Wait. So after the jungle and burning city, I just go to the mountain?

[lobo]

After loss upon loss, death upon death of my party, starting over then starting over again ad naseum, I finally got through the first two locations, the jungle and the city. After the second one's inn. i find I only have one choice: go to the mountain. I thought the mountain was the end of the game? I only have unlocked one guy, the crusader dude, but since I have no choice, I just go in. Soon as I enter the mountain, I'm confronted with a fight against a brain with chains dangling off it. The thing paralysis my teams ability to fight and heal itself and just kills me. Now I'm back at the beginning of the game.

What the hell is going on? I thought I had to get through all those signs of negative emotions before the mountain. I'm only on "Denial," the first one.

[Polyurethane]

The end of each chapter ends with a confession boss at the mountain. You, my friend, just wiped to your first confession boss.

(Denial is represented by shackles on the mind)

[lobo]

Originally posted by Polyurethane:

The end of each chapter ends with a confession boss at the mountain. You, my friend, just wiped to your first confession boss.

(Denial is represented by shackles on the mind)

Thanks, Yeah it was a miserable fight. Just watched my team die slowly as those chain things neutralized all their fighting, buffing and healing powers leaving them impotent, just getting chopped away at, helpless, until they died one by one. It was ridiculous and miserable.

I just went through those two areas again thinking maybe the problem was I bailed on fighting the lair boss last time. This second time I killed the boss, but yeah the same situation; I'm forced to go into that mountain. If I lose that fight again (which I'm sure I will), I have to start over from the very first fight in the beginning in the autumn road with the leaves.

I think maybe I'm done with this game.

[fistleaf]

You are correct. This is DD2 gameplay. You will repeat the same thing with 4 more mountain bosses.

[MarcoPants]

Originally posted by lobo:

Originally posted by Polyurethane:

The end of each chapter ends with a confession boss at the mountain. You, my friend, just wiped to your first confession boss.

(Denial is represented by shackles on the mind)

Thanks, Yeah it was a miserable fight. Just watched my team die slowly as those chain things neutralized all their fighting, buffing and healing powers leaving them impotent, just getting chopped away at, helpless, until they died one by one. It was ridiculous and miserable.

I just went through those two areas again thinking maybe the problem was I bailed on fighting the lair boss last time. This second time I killed the boss, but yeah the same situation; I'm forced to go into that mountain. If I lose that fight again (which I'm sure I will), I have to start over from the very first fight in the beginning in the autumn road with the leaves.

I think maybe I'm done with this game.

spoiler for the Chains of Denial's gimmick

Each round, one of four ability types will be locked: melee, ranged, healing, or stress.
Each ability lock corresponds to one of the locks, meaning if you destroy that particular lock it will no longer restrict those abilities. Taking out the healing lock and whichever one locks your primary method of dealing damage (melee/ranged) as soon as you can makes the fight flow much smoother

[MadMan]

Originally posted by fistleaf:

You are correct. This is DD2 gameplay. You will repeat the same thing with 4 more mountain bosses.

Similar thing is in DD1, so...

[Gal Kraft]

To expand, each "run" you choose a confession (in this case Denial, the first one), where you visit 3 regions (except in this case 2 regions, because Denial), from a pool of 5 region types (except again this case 2 regions, because Denial). Then you proceed to the Mountain, where you encounter cultist boss fights and the final boss fight (except in this case, just the final boss because Denial). It's not meant to be GG EZ, but once you do succeed, you move on to the 2nd confession, Resentment, where 3 new regions open up, and a trophy from a regional lair boss will be required before you reach the Mountain.

EDIT: the pattern I see with frustrated players complaining about difficulty or grind is because they repeat the first confession a lot, and do not get to see the other regions, or the power of the Bounty Hunter. Once you reach Act 2 you will more likely understand why people enjoy it so much. You have more regions to search for hero shrines and gain loot before the final encounter. And then you get party wiped at the boss but by then you got a better grasp of how to learn from failure.

Tip for Denial: play aggressively the first couple rounds, lick your wounds only after you've downed at least one lock.

[Soho]

Originally posted by Gal Kraft:

Tip for Denial: play aggressively the first couple rounds, lick your wounds only after you've downed at least one lock.

Alsoon Denial, each of the 4 different locks does a different skill "lock" = one locks healing, one locks stress heals, one locks melee attacks, one locks ranged attacks- take out the one most important to you first if you can e.g. if your group is reliant on melee attacks, concentrate on destroy the lock that is going to prevent melee attacks

[CyrusWindstrider]

Denial is a gimmick sort of boss that once you clear up one or two of the locks the game either gets way easier, or way harder, depending on what locks you have killed. Clearing the lock for healing and ranged/melee is pretty much the only good solution here; fortunately, they are all reasonably clearly stylized so you can see which lock shuts down which aspect of play. (Except for the melee lock, which is for some reason a lion.)

Considering it is the absolute last fight of the run, the stress lock (Unless you have too many meltdowns ripping your health to shreds) is pretty much always going to be your last target, as relationships don't carry over to your next run even with the same party members.