Got 100% Trophies - Good Game / My Trophy Thoughts

[ByteTyson]

Hey folks, wanted to share my thoughts. First off, this game is really a "rare gem" if you like  tactical / turn based strategy games.   I highly recommend it and I had a blast playing it and can't wait for a sequel.  This guide is for those that are considering playing Dungeon of N but are doing some research beforehand to see if there are any trophies that are a pain in the ass.  I strongly encourage researchers to 'take the plunge' and have no fear:  This thread will help you through and nothing is too hard on this one.  Now onto the trophy thoughts:

 

1)  Hardest trophy is beating the game on "Nightmare" mode.   There are about 3 or 4 battles that are a challenge.   I played the game immediately on Nightmare and learned it so you do not need to do a "Normal" playthrough first to learn the mechanics.  I recommend two runs:  first on Nightmare mode, then 2nd on Normal mode (called Tavern Song) with Ironman on.  Consult this guide for your Nightmare run if you decide to go that route first:  https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2896942669.  You can immediately start on Nighmare AND IronMan if you want, just make sure to save scum.  The game saves every turn.  If all characters 'die' in a battle then the save will be deleted, so just keep backups.  Best to backup the initial 'planning phase' of a battle where you get to place your characters before actually beginning the battle.

2)  Three fights I found the hardest:

• End of Tutorial - Believe it or not, the first 'real' fight at the end of the tutorial after spinning the wheel of fortune.  Since I was still in learning mode I found this to be quite a challenge.
  • Don't use Overwatch; at first it seems valuable, but you rarely if ever end up using it as a strategy.
  • Imperative to use your AOE skils effecitvely to beat this fight:  Elf arrow and Wizard AOE must hit 2to 3 mobs to successfully beat this
  • Thief sucks early on but is a beast late game.  He is a glass cannon early game
• Vanna White / Jax Splayjack - Chapter 5 - This one and the Losax fight are the two hardest in my view.   Imperative you use Randomia Gauge (level 2 or level 4) to revive folks.  Focus on Vanna White since she charms.  Ignore Jax until he is the last one standing.   He has insane dodge and runs around AoE'ing folks from afar.   By now you should know:  Crowd Control is king in this game.  Imperative to use Stuns, Knockdown,Freeze etc to control mobs, otherwise you will lose on Nightmare.  Check out Steam forums of the game for additional tips on this fight if you are having trouble or reach out to me here.
• Losax Boss Fight - He gives you a party wide AoE debuff that eats HP each character turn.   The amount of damage done increases each turn.   It can be 'cured' only by dying or using the Priest 'cure' spell.   Use Thief 'caltrops' to Immobilize Losax.  Each turn he 'moves' and creates an Image of himself that must be killed.   By using Caltrops you can prevent him from moving and reduce the creation of new mobs you need to kill.
• Honorable Mention "priest quest" Orgy Fight - This happens in the cellar of the basement as the last step to complete the priest quest and get an achievement.  This is probably the first time you will truly encounter a hard fight. Alot of AoE wizards you need to control or burn down fast to prevent them from mauling you.  Also the Bruiser adds can be rough and must be crowd controlled.  It took me two tries to beat this one.  Since you will likely pick Priest for your companion, you will encounter this on Nightmare mode which makes it tough.

3) Priest is probably the best "Companion" to choose for your Nightmare run.   Not probably:  on Nightmare you need all the healing you can get and she has healing in spades with 3 different types of heals.  You'd be crazy not to select her during your Nighmare run.

4) Prioritize putting points into Agility for your first two to three levels.  Attribution Point allocation and Talent selection is VERY important on Nightmare.   I can't emphasize this enough:  you must pick Talents with Crowd Control to beat Nightmare.  Don't 'overallocate' to Agility either.  When you go to the tab to assign attribute points after you level up, that screen shows only your 'base stats' and does not factor in your adjusted stats after gear.   So make sure to review your precision values with gear on the gear tab prior to assigning points so you don't over invest in agility and end up with precision > 100.

5)  Ogre, Barbarian, and Wizard are your top three damage dealers overall.  Once you get your precision close to 100, start dropping all points into Impact or Constitution to beef them up.  Also for their 'passive' talents pick the ones that increase Strength, Impact,etc.   Thief becomes the best 'single target' damage dealer late game, but you really need to be at level 8 to 10 before he opens up.

6)  Death is for wimps - Complete the game without ever having one of your characters knocked out, this means that you cannot finish a battle with any character whose 'knockout' timer expires.   I did this on my Nightmare run.  Go into Combat settings and change the Knockout duration from 3 turns to 5 turns to give you more breathing room to heal folks when they are 'downed'.  Folks become 'downed' when their HP hits zero but you have X turns to reviive them and bring them back into battle with a heal.   I am NOT sure if this achievement still pops if you finish a battle while you still have a 'downed' character where their countdown is still > 0.  No character can actually die in this game, they will auto revive at the end of battle.  But this achievement worried me due to the wording of it so i always made sure to revive all characters before I killed the last mob to complete a battle.

7) To more easily get the achievements for "Help the Paladin" "Help the Bard" "Help the Priest" you must make a save point during a battle at the end of Chapter 2 as the game will auto transition to chapter 3 and 'force' you to make a choice.  There is a battle that automatically ensues after you kill the "dead thief" in Chapter 2.   Immediately following that you will have 4 orcs spawn and another battle will start.   Wait until you have one orc remaining and are about to kill it but make a manual Save here.  Immediately following this sequence you will have to choose your companion.   I waited until my 2nd Normal Ironman run to knock out these quests and achievements.  The final step in the Companion quest line begins after completing the Pharmagist quest in Chapter 4 for all 3 companions.  You can't miss it as you will automatically get stopped by an NPC when heading to the Lift/Stairs on floor 1 after leaving the Pharmagist from the main quest line 'turn in'.

8)  For the Mel Boots achievement, you MUST 'help' Mel with the tasks he gives you.  These tasks are not always side quests that show up in the quest log  The first one is (retrieve bottle of wine) but the others aren't.   Three things you must do: first, you must complete the 'wine' quest to retrieve a special bottle of wine in the basement.  Second, you must find the umbrella of resistances when doing the Pharmagist quest.   ignore the main quest ask to 'collect ingredients' and head to the Caves and get the umbrella by fighting a bunch of rats.   Third, when you meet with Mel in the late game a 2nd time (i think it is chapter 7 or 8)  you must AVOID going to the Prison but instead must go to the top floor called the Rooftop.  Your main quest will path and you will have two options and make sure to do the Prison portion 2nd AFTER you go to the Rooftop.

9)  Some people swear by putting points into Courage attribute to have higher initiative.  I found this to be a waste as i would often end up 'delaying turn' to let the mobs come to my tanks.  I found better use of precious attirbute points going into constitution/strength instead of courage.  If you want to boost courage, use gear/items instead.

10) Pyrrhic victory - Finish a combat with a level 3 injury on every character - I did this on my ironman playthrough during Chapter one.  Just let folks die during battle and let their 'knockout' time expire and they will 'revive' but have 3 Wounds after the battle ends.   Build up 3 Wounds across each character and don't heal the wounds then complete a battle.  Actually quite easy to do in Chapter 1 Tutorial around battles 3 to 5.  You don't need to 'start' the battle with 3 Wounds to get this to pop.  Only 'end' the battle, which means you can get this by letting somebody get downed that doesn't have 3 Wounds and let their knockout timer expire.  As long as everybody else has 3 Wounds when you complete the battle this will pop.

11) We come in peace - Kill the Golbargh.  I did this on my Nightmare run.  Follow a guide on steam to learn how to spawn him.   You must burn him down and control the skeleton 'healer' mobs so they don't heal him.  I beat this my first try but i needed to watch a video, etc. beforehand.

 

DLC 1 - Ruins of Limis (trophies included in Base Game trophies) - Easy, just follow a guide on Steam and make a save prior to 'choosing' the Necromancer vs Vampire choice.   Choose one side, get achievement, then reload save and choose the other side.

 

DLC 2 - Splat Jaypack Arenas - Standalone DLC initiated from the Main Menu.  

Staff cut Win a battle with a team of 4 or less characters in Normal Difficulty (or above).  I did this on the first battle with the rats/chickens.   I used Elf (for AoE), Wizard (AoE), Priest (ranged attack and heals) and Barbarian (AoE as well).

Final battle of Jaypack Arena is pretty tough but by this time you should know the game well and beat it.

 

DLC 3 - Back to the Futon

Cute Dungeon - Back to the Futon: Pick a cute decoration

Gloomy Dungeon - Back to the Futon: Pick a terrifying decoration

Mystical Dungeon - Back to the Futon: Pick a magical decoration

All three of these can be obtained at the same time if you make a manual save.   On the top floor of the Futon DLC (named The Tavern floor), there is a spot in the upper left of the map where you will come across two NPCs.  One of the NPCs will have cages and there will be a zombie, a venus fly trap, and some other mob in a cage.  Do NOT talk to these NPCs.  If you talk to them you will have to make a choice related to this trophy and it will lock you out of getting all three depending on when you last saved.  Instead, skip these NPCs and head south to engage in a battle where you have to disable two switches.  (The objective in your main questline should be completing 8 tasks and you should be on the  "Improve Treasures" objective criteria).  When you get to one final Mob left to kill, make a save.   After you kill the mob you will automatically be forced to make a selection.   Each of the three 'answers' aligns to the above mentioned three trophies.   After selecting your answer head back North and talk to the two NPCs and select their 'answer' that corresponds with the theme of the achievement (i.e. Cute vs Gloomy vs Mystical).   If your answer for each of the three questions aligns to the theme you will get the achievement to pop.   Manually reload your save and rinse and repeat to get all 3.

 

Hit snooze - Back to the Futon: make 10 enemies sleep

There is an item you will get in the Futon DLC (necklace or ring i believe) that will give you the ability to put enemies to sleep.  I put it on the dwarf.   Use this item throughout the DLC and the trophy will eventually pop.  You get the item rather early on.

 

Legendary brew -Back to the Futon: Drink 20 legendary potions

This one was a little scary for me as the game doesn't really tell you what constitutes a "Legendary Potion".  There are 'yellow' background healing potions but this DLC introduces a 'platinum' background consumable.   Since i wasn't clear on what the game counts as Legendary Potion, i would buy most all of the platinum ones and the legendary healing ones.  Then i would drink potions once i was near the end of a battle and had the battle won with only one or two Mobs remaining to complete the battle.  I did this through the mid to late game and eventually the trophy popped for me after i was about 80% through the DLC.

 

Hope this was helpful if you were on the fence about playing this game:  DON'T BE.  It is really fun and worth the time!

Edited May 1, 2023 by ByteTyson

[KennethMcCormick]

Wow. Nicely written and on point: nice! ?

 

My two cents, if they’re worth even that:

 

40 minutes ago, ByteTyson said:

• Vanna White / Jax Splayjack - Chapter 5 - This one and the Losax fight are the two hardest in my view.   Imperative you use Randomia Gauge (level 2 or level 4) to revive folks.  Focus on Vanna White since she charms.  Ignore Jax until he is the last one standing.   He has insane dodge and runs around AoE'ing folks from afar.   By now you should know:  Crowd Control is king in this game.  Imperative to use Stuns, Knockdown,Freeze etc to control mobs, otherwise you will lose on Nightmare.  Check out Steam forums of the game for additional tips on this fight if you are having trouble or reach out to me here.

 

I’d add: dispatch the two gobs on the right as soon as you’re beginning the fight: they’re basically a one hit kill, but if you let them live, they quickly become a nuisance. Otherwise, what ByteTyson says. Odds are Vanna will charm someone, but it’s only for one turn, most likely the one that includes you killing her, so that’s not too bad.

 

40 minutes ago, ByteTyson said:

9)  Some people swear by putting points into Courage attribute to have higher initiative.  I found this to be a waste as i would often end up 'delaying turn' to let the mobs come to my tanks.  I found better use of precious attirbute points going into constitution/strength instead of courage.  If you want to boost courage, use gear/items instead.

 

I’m one of them. I tried to keep the Priestess’ courage pretty high, so that she could begin any encounter by boosting everyone else's through her buffs. Second was the Ranger, for the same reason. Afterwards, it was either the Mage freezing a zone with her Icestorm or the Barbarian using three points to move / pounce-stun / yaaargh! or barrage any debuffing or zone attacking baddies thinking they were out of range (the fools), then the Ogre immediately before the Dwarf, for a throwing combo. It’s pretty aggressive, but it allowed me to control the battlefield from round one most of the time. Extremely useful against the jinx squads.

 

Don’t get me wrong, I’m not saying you should put everything in courage, but try to keep it just a tad higher than the mobs’. And regarding turn delay: I personally saw that as an incredible tactical strength, as it allows you to carefully build an extreme combo where you play twice in a row, last, then first, or at least before the enemies. With the mage, it can become quite devastating.

59 minutes ago, ByteTyson said:

Legendary brew -Back to the Futon: Drink 20 legendary potions

This one was a little scary for me as the game doesn't really tell you what constitutes a "Legendary Potion".  There are 'yellow' background healing potions but this DLC introduces a 'platinum' background consumable.   Since i wasn't clear on what the game counts as Legendary Potion, i would buy most all of the platinum ones and the legendary healing ones.  Then i would drink potions after i was at the end of a battle and had the battle won with only one or two Mobs remaining to complete the battle.  I did this through the mid to late game and eventually the trophy popped for me after i was about 80% through the DLC.

 

Personally, I made a mental note of what was sold where and what I had in my inventory, and when the total reached 20, I uploaded a save, went on a shopping spree, equipped everything, started a BS fight, drank whatever I could, popped the trophy and reloaded.

[ByteTyson]

Thanks for contributing KennethMcCormick!  You were my inspiration for sure to persevere through the game as I saw you were first to 100% so i knew it was possible and that there weren't any bugged trophies!

 

Good recommendation on the Legendary Brew, i didn't even think of that!

 

Also, i never toyed with Courage builds, but what you say makes sense!  I developed a kind of tunnel vision early on using Barbarian/Ogre slap AoE that I got so used to delaying turn that I never really tested Courage builds but some folks swear by it for exactly the reason you mentioned.  I could see where the Priest Orgy fight it would be really beneficial to have Mage higher on the turn order for AoE stun.

 

Have you played Fantasy General 2 yet?  I highly recommend that one if you liked this game.  More depth for sure, but if you are a fan of turn based strategy then Fantasy General 2 is mandatory.  I did a similar post in those forums.   I would say the challenge in Fantasy General 2 is harder for sure, but the satisfaction is immense getting 100%.   By far one of my most satisfying accomplishments was 100%'ing that one.

 

Oh and back to Dungeon of N - One other point to make:  Wizard builds.

 

Wizard is really a beast.  There are debates about what talents are the best.  Here is the key I found:  Many of her talents do NOT require precision checks, which means you can skip agility and ignore your precision stat.   The only early talent that does a Precision check is the 'slap' talent that has a knockdown enhancement talent as well.  Also her ice bolt does a precision check.  But there are three 'late game' skills that are 100% hits, no precision check:

 

Blizzard

Bunny

Snake

 

These three are 100% guaranteed to hit.  I respecced using an Oblivion Potion and removed her Slap skill and respecced her.  I put all points into Impact (Intelligence) and some Constition for late game.

Edited March 1, 2023 by ByteTyson

[KennethMcCormick]

Haven't played Fantasy General, no. Will have a look, thanks for the reco.

 

And yeah, I defo overused the bunny and the snake after freezing everyone . Some people go for the fire birds, and I did try them, but I wasn't sold, really. If you manage to kite your enemies to stand in line, you can have fun with a Mage’s Ray/ Elf’s Rainbow,  but that more context specific.

 

Still gave her a bit of Agility, not as much for precision but to go with the dodge skills and appropriate gear, for the once in a while wise guys that managed to sneak up on her.

Edited March 2, 2023 by KennethMcCormick
Typo

[KennethMcCormick]

On 01/03/2023 at 8:14 PM, ByteTyson said:

6)  Death is for wimps - Complete the game without ever having one of your characters knocked out, this means that you cannot finish a battle with any character whose 'knockout' timer expires.  [...] I am NOT sure if this achievement still pops if you finish a battle while you still have a 'downed' character where their countdown is still > 0.[...]

 

Just remembered I forgot about this one, yesterday, and it’s a pretty important one...

 

It’s actually OK for the sake of this trophy to end a fight with downed characters while their counter is > 0. It happened to me once, with a fight ending unexpectedly with the last enemy walking into a reaction hit, before I could heal everybody. Like the trophy description states, as long as you’re not knocked out, you’re good to go.

[ByteTyson]

On 3/2/2023 at 1:25 PM, KennethMcCormick said:

 

Just remembered I forgot about this one, yesterday, and it’s a pretty important one...

 

It’s actually OK for the sake of this trophy to end a fight with downed characters while their counter is > 0. It happened to me once, with a fight ending unexpectedly with the last enemy walking into a reaction hit, before I could heal everybody. Like the trophy description states, as long as you’re not knocked out, you’re good to go.

This is great to know.  I scoured the internet looking for this exact info but never found anything whatsoever so i can't count how many times i restarted a fight to avoid this scenario where i 'beat' the battle by killing the final mob but didn't get a chance to ress somebody that still had a knockout timer > 0!  Hopefully this information benefits future trophy hunters to not have to be as paranoid as i was!

[Vern3r0z]

what would you rate it out of 10 in terms of difficulty for the 100%?

[ByteTyson]

I would rate it a 3 or 4 out of 10 depending on how much of a fan / experience with Turn Based Strategies the player has.  If they have little to no experience with this genre, then i would bump it to a 7 out of 10, but folks that play these games will pick up the mechanics quickly, etc.

 

Update:  Just reviewed your list Vern, you have an amazing completion %!  Outstanding accomplishment.  I am quite confident you will have no problems as you did Mutant Year Zero, which from what i have read is much more difficult than this one.   This one is quite fun so if you are 'on the fence' take the plunge!  Great game mechanics, but not much in terms of story, just a trope really

I setup notifications on this thread so if folks have questions, i can stay active to answer them to help, just fyi.  It won't take me days to respond!

Edited March 6, 2023 by ByteTyson

[MrTacoNinja]

After watching a little gameplay footage do you really have to micromanage 7 characters? I absolutely hate that and will not play it if that's the case.

[ByteTyson]

Let me take a look at your game list and get a better sense of your tastes before responding directly.

[MrTacoNinja]

3 hours ago, ByteTyson said:

Let me take a look at your game list and get a better sense of your tastes before responding directly.

 

I don't mind 3 or 4 (well, not really - it's still a bit tedious). But 7? No thanks.

[MrTacoNinja]

On 5/12/2023 at 10:09 AM, ByteTyson said:

Let me take a look at your game list and get a better sense of your tastes before responding directly.

 

...and vanished. Awesome. ?

[ByteTyson]

On 5/12/2023 at 0:34 PM, MrTacoNinja said:

 

I don't mind 3 or 4 (well, not really - it's still a bit tedious). But 7? No thanks.

Sorry I read this and figured you had made up your mind.   Without any vested interest to persuade you, looking at your list I can definitely say this game is far and away better than Narcos Rise of the Cartels.   But obviously it is no Divinity Sin 2.   I know what you mean about too much micro—I am playing Tactics Ogre now and it is exactly that—boring micro.  What makes this game unique and reduces the feeling of drudgery is that each character is totally unique and plays a key role.  Unique talents, skills, etc.  it is a trope making fun of RPGs and the story makes fun of itself but the mechanics for a turn based strat I found to be fun and sound.   Each characters turn must be thought out and each chars strengths must be exploited.   Much closer to Mutant Year Zero than Narcos etc

 

i found it challenging on Nightmare mode with some battles having high difficulty spikes requiring 2 attempts on my part but nothing pissed me off except for critical fails here and there during inopportune moments

Edited May 17, 2023 by ByteTyson

[Vern3r0z]

On 6.3.2023 at 11:20 PM, ByteTyson said:

I would rate it a 3 or 4 out of 10 depending on how much of a fan / experience with Turn Based Strategies the player has.  If they have little to no experience with this genre, then i would bump it to a 7 out of 10, but folks that play these games will pick up the mechanics quickly, etc.

 

Update:  Just reviewed your list Vern, you have an amazing completion %!  Outstanding accomplishment.  I am quite confident you will have no problems as you did Mutant Year Zero, which from what i have read is much more difficult than this one.   This one is quite fun so if you are 'on the fence' take the plunge!  Great game mechanics, but not much in terms of story, just a trope really

I setup notifications on this thread so if folks have questions, i can stay active to answer them to help, just fyi.  It won't take me days to respond!

perhaps i will grab it at some point when on a sale then, thanks for the info.