Darkest Dungeon

[Firuthi Dragovic]

STATUS UPDATE: DAY 38
Weeks 166-170

You know, when I set out for these tasks, I must remember to pack enough resources.

I got into the Courtyard, but only had the one invitation to work with. So I made significant progress the first round (enough that I don't need more than 4 ventures into the place), but couldn't do any more rounds yet.

So this time, my focus has been on bosses. Both the Formless Flesh and the Gibbering Prophet are down. Both fights involved the same two heroes - Raoulin and Moyaux, my Houndmasters - but for completely different reasons. For the Flesh, it was a mix of full-team targeting and being able to focus on the unarmored parts when they showed up. For the Prophet? Mark him, target him from a distance. Mussegros and Linesi were in on that second battle too.

At this stage, I'm making about 20k in interest per week alone. So I don't think I need to grab any more money items, unless I can find trapezohedrons (like the ones in the Shrieker's nest - and thanks to the Geological Studyhall, they stack!) or tapestries. No, I can load up on provisions and go to town on these places, grabbing heirlooms and maybe interesting trinkets on the way. When the Countess is down, I may be spending some more weeks in the Courtyard area grabbing trinkets.

It's a bit important I get the Countess down immediately so I can resume going to the Farmstead. The two invitations I got on a run during this round may actually be enough, if I stretch each trip sufficiently. But taking her on is going to be a challenge for certain.

 

[Firuthi Dragovic]

STATUS UPDATE: DAY 39 PART 1
Facing One's Future Failures

A much stronger and much longer vision of the future happened this time. And... there's hope for me yet.

It started as these visions do, back at the altar. With the help of my candles, I now know the identities of all of my possible allies on this long and twisting road. Bounty Hunters, Hellions, Occultists... and a newcomer, the Runaway. That one introduced herself as Moyaux... I get the feeling she will share the same name with any Houndmaster or friendly Antiquarian I've encountered (so not ^$@@ING Fonnereau!). To avoid confusion, I'll refer to her as Moyaux II in this entry.

The Duelist? Has introduced herself as Marci, sharing names with the last Shieldbreaker I knew. The Hellion is the long-fallen Vernon, and the Occultist is Courcy.

Vernon fights as I expected. So does the Occultist, although he started off missing one of his support hexes. The Runaway Moyaux II? All about fire. That includes smoke, and that was honestly her most useful trick.

Anyways, this expedition started in the Tangle. Here I ran into a whopping three shrines. In order:

• Vernon recalled how she got into a warband in her younger years... and a major night of revelry. She recalled learning an aggressive way to bleed out opponents too close to bring the full weight of a polearm to bear.
• Moyaux II recalled running away from the orphanage where she was raised... after one too many incidents where she was branded with a hot iron. Remembering all that sneaking reminded her of ways to strike at any distance.
• Courcy recalled the cult he ran, and how they helped him out with astral projection. He wound up recalling the hex that he was missing, and it has proven exceptionally valuable.

This time, on my path through the Tangle, I FINALLY ran into a Hoarder. I swapped the treasure map with him for an old but well-forged sword... checking in at the inn, I found out it was indeed Reynauld's old sword. Finally, I had enough of the pieces together to pinpoint his location... on the other side of the Sprawl, in a cage.

I had business to take care of first, though. There was a call to enter the Great Library again, and confront the Librarian. This team was... better, for handling that place. Still not powerful enough to stop the Librarian before he burns all of the books. However, it was enough to bring down the Librarian without anyone dying! That's the first time in any of my visions that I've been able to foresee cleaning out a Lair. I believe I will be required to do that every time from now on... hopefully I can pick someone else for the next time I do that.

My focus from here was making it to the cage, but I did have time to find a fourth shrine. I heard out Marci's story. She... she apparently used to be at an academy, but went above and beyond with her approach to discipline. A bit of a perfectionist. She showed off a strong kick she had been practicing in those days, good enough to send someone to the back of the lunch line. Wonder if it'll work for the battle line too.

So how'd the whole cage incident go? Well, I encountered a massive Warlord who ripped through my front line. Courcy's healing and some salves kept people up, but Vernon didn't make it to the end. Eventually, the Warlord went down to one of Marci's ripostes. With the long search ended, I could have just dumped the freshly-rescued Reynauld off at the next inn and continued on to the mountain. But... he actually insisted on taking Vernon's place on the battle line, despite not having trained for a while.

You would not believe what I saw up on that mountain. A huge brain, shackled to four locks! As the team and I approached, the locks sprang to life and started attacking!

The locks denied some of the team's efforts. Mainly, there was little chance to attack at a distance, and only one opportunity for Reynauld to do stress recovery throughout the whole fight. Moyaux II might not have lasted to the end, but didn't go down right away... and Courcy earned his keep. Between hexing the locks to make Marci and Reynauld strike harder, and his ability to do healing infinitely (even if very random and with a risk of bleeding), I somehow scraped through the entire encounter when I believed I had no chance at all!

I still do not know what crime happened in this vision, for me to face such a big denial. But the brain has been unshackled.

And I know to no longer deride Occultists for being useless.

First confession completed.

When I have another of these visions, what will be my plan with the 98 candles I got? Simple. The Stagecoach comes first. I want that thing as strong as possible and able to carry lots of stuff.

 

[Firuthi Dragovic]

STATUS UPDATE: DAY 39 PART 2
Weeks 171-175

So at this point, I've made a fair bit more progress in the Courtyard, and dealt with all of the remaining bosses in the main regions. I had enough to spare for a couple of attempts at the Farmstead.

Sadly, neither team I sent was good enough for a guaranteed Memory. Even the Reynauld/Dismas team doesn't quite have enough Blight damage to carry through the Sleeper battle. I realistically need two strong Blight dealers for that battle. Maybe the team should be Highwayman/Shieldbreaker/Jester/Vestal? Vestal is practically mandatory with the kind of damage being shot out.

However, that does not mean this was fruitless. I actually saved another Abomination in the Courtyard - Meverel - and built both the Miasmal Orchard and the Altar of Light. Just a couple more buildings to go before all the districts are set.... though naturally one of them is the one that's 750 crests...

....oh yeah, a couple oddities this week. Another Shrieker battle that secured me 5 trapezohedrons... and something funny that happened when going after the Drowned Crew: when trying to rest, I got an ambush... that included a Gatekeeper. Seems the Countess is eager to meet me at last. I should not keep the lady waiting too long...

I will definitely do the Farmstead a couple times on Week 176 due to it being a bonus week, but I get the feeling that whatever awaits me in the Courtyard after the Countess might need some attention. I really want those trinket sets, given just how valuable the Highwayman's has been for me....

 

[Firuthi Dragovic]

Day 40 of the logs is going to be delayed for two reasons:

1. Runs of the Farmstead do not advance the week counter and take more time than a Long dungeon run to reach a shot at Memories.
2. The Farmstead is simply not worth the effort.
   1. Out of all my runs after the successful one, only two of them even made it past the Miller due to random crit bullshit.
   2. The Farmstead is a slog otherwise, plain and simple. Only very specific teams get anywhere at all and I can't keep running the same thing hoping for RNG.
   3. Due to the above, I am better off grinding the Thing from the Stars to get the Memories needed for the Mill. I get a 1 in 5 chance of him dropping a Memory each time I fight him, and I make enough money that I can bring all provisions into each dungeon... so I can simply meet him head-on repeatedly.
3. Day 40 is going until I beat the Countess. That may be just five weeks, that may be ten.

I'm also... running out of non-repeatable things to do. I don't plan on getting every single Crimson Court trinket, just every District. Beyond that, the only static boss I've got before the Dungeon itself is the Countess. I can repeat dungeons trying to get good quirks locked in for my teams but that's about it.

After Day 40's log, I am simply going to track weeks arbitrarily rather than log every five. I don't have infinite space in the notebook and I want to save half of it for Darkest Dungeon 2.

 

[Firuthi Dragovic]

STATUS UPDATE: DAY 40 PART 1
Weeks 176-180

So, I halted the Farmstead until I could deal with the Countess. And I'm probably going to stay on hold with it for the foreseeable future - or at least, until every hero on my roster hits resolve level 6 and The Red Hook is built.

But I learned something valuable from my attempts at the Farmstead that I used later on. Namely, that the Crusader can actually serve as a decent stress healer if you give him the Ancestor's Scroll trinket. I think one of his Court trinkets has the same boost, but I don't have that yet... but it does make me wonder about the combined result.

Either way, I chose to finish business with the Countess. I actually had a bit of a false start, trying to use the same team as before. See, the Countess does three things: injects eggs, brutal tongue-lashings, and blood draining. And gets the vapors every once in a while.

So I brought a power team. Amiens, Gueron, Harcourt, and the tried-and-true Mussegros. Mussegros actually had the option of a frontline skill this time, but he never got to use it. Most of the work was done by the bleeds from Amiens and Harcourt, with Gueron on healing duty for the whole fight. See, those eggs will burst if the affected person attacks. But only if they attack. So Amiens took the brunt of those, using Exsanguinate to get right back into fighting form each time. In very short order, the Countess was down, and the Crimson Curse is hardly an issue anymore.

And in short order I had enough portraits to build the House of the Yellow Hand, thus completing all the buff-based Districts.

So where does that leave me?

If I don't get The Red Hook and the Mill built by Sunday, I'll log my progress on that day. I will be taking on the Garden Guardian a few times for trinkets if I'm in a good mood, but most of my time will be spent on The Thing from the Stars.

When the two remaining districts are built, it'll be time to tackle the Darkest Dungeon itself.

I have one more future vision to address, and I will be getting to that today.

 

[Firuthi Dragovic]

STATUS UPDATE: DAY 40 PART 2
It Becomes Clearer Now

So with the news of the Countess going down, I had another vision of the future.

I found out a bit more about that thing I was denying. A half-circle with five points, found in a blood-soaked cypher. The Iron Crown. Of course! The symbol anyone afflicted saw in the Hamlet! But... even with a symbol this ancient, how did it become so prominent in the Hamlet in the first place....?

I now realize... my visions up to this point? They happened right after I solved the riddle of the Hamlet. I go on this journey the minute I uncover what is beneath that secluded place... but there are still some gaps to fill. I do know... despite the glory of the Hamlet as it is now, that place is liable to collapse without my involvement, no matter what caretaker I hire.

Such is life, I guess...

But let's get to the vision. As I said I'd do, I immediately spent all those candles and upgraded the Stagecoach into as much of a luxury ride as I can get. Better armor, better wheels, a lot more capacity to put things in and on it. And a few candles to teach myself how to better survey what comes ahead...

Apparently now, the theme is "Resentment". From not being able to discuss what was in that cypher with the academy. Also, it seems I really do have to take on at least one region leader on the journey, every single time.

The team this time? Flagellant Amiens, Crusader Gueron, Highwayman Harcourt, and Vestal Lanquetot. Now the road gets a LOT tougher. First off, not nearly as much Mastery right off the bat. Second, two new regions came up: The Shroud, and the Foetor. The Shroud is the one I hit first - it's kind of a coastal deal, much like the Cove but with a different kind of aquatic folk pestering me.

While here, I hit up the Shrine and asked Lanquetot about her story. She was apparently at a very disciplined and sheltered abbey, tending a sacred flame. But she was having some... hidden desires that she uneasily tried to suppress. She taught us some of the prayers from the abbey... one of them is so powerful she can actually clear smaller blights, bleeding, and even burns with but a word! Amazing.

Before I discuss the other region, the Foetor, I should note something about the cultists. In the last confession, their altar granted stealth. Now? Critical tokens. They're much more dangerous already.

So... the Foetor. I didn't complete it this time, but it's some kind of farmland with gluttonous residents. It's like what would happen if Nurgle's minions were just bloated and not full plague-spreaders. I easily bit off more than I could chew here, and due to my earlier failures to confront the Loathing, only Gueron made it to the next Shrine.

He recalled being a farmer, forced to do a harvest early because of a sudden frost. He... only got enough for his wife and child. I told him to keep up that reaping technique, as it'd be handy on the battlefield.

And that's about all that could be done. Alone, Gueron stood no chance against cultists... so here I am, back at the start, with a little less than two dozen candles to my name.

Next time, I need to start boosting my heroes directly. I gave the Stagecoach a ton of love already.

 

[Firuthi Dragovic]

STATUS UPDATE: DAY 41
Weeks 181-Unknown

I'm actually going to give the progress report now. I've managed to settle into a rotation of sorts, with two different main teams and the occasional expeditionary team.

First, my team for the Garden Guardian. Fairfax the Leper, Port the Grave Robber, Clinchamps the Jester, Guyot the Vestal. Garden Guardian is exceptionally easy... as long as the shield and spear remain unbroken. It does take a while, though. Worthwhile cost, to secure some more Court trinkets.

The larger news is the Farmstead. I actually have a consistent group for this place! Mussegros the Man-at-Arms, Marci the Shieldbreaker, Harcourt the Highwayman, Gueron the Crusader. Mussegros needs to either keep decently-high PROT or use his Crimson Court set, Gueron uses the Signed Conscription and the Ancestor's Scroll, Marci and Harcourt use their respective Crimson Court trinkets. The way I deal with bosses with this team is riposte, riposte, riposte! Both the Miller and the Sleeper regularly hit the whole team, so both Harcourt and Mussegros can punish them for it. In fact, with his Court set, Mussegros doesn't need to do any other offense! I can actually keep a couple of his buffs, or his debuff, on his skillset full-time.

And with both the Conscription and the Scroll, Gueron actually does passable stress healing and single-target healing full-time - and unlike the Jester and Vestal, he won't crumple to just one errant critical. Multiple crits from area attacks or a big one from Treebranch Smackdown when the Weald filters in will still ruin my day, of course, but that's RNG.

With this settled, the time is drawing ever closer to consider who to bring to the Darkest Dungeon. I will most definitely need to be on my A-game this time. And I do not permit Reynauld or Dismas to deploy until the time is right. I... also don't want to use Mussegros until at LEAST the second expedition. Supposedly, there's a whole lot of shuffling going on down there...

UPDATE: I decided this bit of news didn't need a separate update...

I will actually be going to the Courtyard until the Garden Guardian has coughed up all of the remaining Crimson Court trinkets - probably looking at 10-11 fights with the guy. The Red Hook was built on week 197, and the Mill on week 209.

Here are the available heroes going into the Darkest Dungeon:

• Reynauld, Crusader (reserved for finale)
• Dismas, Highwayman (reserved for finale)
• Valorges, Plague Doctor
• Craon, Vestal
• Fairfax, Leper
• Port, Grave Robber
• Clinchamps, Jester
• Guyot, Vestal
• Mussegros, Man-at-Arms
• Marci, Shieldbreaker
• Harcourt, Highwayman
• Gueron, Crusader
• Grancourt, Highwayman
• Bourneville, Jester
• Lanquetot, Vestal
• Raoulin, Houndmaster
• Moyaux, Houndmaster
• Ravenot, Jester
• Meverel, Abomination
• Selina, Antiquarian
• Linesi, Musketeer
• Bondeville, Houndmaster
• Courcy, Occultist
• Grentemesnil, Crusader
• Marchès, Flagellant
• Amiens, Flagellant (I actually got a second revive somewhere in this)
• Bertran, Hellion

I also have two Veterans that I can't realistically train right now.

So... let's see, that's:

• 3 Crusaders
• 3 Highwaymen
• 3 Houndmasters
• 3 Vestals
• 3 Jesters
• 2 Flagellants
• 1 Plague Doctor
• 1 Grave Robber
• 1 Leper
• 1 Man-at-Arms
• 1 Shieldbreaker
• 1 Abomination
• 1 Antiquarian
• 1 Musketeer
• 1 Occultist
• 1 Hellion

No Bounty Hunters or Arbalests in the mix, and most of my options are unique - if I lose them in the dungeon, I don't get another without severe grinding.

The next time we talk, either I'll have succeeded in clearing the Darkest Dungeon... or I'll be desperately trying to raise an entire roster.

I've made it this far... this is the grand finale of the first game. Can I do it?