Party Building/Composition

All of the heroes sorted and organized in a way to assist in putting a team together. Also some tips.

This guide is out-of-date

On June 19th, with the release of the new 'The Color of Madness' DLC, there was a major balance patch. Now, some of the information in this guide is incorrect. In particular, I need to update boss strategies. That may take a while.

Positions listed as "Front, Middle, Back"

A compact way to look at things.

Front:

Middle:
, ,
Back:

Recommended Position Chart

• It is technically viable to use heroes in other ways that aren't on the chart, like a Jester with Finale. This chart just puts heroes where they are the most viable.
  
• I don't recommend putting certain heroes (like the Occultist) in the front because they have low health totals, unless they have trinkets, quirks, or a Man-at-Arms to improve their survivability.
  
• There is a more detailed, but possibly more confusing chart farther down in this guide labeled "More Detailed/Lenient Position Chart".

Position 4

Position 3

Position 2

Position 1

The Flagellant & Shieldbreaker (bottom 2) are DLC characters.

Bleed & Blight

In each area, the enemies are typically weak to either Bleed or Blight and are resistant to the other.

Bleed is preferred in:

• Warrens
  
• Weald
  
• Courtyard (DLC)

Blight is preferred in:

• Ruins
  
• Cove

Heroes that have Bleeds:

Heroes that have Blights:

Healing & Stalling

Would you like to become less dependent on the Vestal? As a general rule, if your team doesn't have a powerful healer, make sure that at least 3 out of 4 heroes have either a self-heal or a weak heal (at least until you get more comfortable with the game), and learn to utilize stalling (explained below).

Powerful Healers:

Weaker/Off-Healers:

Self-Healers:

No Healing Whatsoever:


Stalling is where you intentionally delay finishing off the enemy, in order to buy yourself extra turns to heal up, towards the end of a battle. Stalling becomes much more effective if your team has a stun.
There is a penalty if you stall for too long; more enemies appear and your heroes recieve stress.
To avoid this penalty, you can:

• Stall on a large size-2 enemy instead.
  
• Kill the final enemy before the penalty kicks in. Your heroes will give you a warning via dialogue box before it happens.

Stress Healing (In-Combat)

Stress Healers & Self-Stress Healers:
&
Camping skills are also very helpful in healing stress.

Stunning

Heroes with high-base% chance stuns :

Other heroes with stuns:
,

Shuffle Resilience

You may have had trouble in the past when your team is forced out of its regular position, like when your party is surprised. Part of constructing a good team involves making sure that your party can still function even when someone is out of position. This can largely be accomplished by equipping your heroes with abilities they wouldn't normally use, just in case.

-Examples:
The Arbalest greatly prefers to be in the back, in positions 3 or 4; if she is forcefully moved to the front, then she becomes useless and you would have to waste a turn moving her. That's why you should give her the skill 'Blindfire'. Even though Blindfire is sub-optimal most of the time compared to her main attack, 'Sniper Shot', it'll come in handy in those situations.

Same idea; it's good to have Holy Lance on your Crusaders, so that if they end up out of position, it won't be as much of an issue. Holy Lance also has the added benefit of moving the Crusader forward by 1. Abilities like Holy Lance that also move your character's positions are useful in general for creating shuffle-resilient teams. There is a list of these abilities in the next section.

The Leper, unfortunately, does not have any abilities at all to use when he is out of position (he is the only one like this). I recommend not using the Leper when you know you're going to be shuffled around, like when you're in pitch black darkness, or against particular bosses.

Dancing (And List of Movement Abilities)

Dancing refers to a team composition that abuses movement abilities. The go-to ability to abuse is usually 'Lunge' (Grave Robber). Dancing teams are incredibly shuffle resilient; they don't really care if they're surprised or shuffled.

Lunge is a powerful ability-- it does 40% bonus damage compared to Grave Robber's other ability, 'Thrown Dagger'. However, it also moves the Grave Robber forward 2 positions, meaning that she can normally only use it once. The idea of most dancing teams is to use other characters to push the Grave Robber back into position to use Lunge again and again.

-Example Dancing Team:

After using Lunge, the Highwayman's 'Duelist's Advance' and the Man-at-Arms' 'Rampart' abilities move themselves forward, too, pushing the Grave Robber backwards so that she can use Lunge again. If shuffled, the team all has abilities that push themselves forward so that the Vestal naturally ends up in the back again. If your heroes don't act in the correct order that you want, you still have other abilities you can use, like 'Point Blank Shot', 'Guard', and 'Pick to the Face'.

-List of Movement Abilities:

Hero

>>> Abilities

<<< Abilities

Reveal Stealth

Flashpowder
Flare
Tracking Shot
Intimidate
Illumination
Expose

Marking Synergy

Heroes that have the ability to mark:

Heroes that can do bonus damage against marked enemies:

Other, Minor Synergy

or
Antiquarian Guard + Highwayman Riposte
The Highwayman has an ability called 'Duelist's Advance', which makes him riposte enemies that strike him. You can combine this with the Antiquarian's 'Protect Me', which forces the Highwayman to guard her. This will funnel more attacks to the Highwayman, meaning that he ripostes more enemies. It also gives the Highwayman a +Prot buff, making him a little more durable. In a similar fashion, the Antiquarian's guard also synergizes with the Flagellant, as the Flagellant benefits from taking damage.


Jester Ballad + Leper
A fool and his king. The Leper is strong and tanky, but he has a downside-- he has low accuracy. The Jester has an ability called 'Battle Ballad', which buffs the entire team with accuracy, crit, and speed, and it helps alleviate the Leper's downside. Or you could just equip the Leper with accuracy trinkets.


Occultist Heal + Plague Doctor Cure
The Occultist's healing move, 'Wyrd Reconstruction' has some downsides. One downside is that it can cause bleeding. If that worries you, you can bring the Plague Doctor along as well, because she can cure bleed with 'Battlefield Medicine'.


Plague Doctor Gas + Hellion Yawp
You can stun all 4 ranks. Quadra-stun.

or
Gatling Gun
Point Blank Shot does bonus damage, but it moves the Highwayman backwards, and he also has to be in position 1. Having 2 Highwaymen in the front enables you to endlessly abuse Point Blank Shot. This strategy is improved upon with the Shieldbreaker, because her "point blank" abilities have better reach.


Religious Classes
They're all religious. That doesn't mean much, but the Vestal has a camping skill that gives +15% prot to religious characters for 4 battles.


Stacking Dodge Buffs
Why didn't Reynauld just... DODGE?

Significant Camping Skills

With good use of camping skills, you may never have to use the Tavern/Abbey to heal stress, or the Sanitarium to cure disease, saving you a lot of gold.

Prevent Nighttime Ambush:

Cure Disease:

Party-Wide Stress-Heals:
Zealous Speech
Quarantine
Revel (medicinal herbs can remove the debuff)
Therapy Dog
Gallows Humor
Every Rose has its Thorns & Mockery
Party-Wide Buffs:
Tactics & Weapons Practice
Marching Plan

Sorted by Health/Tankiness

The specific health values are taken from level 5 heroes, but the order is the same regardless.

High Health (55-63)

Medium Health (43-47)

Low Health (35-38)

I have glass bones and paper skin (29)

Who Should I Bring to the Ruins?

Bonus DMG vs. Unholy.

Blight is effective.

You can use knockback, pull, and shuffle abilities to move enemies out of position, forcing them to use weaker attacks. Enemies such as the Cultist Brawler [darkestdungeon.gamepedia.com], Bone Defenders [darkestdungeon.gamepedia.com], Bone Courtier [darkestdungeon.gamepedia.com], and Bone Arbalist. [darkestdungeon.gamepedia.com]

Veteran Dungeons
The Bone Captain[darkestdungeon.gamepedia.com] can be countered with a strong stun, and/or with a tanky character in position 1.

Champion Dungeons
The Bone Bearer [darkestdungeon.gamepedia.com] can be countered by using blight attacks, because enemies that die to blight don't leave corpses, and therefor cannot be resurrected by him.

Who Should I Bring to the Cove?

Bonus DMG vs Eldritch.

Bonus DMG vs Unholy. There are only a couple of unholy enemies that appear in the cove, but they are very high-priority targets. Specifically, I'm talking about the Drowned Thrall [darkestdungeon.gamepedia.com].

Blight is effective.

Veteran Difficulty

The Uca Crusher [darkestdungeon.gamepedia.com] inflicts a powerful bleed, so you can counter it by bringing a Plague Doctor and using 'Battlefield Medicine' to cure bleed. In fact, doing this enables you to infinitely stall off of the Uca Crusher.

Champion Difficulty
(Bring Medicinal Herbs for Hellion's 'Revel')
The Squiffy Ghast[darkestdungeon.gamepedia.com] can be countered by bringing stress-healing heroes. You might also consider bringing Laundanum, a usually not very useful provision item.

Who Should I Bring to the Weald?

Bonus damage vs Human and Eldritch.

Bleed is effective.
(cure disease camping skills)
The Weald is one of the more likely places to catch a disease.

The enemies here take advantage of marking synergy. Fungal Scratchers [darkestdungeon.gamepedia.com] will focus on marked heroes and use a more powerful attack, 'Rend the Marked', against them. The Arbalest's 'Flare' ability removes marks.

Alternatively, instead of removing marks, you can choose to tank the damage. These are heroes that can apply a +PROT buff to themselves, and even Mark themselves, too. The Flagellant in particular benefits from being marked, because taking damage allows him to use his powerful healing abilities.

Veteran Dungeons
(is also good at tanking)
Besides getting 'Rend the Marked' to death, the other way you're likely to die in the weald is to the Unclean Giant, [darkestdungeon.gamepedia.com] and his powerful 'Treebranch Smackdown' ability. The Man-at-Arms' Guard ability applies such a strong +PROT buff, that it allows him to eat crit Treebranch Smackdowns for breakfast.

Champion Dungeons
The Hateful Virago [darkestdungeon.gamepedia.com] can be countered by using bleed attacks, because enemies that die to bleed don't leave corpses for her to transform into mushrooms that block healing.

Who Should I Bring to the Warrens?

Bonus damage vs Human and Beast.

Bleed is effective.
(Cure Disease camping skills)
It's really easy to get diseased here from the curios and Swine Wretches [darkestdungeon.gamepedia.com].

Veteran Dungeons

The Swinetaur[darkestdungeon.gamepedia.com] can be countered with a strong stun, or by using the Man-at-Arms to guard and take the hit.

Champion Dungeons
(they can reach the back)
There is an enemy named the Swine Skiver [darkestdungeon.gamepedia.com] that needs to be killed immediately.

Who Should I Bring to the Courtyard? (DLC)

Bleed is effective.

Taking a lot of stress damage is basically unavoidable, because you run into enemy compositions that have too many stress-dealers in them, like multiple mosquitoes[darkestdungeon.gamepedia.com] or Manservants[darkestdungeon.gamepedia.com]. Also, heroes that have the crimson curse can stress each other out. On the other hand, there are some curio interactions that greatly assist in managing stress.

The Vestal and the Man-at-Arms improve your team's survivability. Because the Courtyard is difficult, playing it safe with them isn't a bad idea.

The Courtyard is brutal, but your progress is saved, so even if you have to abandon the quest, the next time that you return you will resume from the spot that you left off at. It may take multiple visits to reach the boss, but when you finally do, you can create a different team specifically for that boss.

More Detailed/Lenient Position Chart

Not sure if this is the best way to display this information. Hopefully you can decipher it easily enough.

• At least 3 non-movement abilities are required for that spot to show up on the chart.
  
• Ability = Gives you a general idea of what you'd be doing in that spot, because abilities are limited.
  
• Smaller portrait = Not the ideal position, but still possible.
  
• Trinket = There's a trinket that incentivizes that spot.

Position 4

Position 3

Position 2

Position 1

Specific Boss Fights (Spoilers)

Necromancer:
Boss Info:

• He can AOE stress your team.
  
• He can damage the front 2 positions, or the back 2.
  
• Every time he attacks, he summons a skeleton in front of him.

Strategy:

• Try to kill the skeletons that he summons at the same time, so that they don't become overwhelming.
  
• In veteran+ dungeons, you may want to bring a strong stun, because he has a chance of summoning a Bone Captain.

Prophet:
Boss Info:

• He sits in position 4, behind 4 wooden pews. Destroying the pews awards bonus gold after the battle, but is optional.
  
• At the beginning of every turn, he will mark spots on your team. At the end of the turn, those spots will take massive damage from falling rubble.
  
• He can also inflict blight and stress.

Strategy:

• Bring a Man-at-Arms to Guard your heroes from falling rubble.
  
• Bringing an Occultist to cast 'Weakening Curse' on the Prophet in order to apply a -DMG debuff is very effective, because it lowers the damage of the falling rubble.
  
• You can also spend a turn moving one your heroes to manipulate who takes the brunt of the falling rubble.

Siren:
Boss Info:

• She will attempt to mind control a member of your team.
  
• Sometimes she also summons fish enemies to aid her.

Strategy:

• Bringing an Abomination or Antiquarian (they have low debuff resist) to get mind controlled by her is a good thing because they aren't very threatening. The Abomination does not transform to attack you, instead he just heals himself, for some reason.
  
• The Arbalest's 'Flare' ability increases your party's debuff resist, lowering the chance of getting mind controlled.
  
• You can also bring Holy Water provisions and drink them for the fight, because they increase debuff resist.

Drowned Crew:
Boss Info:

• This boss counts as Unholy.
  
• They will summon an Anchorman, who will attempt to 'Anchor' one of your heroes, pulling them to the front and covering them with chains. While they are chained, they take stress damage, and the Crew will rapidly heal. You can break free by killing the Anchorman, but another one will be summoned. On higher difficulties, it is difficult to out-damage the healing.
  
• They can also inflict bleed, but for the most part they attempt to win by slowly stressing your team out.

Strategy:

• If a hero becomes virtuous, they will become immune to the anchor.
  
• It is possible to pull the Crew in front of their Anchorman, trapping the Anchorman in position 4 where he can't do anything. (+Movement% Trinket Required)
  
• If you choose not to cheese it with virtuous heroes or by pulling with movement trinkets, then you can focus down the Anchorman with a Crusader or Leper, and by stunning him, in order to limit the amount of healing the Drowned Crew receives.

Hag:
Boss Info:

• She sits in positions 3 & 4, behind a cauldron.
  
• She will kidnap one of your heroes, and throw then in her cauldron, cooking them alive. It is possible to free the hero by attacking the cauldron, but when they reach Death's Door, they will escape automatically and end up in the front of your party.

Strategy:

• Make sure that all of your heroes can target position 3 or 4.
  
• Ignore the hero that is being cooked alive, and just focus down the Hag.

Brigand Pounder:
Boss Info:

• The cannon will do massive damage at the end of every turn, unless you stun or kill the Matchman.
  
• At the beginning of every turn, the cannon will summon more Brigands, including another Matchman, if one does not currently exist.
  
• The cannon has very high resistances to everything (except marking).

Strategy:

• Make sure that your team can target every position, just so if one of your heroes misses the Matchman, you have another who can finish him off.
  
• Go all-out offensive, killing or stunning all of the Brigands every turn. If you can manage that, then you won't even need healing.
  
• Slowly, but steadily, deal chip damage to the Cannon after all of the Brigands are dealt with each turn.

Swine Prince/King/God:
Boss Info:

• There is a little pig in the back named Wilbur. He will mark someone on your team, and then the Swine King will attack the marked person for lots of damage.
  
• DO NOT ATTACK the little pig until after the Swine King is defeated, because it makes the Swine King angry.

Strategy:

• Use a Man-at-Arms to Guard the marked heroes.
  
• Alternatively, you can use the Arbalest's 'Flare' ability to remove the marks. The Swine King will still attack a random target, but it will be for less damage.

Formless/Unstable/Inchoate Flesh:
Boss Info:

• The Flesh is 4 seperate entities that share a healthbar.
  
• Every turn, the entities randomly morph into a different form. I'm going to list them:
  
• Head - inflicts bleed
  
• Spine - inflicts stun
  
• Heart - heals itself
  
• Butt - inflicts blight
  
• The heart is a weakspot, when it is available to attack.
  
• This boss hurts a lot.

Strategy:

• Bleed and blight abilities that hit multiple ranks, like 'Hound's Harry' are particularly effective. Just be careful, because all of the heroes that have AOE DOT abilities like this just so happen to be squishy.

Random Encounter Boss Fights (Spoilers)

Collector (Hallway)
Boss info:

• Any hallway battle has a small chance of being the Collector, with the chance increasing on higher level missions.
  
• It will summon up to 3 different kinds of heads. I'm going to list them:
  
• The Collected Vestal will heal or buff a random member of its team.
  
• The Collected Man-at-Arms will guard a random member of its team.
  
• The Collected Highwayman will attack you, with a high crit chance, and prioritizes marked targets.
  
• You are rewarded special 'severed head' trinkets when defeating him, and if you already have all 3 of them, you'll get a lot of money instead.

Strategy:

• Prioritize killing the Collected Highwaymen, and THEN attack the Collector when there are no Highwaymen left.
  
• Ignore the Collected Vestal and Man-at-Arms because they have no offensive abilities.
  
• If a Man-at-Arms is protecting something you want to attack, you can get him to stop by stunning him.
  
• Stuns against the Collector itself are also powerful, when they work.

Brigand Vvulf (Event)
Boss info:

• This boss has a chance of showing up in the form of an event, but only if you have at least four level 5 heroes.
  
• If you ignore the event, 2 of your building upgrades will randomly be destroyed.
  
• You don't fight the boss immediately, you will have to walk through some hallways and kill Brigands first.
  
• Similar to the Prophet, he marks positions and then those positions explode for loads of damage.
  
• He summons Brigands to help him during the fight.
  
• He has a pile of bombs that you can attack, but I don't recommend doing it because it hurts your heroes to attack it and also he just replaces it afterwards.

Strategy:

• Try to enter the fight with fully upgraded heroes.
  
• Bring a Man-at-Arms to guard the marked positions.
  
• If you feel like you're not ready to fight Vvulf, then you can send low-level heroes on a suicide mission. Vvulf will go away for a while, and won't destroy any of your building upgrades.

Shrieker (Event)
Boss info:

• The boss flies away after 4 rounds. All you have to do is survive, though.
  
• It has 3 actions per round.
  
• The most dangerous thing it can do is CRIT peck you for 30 DMG.
  
• When it flies away, it deals 50 stress damage to everyone.
  
• If you can kill its nest in the 4 rounds, then you'll get a bunch of bonus gold.

Strategy:

• Attacking the Shrieker isn't necessary.
  
• A marking team is particularly effective for killing the nest within 4 rounds for bonus gold.

Shambler is really hard (Hallway/Curio)
Boss info:

• Your party will always be surprised, and he will occasionally shuffle your party, so a shuffle resilient party is required.
  
• He does AOE damage, inflicting bleed and blight on your whole party. It's not that bad if you bring a lot of Holy Water, Bandage, and Antivenom provisions.
  
• He summons 2 tentacles in the front with high speed and prot, and do massive amounts of stress damage. If destroyed, the Shambler resummons them.

Dying of heart attacks is a serious possibility. Here are some strategies:

• A town event, like one that gives increased virtue chance or allows high-level characters to go on low-level dungeons makes for a good opportunity to do some shambler hunting.
  
• If you get the opportunity to fight him in an apprentice or veteran dungeon, go for it because it's easier on those difficulties, and your low-level heroes are easier to replace, if they die.
  
• Consider preemptively scrambling your team, so that when you're surprised, you might be re-scrambled into more favorable positions.
  
• Use the Hellion to 'Barbaric Yawp' the 2 tentacles, and if she's shuffled into positions 3 or 4, you can just use 'Breakthrough' instead.
  
• Use a marking team to focus down the shambler quickly.
  
• Use -Stress DMG camping skills, like the Crusader's 'Zealous Speech' and the Houndmaster's 'Therapy Dog'.
  
• The torchlight level is always 0, so trinkets like the Moon Ring will be more effective.
  
• Cheese it by getting all 4 of your heroes virtuous. This can be accomplished by stalling infinitely, passing turns to get your heroes stressed out, and if they become afflicted instead, stress-healing them back down to zero and trying again. This takes a long time, particularly if you don't have +virtue chance trinkets.
  
• Cheesing it with the Man-at-Arm's dodge buffs may also be possible.

Darkest Dungeon (Spoilers)

Because of how risky the Darkest Dungeon is, try to go in with fully upgraded heroes, and buy all of the provisions that you can. There is no nighttime ambush in the Darkest Dungeon, so don't worry about that. Don't worry about Shovels and Keys, either.

DD1- We Are The Flame- Shuffling Horror:
There is a map[hydra-media.cursecdn.com] to make this area a little easier.
Before reaching the boss, Rapturous Cultists[darkestdungeon.gamepedia.com] are the perfect enemies to stall on, because they have no offensive abilities-- they only heal or guard. With stalling and camping, you can make sure that you're in near-perfect condition when you reach the boss.
The boss:

• Scrambles your team a lot, so bring shuffle-resilient heroes (not leper).
  
• Applies a two-target bleed.
  
• Does AOE stress damage, which also lowers the Torchlight by 25.
  
• Summons a single Cultist Priest or Defensive Growth to help it. I think you should ignore this.

DD2- Lighting the Way- Templar Impaler and Templar Warlord:
There is a map[hydra-media.cursecdn.com] to make this area much easier.

• There are 3 boss fights in this quest. One of them is an Impaler + 2 Polyps, another is a Warlord + 2 Flesh Hounds, and the last is an Impaler + a Warlord (bottom-right boss fight). The Impaler + Warlord fight is the hardest, so you may want to consider getting that out of the way first.
  
• During the double-templar fight, it is optimal to focus down one of them first, particularly the Templar Warlord, because it has less health.
  
• You must equip the 'Talisman of the Flame' trinkets that were awarded to you for completing the first Darkest Dungeon quest. Because there are only 3 of them, you must guard the fourth party member when fighting the bosses.
  
• They have 2 actions per round, and usually at least one of them is 'Revelation', which doesn't hurt you if you've equipped the 'Talisman of the Flame' trinkets. This means that you can significantly lower their damage output by stunning them after they use Revelation. To clarify, you can sometimes get them in a loop: Revelation (for 0 DMG) > Stun > Revelation again > Stun.
  
• The Templar Impaler/Warlord are both part beast, so the Houndmaster is slightly more effective.
  
• They deal massive amounts of Blight, so you should buy all of the Antivenoms.
  
• If moved out of position, like with 'Rampart' (Man-at-Arms), they can't use their powerful Blight attacks.
  
• Don't forget to actually activate the altars after defeating each boss.

DD3- Belly of the Beast- Mammoth Cyst & White Cell Stalk:
There is a map[hydra-media.cursecdn.com] to make this area much easier.

• This area is massive.
  
• The White Cell Stalk is a priority target, as it can teleport your team to a random location in the dungeon, increasing the amount of time that this quest takes. I recommend using a lot of heroes that can hit rank 4. If you can make an entire party of heroes that can hit rank 4, that'd be great.
  
• The Mammoth Cyst will always use one of its two actions to re-summon the White Cell Stalk, if it's dead. This means that you can infinitely stun-lock it, and it'll never attack. For clarification, you can get it in a loop like this: 1. You stun the Cyst, 2. You kill the White Cell, 3. The Cyst summons a new White Cell, 4. Repeat.
  
• The Plague Doctor's 'Blinding Gas' ability, combined with her 'Blasphemous Vial' trinket is incredibly good here, as it stuns both the Mammoth Cyst and the White Cell Stalk.
  
• The Occultist's ceiling spaghetti ability is really good for a similar reason-- it hits both.
  
• The Hellion and Flagellant are the only heroes that can hit position 4 from rank 1.

DD4- Hell is in the Heart- Heart of Darkness:
The hard part is over, it doesn't really matter who you choose to bring.

• Food and torches are not required at all. You can adjust the torchlight level in the first room, and then it'll remain the same from then on.
  
• First, you fight the Ancestor. He multiplies into 4 of himself, and you just have to kill them. Eventually, he will summon Imperfect Reflections of himself, and you have to kill those to actually deal damage to him.
  
• The Ancestor is part Human.
  
• Next, the Ancestor will get rid of all of his clones, and he'll just bounce around between positions 1-4. Being able to hit multiple positions is convenient.
  
• Finally, he will morph into a Heart of Darkness. At first, the Heart of Darkness is gestating, and doesn't do anything. While gestating, attacking the heart actually heals your characters, but it has a chance to inflict them with blight. A common strategy is to drink Holy Water at this time, and then attack the Heart to heal back up to full health.
  
• The Heart of Darkness wakes up, and you have to kill it. The only special thing it does is force you to choose 2 heroes who have to die. It makes a hero die after it hits a certain health threshold-- which is when it is at 2/3 health and 1/3 health respectively. Just sacrifice heroes that have gotten afflicted during the battle, or don't work well in the front positions.

(there is an achievement if you bring Reynauld and Dismas to this quest)

Trivia Fact: It's possible to avoid the 2 mandatory deaths in DD4. You can do this by only bringing 2 heroes to the quest instead of 4 (this makes it much harder, though), or you can do a lot of damage in a single attack, so much that it skips the 2/3 and 1/3 health thresholds. Usually this is done with a Leper and 3 Plague Doctors buffing the Leper to an insane degree (and CRITing).

Crimson Court Bosses (DLC, Spoilers)

Again, the team that you explore the Crimson Court with doesn't have to be the team that you fight the boss with, because it saves your progress in the dungeon.

Crocodilian:

• It has 2 actions, but one of those actions is usually used to move to another posiition.
  
• Being able to hit multiple positions is convenient.
  
• When it is in the front, it uses 'Teeth Rake', which pulls a hero to the front and inflicts bleed.
  
• When it is in the back, it uses an AOE stress attack.
  
• When it is in the middle, it uses 'Submerge', which is always followed by 'Apex Predator', and it hurts a lot if you don't interupt it with a stun. If you constantly push/pull it so that it's not in the middle, it can't use Submerge, and therefor can't Apex Predator either.

Fanatic (hallway): Only has a chance to appear if you start a non-coutyard quest with multiple crimson curse-infected heroes.
He is basically a much stronger version of the Hag. I don't have much experience with him, but I've heard that he is very hard. For now, I recommend ignoring the pyre and just focusing him down with a bleed team.
Boss Info:

• You are warned of his appearance in a dungeon via the loading screen.
  
• He bounces between positions 1&2 and 3&4.
  
• He has 3 actions per round, and can buff his own PROT.
  
• He can stun & knockback anyone.
  
• He has a small amount of marking synergy, marking your team and doing bonus DMG to them.
  
• Like the Hag, he will kidnap one of your heroes and damage them every turn, and when they reach death's door, your hero will be deposited back to you onto position 1, and then he'll steal someone else. Careful that this doesn't ruin your party formation too much.
  
• He has a strong single-target bleed.
  
• Almost all of his attacks do some stress damage.
  
• It is possible to dodge his kidnapping attack.
  
• If his pyre is completely destroyed, he resorts to using a relatively weak AOE attack that also does some stress damage.
  
• He is guaranteed to surprise your party when you run into him.
  
• If you retreat from combat, the hero that is on the pyre won't retreat with you, and even then, the next hallway encounter will be the Fanatic again, anyways.

Baron:
There is a map[hydra-media.cursecdn.com] to make this mission easier, if you want.
The Baron is like a 'cup game'. He hides inside one of four eggs, and you don't know which one he is in. What you should do is open one egg at a time, and then kill the enemy that is inside before moving on to the next egg. The Baron likes to use an attack that hits all 4 ranks of your team, so Riposte is particularly effective.


Viscount:
There is a map[hydra-media.cursecdn.com] to make this easier, if you want.
I can't think of any specific heroes that are particularly good against the Viscount, besides bleeds. The strategy for the Viscount is to destroy the three hanging 'Bloodbags' that are in positions 2-4, because the Viscount will take bites out of them in order to buff himself. Apparently some people have had success ignoring the bloodbags and focusing down the Viscount, though.


Countess:
Another map[hydra-media.cursecdn.com] here.
Final Boss. The Countess can:

• Inject your heroes with an egg that does damage over time, and later explodes. (note: the egg won't do anything if you never attack with that character-- use other abilities if possible)
  
• Shuffle one of your heroes.
  
• Deal AOE stress damage.
  
• Deal damage.
  
• Stun 2 heroes at the same time.
  
• Give herself a +PROT buff.
  
• Sometimes she wastes her turns by constantly changing forms.

I cheesed this fight by stacking +DODGE buffs with the Man-at-Arms. The Man-at-Arms also has some really nice party-wide camping buffs that I used as well. Without cheesing the fight, I would imagine that a bleed team would be effective. Don't be afraid to run away from this fight if things look bad, because the only penalty is stress.


Garden Guardian:
After defeating the Countess, you get this repeatable quest in the Courtyard that allows you to get all of the exclusive trinkets that you missed. He is the only enemy that the 'Sculptor's Tools' trinket works on, if you have it.

• His arm in position 4 constantly stresses and bleeds your team. Destroy this.
  
• His body does nothing, unless his shield is destroyed. Don't completely destroy his shield-- it makes the boss angry.
  
• His shield automatically defends the body when it is on the ground. It flies into the air, giving you an opportunity to attack the body. The next turn, it will slam back on to the ground. It only hits characters in the front of your team, and has a chance to stun or move them backwards.
  
• The boss is immune to everything excepting marking.

Unfortunately, this boss takes a really long time to kill. He isn't very threatening as long as you destroy his arm, though. You may want to consider equipping +move resist trinkets on your frontline. When the boss is guarding himself, you can use that time to heal or buff your team, and AOE attacks like the Leper's 'Hew' and the Crusader's 'Zealous Accusation' can bypass the shield when it is guarding the boss, which makes the boring fight go by a little faster.

[Shadowlurker4897]

I would recommend you to try occultists stun and you might enjoy him in rank 2 aswell!

[Shadowcran]

Excellent Guide

[Ghostwish]

Or people who reply to year old comments, jfc...

[grail666]

@Ghostwish For people who wish to play the original Darkest Dungeon, obviously.

[Evo ♥♪]

As a new player I appreciate guides like this a lot

[Ghostwish]

Why? The game is so old we're waiting on the sequel.

[Mr Affluenza]

Are you ever going to update this buddy?

[Thrandir]

Nice job very helpful

[Whiteout]

I really liked the presentation/ format of this guide. It's clear, easy to use, and professional. Thanks

[Bunger]

I'm not sure why this isn't included in minor synergy, but plague doctor's emboldening vapours go great with hellion