start and Stealth chance increased from 10% to 33%
  
  
• [Community] Covert Cloak: Trigger change from Turn Start to Round Start
  
  
• Faceless Visage: Taunt chance increased from 20% to 33%
  
  
• Annotated Textbook and Early Experiment names properly assigned
  
  
• New Stagecoach Upgrade Almanac: The Shroud
  

Misc Gameplay

• Added “Heat Wave” region modifier. (Reduced Burn resistance)
  
  
• HALE battle modifier bonuses reduced from 25% to 10%
  
  
• FRENZIED battle modifier bonus damage reduced from 25% to 20%
  
  
• Adjusted food-related Stagecoach upgrades due to new food design
  
  
• Tea Service now properly reduces negative banter instead of increases it
  
  
• Battle configurations were adjusted to use multiple conditions where relevant (e.g. shambler has increased chance of spawning when torch is low AND region is closer to the mountain). Also adjusted all region # conditions for full-length region # instead of raw region #. This ensures that taking the SLUICE doesn’t mess up power scaling.
  
  
• Added new region goals for “Visit Oasis” and “Visit Creature Den”. Adjusted chances of other region goals.
  
  
• Retune of Triage Kit and Healing Salve: stacking limits reduced; prices increased. Increased heal value of Triage Kit
  
  
• Added many new hero Barks (Food consumption, leaving Shrines of Reflection, and many more!)
  
  
• Tuned down all relationship act out frequency some
  
  
• Revised the “Block partner from moving” relationship Act Out to only block moves where the partner themself is moving (now won't block situations where the partner tries to move someone else)
  
  
• Note: we will be revising Relationships significantly in a future update
  

Bug Fixes

• Fixed an issue with the Stagecoach not loading properly after changing the livery
  
  
• Fixed an error caused by toggling the Inn Provision screen too quickly
  
  
• Fixed missing gender for localization of hero death to quirk strings
  
  
• Fixed an issue with combat sorting
  
  
• Fix for resolution dropdown sometimes not updating properly after monitor switch
  
  
• Fix for meltdowns not logging in the players run log when occurring outside of combat
  
  
• Fix for being able to drive the coach while over-encumbered if you quit to the main menu and reloaded
  
  
• Fixed a softlock caused by the same hero having multiple meltdowns
  
  
• Fix for healing poptext at the Inn to be consistent with other poptext locations
  
  
• Fixed an issue when encounter choice lock-in continues through other screens
  
  
• Fixed a display issue with various quirks and effects applying before the poptext appears
  
  
• Fix to biome modifiers being rolled without biome goals
  
  
• Fix for barks overlapping with combat and affinity zoom ins
  
  
• Fixed an issue where the character sheet would become inactive if toggled too quickly
  
  
• Fixed an issue where the relationships tab on the character sheet would break when only one hero remained in the party.
  
  
• Fix to CRIT strikethrough to show CRIT value when striking through
  
  
• Various UI fixes for non-english localization
  
  
• Inn store inventory saves
  

Note: The narrative sequence redesign was extra work added to this milestone, just as Hero Paths were packed into M1 despite not being on the roadmap. We are always looking for ways of adding value and richness to the game. Consequently, however, “Permanent Hero Upgrades” have been moved to a subsequent milestone and will be part of our massive progression system overhaul. More info to come!

 

[Ibn Sina]

Game is set up for failure no matter what they do. Hopefully this game tanks the company.

 

[Generic-Giant-Spider]

https://www.reddit.com/r/darkestdun...ning_how_to_beat_darkest_dungeon_helped_cure/

The real terror and madness is DD's fucking loony toons fanbase ackackackackack

 

[Alienman]

Those things have to be astroturfed. Every game sub have them. Skyrim cured my aids, Counter Strike reduced my brain tumor, etc etc.

 

[1451]

I played the update.
Some cool ui improvements which make life easier.
But being forced to clear lairs is something I do not understand.
They made this piece of content and nobody wants to complete it, so they make it obligatory to progress instead of actually improving it.
Some bad luck during the second wave of a lair encounter and your run is over.
Maybe this is for the best of course, if your party is not good enough to clear a lair, the boss will kill you for sure.
Still it took them seven months to add a boss, at this point the game will be in early access for three years.

 

[Sarathiour]

https://www.reddit.com/r/darkestdun...ning_how_to_beat_darkest_dungeon_helped_cure/

The real terror and madness is DD's fucking loony toons fanbase ackackackackack

400 hours to clear the game.

Sound like a skill issue.

 

[Reever]

Counter Strike reduced my brain tumor

more like increased.

 

[1451]

I can't pick the second boss, anyone else has the same issue?
The game has some weird rng. Enemy resistance to death may be 50 and they can stay at death's door for four consecutive hits.
My resistance to stun can be 60 and I am constantly stunned.
It's either rigged or extremely bugged.

 

[Sarathiour]

On such small number, it's entirely within the realm of rng, and we're always biased toward those things.

Better question would be what kind of retard thought that putting death's door on enemy was a good idea, but I think we're already been over this.

Not touching this before it release, and then probably going to sail the high sea and finish it out of spite to write something assassine.

 

[Ibn Sina]

https://www.reddit.com/r/darkestdun...ning_how_to_beat_darkest_dungeon_helped_cure/

The real terror and madness is DD's fucking loony toons fanbase ackackackackack

Gamers are truly subhuman.

 

[Grunker]

https://www.reddit.com/r/darkestdun...ning_how_to_beat_darkest_dungeon_helped_cure/

The real terror and madness is DD's fucking loony toons fanbase ackackackackack

i mean i'm with you spideyman but perhaps being on the codex one should be mindful of accusing other userbases of mental afflictions

 

[Generic-Giant-Spider]

https://www.reddit.com/r/darkestdun...ning_how_to_beat_darkest_dungeon_helped_cure/

The real terror and madness is DD's fucking loony toons fanbase ackackackackack

i mean i'm with you spideyman but perhaps being on the codex one should be mindful of accusing other userbases of mental afflictions

What do you mean are you saying we all have somesotrtpofofujfmentalafflictionHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA

Edit: sorry bathsalts kicked in

 

[ERYFKRAD]

l have somesotrtpofofujfmentalafflictionHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA

Didn't your mamma teach you not to rest more than 2 feet on your keyboard.

 

[Infinitron]

https://www.darkestdungeon.com/news/darkest-dungeon-ii-community-update/

Darkest Dungeon II: Community Update

Greetings!
We hope you are all enjoying the barnacle bleeds, ordained enemies, and rolling fog!

Our most recent update, “The Shroud of the Deep”, contained a massive amount of new content, mechanics, and quality-of-life improvements. The Red Hook team had a lot of fun creating it.

With the Shroud now live, the team is catching the last bugs and introducing a few final improvements. We’re also looking ahead to subsequent updates, and wanted to communicate some adjustments to our production plan.

We have heard from you that more frequent updates are preferable, and we agree! Going forward you can expect more frequent, smaller-scoped milestone releases. Consequently, our previous roadmap is no longer reflective of our production plan.

We have been following the discussions on Reddit and Discord keenly, and auditing the game ourselves. In our assessment there are three main areas of the game that require work and dedicated focus.

We are assigning additional time and talent to three areas we believe are essential to creating a great game.

Progression:
The current xp/unlock system is quite minimal and lacks enough meaningful choices. We have heard the community’s desire for something more evocative of Hamlet-style upgrades and decisions, and this dovetails with our own internal vision.

We’re currently working on a complete overhaul of the progression system and look forward to sharing that with you. The new system provides a much stronger and compelling link between expeditions, and is focused around an interesting hub through which you will increase your capabilities and unlock new items.

Relationships:
Relationships are currently not as engaging as afflictions in DD1. Knowing a relationship is headed in a positive or negative direction robs the reveal of its impact, and the amount of passive banter and frequent interruptions stemming from relationships can clog up the combat experience.

Our goals with the next pass on the relationship system are to:

• Bring back some tension and surprise
  
  
• Add more meaningful choice into the system
  
  
• Make the benefits (and drawbacks) of relationships more active and tactical (less of a spectator sport)
  
  
• Remove some of the combat clutter and interruptions
  

We believe that the central thesis of relationships evolving and impacting a party’s capacity to survive the journey remains highly compelling. We are excited to revise the system to make the experience more active and engaging.

Spoiler

Driving:
Darkest Dungeon II is not a reflex-oriented driving game.

The stagecoach sequences mirror the walking in DD1, but we recognize that the tension of stumbling on a trap, or the possibility of a blockage, ambush, etc, is missing from the current roadways. While we will not seek to directly emulate the DD1 experience, there is definitely room for growth here.

We are looking to add new decision-making layers to the driving sequences, which in turn open up new avenues to enhance the preparatory aspects of journeying.

Content:
Our overall content scope remains largely unchanged. But as we noted on the previous roadmap, “we will pivot as needed for the health of the game”.

In order to properly support the initiatives above and create the richest possible experience, we are re-prioritizing our content teams away from creating a new region/faction. The number of people and working hours going into Darkest Dungeon II remains identical, but we are focusing on producing content that has the maximum possible run-to-run impact on the quality of the game.

Environment Art:
Instead of creating a new region’s worth of world content, we are focusing the environment team on enriching our current set of regions with new horrific sights and route variation. Adding to existing regions will make repeated runs more interesting, more often.

Character Scope:
Monsters shared across multiple regions bring more value to run diversity, and as such, we have opted to refocus the character team away from another region-specific faction and towards new minibosses that can appear any/everywhere. You can look forward to a massive, 3-slot Cultist Exemplar, the return of the Collector, and a third, secret threat.

Larger mini-bosses take longer to create, and, in the case of the Collector, require additional supporting characters. The totality of this effort matches a faction of 6-7 normal units, and will add more value to the game proper. TLDR; The number of playable characters, final bosses, and overall character scope/production effort remains unchanged.

What’s Next?
Our next milestone will be a Trinket overhaul. Trinkets are vital to so many parts of the game, and we recently dedicated extra resources towards improving them based upon the excellent feedback we’ve received from the community and also based upon our own learnings from observing the game over these last months.

After trinkets, we will be reinforcing the Cultist faction with new units and a new home! The Altar, Herald, and Exemplar mini-boss will grow the Cultist faction to its full size, and we’ll give the Guardian location a facelift to match.

Following that, our progression overhaul will be rolled out - this is a big one, and the team is really excited about it!

Also, as the series of Hero Path blog posts wraps up, we will be providing regular updates with commentary and behind-the-scenes development insights!

Please note: anything not explicitly mentioned here can be assumed to be in production - heroes, final bosses, story content, playable skins, paths, pets, balance/tuning etc.

1.0 Launch: Feb, 2023
This revised roadmap favours more frequent updates, and is in service of reaching a complete 1.0 in February 2023 on EGS and Steam. Console releases will follow.

Coming Next:

• Trinket Improvements & 3rd Hero Path
  

Coming Next Next:

• Cultist Reinforcements
  
  
• New Progression System + New Hero 1
  
  
• Act 3 Confession/Boss
  

Coming After That:

• Act 4 Confession/Boss
  
  
• Relationship Rework
  
  
• New Hero 2
  
  
• The Collector miniboss
  
  
• Driving Improvements
  
  
• New Hero 3
  
  
• Secret Miniboss
  
  
• Pets
  
  
• Hero Origin Skins playable
  
  
• Act 5 Confession/Boss
  
  
• …and more!(™)
  

 

[Generic-Giant-Spider]

Instead of creating a new region’s worth of world content, we are focusing the environment team on enriching our current set of regions with new horrific sights and route variation. Adding to existing regions will make repeated runs more interesting, more often.

Who actually wants this lmao

 

[1451]

Abandoning the roadmap means that they won't release the game after a year, cool.

Finally reached the second boss.
It's ridiculously overtuned and I don't think that it's worth it to beat it when it's almost certain that it will be nerfed.

 

[Infinitron]

https://www.darkestdungeon.com/news/darkest-dungeon-ii-the-hellion/

Darkest Dungeon II - Hero Paths: The Hellion
The Hellion.
"The spilling of blood - an offering to the Gods!"

Berserker or Ravager?
The Berserker path causes the Hellion to lose all control and sense of self, putting her in a frenzied state with heightened bleed chance, bleed resistance, and bleed crit. However, in her hysteria Hellion is put at risk with a diminished HP.

Berserker Hellions ride the razor’s edge, sporting less health than normal but a greater resistance to death itself. Her Bleed skills – If It Bleeds and Bleed Out – have enhanced CRIT rates and, similar to other DOT-driven paths, bypass a significant amount of resistance.

There are a couple of ways you can run a Berserker Hellion. The obvious first option is to lean into her Bleed options, which allows her to reach targets in ranks 1, 2, or 3 depending on her own placement. Using Bleed Out will quickly penalize her own damage and speed but the Bleed itself is unaffected; pile it onto whomever is unfortunate enough to be up front!

While Bloodlust looks like a natural support skill for this Path at first glance, its value will be much reduced if you’re relying on Bleed Out as your skill of choice since those Winded tokens will quickly override any benefits.

Alternatively, you could lean into the reduced maximum HP as this will also make it easier for her to reach the HP thresholds that trigger her innate damage buffs, amplifying the power of skills like Wicked Hack, Iron Swan, or Howling End. The 20% bonus Deathblow Resistance will easily take her to cap with sufficient leeway to counter mild penalties from other sources, such as quirks or disease.

If you’re going that route, damage buffing trinkets from the Gnarly Knuckles line will maximize the output. Avoid trinkets that regenerate health – unintentionally bumping yourself out of the innate damage buffs – and consider defensive trinkets like the Bouncer’s Belt or Buttressing Band instead.

If you expect to sport Winded tokens on the regular, trinkets that can apply additional debuffing effects such as the Sparkleball or Clarifying Carcanet pair well with Barbaric Yawp or Breakthrough and offer a secondary support role when bleeding the enemy dry is a less viable option.

Naturally, we can’t forget to mention the Beck and Call trophy’s doubling effect on Bleed DOTs!

Spoiler

With The Ravager path Hellion has increased firmness of mind and will in the face of danger giving her greater HP and increased Damage when placed in rank 1. Unfortunately with this bolstered mettle she starts the turn bleeding and her bleed skills become nearly useless with decreased bleed chance.

While the Ravager’s Bleed skills are all but useless, her capacity for front line violence is unrivaled. The rank 1 damage bonus makes Iron Swan an excellent way to dispatch troublesome rank 4 monsters, Wicked Hack gets a whopping +100% damage bonus if the target has Combo, and Howling End deals significant enough damage that the first Winded token will barely affect it.

Did You Know: The damage debuff from Winded is additive, so a Ravager in rank 1 will still be able to deal half damage (or full with a Strength token) when completely Winded. It’s not optimal but it does mean that her damage can remain viable for longer than you’d expect.

The Ravager’s increased health pool makes it a bit more difficult to trigger her innate damage buffs but she can be a valuable Taunt tank, though you need to be careful when her HP is low since she may spring an unexpected leak at the start of any given turn.

Did You Know: The Bleed effect that a Ravager sustains cannot be resisted, so Bleed Resist trinkets won’t have much value. However, pairing your Ravager with a Runaway can turn the self-inflicted Bleed into a source of healing.

If you have any other Hero in your party who can inflict Bleed, such as the Plague Doctor or Highwayman, the Bloodlust skill can net you some solid additional punch on top of everything else.

Since you want your Ravager to remain in rank 1, the General’s Dream trophy is one of your greatest assets. In the absence of that, Clenching Claws can help her keep her place if you aren’t immobilizing yourself already with Toe to Toe.

Wounding Words will further fuel your considerable damage, while the Smoldering Hymnal can grant extra actions per kill – and your Ravager will be killing things.

On the other hand, there’s always True Entropy if you like to be surprised!

Community Impression

When put to a vote,Twitter and Discord were divided between Berserker and Ravager. On Twitter, Berserker took the lead with 61.6% votes and 38.4% for Ravager. On Discord, Ravager was preferred with 184 votes and only 26 votes for Berserker.

Ravager by far is the stronger path, as Howling End can 1 shot most enemies with the 50% damage buff in rank 1. Having a higher bleed chance is nice, but being restricted to only using one of her bleed moves because of positioning makes Berserker feel lackluster. - @RustyTusks

Hellion's strongest aspect is the turn 1 Howling End nuke a foe and as such Ravager is the much superior option imo. Iron Swan also becomes quite a potent skill as well. - @Swiftsea96

DOT builds in general can be hard to justify, and with the insane damage and health buff that ravager provides, it's no contest that it's the best choice. The bleed skills are also weird positionally, so I like not having to think too much about where she is in the lineup. - @crowboyo

Ravager is just far stronger.
Bleed out is nice with the added Bleed Chance from Berserker.
But the +50% damage in Rank 1 from Ravager is far stronger. Howling End -> Toe to Toe -> Howling End until everything is dead. - @TKillidia

Berserker, despite the key issues with her two Bleed skills (and for the most part, the different playstyles that do not synergize together), is honestly fun for me. Beyond more frequent Bleed Crits, applying Bleed so frequently and reliably is incredibly destructive, especially with the new HP changes where a crit Bleedout will drain most enemies of a major portion their health. The reduced HP is... interesting, but the DBR increase is a bandaid that makes it bearable. - Koffee

Ravager is far superior to berserker. Hellion already wants to be in rank 1 because of her trinket, and this just gives her even more damage. Bleed out is a good skill, but bleed out can't be used with if it bleeds, and neither compare to the damage potential of howling end.. - ShuffleFM

Oh yeah Ravager is looking good. Could get easy heals from Cauterize. - Otzdarva



Only one hero next! Next week we will talk about Man-at-Arms. If you would like to be more involved with discussions on hero paths come over to our Discord server! We would love to hear your thoughts on the Hellion’s paths, how it’s changed your playstyle, what trinkets you use, and any suggestions you may have.

To join our Discord server follow the link below:

https://discord.gg/darkestdungeon

Thank you everyone for being a part of the community and taking a part of this ride through the crumbling chaos of the world.

 

[LESS T_T]

Steam page: