If players want to get far in Darkest Dungeon, they have to think carefully about each step they take. Here are the Weald’s best heroes.
Darkest Dungeon was made by Red Hook Studios and came out in 2016. It had a unique look and challenge that made it appealing to both Lovecraft fans and strategy fans. Darkest Dungeon is a game with four main areas, not counting DLCs and the Dungeon itself, and a focus on careful planning, building teams, and being careful at every step.
Darkest Dungeon 2 is more forgiving when a character dies than the first game, which is about to leave early access. If a player puts the wrong hero in the wrong place, they can lose hours of progress, so they should think carefully about every choice they make.
Hellion
Hellion is just a good choice for the Weald, just as she is a good choice for anywhere that needs high damage. She can use bleed, a frontline stun, and Iron Swan to get to position 4. The Weald has a lot of blight and bleed to watch out for, so Hellion’s ability to heal herself can be used a lot, and her high damage makes quick work of any weaker enemies. She also does well against the Hateful Virago, one of the Champion enemies of the Weald, because she tends to stay in the back.
Hellion can have trouble with high-PROT enemies like the Fungal Scratcher, but her bleed skills can cover most of that. She is also very soft, which can make the Unclean Giant, who travels with the Virago, very scary. Because of this, to protect her, it’s best to have guard through either Houndmaster or Man-at-Arms.
Houndmaster
Houndmaster can take care of almost all of the threats in the Weald. He does more damage to certain monsters, like the Rabid Gnasher and the Unclean Giant. Houndmaster also has a good chance to bleed enemies with more health, and he has a guard that can stop attacks like the Treebranch Smackdown from the Unclean Giant. He also has some synergy with marks, which can be useful against bigger enemies, and his camping skills are almost never bad.
In reality, there isn’t much reason not to use Houndmaster in the Weald or other places with low bleed resistance. He depends on mark more than, say, Flagellant does, but his ability to help more than makes up for that.
Man-at-Arms
Even though he is best in Champion Dungeons, the Man-at-Arms is a valuable member of any party because of how useful he is. A Man-at-Arms can be used almost anywhere, even in the Darkest Dungeon. The Man-at-Arms has a stun, a reposition, a knockback, mark synergy, a self-mark, a guard, buffs for allies, debuffs for enemies, stress resistance, a riposte if players need it, and is also very tanky.
His camping skills are easier and give him and his team a wide range of buffs, but his damage is still not very good. He can do some good damage with the right items, but his main job is to make his team impossible to kill. When paired with a healer like Vestal or Occultist, Man-at-Arms can happily take a Treebranch Smackdown and then ask for more. He’s just a little weak to bleed and blight since PROT doesn’t stop it, so watch out for that.
Arbalest
If they are allowed to, Weald enemies can mark heroes so that they take a lot of damage. The Hateful Virago is the worst of these enemies. Arbalest is one of the few heroes who can stop this. Since he can clear marks, stuns, and stealth all at once. She can also help healers, make it easier to hit slippery targets, and nuke anything that’s marked.
Her camping skills are good, but the best one is Restring Crossbow. Which makes her damage much stronger. She can’t work in the front line, so if Unclean Giant’s Confusion Spores move her. The next smackdown will be a harsh reminder of what’s going on. After that, Arbalest is just like a ranged Bounty Hunter, but he moves less and clears more status effects.
Also, people who bought the Musketeer DLC should know that the two heroes are the same in every way except for how they look. In this way, Musketeer is a good replacement.
Plague Doctor
Even though there are a lot of high blight resist cards in the Weald, Plague Doctor is still a good choice. Her ability to heal blight and bleeding is useful, as is the fact that she can easily stun everyone. But Emboldening Vapors, which increases a hero’s damage and speed, is one of her most important abilities. It can used on Hellion to kill the Crone before she debuffs, on Man-at-Arms to set up Bolster or Defender, or just to let Leper focus on accuracy and become a killing machine.
Plague Doctor doesn’t have much to say about it, to be honest. Her camping skills aren’t very good. But her disease cures can save her a lot of valuable gold. Since Weald enemies have low resistance to stuns, her stuns are consistent and useful. Blight can still be useful against some enemies, and corpse clear is great when the Hateful Virago can use corpses. There are just not that many times when Plague Doctor is a bad idea.
Leper
Leper can play in two ways: Revenge or Withstand. Revenge makes up for his bad damage and accuracy, letting him do big numbers of damage. This can let Leper tear through almost anything with the right quirks and buffs in Slope Game. Withstand increases Leper’s resistances and marks him as a tank, making him more like a normal tank. Fungal Scratchers and other enemies that focus on marks can be a problem, but Solemnity lets him stay alive while the healer works on other things. The rest of his moves are very simple. He has two attacks, a clear stealth, a clear corpse, and a self-heal to keep him alive.
His camping skills are interesting because he has two stress heals that cost either health or allied stress. But Reflection and Bloody Shroud are his main skills. Reflection gives Revenge a big boost to its stats, and Bloody Shroud gives a wide range of resistances to go with Withstand. Leper is a simple hero, but don’t be fooled by his huge amount of health and ability to kill an enemy in one hit.
Darkest Dungeon is now available on PC, PlayStation 4, PlayStation Vita, iOS, Nintendo Switch, and Xbox One.
