The 3 Most Broken Mechanics: Darkest Dungeon

There are a few specific mechanics in this game that you either have to focus on or have a tougher time for not using. I wish it wasn't the case, and I hope Red Hook knows this as they continue to develop Darkest Dungeon 2.
► Patreon: / shufflefm
► Discord: / discord
► Twitch: / shufflefm
► Twitter: / shufflefm
► Playlist: • Darkest Dungeon Tier L...

[@filipesilveira5360]

The thing I hate the most and needs to change is when you finally do a perfect run in a dungeon, no stress, full health, and are rewarded with just negative traits and diseases.

[@OneBiasedOpinion]

Weird, I only get deceases on runs that go poorly.

[@countbooga6997]

@@OneBiasedOpinion he meant diseases genius

[@Adantei]

@@countbooga6997 And I believe that was spelling error my scholar of knowledge

[@drumsandstuff3560]

@@countbooga6997it was a joke genius

[@jmsgridiron5628]

@@drumsandstuff3560 Not to be "that guy" but I don't think either of you are geniuses

[@stripedgillette3580]

The game is punishing enough that I don't really feel bad about abusing these mechanics.

[@Jester4460]

The funny part is I think the game got harder over time because people said it was easy leading into the horrors of it now

[@kadimusbaratheon7352]

Exactly.

[@theblackbaron4119]

*Remind yourself that overconfidence is a slow and Insidious killer.*

[@napalmpudding]

​@@theblackbaron4119not if I stun it first...

[@THEREALSPARTAN]

"How do we ease the power of a status that takes turns off units?" "Easy! Give enemies more turns!"

[@phillipmele8533]

“They hated him because he told them the truth.”

[@Snipfragueur]

Just make it very unreliable. Or if an ennemy is stunned once, the +50% stun last for the whole fight.

[@TheRealElithica]

The Fanatic smiles at this

[@RagnarokiaNG]

I find great comfort in scouting, and I rely a lot upon stuns. I can see making the game harder as a challenge by doing neither but I enjoy my comfort blanket.

[@ShuffleFM]

Scouting is definitely great security. The challenge of not having it isn't so much a normal difficulty curve that I personally would like, it's just you running over traps more often with no counter play.

[@rogueliker2825]

And getting surprised and 3 of your heroes having to move

[@fortheloveofking]

I like stuns being OP in this game because stuns are so much more useless in any other game. The same goes for stacking blight.

[@lydiasteinebendiksen4269]

It's not that it isn't good to have these things, it's just that they are implemented in a way that makes them, as you say, a comfort blanket, which alone just encourages you to use them (a good thing) but then make the process of using them so easy or optimal that it's not a reward or a safe strategy among many viable alternatives, but the best answer to every single challenge. If you have good stun and scout, you will (almost) allways benefit from it, so you don't feel clever for doing it, and you only feel stupid and cheated if you try improving beyond them. They are so good they aren't a choice, but a chore, but they could be more!

[@WhatWillYouFind]

Necroposting is lit. I was surprised how much harder they leaned into it for DD2.

[@agentdiner]

I always thought that they should have designed the mini map to reveal itself as you explored, like they do in DD 1-3 AND vvulf, rather than have the whole layout visible from the start. Then base scouting could reveal the layout, while a critical scout could reveal what's in the adjacent hallways or something

[@weeballoon5865]

Great idea ,maybe it should also reveal traps to make an actual investment. wish scouting didn't fell so necessary.

[@michaeljackson8002]

That means the dungeon has to be linear or you'll have to walk back on yourself when you realise an objective is near the starting point. It would then make scouting vital, like the accuracy tax

[@gaurd3]

I "enjoy" the misses. It's pleasurable pain, and is a part of Darkest Dudgeon ecosystem of perseverance . I can't imagine DD without it.

[@clintonarneson226]

How can you tell when you're good at Darkest Dungeon? When your critiques are centered around it being too easy. Love it!

[@kadimusbaratheon7352]

Exactly. He forgets that most people who play this game don't even get to week 50 because they lose all their units way before that. Most players don't even finish the game. 😅

[@Harps0ng]

Stuns are broken, and flagellent's ability to stun the entire enemy party is why he's the most broken hero in the game

[@morinor1340]

Dont forget to give flag his dazzling charm! Saved me many times from successfully completing a quest

[@paulberry5750]

I actually Paid extra for the Flagg. I expect a little power for my extra cheddar...

[@morinor1340]

@@paulberry5750 wym flag is fun, great class with a variety of builds you can do

[@vectorricktenson216]

how can you stun the entire enemy party as the flagellant?

[@morinor1340]

@@vectorricktenson216 by death

[@xerxese5433]

The way I see it circus really was testing the waters for new mechanics, like the daze may be the new stun now, which is a better attempt to balance, but only really works when you can pick and choose your heroes, but I think their could be some effective use to even random turn order

[@Alastair_Ulven]

I 100% agree with accuracy. It is more fine when there are tons of attacks. When you get into 100s of attacks a second it averages out. But when you have small amounts of attacks that are very impactful like XCOM then bad RNG can make you lose at no fault of your own.

[@calsalitra4689]

What makes it work in Xcom is the presence of guaranteed attacks. Using Enemy Within as an example, I can use grenades, rockets, MEC punches, MEC flamethrowers, psi attacks (sometimes), etc. It gets balanced out by the fact that those abilities have either limited uses (grenades, flamethrowers) are only situationally guaranteed (MEC punch, psi attacks), or both (rockets). As a result, as I continue through a long mission, I have to ask myself if I'm willing to risk guaranteeing a kill, at the cost of potentially not having any more guarantees later on when I need them. In Darkest Dungeon, this could be designed in the way of offensive provisions that are guaranteed to do damage to a target. However, being provisions these are not replenished between fights, and looting them would either be rare or impossible.

[@jacthing1]

​@@calsalitra4689the other issue with XCOM is it cheats. If I remember correctly, it will force you to miss if your hitting enemies too much. However this also works for you, if you keep missing it'll make you hit even if the chance is like 2%

[@StarfuryB5]

Considering DD is basically a game about RNG management, I think the biggest issue with these three mechanics is that they allow you very limited and/or not fun ways to control said RNG. Accuracy as a concept is a good idea for a game like this IMO, but the fact that outside of trinkets there are very few ways to manipulate it, is a huge issue. In XCOM for example you're affected by accuracy just as much, but you can flank or destroy cover to increase it greatly, you can also just control enemies and move into better posistions. In DD such options are very limited. Maybe if they buffed all ACC on abilities, removed ACC from trinkets and gave more ways to either buff it on heroes or debuff enemy DODGE it'd be better. As it is it really is just a tax. Scouting is a presonal peeve of mine. Once again the concept is nice, after all attempting to get more information about upcoming dangers makes quite a bit of sense when exploring dungeons filled with monsters, but the way the game handles is is just awful really. Traps and suprises are, for me, the two worst mechanics in the entire game. They both alternate beetween either BS, barely mitigable and annoying as hell, and being a complete non-issue. And suprising enemies is almost a guaranteed easy win, its like getting a bunch of free stuns, just dumb. I'd love scouting and it's rewards to be more resource or ability based rather than just pure RNG. Like idk, have some decision making involved. Risk suffering HP and stress DMG, or make it cost a torch, get rid of traps and suprises and make it unlock better paths or make it give more loot, dunno, I'm not a game designer. You could even maybe risk your scout getting trapped by enemies and you'd have to rush to rescue them with a shorthanded squad or have them die. As for stuns the bad part about them IMO is that they are a no-brainer. The idea of trading actions is a solid one, but most of the time there is no decision to be made, just stun 'em and nuke 'em. Maybe if you needed some setup for them. They could all have a really low base chance (or even none) but you could do stuff to set them up. Like one could be good if they bleed or are blighted, or it's good if they have less than 50% HP, something like that. It'd encourage more decison making and some combos instead of just being click and forget. So as far as I'm concerned I'd like to see all of them in DD2, just make them more interesting, they are kinda too "automatic" in DD, imo.

[@ShuffleFM]

I think your thesis perfectly explains it.

[@deidian635]

Mostly ok except for ACC/DODGE: DD has a dynamic system in which there's plenty of ACC and DODGE buffs and debuffs from all sides. One of the reasons why DODGE is considered somewhat unreliable outside specific showoffs: you never know when you high DODGE hero it's going to get -50 DODGE and threaten the balance of everything. ACC is the same, except as soon as you get an ACC reliant character you just use herbs to get rid of the debuff to not risk whiffing the attack. Same for diseases that lower ACC: you remove them ASAP even before entering combats. Even rabies is not a good idea despite the +DMG if you can't ensure to compensate it with trinkets. It boils down to the same concept as stun: if a combat lasts around 4/5 rounds everyone doing an action and dead/stunned enemies don't perform actions the entire equation establishes that action is the trade coin and it's the most expensive value as DD is balanced(in reality this value is pretty much in every RPG game, even MMO). A no-operation action is the home run against any team friendly or foe. +50% DMG mod isn't going to fix it: you already have that in marks(some even almost duplicate damage +90%) and aside niche scenarios they aren't really profitable because cannons are somewhat unrealiable and inefficient at killing flies and you're paying 2 actions up-front. In the end as a newbie you get frustrated because ACC/DODGE sets a bar to reliably hit enemies to not lose actions: you eventually realize the gist of action economy and just play by it. As a result DD2 looks like quite right: they remove the static element and leave only the dynamic part of it(tokens, debuff, ...) PS: lot of time I don't play Pokemon but I can remember that disabling in PKMN is mostly not a thing. All disable type of moves are heavily unreliable and if some Pokemon has reliable disable moves it either lacks capabilities to do strong attacks, it has some fatal weakness that makes it a no-go against certain types or their stats are far from good. It's also somewhat easier from 1v1 or 2v2 battles compared to DD idea of 4v4 in which you can pack specialists in disabling together with powerhouses of death and you get both worlds in the battlefield, which is actually how most overkill parties in DD are built in fact.

[@calsalitra4689]

Something to add to the XCOM comparison, is that there are also methods of dealing guaranteed damage, that carry risks themselves. Grenades, for example, might let me guarantee a kill on a Thin Man in a really nasty position, but in doing so I risk not having that when I need it some other time. In Enemy Within Using a MEC punch might let me guarantee a kill, but in doing so I risk overextending my MEC and opening them up to damage or, worst case scenario, waking up a pod I'm not at all prepared to deal with. Darkest Dungeon doesn't really have anything like this. Offensive provisions that deal guaranteed damage and can't be looted, skills that guarantee hits but carry penalties (maybe debuffing the user, stunning them, or perhaps even buffing enemies), that add a different kind of risk. This, I think, would enhance the risk management without removing accuracy entirely.

[@deidian635]

@@calsalitra4689 Hellion? "Bleed out" deals insane DMG(12-23.8) and inflicts bleed(5pt/3rds) but she gets -20% DMG, -3SPD for 3rds. "Barbaric YAMP!" The same except it stuns 2 enemies with above normal chance(150% base). Missing gives you debuff anyway which is part of the risk. Arguably at 4/5 round combats it's unlikely Hellion being seriously debuffed before everything's dead. Flagellant is supposed to be this with his: I get stronger the close I'm to death. No one plays him that way because it's risky and at some point he just dies instead of capitalising his gimmick. To a certain extent lunging with Grave Robber entrails a certain risk: she's dodgy and all but has low HP. Having a madwoman without armour recklessly stabbing around front lines while effective can get her seriously injured if she doesn't manage to dodge. Lowering torch is another high risk situation: "The light, the promise of safety" is a very true statement. As long as you play well in >75 everything goes as planned. At 0 light there's no guarantee even if you play perfect: all the mitigation in the world won't fully prevent shenanigans like Shamblers, failures to scout which will cost things. You grab loot faster though. There's risk Vs reward elements in DD whether they can be more varied or more can be added.

[@calsalitra4689]

@@deidian635 How many of those are absolutely guaranteed damage options? Besides Barbaric YAWP (which also happens to be a stun, which also happen to be overtuned), there aren't any ways of getting a guaranteed result without buffing acc to absurd levels. Guaranteed results can be powerful, but with them present the game can be given a harsher balance, which, if the guaranteed damage being an offensive provision route is taken (with low stack sizes and no looting), it's possible to run out of them and have the balance turn against you. That's why I brought it up, since having access to guaranteed damage can actually enrich the risk vs reward, when you have to very seriously consider if it's worth using a very limited resource that might be valuable later. DD already has resource management, but none of the provisions on offer really have the combat niche of guaranteed damage.

[@mintx1720]

Hit/Avoid is actually a decent mechanic in DD, it's just that damage trinkets/quirks are understated compared to hit/avoid ones. Pokemon is one of the few games that I've played where people enjoy sacrificing hit for more damage. That's because the hit boosting item gives +10% hit, whereas the damage items boosts +20%-50% damage, the higher valued items comes with drawbacks ofc. Having imperfect hits creates drama and coming back from a miss is satisfying. I'm sad to see hit/avoid go in DD2.

[@tomassmith2088]

Idk if even pokemon is balanced for preferring damage over hit. Accuracy/evasion manipulation is basically banned in competitive because of how strong it is. Thunderbolt tends to be preferred over thunder unless you have rain strat

[@kirbyjoe7484]

Yeah, it is a shame to lose accuracy/dodge as a mechanic. The only reason it is an issue in Darkest dungeon is because of how it's set up where characters can stack enough accuracy to never miss or stack so much dodge they are untouchable. If you have an accuracy system you need to always leave a least a small chance of a critical whiff when it comes to hitting or evading even when the stat is high enough that it should guarantee success. People will stop obsessing over maxing the stat and viewing it as a tax if it is impossible to get it high enough to guarantee every hit and the other damage dealing equipment alternatives are attractive enough. For instance a trinket that offers a +20% chance to stun to a non-stunning character's every attack would be a nice alternative to a trinket that offers like +10% accuracy. It's even more important to make sure a character can never stack enough buffs to get their dodge percentage above like 90%.

[@Doc_Tar]

Have to agree with you on all points. Traps in the Cove are the worse because of the huge debuff. Scouting is too overpowered and accuracy is too important. I won't want to see stuns taken out of the game completely, there is some strategy to applying them and some monsters are pretty hard to stun, especially early in the game. Your point on lack of accuracy making the early game frustrating is also a problem for me.

[@stonecoat_art]

hey bro thanks for all your content, your videos got me heavily back into the game after I dropped it a couple years ago. I've only had one full party wipe so far, and I'm about to attempt my first DD. keep up the great work

[@Rith9789]

I’ve been playing the game since Alpha. And only beat it this year. Lol no rush. Take your time with DD. It’s one of my favorite areas in the game.

[@FinetalPies]

I agree that stuns are strong but I don't see how to nerf them without just like, decreasing their success chance which is just a different kind of accuracy problem. I think scouting is great where its at, it's powerful but the player should have some powerful things at their disposal as they advance through the game. If I were to change accuracy it would be so that your chance to hit is never lower than 45% and never higher than 95%. Then instead of just basic "% to hit = accuracy - dodge" formula, something a little more curvy. Additive stats are always just a huge risk. I think that missing is great and gaining access to accuracy trinkets and leveling up your skills at the guild is like, a core part of the power progression through the game.

[@gewreid5946]

One way of nerfing stuns would be to give every stun move a "use per battle limit". You could then further differentiate stuns by having more uses but lower chance or the other way round. That might make it more of a decision when to stun. Though turn 1 stun and damage burst would probably still remain.

[@hueman9330]

While accuracy is very annoying, I think it’s a necessary mechanic to make the game difficult. A lot of gameplay revolves around manipulating RNG as it is. When I run a leper I know I’m going to probably bring a jester to spam ballad, and I’m okay with that because of the payoff. I’m interested as to how DD2 will handle the lack of accuracy, as long as the blindness mechanic works decently.

[@Katzenklo15]

I think nerfing healing in DD2 might be a way to address part of the power of stuns. In DD1 not only do you get to prevent taken damage, you get to stall and get extra heals in that you normally wouldn't be able to. While they will still be very strong, to a degree there is a nerf to stun tactics

[@Lyonatan]

Best example of broken avoidance in a game is when I tanked Black Temple with a Rogue in World of Warcraft having something like 108% overall avoidance.

[@dylanr3733]

For accuracy it make sense. In the end of the day it a game about hitting/killing targets.

[@HoboHunterRik]

The most broken mechanic is letting leave the provisioning screen without buying touches...

[@quinnlee-miller9792]

This is 100% unrelated to the video, but I wanted to thank you for all the tips and tricks; I finally got my first Shambler kill via summoning, and while I only got the Idol from it, it’s given me a sense of accomplishment. I’ve only taken out the Shuffling Horror, just to beat the game, and honestly, even though my team was ridiculously well suited for a mr.shambles battle (Vestal, Jester, GraveRobber, Crusader), I was personally afflicted the entire time. Your guides do help immensely, and while I was okay at the game before, these have made it so I’ve only retreated once in the 30ish weeks I’ve been playing (another was due to afflicting the very first round of battle due to 2 traps in an unscouted hallway hitting my most stressed person but that’s the game baybeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee)

[@arckmage5218]

1. I think stuns are the most OP, cuz they basically are why I usually come out of most dungeons with no stress. 2. In sort of the same vein, I think what would be more cool and interesting than stuns is the move mechanic. Instead of having stuns, you try and move the enemy positions so that the enemy will use weaker skills. That way you're still under threat of being hit and potentially crit, albeit by weaker attacks. 3. Scouting is interesting, but I feel like it could be mitigated a bit if maybe there was a supply item that automatically triggered when you step on a trap. Sort of like how shovels work. Like whoever has the most trap disarm on your team rolls for the trap when you step on it.

[@Tomeroche]

Stuns are incredibly OP but honeslty without them It'd be really hard and frustrating to stall to use combat skills for healing. Position changing is something a few units can already do but ultimately it just doesn't really amount to much unless you can move someone from the back to the front or vice versa. It doesn't really help that you often don't know which ranks allow which skills enemies other than in the vaguest sense. THat is even if the skill that's a pain in the ass isn't just universal. Scouting is cool, but frustrating in that you have no input so it's really a random shot of either massive gains or nothing at all. Really wish there was a way to retrigger it, even for minor benefits. For traps and items, it'd really suck to have to waste even more inventory space but yeah, having usable items for dealing with traps and other such consumables would be interesting.

[@lydiasteinebendiksen4269]

How I would fix each: Accuracy/dodge: Dodge could be a buff/condition like riposte, meaning accuracy would be relevant only against targets that have activated it as part of a combat skill or something. This way it becomes speed dependent, and would be part of a trade off, using for instance a weaker attack for the chance of negating damage. Scouting: You can designate a character to scout, meaning they have to be upfront, take extra passive stress, and become the target of any trap their scouting chance fails to spot. This way there is a strategic element of wanting both a good scout, someone who can be in rank 1, and mitigating the penalty which incentivises changing them. You could also disable scouting leaving everything as-is. Stuns: Replacebit with "daze" which penalises the targets speed and makes them more subject to crits. If another character dazes the same target before the first daze wares off, they become stunned. Now it takes two actions, making it far less dependable and broken, but still a strategy that can work if you set it up and use it in the right moments.

[@smegid586]

Conflicted over hit chance in games ever since playing Mechanicus. The guaranteed hits felt like a breath of fresh air.

[@pizzamafioso9191]

I think you can't make a game like DD without any exploits. This would make the game for new player even harder and even more frustrating. This game is supposed to be hard in your first couple of runs. Someone who plays this game for months/years will always find exploits like how great stuns and scouting is but new player need this strong "helping hands" to get some breath breaks. It's a big + that dev made so many patches for a game like this.

[@Owlr4ider]

The fact that you list both accuracy and stuns as broken mechanics says to me that it's not that these mechanics are broken but simply that their alternatives are simply too weak. Firstly the existence of accuracy itself reduces the effectiveness of stuns, as a stunning attack has to hit in order to actually stun, thus needing to pass 2 checks: accuracy and than stun chance. This mechanic is true for all other status effects in the game, each with its own secondary check(blight, bleed, movement, debuff) which is supposed to keep all of these in check seeing that a rogue like game like Darkest Dungeon has randomness ingrained in it. The real issue thus is that there really isn't a good alternative to these mechanics(accuracy and stuns) that make them seem like being a sort of tax. Imagine for a moment if reactive play was stronger, and thus actually viable. All of a sudden you could risk going with less accuracy as your compensation of a stronger reactive game plan will make up for the risk. However since reactive play is so weak than stacking accuracy and to a slightly lesser extent stuns seem mandatory. Of course making reactive play more viable is tricky in and of itself as the game's balance is already sitting on a razor's edge. The fact of the matter is that there are plenty of defensive trinkets and perks in this game and most of them are garbage because taking them means you're not taking offensive ones instead and offense>>>defense as proactive play>>>reactive play. A change of numbers, mostly in terms of buffing the currently weaker options rather than nerfing the stronger ones, will give players more options and ideally make those defensive trinkets and perks more viable to build a viable strategy on. That way accuracy and stuns stop feeling like a tax and instead become simply another choice on the risk vs reward spectrum.

[@allenfitness3895]

I know I’m late to the party here, but if you don’t scout, but walk extremely slowly, m, when near a trap, the trap icon from the map will appear on your status effect bar. If you catch it before you trigger the trap, you can catch it in time and disarm it. Maybe this was changed since this video, but it seems to be the case in 2024

[@theenduriangamer5509]

Stalling is actually one of my most hated "Broken" mechanics. Moreso that it kind of becomes mandatory at certain points. There's just no more reasonable way to heal HP and Stress or stabilize then that- other than getting stuns mid combat which is actually somewhat fair IMO.

[@Boomgaardian]

If more characters had access to riposte I say that is broken

[@jackthedude8129]

I love how this game is still getting attention after all these years. And now with darkest dungeon 2 coming out I bet a lot of people will revisit this masterpiece

[@ryanhowse9266]

"Ok, team, achievement statistics show that people are finishing this game, what do we do?" "Make it hard to heal" "It's already really hard to heal"' "MAKE IT HARDER. AND SHOOT THEM IN THE HANDS SO THEY CAN'T PUSH THE BUTTONS"

[@Tomeroche]

Probably the easiest way to deal with stunned would be to make it act like Surprise, just ensure the guy goes last either this round or next round (depending on if he's already acted.) They still get the same number of turns, but now you can set up before they move.

[@olchum7605]

That's what daze is, they thought of it in butcher circuss update and dd2 mostly revolves around daze, stun is rare

[@disasterjones5798]

I have to personally disagree on the scouting function being too OP, but maybe that's because I have seen my fair share of dungeons left unscouted even with a 75% chance. It isn't guaranteed to proc unless you devote all your slots to scouting trinkets and/or only taking heroes with scouting quirks, and then that makes that hero markedly less effective in the dungeon at large. Yes, it means I get more information (to a degree) and I am less likely to be screwed over by the mysteries of the dungeon, but disarming a trap isn't guaranteed, finding secret rooms aren't guaranteed, and I have no means of determining whether that hallway fight is just a couple spiders or a Collector. I don't personally see the level of success with scouting that would garner it "OP" in my mind, but I suspect that largely has to do with the difference in our playstyles.

[@Beton_Arme]

Try torchless and you ll never say that

[@cmck362]

Not sure I agree. If you take away accuracy, stuns, and scouting you get a very boring meta. Stack speed and damage to one shot enemies before they can move on a mobile team. Sounds exactly like stunning without the stun tbh. You're still going to need to take offensive trinkets. If accuracy isn't picked then it'll be damage instead since if you can't reliably two shot things you might as well unreliably one shot things. And if you decide not to take either then you're unreliably two shotting things which is just awful. Unless of course hero damage is overtuned to the point you don't need offensive stuff, but that's even worse for balance. Stuns are meant to deny turns. That concept will exist no matter what. If you aren't doing it through cc then you'll just stack speed and damage to kill them as soon as possible instead which also lowers the dependence on healing too. You can't stall with this, but you don't need to if everything is dead before they hurt you. Scouting stops surprises and traps. If you can't do that then you'll need to take teams that give no fucks about getting shuffled. You'll also need to take crit, stress heals, or camping to recover from traps and unavoidable hits. Basically what I'm trying to get across is that removing or nerfing accuracy, stuns, and scouting to oblivion just creates _other_ problems. You're just playing whack a mole with design flaws.

[@ShuffleFM]

Never said there wouldn't be other balances to compensate if need be. The discussion is that the game in its current state has these things as outliers.

[@cmck362]

@@ShuffleFM You presented it in a way that makes it seem like you want those three changed, removed, or nerfed while also showing that you'd be glad if they weren't in dd2. Either you didn't bother thinking about the ramifications (iirc damage meta with scouting as a hero stat was a thing some time before crimson court) or you blatantly ignored it for content. So yeah you most definitely did 'never said'. Which is why I said it instead.

[@ShuffleFM]

You're not getting the point of the video and instead are trying to frame the topic differently so you can act like my opinion doesn't have merit since it doesn't fit your new framing. The issues are quite clearly laid out. Will other issues pop up? Sure. I didn't say they wouldn't. So I don't get what you're trying to do, but accusing me of doing something like forgetting to mention some other proxy topic for content is a new one for me. Not a fan tbh. Yeah you need some way to slow the game down if stuns aren't there. The issue is that stuns are brain dead and over half the cast has them. That's the difference between hitting blinding gas or having to set up movement to disrupt the enemy. Unless an enemy is stun immune they lose to stuns. Not all enemies lose to movement. Not all enemies die in 1 crit so ganking them is harder. There is more decision making than slamming blinding gas every other turn. Hope that makes sense.

[@WRanger87]

I agree with this list completely, but I think that both accuracy and stuns were hugely instrumental to the success of this game. Accuracy (and crit) create the satisfying dopamine slot machine that this game largely is. Stuns are the first and most basic element of strategy that makes players feel smart; because the monsters are so terrifyingly dangerous, stuns feel great and are frankly needed due to the gameplay they’ve set up.

[@N0TYALC]

Of course missing your attacks isn’t “fun”, but it’s not meant to be. Dying isn’t fun, paying money for upgrades isn’t fun, having your damage dealers get stunned isn’t fun. The fun part is overcoming those obstacles. The game would be unbelievably boring if everything always went right, and that includes accuracy.

[@jennyperpa5302]

There's a reason why I usually lock in accuracy quirks if they're applicable to the hero. It helps.

[@QuestionableObject]

Stuns are broken but you're super punished for not using them. The difference between using stuns and not using stuns is night and day on how battered your party will be. I'm hoping that in DD2 stuns will be more of an interrupt mechanic rather than a catch all win-button. Instead of being able to chain stun everyone into oblivion you'll be wanting to save stuns to interrupt dangerous up-coming attacks instead.

[@andrewtabish]

Accuracy is why DND can be so frustrating

[@morinor1340]

dnd is entirely based around RNG, and its a social game, not a video game. Having to hope for good rolls becomes a lot more frustrating when you actually try to beat a game vs just having fun with your friends pretending to be wizards

[@keithemerson7662]

5th edition uses bounded accuracy, so you don't need to gear up or never hit again. 26 is about the highest you can go on AC, so a hoard of goblins can threaten a lvl 12 paladin who would normally have around 38 AC in 3.5 or pathfinder

[@SuperLumianaire]

In other words, three things I will abuse maliciously.

[@ShuffleFM]

You will notice an improvement in play if you haven't been doing this, it's true lol

[@spencerbowler7287]

I'm surprised that critical hits weren't discussed in this video. Crit chance even more generally beneficial than accuracy for heroes because critical hits stress heal multiple heroes and grant a powerful personalized stat buff in addition to increasing damage output and chance to apply status effects. The crit stats on trinkets are much more understated than accuracy which makes crit less ubiquitously abusable than accuracy, but hero skills with high crit rate modifiers are very strong, such as Occultist's stun, Graverobber's attacks, Jester's Ballad, and my favorite interaction: Arbalest's Sniper Shot with a base 32% crit vs. marked, with critical hits granting her a buff for an additional +33% damage vs. marked. On the monster's side, critical hits deal an overwhelming amount of both health and stress damage to your party completely randomly. The threat of being crit multiple times before you can recover from the first crit is a challenge that the game can demand from you at any time unless you are absolutely shattering the enemy's action economy. At low torchlight, every enemy in the game gets significantly increased crit chance and accuracy, and when compounded with increased damage and massive stress penalties, even a weak monster can regularly hit like a nuclear bomb with a devastating stress cleave. On a related note, Arbalest's Suppressing Fire is an incredibly powerful move to use on turn 1 when she's not set up to kill something immediately because it completely prevents (the usually more dangerous) half of the enemy team from landing crits. A functional team will be able to easily recover from an average fight, and the threat of failing missions or losing heroes almost always comes from enemies landing unfair crits, so preventing a majority of worst-case scenarios while also significantly reducing their damage, stress, and disruption output is huge. Arbalest can very realistically land kills on turn 1 with ideal setup and Suppressive Fire cripples the enemy team comparably to landing a kill if the setup doesn't quite work out, and the fact that Wrathful Bandana supports both halves of this flowchart is the icing on the cake.

[@ShuffleFM]

Crits were a contender. You could consider them 4th, right after these 3. They can be too strong but I do like that the crit buffs for some heroes change your thinking for next turn, and that's cool.

[@houtamelocoding]

A bit late to the party but one thing I feel more games need to use is "Tales of Maj'Eyal" stun system. There are variety of different types of stuns and none of them make you lose your turn (the most common ones being "your damage is halved", "your damage and resistances are halved", "your movement speed is halved". This difference makes stuns still a very important and strong mechanic but not to the point where the "stunned" character can't do anything about it (there are numerous ways of instantly clearing stuns).

[@AntlionUncletruthin]

Maybe they should have the stun resist buff characters get after they wear off give additional benefits. Maybe damage and prot, as if they are shaking it off and coming back into the fray at their max to make up for lost time.

[@Gru39]

Most broken mechanic is affliction's stress effect on the rest of the squad. Just one afflicted hero can stress the rest way too fast

[@churchofmagic3733]

Darkest Dungeon 2: Stuns? What stuns? Legit tho. Blinding gas, rampart, barbaric yawp, so many stuns have been yeeted, I’m literally shaking and cryin

[@aToxicJester]

Happy that accuracy isn't in DD2. Missing a 95% chance is literally the worst feature of the game.

[@eclecticspaghetti]

[pushes up glasses] "um akchually you can't miss a 95% chance because the game has a hidden +5% accuracy bonus and-" ok ok jokes aside i get what you're saying

[@disasterjones5798]

That's X-Com ba- oh wait, wrong game

[@burrito4332]

@@disasterjones5798 as a huge fan of dd and xcom, this was too funny.

[@skizz0phrenia270]

You do know 95% isn't 100%, right?

[@aToxicJester]

@@skizz0phrenia270 it isn't¿? Mind blown

[@keheck]

More on that ACC point: I've made it my rule as of late that stress dealers will always get one more turn of stress in. If I could deal the killing blow on them, all attacks will miss

[@whyisdiscostevetaken]

as someone who locks in explorer quirks early game, i disagree that scouting needs to be nerfed, but i do think traps are unfair as they sit a way to make scouting less effective: have traps be visible (and disarmable) on the corridor screen if you have someone on your team above 80% trap, regardless if the trap was scouted it'd add visual skill/ability to what is otherwise a numbers crunching game, and it would take away half the purpose to scouting

[@whyisdiscostevetaken]

and likewise, i would appreciate secret rooms to be slightly visible in the background (and accessible) if your team meets certain requirements, be it one teammate that has a high enough scout chance or trap % i would like gameplay features added that would make speedrunners feel pain

[@jamesrichardson9355]

Ight I know this may sound wierd, but coming from a guy who mainly plays modded. I've had a blast using the offering with health and defence trinkets exclusively. As she ramps up bleed and blight then nukes a anemy when she passes it. I love the offering so much.

[@hans1783]

I realize smth… the greatest joy is discovering about the game through playing it on ur own. Any discovery made feels more rewarding. Because if u want to min max at one point u'll end up with a speedrun build. By that time, ur interest in the game will also speed off the cliff.

[@jmsgridiron5628]

3:41 I still have fun without using accuracy trinkets. In fact, unless the trinket has another bonus with it besides accuracy, I typically sell it immediately. We don't need accuracy when brute force alone will suffice.

[@RaskaTheFurry]

Scouting is great... but could be something you should be able to make more consistent by making sacrifices somewhere else... information is infinitely more powerful than anything else tbh...

[@ShuffleFM]

It is. I just don't like how easy it is to get as much value from it

[@frankmc8355]

I like the way Divinity: Original Sin 2 deals with CC and status effects in general. Every character has "armor"--extra HP that is deducted first when you are hit, which prevents status effects as long as the target still has armor. It means you have to focus an enemy's armor down first if you want to CC them, and lets the devs be stingy with healing for balance because the armor is always there. There was a mod I had for D:OS2 as well that replaced armor with endurance "tokens," which was really how I was hoping Red Hook was planning to handle stuns since they're doing token things anyway. The way they works is you start combat with a set of "tokens" that prevent CC. Again, if you want to stun something you have to eat through its tokens first.

[@disasterjones5798]

Sounds somewhat like the artifact mechanic in Slay The Spire, where it negates secondary effects entirely until all the tokens are consumed. That could be a very interesting way of balancing out how stuns affect the action economy.

[@frankmc8355]

@@disasterjones5798 Exactly, though STS is kinda different in that it doesn't really have a stun mechanic. The really nice thing about artifact token as a system is that it isn't RNG reliant at all.

[@doublecrossedswine112]

I know I get pissed off when I have a 83% chance to hit and miss 3 out of 4 attacks. Or an 80% to disarm traps and only succeed 2 out of 4. Or getting crit hit 2 or 3 times in a row. I do this so consistently I've just come to the conclusion that Red Hook uses a different type of math than the one I'm accustomed too.

[@doublecrossedswine112]

@@dmytrokovchenko6079 I find my luck by making teams to focus down 3 and 4 quickly. Otherwise, that rng gets out of control. Calling me stupid isn't necessary. I don't have those fancy quirks and trinkets to work with. I have the base game. So ease up a little.

[@KonoGufo]

@@dmytrokovchenko6079 People must really like ya when you're coming out swinging with "you must be stupid" while somebody's just peacefully sharing their experience

[@UnimpressedCat]

Scouting is not op, think it is as necessity. Stun is feels unfair because most of the monsters dont have stun

[@mathan583]

I would have picked entirely different mechanics (crit and deathblow resist come to mind). Imo this is a testament to the quality of the game. DD allows for so much diversity in gameplay and strategy. Different players will find entirely different mechanics overpowered, which is nice :)

[@ShuffleFM]

You're totally right!

[@skipperg4436]

Ideal solution would be that heals, stuns and ultra-high burst damage were all options. Exclusive options (i.e. you can either have party that can heal OR have party that can keep enemies stunn-locked OR have party that can end the fight in less than 2 rounds)

[@Alex-nr4xb]

I've always hated Accuracy as a stat in any game (main experience being WoW) because you're basically digging yourself out of a deficit. You feel the pain of misses but it's not like you're *happy* that you hit.

[@cookiecapitan3655]

I beat DD1 without ever caring about accuracy and mostly without jester's buffs. idk, it is not something you must care about to beat the game or have fun doing so. At least when you do not aim to minmax everything

[@soulechelon2643]

Just started playing DD again very recently (never beat it. Kinda A.D.D.'d out of it years ago) and I totally agree on the accuracy thing. Yes, it creates tension, but it only pushes the player to, as you stated, stack as much ACC/DODGE as possible, or bring high ACC/DODGE classes, or use ACC/DODGE abilities. It's sad, because I downloaded a ton of class mods (making sure they weren't busted. I want more variety and choices, not ez mode) and you can tell alot of them were made specifically to cater to buffing those stats. And those that don't have a hard time surviving early game.

[@deidian635]

The balance issue with your mention is partly due to the stress/affliction system: it's always a risk to implement something new. A leper or a crusader might be tanky, but they still have the same stress bar as others(100 to affliction, 200 heart attack and possible death). Balance is that you can't out-heal, for stress it's even harsher than with HP meaning that stress heals are much more weaker against the damages than HP. Then you have high ACC/DODGE characters which try to offset that having way lower HP: but what about stress since it can kill anyway?? It so happens that those "weak" characters are in fact the most resilient to stress damage than the real tanky heroes and to top it off they kill/stun stuff rather fast preventing more stress damage income: two birds one stone.

[@hafyrrochagm7471]

Basically nonsense the stun part. In Turn RPG you are basically always preventing damage. Either killing or stunning. And what you suggest earlier, "tanking damage" isnt an option if your stress bar can kill you too and deaths door nerfing all your char stats to ground. And just dont forget dots included in most enemie attacks.

[@ShuffleFM]

I don't tell you to take damage. I specifically said that stuns are good because they stop you from getting hit 4 times in the first turn. Not sure what you're trying to argue otherwise.

[@gabrielfranzini977]

Accuracy is very good thematically, it can always go wrong at any moment, the problem is that is sucks mechanically, it takes away from the tactical gameplay and punishes you through no fault of your own, it is enjoyable in the first 50h or so, but it quickly becomes just frustrating when you know how to play

[@uhitsethan]

Arguably, ACC is what makes darkest dungeon, well, darkest dungeon. Knowing that you can be screwed over regardless of prep keeps tensions high. IMHO, it's just a balancing issue. ACC does feel like a tax, so I'd much prefer to reduce the amount of influencing factors that goes into optimizing acc. That way, you will never miss shots or sometimes miss shots. DD2 handles this perfectly. There is still accuracy with blindness and dodge, but the token system makes it feel less like min-maxing because every influencing factor is extremely impactful. (25% increments, instead of a 5-10%). With all that being said... I think DD2 would benefit from a 95% hit cap. Nothing should be assured in the darkest dungeon.

[@bosmosis]

Fair points. Seems you could also add that using a consumable (bandage, potion, food, etc) doesn’t cost a turn

[@nyoodmono4681]

Accuracy gets very important later on at the hardest levels. Early on the biggest threat is not being able to upgrade units because of mismanagment with heirlooms/ buildings/ gold. What really is op is the crusader which will always alow you to manage stress. Scouting makes you rich and is really usefull, that encourages usage of Grave Robbers, Highwaymen.

[@nyoodmono4681]

@O K This is about the video claiming accuracy beats everything. My point is that this comes only true in the endgame. There *is* a difficulty spike early on with heirloom managment, easily resulting in being under staffed and or playing underleveld, delaying upgrades with the armory and guild. Just because you know what to do does not mean that this is not a hurdle for newbies. After that the game is very easy, yes. Scouting beats everything mid game, because you wont be trapped, suprisded and will get rich. The crusader makes everything way easier, keeping all heroes in the roster sane, for free. I do not rely on him as a single class, he just always fits.

[@paulberry5750]

Scouting is fine. Stuns are something I don't always use. Personally I enjoy the Core Combat Loop of DD1. The back & forth slugfest is my bread & butter. I'm here for crits & big numbers. Is Accuracy a problem? Dodge Debuffs my man. Also, DD1 was pretty fun in EA. Tinkering with the formula lead to some well deserved criticisms.

[@ShuffleFM]

Dodge debuffs are inverse accuracy, and you need some accuracy to hit the evasive enemies with them in the first place.

[@paulberry5750]

@@ShuffleFM YMMV but my Debuffs land most of the time. Much more than Stuns land. RNGesus is a capricious master.

[@illan731]

Damage is broken. Remove damage. Seriously, if acc is removed people will build damage and still not use defensive trinkets/abilities. Like stuns... or maybe they will because stun and dodge are so good.... this is a very conflicted video

[@benvictim]

Accuracy (if it should be in a game or not) can be broken down into two questions. 1) How punishing is a miss, and is it possible to recover? 2) Note, this kind of ties back into 1 but: How fast is your action economy? 3) Note, this one is more for Online games: How min-maxxy is your community. The more min-maxxy your community is, the more toxic accuracy as a stat becomes So to explain myself. for Number (1): if a miss isn't that punishing or you can recover easily from it, then it isn't that big of a deal but can still draw a player into a moment. It can help create tension with out that much of an impact. I.E you might miss, but you have enough recovery to make up for the miss. Number (2): games with long TTK / long action economy, misses are less punishing. In say FF9, you could spend 5-10 minutes in a battle and take high double digit to triple digit amount of actions. A few misses here and there doesn't hurt in the grand scope of the battle. In darkest dungeon, were on average your team is only taking 8 to 12 actions, a miss is a SIGINICANT set-back in action economy. I would argue that in Darkest difficulty you can forgot accuracy on some characters since a miss usually isn't that pushing and you can usually recover, but on bloodmoon every hit has to land. Enemies deal too much damage for easy recovery and action economy is so tight that you just can't go without acc. This also leads into why stuns are so powerful. Action economy is so tight that removing the ability for a unit to take an action is just so powerful.

[@OK-sd3lp]

Not really. Just learn to properly recover needed. Accuracy = consistency. It is that simple. You overthink a simple mechanic.

[@benvictim]

@@OK-sd3lp the amount of hits determines how consistent accuracy is. If a fight lasts long enough and you do 100 attacks, but miss 5... You only loose out on 5% damage. You can make that damage up elsewhere (like thru raw +dmg). If a battle lasts only 10 attacks and you miss 5, welp there is half your damage now. Consistency is dependent on the length of battle. Longer the battle / more actions you're taking. It's why donkey Kong is one of the best characters in super Mario party despite having a dice with four 0s on it. Matches are long enough, and the numbers are large enough to were his 33% chance for a big number actually makes him one of the best characters.

[@gustavomartins5599]

Stuns are really good, but not so much as being broken. Most enemies have a good stun resist, making it possible to stun it just once at every two turns. Also trading one strong attack for one stun is good but not excellent. And the game is hard, so using good mechanics is simply necessary.

[@Inquisitor_Redacted]

I feel they could address the stun issue by; first reduce the number of heroes that have access to them. And two making them a limited resource, either by giving them limited uses per battle or making them something you have to replenish before using it again.

[@Seproc]

I think these broken mechanic are only considered broken to hardcore gamers that played for about a thousand hour minimum of DD, for any games really. If youve played enough to know everything about the game, the "challenge" gone so you find ways to make it hard for you, like torchless, no stuns etc and or complain about the mechanics because it makes it easy for you and your 500+ hours gameplay. For plebs whos not min maxing and just to enjoy the game, these mechanics are just normal.

[@mjstarkweather1]

I just recently got into Darkest Dungeon and have been watching a ton of these vid's. Thank you!

[@martindejonge695]

Gathering gold is hard at the start of the game for me and I came across this "can't touch this" video and I tried the team and I was wowed by the results. With one run I didn't pay attention and instead of taking a weald quest I took a cove quest and lost my man at arms in the last fight but the team is good. If a character has high dodge by default I try to build around that so that I don't need to worry about character.

[@-_-5470]

Just watched your provision video only to be notified that you uploaded this one, more content for me :D Keep up the good work!

[@Khrene]

> Stuns. Yeah hoping they use the Daze/Stun mechanic I mention before where you have to daze an enemy with one move and stun with another. Thinking about stun/daze made me think of how they wouod visually represents that using the turn count bar theyre adding. That IMMEDIATELY took me to FF10 where they had moves like "Delay Buster" which would knock opponents down the turn counter.

[@Keizor1997]

imo random crits are just as broken as accuracy, when your character can get otkd by enemies without it even coming to your turn to heal up or prevent it

[@NoraNoita]

Different take on Accuracy, it's a stat that exists in every pokemon game as well, just not dodge, well until that one Insect Ghost thing Pokemon. Having Accuracy on moves for balance like a 120 dmg move has 40 accuracy, or Earthquake and Fissure having low hit chance, is balance, but yeah. On traps, yeah they suck, I have a few things in mind how they could've been done but it's too long to explain. Stuns, are also in Pokemon, and even in different forms, we have Freeze which is a direct stun, can't do anything aside from switch IIRC if even, and Paralyse which is like a 50% chance that you can use a move, and also your speed is reduced and then there's also even confuse which also kinda works like a stun. I find stuns okay in this game.

[@kevingriffith6011]

I can only hope that red hook is considering broadening the variety of mitigation mechanics to compensate for the reduced healing in a way that doesn't make stuns and burst damage the only games in town. Abilities that grant temporary hit points that go away at the end of a battle could be one way to add in-combat sustain without leading to stalling. Stronger debuffs could put more emphasis on bringing the right heroes to the right dungeons, since unlike stuns debuffs don't effect all enemies equally... same with displacement abilities.

[@ShuffleFM]

We know that we are getting dodge and block tokens, but other thing like debuffs to mitigate damage would be very nice too.

[@kadimusbaratheon7352]

It's really funny to hear someone say that a hardcore game like Darkest dungeon have "broken player mechanics". I honestly don't think they're broken at all. And if you're going to nerf them, either you're going to be obligated to also nerf the enemies or give the players something to fill that hole all together. When I clicked on the video, I thought he was about to talk about how the enemies are broken, not the players. LoL.

[@Nijht]

So, to sum it up: 1. Accuracy increases the tension of combat because it adds a degree of chance, but it also hampers build diversity because every sane player is going to try to mitigate that chance in every way they can. 2. Scouting gives far too many economic and preparatory benefits for the small amount of investment it requires. At the same time, it feels like you're forced into doing it because traps have no other form of counterplay. 3. Stuns are insanely powerful because your turns are inherently less valuable than your opponent's turns. This is intended by the devs, of course, but the unintended consequence is that it promotes degenerate gameplay. There are only three ways to truly gain advantage in the fight: Stunning, stalling, and spending a turn to make your future turns worth 'more' relatively (marking, moving enemies, etc.). The second option is boring and the third often doesn't have enough payoff so the first option starts to feel like the *only* option.

[@Femaiden]

TBH, i think stalling is a broken mechanic, the fact that you HAVE to stall to be successful and effective. stalling tactics in games always feel "cheesy" to me, like the player is "working the system", exploiting the game mechanics to get more heals out, but then this game kinda makes it mandatory to do this, while still attempting to punish the player for it, with antistalling mechanics like automatic stress damage and enemy reinforcement , until the player figures out how to play around it and prevent that. I think stalling is broken.

[@madmeggie]

I have a file going on iPad right now, and I’m in w42 and haven’t seen any scouting trinkets. Even fought shambler and didn’t get the map. The only way I can increase scouting chance is by bringing heroes with scouting quirks, so I rarely have better than 35%. I still get a couple good scouts per dungeon though, and it makes finding a map in a pack instead of real loot actually exciting rather than disappointing!

[@moneygrowslikegrass]

I would say stuns, other two are just classic punishing mechanics which fit well in this punishing game

[@TheRealElithica]

I liked accuracy and hardly ever needed accuracy trinkets, even on stygian.

[@gregorioruiz1983]

I think playing into crits is huge. It gives you a buff and heals stress. So, so OP

[@goatmagnum]

Imagine wanting Darkest Dungeon to be more punishing than it is.

[@toprak3479]

I called 2 of the 3. Expected something like dots or riposte instead of accuracy though.

[@ChamblesRNG]

About accuracy: Youre talking from the perspective of a master of this game but when I first started, I was petrified when I embarked on a mission with a 80% accuracy lepper. But wow was it a ride.. This game is not only about numbers and percentages. Its about the darkest dungeon punishing experience before you memorised all of the numbers. Thats the part of the fun to loose. It imitates the real world frankly.. Well maybe I'm too old and cool for alla you but dwarf fortress' 'loosing is fun' is the sweet spot for me.

[@calsalitra4689]

I think what makes people annoyed is that the risk of bad RNG can be mitigated, but there's no way to even partially control. I'll use X-Com Enemy Within as an example. In that game, certain options are able to provide guaranteed damage, such as grenades, rockets, MEC punches, MEC flamethrowers, psi attacks (sometimes), etc. However, all of these options have either limited uses per mission (grenades, MEC flamethrowers), are only situationally guaranteed (MEC punches, psi attacks), or both (rockets, which also only have a 90% chance to hit the intended area, which is still better than risking a 10% chance to hit that might not even kill). As a result of this, I have to consider if I want to use certain guaranteed options. For example, if I find myself in a disadvantageous position vs, say, a Classis difficulty Thin Man at full health, I can consider shooting a rocket to guarantee that kill. However, if I only started the mission and I don't know how long it is, I have to consider if it's worth the loss of potentially my only rocket to have a high chance of guaranteeing my safety. In the case of situational guarantees like the MEC punch (MEC needs to be adjacent to enemy), I have to consider if its worth the risk of potentially overextending my MEC and leaving it vulnerable, or god forbid stumble into more aliens I'm not prepared to fight against. Darkest Dungeon doesn't have anything like that, which can make it frustrating when a lone enemy on 1 health is in a position to do massive damage, but there's fuck all I can do to actually guarantee he dies. The form it could take is offensive provisions that can't be looted mid dungeon, which would be able to guarantee damage against targets, at the cost of taking up space and only having a limited number of uses. This wouldn't mean the game can't still fuck the player over with bad RNG, it just means there's a different, unique kind of risk the player needs to think about as they deal with enemies. Dwarf Fortress might not be entirely the best comparison by the way, since in DF success is always in the hands of the player. "Losing is fun" because there's always something I can do to improve, like setting up child sentries to make sure Werecreatures are detected before they can start biting. Or setting up and equipping militaries early, maybe trade with Caravans to get them equipped with stuff better than copper. There are a few ridiculous situations like getting an Undead raid 2 minutes into an embark, but since absolutely nothing was invested you didn't actually lose anything. The DD equivalent to that is sending a squad of complete newbies on a difficult without supplies and getting them all killed. Nothing of value was lost, and in both cases the decision to send those poor bastards in the first place can be seen as the mistake. This is in comparison with Darkest Dungeon, where there's always the risk of losing a character to an enemy on 1 health that I failed to hit on 3 separate attacks. I ended up with a bit of a wall of text, sorry about that.

[@ChamblesRNG]

@@calsalitra4689 Impresive post man and a good read! Reminded me how I utterly despise XCOM for actually having rigged RNG 😂 As to DD randomness - its a element of the design of the game. Even the title screen warns you that missions will go ape shit and heroes will die.. But at least they go with style! And you can tell stories of shit that happened in this game that ended in horror but were totaly epic. Thats what I mean, I dont mind losing so long as the process itself is 'rewarding' - like in Dwarf Fortress - loosing is fun because the thing that you can never be in control makes it exciting - a Dwarf steps on a pressure plate cause was looking for its newly born child on this exact tile and releases myhem. You cannot prepare for that! On the other hand you got fucking Thin Man, cartoon-like idiot from childs game whiping my teams over and over and over again in the early game cause 3 '' 90%'' checks fail in a row and they always one shot you. I donno.. Only thing I can be certain of is that my copy of Enemy Within was destroyed while DD is sitting on my disc, treasured. I will be back playing it soon enough.

[@ShinraSetora]

I know it's an old video, but on the accuracy/missing attacks, I really do agree, taking some other strategy games for examples, XCOM is probably one of the worst game with the RNG of missing attacks, that's why on higher difficulty you endup using everythings that has a 100% hit chance like explosives, a game that is still in early access called Wartales, doesn't deal with rng hitting/missing targets and then it comes down to your own battle plan and strategy, it's really enjoyable, if you fail it only comes to your planning, not RNG. Darkest Dungeon can be very frustrating with the RNG even with the best characters and the best items.

[@ShuffleFM]

Wartales is so good

[@quickpawmaud]

I think it should be like Pokémon where most moves always hit but some moves are more powerful with a penalty to accuracy. As well there are some evasion boosting moves. So there could be a powerful character that doesn’t always hit but could be boosted by another character to hit more often etc. but most characters and enemies should always hit. For stuns I think enemies could become immune to stun after being stunned once. They would still be powerful but you couldn’t spam them and it removes some rng with them just getting increased resistance currently.

[@DXGraveman]

my issue is why is the 15 dodge spider dodging more than my 40+ dodge player character in a PvE game

[@goatsplitter]

I think a lot of this can be fixed with difficulty levels. I don't want it to be super brutal and these are all stat adjustments for the most part. If you think stuns or scouting is OP, then make those resists or chances higher (for resists) and lower (for scouting) in higher difficulties - so players that want a harder time can adjust accordingly. or hell, make a slider for that kind of thing. Same with accuracy, adjust it by difficulty level so that characters hit more and/or enemies dodge less in lower difficulties and the inverse on higher. These are really simple things that could be adjusted with more difficulty options. Just my two cents, for what that's worth.

[@Femaiden]

the game does have difficulty levels. . .

[@goatsplitter]

@@Femaiden I'm aware. . .

[@Femaiden]

@@goatsplitter maybe i misunderstood your comment then. I thought you meant that they should add difficulty levels to the game. if you meant allowing the player to customize and fine tune the already existing levels, then yeah, i agree that can't be a bad thing. although, you probably have the "git gud" tryhard elitist crowd who would be like, "it doesn't count unless you turn everything to max"

[@goatsplitter]

@@Femaiden Adding additional options, i feel like, is always a good thing that allow people to fine tune it to their accessibility. The tryhard elitist crowd can just dial it all the way up then, too - and also can kick rocks for what it matters to other people enjoying their own version of the game. Mostly i just meant, from the discussions about stun resist and stuff, to be able to slide that or something. Things like that are easily alleviated with options if the devs wanted to do so. its all numerical. maybe a mod. idk :)

[@Femaiden]

@@goatsplitter i agree, dials would be good.

[@frankmc8355]

Isn't there very technically counter play to traps, since you can dodge them and resist their secondary effects? I think you should be able to control who gets hit by traps. Like, first rank is always the trap target or is target 75% of the time or something. Then the counter play is making your rank 1 tanky enough they can take the hit and secondary effect. Then, you can nerf scouting/trap disarm and even buff traps since traps aren't an automatic "a random party member gets smacked if you can't scout," they're "your leper (probably) gets smacked if you can't scout"

[@ShuffleFM]

Being able to target who got hit would be nice

[@anonimus370]

Stuns are the only reason the game is even remotely playable by people who aren't hardcore masochists. I hate what they did with stuns in DD2, cause enemies still get normal stuns, but players need combo for them.

[@MasterLapin]

I don't mind the dodge and accuracy, I think RNG is part of the theme of the game, but I do think a stunned enemy should still be able to use some moves, just not attacking

[@Loreweavver]

I think Darkest Dungeon should take the approach that Dragon Age Inquisition took. That game eliminated healers entirely and instead had magic barrier and guard mechanics that had to be maintained to prevent damage. This s could work well with DD because if health and stress can only be healed by items and camping the dungeon gets progressively more dangerous the longer it lasts.

[@anonimus370]

Why would someone enjoy "missing" through no fault of their own is beyond me, a dice just decided that you are FUCKED, and you enjoy it? what kinda psycho enjoys that?

[@alexanderhall9625]

I don't know about scouting but stun could be nerfed due to the more consistent ways to reduce or avoid damage through tokens

[@scottli6995]

All these mechanics is what makes darkest dungeon the game it is. Fixing these in DD2 will just make it another game entirely,,,

[@steveharrison76]

Hard, hard agree with the point around accuracy. It’s annoying, and absolutely is a tax.