4-Part Video Series for the Guide

1. Guide (Post-DLC, Important Numbers, & Relics)

(Guide Video #1)

The intention of this video is to be a shorter all-in-one guide. A shorter version of the next 3 videos. In this video I go over how newer, casual, or stuck players can improve I also cover important numbers/breakpoints for surviving getting one-shot, damage, what items to give to each Nightfarer, and the Core relics. 

Another purpose of this video is to bring clarity to the numbers behind the meta because players may retire, while other players might start their climb in the future, without many hardcore players to help.

2. Guide (Pre-DLC)

(Guide Video #2)

This video covers a lot of Boss Mechanics, Routing (Pathing), and general skills for trios. It was made before the DLC and was my first time making a guide video. I go in-depth into Boss Mechanics in particular. If you aren't here for Boss Mechanics clip analysis, you can skip this video now, but don't forget how important knowing certain Boss Mechanics is.

3. What Most Players Get Wrong (Even at Depth 5)

(Guide Video #3)

This video covers how to actually improve. And why you should focus on specific Boss Mechanics and Routing. Many players obsess over relics, but they are not that important.  Boss Mechanics and Routing contributes to 80%, maybe even 90% of the success of a run. 

When people look for help, the first thing people answer with is "What are your Relics?" The reality that the person seeking help, will not by fixed by adjusting a few relics. Especially not from Depth 1-3. Most of your damage and survivability come from good routing. Dying on a Nightlord plummets your team DPS for a period of time. 

4. Wylder 70-Winstreak with Mid Relics

(Guide Video #4)

The end of my 70 Winstreak at Depth 5, with mostly randoms, and almost 1000 hours in the game, was a simple routing mistake. That should show say a lot on its own. I used mid relics with the core Wylder utility ones and some damage to try and prove a point. The video goes over an analysis of the gameplay of 8/70 of those games. 

1. Deep of Night Scaling & Depth Progression

Expedition Scaling

If you look at the scaling in Deep Of Night, it can help you make better decisions. For example, notice on the left that regular Evergaols and field bosses get a 65-80% HP increase for being blood/red. That's why Blood Ancient Beasts, Banished Knights, and Stoneskin lords are so tanky. Formidable ones only get a +15% HP increase. 

The return on investment for your time doing the Red Formidable bosses can be much higher, if done at the right time. At the same time, they attack more frequently, and could cost you more time than just +15% HP alone, like the other Red bosses/mobs. Red Trash mobs give double runes and guarantee a drop. To get a drop in the base game you had to open interactables, chests, or kill special monsters. Your item pool potential has now increased if you kill red mobs.

Credit for table: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1Yu1QWcDTBSIwx3NA9SuyrxqY7pCeE9jzzb9wcRInVJg/edit?gid=721645342#gid=72164534 

Numbers to prevent getting One-Shot & Damage Formula

The chart is above important to understand what you need to prevent getting one shot, how much damage you need, and which passives you should choose. Deep of Night is only a 1-shot fest if you choose to go glass cannon. I will start by analyzing numbers from Depth 4-5 as that is when the scaling becomes unfair (and as you can see in the chart). Depth 3 is pretty fair where you can pretty much run anything and be fine. Squishies start getting 1-shot often from there.

Important Numbers

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/u/0/d/1meXOw4jR1hh7YXVMeijWwSDIXnCw6Tk4hTZPq2qvyK4/htmlview?gid=754182815&pli=1#gid=1078794188

The number of times I got 1-shot 70 of games as Wylder at Depth 5 with 1355 HP? 

0/70

The times were I got 1-shot were bad routing at Day 1 or I picked Libra's eventual greatness. You can also see the expedition in the video above - Guide Video #4.

You can make it so that you and your trio rarely get 1-shot by sharing items,  good routing decisions, and/or passives from your relics. It is not a one-shot fest or damage sponge at Depth 4+. The game just doesn't tell you anything or guide your progression.

Below are some estimates you can use for survivability and damage. It's all estimations based on getting hit and watching my HP bar, analyzing 1000+ expeditions. The real number can be derived by seeing how calculating damage you take from your vigor bar, data-mining. Characters have slightly different  base negations. Focus is on Depth 5, and lower depths later.

How much damage negation do you need at Depth 5 - Clip #1, Clip #5?

1200 Vigor + 40% Damage Negation as a melee at Depth 5. 

Why this number? If you reference the chart above, bosses at Depth 5 do +231% damage versus the base game. This means they actually do 3.31x their base game damage.  

These Nightfarers are close at lvl 15: Wylder = 1120 HP. Guardian = 1280. Raider = 1200. Executor = 1000. Undertaker = 1040.

Depth 5 Nightlords will deal 1500 damage on average per attack. They actually do ~1000-2200 depending on the type of attack, split physical/affinity damage. With 1000 being very light attacks like one slash from the Balancers. 2200 being attacks the Nightlord's heavy attacks & ultimates. Examples include: Dreglord's last phase transition with double explosion, many Everdark Gladius attacks, Everdark Caligo's armor phase transition. It is estimated after the Nightfarer-specific negations which slightly differ by a few percentages. 

If the boss does 2000 damage, having 1 Damage Negation at Full HP +40% will mean it will do 2000 * (1-0.40) = 1200 damage to you

You can survive pretty much every hit at Depth 5 with those few exceptions doing slightly over 2000.

Should casters/ranged always go glass cannon then?

Depends on your preference. I recommend a hybrid build to start so that you can take hits, fail, learn boss mechanics at Depths 1-3. You will get severely punished for dying or losing at Depth 4-5. If you choose a hybrid build:

Depth 5

1000 Vigor and +40% Damage negation

Revenant 780 HP at Level 15. +40% Damage Negation at Full HP alone won't cut it for Depth 5 and at Depth 4. If you have +40% Damage Negation at Full HP & Damage Negation at Full HP +32%, that still might not be enough for the Nightlord ultimates/heaviest attacks at Depth 5. 

2000 * (1 - 0.4) * (1 - 0.32) = 816.

 816 > 760 HP = Dead.

On Revenant  with 1000 HP, I don't get enough Damage Negation to avoid getting 1-shot on the Nightlord in 

1/20

games at Depth 5.

It also doesn't mean as a glass cannon, that damage negation is useless. I also like to use bosses doing 1500 damage as a reference, as most of their attacks are around that range. Sometimes you might get hit by stray medium attacks, that do 1000-1500 damage, so having one Damage Negation at Full HP can still go a long way even with low vigor.

Depth 4

+30% Damage. Some Vigor/Negation +32% Damage Negation at Full HP to survive getting 1-shot. Not as much vigor as Depth 5.

Depth 3

+20% Damage.  +32%  Damage Negation at Full HP (isn't needed if you have 1000 HP) to survive 1-shots.

Depth 1-2

You're new learning the game, you will no idea what's going on. Just enjoy the ride! Defeating Enemies Fills Art Gauge is all you need to help you out, which I cover in the relics section.

How much damage should I have at Depth 4-5 from my relics?

Hybrid Builds: +40%
Glass Cannon: +60% - +100%. Realistically, +60% - +80% due to RNG.

*One thing to note, is almost all damage sources are multiplicative, not additive, so you will have more damage, the more you stack. But multiplicative is not exponential. And there are many many variables like how the fight goes, how often you punish the boss, that contribute to your damage.

4 stacks of Night Invader (+7%) is actually 31% damage, not 28%: 100 * (1.07)^4 = 131. 

Isn't 1.4x Damage too low for Depth 5? 

In the chart, Nightlord's have +116% HP. That means they have 2.16x their base game HP. At first glance that seems off. But 1.4x is enough because: 

1. Most of your damage and survivability comes from items and passives you get from bosses/the expedition itself. The numbers below slightly lower than what you usually get in an expedition.

2. 1 Everdark Balancer at Depth 5 Trios ~= 3200 HP - Clip #1, Clip #5

   1. It may seem like you need to stack damage to one shot them, but it's trios, not solos. Your melee can whack it for 500-900 HP, another caster can do 1.3k, and you do 1.5k and it dies. 

   2. It can also be bad to have too much damage, because killing them too quickly will cause more another Everdark Balancers from the pack to aggro. If both of your teammates get downed you'll have to deal with 1 or 2 aggro-ing instead of 3. Damage can help if you don't know how to dodge the specific movesets. But if you don't have enough negation to survive one stray hit, the run could be over as well. It's a tradeoff. 

Example 1 Fulghor Charged Lightning Spear

1. Revenant starting with +40% Damage (+21% from Night Invader at Depth 4-5, +19% from other lines). Being generous and assuming you don't get that many dormant powers.

Item Passives (4)  

Improved Sorceries & Incantations (+8%), Improved Charged Incantations (+18%), Improved Affinity Attack Power (+8%), Improved Holy Attack Power (+12%)

Dormant Powers (3 Mini-Boss / Boss passives):

Improved Affinity Attack Power (+5%), Raises potency of sorceries and incantations (+7%), Raises potency of sorceries and incantations (+7%)

0.4+0.08+0.18+0.08+0.12+0.05+0.07+0.07 = +105% additive.

Charged Lightning Spear (Purple) = 450

450 * 1.4*1.08*1.18*1.08*1.12*1.05*1.07*1.07=  1167 damage. +105% is effectively 2.59x Damage.

*If you play Lightning Spear Revenant a lot, you will know that hitting Charged Lightning Spears is difficult on Fulghor. You can potentially do more DPS just using regular ones and not missing. Nightfarer mastery is very important)

Fulghor Lightning Resist = 1167 * 1.20 = 1400 damage

Skill% / Ash of War / Balancer Build / Melee builds can do more or as much as casters. The items from the expedition contribute the most. Running these two relics alone doesn't mean you'll do a lot of damage. Certain ash of wars may have a lower base damage than spells. Melees can also do a lot of damage with Melee attack power +15%.

Relics contributes to +40% Damage. Expedition contributes to +65% Damage. 

Example 2 Heolstor Halo Scythe

2. Wylder/Duchess staring with 1.78x Damage from wearing Red and Blue Balancer relics (48%) and Affinity Up (30%).

Item Passives (5)

Improved Skill Attack Power (+21%), Improved Skill Attack Power (+21%), Improved Skill Attack Power (+18%), Improved Skill Attack Power (+15%), Improved Affinity Attack Power (+8%).

Dormant Powers (2 Mini-Boss / Boss Passives)

Improved Affinity Attack Power (+5%), Improved Affinity Attack Power (+5%).

0.78 + 0.21 + 0.21 + 0.18 + 0.15 + 0.08 + 0.05 + 0.05 = +171% additive.

Purple Halo Scythe = ~320

320*1.78*1.21*1.21 *1.18 *1.15 *1.08 *1.05 *1.05 = 1348 Skill Damage. +171% is effectively 4.2x Damage. 

Heolstor Holy Resist = 1348 * 1.2 = 1617 damage

Relics contributes to +78% Damage. Expedition contributes to +93% Damage. 

The actual number from an expedition can be higher. Your mileage may vary betwen runs/relics. You can hit 3000-4000 damage sometimes with or without specific buffs like Marais, Grafted Blade, Traces of Grace-Given Lord, Libra's Bone Plating, etc. Those are often present in clip farms.

Due to multiplicative damage, stacking damage is everything right?

I think this is a common trap many new and experienced players tunnel-vision on, which I try to from a lot of my guide videos. There are so many variables that contribute to damage to the boss.  

1. If someone goes down, your total team damage drops significantly, by like from 100% -> 10%. Because when one teammate is occupied with reviving-> you take aggro while focusing on surviving. Sometimes team DPS will go from like 3000 DPS -> 0 DPS for 20-30 seconds period.

2. How frequently you hit / punish the boss matters a lot. DPS = Damage Per Second. If you're glass cannon, and not as familiar with the boss, you may be doing 0 damage if you're dead. Same goes for any player. If you play more cautiously because you can't afford to take one hit, you may be doing less damage than someone who's hitting a lot, being aggressive, and can survive.

3. Utility Effects / Defeating Enemies Fills Art Gauge / Ultimates often get overlooked. The expedition itself (Day 1 Boss, Day 2) can be difficult. Those utility relics can save you more of your team's limited time by providing i-frames, easier damage windows, help with reviving, recovering from bad routing /early game, etc.

The actual damage you deal to boss might look like this:

Recluse (40%/100% of Total Damage dealt to Fulghor)

Ironeye (35%/100% of Total Damage dealt to Fulghor)

Wylder (25%/100% of Total Damage dealt to Fulghor)

1 Death = Fight Extension for 20-30 Seconds

If Recluse gets downed every time Fulghor aggros her, she could do 20% of the Total damage in the fight instead of 40%. She will also extend the fight by 30 seconds or a couple of minutes. Same goes for any player. If Wylder goes down, the Recluse  can't attack as aggressively.

If your entire team is skilled glass cannons, and understand boss mechanics, and never get down, then you can speedrun the Nightlords and speedrun the bosses. But we're human, everyone makes mistakes, and glass cannons are a bit more affected by RNG.

 My personal play-style uses a hybrid build in #1 instead of #2:

1. 1000 Damage per cast. Don't get 1-shot.

2. 2000-3000 Damage. Get 1-shot most of the time.

As long as I don't get one shot, I can farm my ultimate and revive new players/experienced players almost forever. 

I advocate for hybrid builds when learning from Depth 1-4. I use hybrid for 95% of my games and never switched off due to my preference. I also get to improve my Boss Mechanics because I can take a hit and easily adjust multiple times during a match. If I don't get 1-shot, I'm gonna be a lot more confident and have higher uptime on my DPS and punish windows. 

However, if you run a hybrid or vigor build, and don't punish the boss aggressively, you could up contributing worse than someone who runs glass cannons and dodges most attacks. Even then, getting downed is so punishing, that probably won't be the case. 

Glass cannon is perfectly fine too. But know the risk and opportunity cost of each type. If you go glass cannon, you are putting trust into your teammates to revive you if you mess up, but there's no guarantee they can handle reviving. You could end the fight faster if you don't get hit though.

I'm new, I don't have relics, what should I do for Depth 1-4?

Relics and these numbers are the least of your worries for these Depths, but you can kind of use scaling chart to derive the numbers from Depth 5. The guidelines I gave above in the Caster are not that much different because the boss HP is lower. The amount of damage you get from the expedition is roughly the same as Depth 5 if playing optimally. But probably a bit worse since you'd be a newer/casual less efficient. 

Once you have a core 6 useful lines for your Nightfarer, you've already gotten 15% out of the 20% overall impact that relics have on runs.

Progressing from for Depth 1 -> Depth 5 & Beyond

The first thing I want to mention is that a lot of experienced players forget about when giving advice for getting unstuck- is forgetting context of what a newer/casual player has, knows, and how they can perform compared to what they had. This is especially prevalent with Relic advice. 

If you never play with randoms, you may be missing out on a lot of learning - Clip #11. I often see Reddit posts about how some couple or group of friends is struggling to progress. In - Clip #11, the duo I played with, spammed Evergaols, skipped Castle, didn't bring the Less Likely to Be Targeted with to Libra, and they were perma-downed. After they played with me and I pinged the passive multiple times, they might've learned from me. This was also how I how I got better- learning from randoms to be able to make this guide. In order to solo ED Libra at Depth 5, I lost to him several times before. I noticed other experienced players staying alive forever by taking it slowly  in a chaotic fight.

When Deep of Night first released, many experienced players/advice givers had around 100-200+ Hours in the base game before starting Deep of Night. You or a newer/casual player probably dont. That means we had time to mess around with builds, play all the Everdarks, figure out the meta, struggle, most importantly, learn Boss Mechanics.

A newer player can complete all the base bosses and Everdarks in under 20 hours. Then you'll likely jump straight into Deep of Night (I would too). 

I will recommend starting with a hybrid/utility relic build with core 6 lines, and not obsess over them until Depth 4 at least. So you can get hit, struggle, and learn (and then be ready to fight any boss and aura farm). Your relics will not be holding you back. 

Once you understand that Routing and Boss Mechanics which are responsible for 80-90% of the success and ease of a run, you can work with pretty much anything at any Depth.  If you want big numbers as a Glass cannon, it's fine, but understand the risk, with less opportunities to fail/learn.

Depth 1 (Newbies/Quitters)

This is where there's no penalty for leaving or losing. As a newer player, I would just get used to the chaos and try to learn as much as you can. This is where you will get familiar with Red mobs and how important items are. 

1. You can get an item with a passive from killing a red trash mob now.I recommend doing this during the mid game when you have some items.

2. Defeating Enemies Fills Art Gauge will help you and your team with clearing those difficult red mob POIs and dealing with dying a lot. This relic has the is just as effective if not more effective at Depth 5. 

Depth 2 (Quitter Galore. Gain Experience for Duoing/Soloing)

The penalty for losing small, so there's a high chance especially on console you'll have players who quit as soon as something goes wrong on the first POI. There is none if you make it to the Nightlord.

1. Quitters are actually a genuine good learning opportunity which will help you later. Because in the future, at Depth 4-5, you may end up having to duo from time to time due to losing a teammate for whatever reason. And you're going to get penalized heavily. Probably didn't want that quitter anyway. 

2. Relative scaling for Duos and Solo with poise is much lower than Trios. Duo bosses can die a lot faster with 2 skilled players contributing versus 2 skilled players, and 1 newbie. This means that a Duo run at Depth 5 Maris can take 1 minute to kill due to lower boss HP and much lower poise. A trio run at Depth 5 with the same players could take 3-4 minutes to kill. 

Example:

Solos and Duos is Easier than Trios?

Adel, Baron of the Night (Base Game)

Solo (1) = 150 Poise, 13140 HP

Duo (2) = 272 Poise, 26280 HP

Trio (3) = 500 Poise???,  39420 HP     

3. Duos and solos are almost a different game mode because of the increase in boss and trash mob aggro.  Can't distract the boss, while another revives. This is also a good opportunity for understanding how to dodge boss attacks and even trash mob attacks like the crucible knight, with little penalty.

4. Hello, again, it's Defeating Enemies Fills Art Gauge. It's here to help a bit with all three of those above points which you can see in every single. I highlight it in particular in a Duo Balancers Full run in - Clip #32 .

Depth 3 (Difficult, but fair)

Most players stop quitting around Depth 3, or stop playing. A lot of casual players stay here, or players get stuck between Depth 3-4. It's also a good stopping point for casual players. It's the game mode where I'd be comfortable running silly builds.

1. Squishy Nightfarers start getting one shot here. Dark Night of the Fathom and damage negation will help. I still recommend some at this stage so you have room to fail and can learn how to dodge enemy attacks by failing to. 

2. This is the last chance you will have for a "fair" game mode for learning Routing and Boss Mechanics. The penalties for losing are tough , but it is way more fair and forgiving than Depth 4-5. You can still learn or brush up on a few at Depth 4-5 with enough negation and vigor though.

Depth 4 (Hell)

After you make it past Depth 3, you will now get destroyed if you didn't focus on developing your fundamentals with routing and boss mechanics. This is also a good stopping point if you'd only like to play casually. Bad relics will not be holding you back at Depth 4, but you should have a few okay ones to work with now.

1. Depth 4 in particular is difficult because

   1. Damage dealt from bosses jump significantly from Depth 3 compared to Depth 1-3. In order to survive getting 1-Shot now, you need 1 Damage Negation at Full HP and a little bit of vigor or more negation somewhere else.

   2. Day 1 Loss = -600. NightLord Loss = -400. Regular win = +200. Missing Map / Unknown Boss = +300.

   3. Because the scaling was more "fair" at Depth 3, you could make it all the way into Depth 4 with mediocre fundamentals. If you don't have an understanding of the meta, you'll now die more often, if you path badly and don't share items, the runs become way more difficult. 

   4. Depth 4 is notoriously known to be "harder" than Depth 5 due to the experience of people you will be queuing with, including yourself. You will most likely get queued with other players who have just reached Depth 4 or are stuck with under 300 hours in the game. In Depth 5, you might get at least one player who has 800+ Hours and can impact the run significantly. That doesn't mean you can't trust your teammates on a basic level. 

   5. You'll notice in my videos I'm constantly checking the passives of my teammates. Because if you read the damage section earlier, your other two team members will likely contribute something. They are in the same Depth as you. But it will be way more difficult if they couldn't find a weapon, passives that prevent them from getting one shot, or are needed for their Nightfarer. This is a solo-climbing and aura farming guide, but you have to help your teammates and not be fully selfish. Helping your teammates makes it easier for you too.

Depth 5 (Don't expect to make it here until you have least 300-400 hours of playtime)

Don't be discouraged if you have more hours and aren't in Depth 5 either. This is more of a warning. Depending on whether you've found useful guides or play with only your friends, you may not have the knowledge or enough experience with boss mechanics yet. If you are thinking about going further, 300-400 hours is roughly the minimum hours of effort someone needs to play. This guide will help you find ways to improve, but it won't help you with giving you much experience and learning from your losses.

You can also still make mistakes in Depth 5. You can still tank hits, but the requirements are higher. As Recluse/Duchess, you might want to go glass cannon, but it's perfectly fine to do hybrid builds. 

It is also not always an easy path to 9999. I got Depth 5 Everdark Libra 3 times in a row, deranked to Depth 4, 3 times in a row. Then I slowed down my fight and started solo-carrying Everdark Libra. Struggling through Depth 4 will help a lot with Depth 5 as it's not too too different, and you will be queued with more experienced players (not guaranteed).

1. Depth 5 is not "free" because:

   1. If running a Glass cannon build, you will need 2 Damage Negation at Full HP to survive getting one shot as a caster. At Depth 4 you usually only need one. That means you are subject to more RNG as well. One will protect you somewhat but barely. Remember the average 1500 boss damage break-point I mentioned.

   2. The players you queue with including yourself, may not be fully prepared for Depth 5 . In a lot of videos random trio could look like this

      1. ~300 Hour Newbie (You).

      2. ~500 Hour Player figuring it out, but can't carry much.

      3. ~800 Hour+ Player who can pull above their weight, but can't be perfect all the time.

   3. The penalty for losing is extremely high. Even though you might win more with randoms, a loss is harsh. -800 from losing to Night 1, -600 on the Nightlord.

Beyond Depth 5 / 9999 (Aura Farming)

There is potential to climb beyond Depth 5 - 9999 by learning how to solo-carry (teaching/helping friends/randoms) every game. 

1. Reaching 9999 still doesn’t mean you have fully mastered the game and have nothing to learn, you can still learn to hard-carry and aura farm.

2. I got an extra 300-400 hours of fun doing self-imposed challenges and helped some randoms along the way. 

3. You can also start a new save, try a new Nightfarer, 0-9999 again, go for 20+ winstreaks. I played Revenant for 777 expeditions until I tried Wylder. I thought he would be boring, but I had a blast using any weapons, taking aggro, mobility, survivability, and of course, aura farming.

What items/passives should I give to each Nightfarer? 

To know what items you should give your teammates, you should check their relics at the start of a match and their inventory during the run. Some people noticed my habit of constantly checking my teammates inventories even during a boss fight. That's because I want them for them to be able to survive 1 hit, if possible. It is my #1 priority. As well as increasing their damage. 

If someone's using Balancer relics, they probably want to use items with good ash of wars or Improved Skill Attack Power. If someone's spamming Rivers of Blood/Corpse Piler, Successive Attacks Negate Damage will make those melees tanky. I'm not including the Increased Maximum HP passive here as it's good on everyone. Many players don't know how much HP they need as covered in the above numbers section.

Wylder 

Negation Priority

1. Successive Attacks Negate Damage (Can be triggered easily with two claw shots or Dual-Wield/Jump attacks)

2. Improved Damage Negation at Full HP

3. Taking Damage Boosts Damage Negation

4. Dmg Negation Up upon Landing Charge Attacks

Damage

Improved Melee Attack Power, Improved Physical Attack Power, Improved Skill Attack Power, Improved Jump Attacks

XYZ Follows Charge Attacks that Land

Ironeye

Negation Priority

1. Improved Damage Negation at Full HP

2. Successive Attacks Negate Damage (Melee Ironeye, or Skill Usage)

3. Less Likely to be Targeted

*XYZ Upon Precision Aiming. Anyone can use a bow with precision aiming. Two-hand the bow. Hold LB/L1 to precision aim. Mine is binded to a different button.

Damage

Improved Ranged Weapon Attacks, Improved Physical Attack Power, Improved Skill Attack Power, Improved Melee Attack Power

Duchess

Negation Priority

1. Improved Damage Negation at Full HP

2. Successive Attacks Negate Damage (Melee Duchess)

3. Less Likely to be Targeted

Damage

Improved Sorceries, Improved Magic Attack Power, Improved Charged Sorceries, Improved Affinity Attack Power, (Improved Holy Attack Power for Halo Scythe builds, etc)

Improved Skill Attack Power, Improved Melee Attacker Power, Improved Physical Attack Power

Recluse

Negation Priority

1. Improved Damage Negation at Full HP

2. Less Likely to be Targeted

Damage

Improved Sorceries, Improved Magic Attack Power, Improved Charged Sorceries, Improved Affinity Attack Power,  Improved Incantations, Improved Charged Incantations.

Executor

Negation Priority 

1. Successive Attacks Negate Damage (Rivers of Blood / Dual-Wield)

2. Improved Damage Negation at Full HP

3. Taking Damage Booosts Damage Negation

Damage

Improved Skill Attack Power, Improved Melee Attacker Power, Improved Physical Attack Power,  Improved Affinity Attack Power 

Revenant

Negation Priority

1. Improved Damage Negation at Full HP

2. Less Likely to be Targeted

Damage

Improved Incantations, Improved Charged Incantations, Improved Affinity Attack Power, Improved Lightning Attack Power, Improved Fire Attack Power, Improved Physical Attack Power (works on Beast Claw)

Raider

Negation Priority

1. Taking Damage Boosts Damage Negation <---- This is extreme priority for Raider. Hopefully you don't need me to explain why! But it's especially important at Depth 5 with enough vigor.

2. Dmg Negation Up upon Landing Charge Attacks

3. Successive Attacks Negate Damage

4. Improved Damage Negation at Full HP

5. Improved Damage Negation at Low HP

Damage

Improved Melee Attack Power, Improved Charged Attacks, Improved Physical Attack Power. Improved Jump Attacks. 

*XYZ Follows Charge Attacks that Land. Raider can do a lot of damage with no damage ups in his kit at Depth 5. Running full vigor is like his best build because he can dish out a ton of damage, poise break,  take aggro, etc. Passives picked up in the expedition help him out. Some damage ups can be helpful, but you'll see a lot of Raiders in my videos be very effective without many.

Guardian 

Negation Priority

1. Successful Guarding Ups Dmg Negation

2. Taking Damage Boosts Damage Negation

3. Improved Guarding Ability (Reduces Stamina consumption from guarding)

4. Improved Holy, Lightning, Fire Damage Negation (Affinity Damage Negation or specific Shields)

5. Improved Damage Negation at Full HP (Only if everyone else has one)

6. Successive Attacks Negate Damage (Shield poke build)

Damage

Guardians can absolutely do damage while taking aggro, and the difference between a good and bad Guardian is night and day. Good Guardians do damage while drawing aggro. Either from Shield Poking or Guard Counters.

Most players struggle to play him well to get the damage output needed in Deep of Night though. You can feel the difference in routing during the day if they aren't contributing much. It's more important for him to pick up those survivability negation passives though. If you struggle with Guard Counters, Shield Poking is highly effective for both aggro and damage output. In order to get a Guard Counter you need aggro. Draw Enemy Attention Upon Guarding is important, but hitting the boss is important as well.

Improved Guard Counters (these build can do a lot of damage IF the Guardian is actually taking aggro). Improved Physical Attack Power, Improved Melee Attack Power. Improved Skill Attack Power works for Balancers, but playing Guardian without drawing aggro for your teammates is not for the weak.

Undertaker

Negation Priority

1. Successive Attacks Negate Damage

2. Improved Damage Negation at Full HP

3. Taking Damage Boosts Damage Negation

4. Dmg Negation Up upon Landing Charge Attacks

Damage

Improved Melee Attack Power, Improved Skill Attack Power, Improved Physical Attack Power, Improved Affinity Attack Power. 

XYZ Follows Charge Attacks that Land

Scholar

Negation Priority

1. Successive Attacks Negate Damage

2. Improved Damage Negation at Full HP

Improved Skill Attack Power, Improved Melee Attack Power, Improved Physical Attack Power, Improved Affinity Attack Power. Bleed, Frost, Rot, or Poison weapons.

(Clip #1) - Full Run with Live Commentary (Everdark Balancers)

Everything I cover in this guide is used in this run. Routing, Boss Mechanics, and even the Top 3 Relic lines in my priority list, are used by all three players. There were no special performance or clutching needed for this run. This is one of the many the runs where almost all of the concepts written this guide are derived from.   I also have really bad gameplay as it was one of the first times I was doing a live-voiceover. 

But it's still an easy win anyway. I get enough damage negation as Revenant and learn/figure out how to take Worm aggro and dodge it- at Depth 5.

(Clip #2) - Aggro Switching

A really old video when Deep of Night first released. But it covers one of the most important skills to learn in Duos/Trios. One of the rare non Depth 5 videos in the guide, but could be useful to get an idea of scaling differences.

(Clip #3) - Reviving Teammates while Dodging Boss and Camera-Lock Off

(Clip #4 ) - Reviving teammate while boss switches aggro

Formula for Shifting Earths (Crater, Mountaintop, Noklateo, Rotted Woods, Great Hollows)

The prime example for Noklateo is in - Clip #5. It is best to do 0-2 Evergaols, and maybe 1-2 Night Invaders for shifting earths. The shifting earths simply give you way more items and benefits to skip out on. Sometimes you might have to give up a Night Invader camp if it spawns too far away to deal with Day 1 or Day 2. 

1. Do the shifting earths over more Evergaols or outside bosses, is because the circle forces you to path there, and you might waste time traveling and not completing POIs on your way there. 

If you waste time on the base map, then you'll only be able to partially clear the shifting earths, which is a decent opportunity cost. The bosses are general densely packed with less travel time between them than the base part of the map.

2. The only thing different about shifting earths is Day 2 routing. It’s common to head for the POI when the First circle on Day 2 starts closing, but I often find it better to go slightly earlier. This is where finishing Castle Day 1 for the dormant drops is important, as it makes routing more flexible. Shifting earth images were taken from the Fextralife Nightreign wiki: https://eldenringnightreign.wiki.fextralife.com/Shifting+Earth. 

3. If you see interactables (like corpses) in the POI, they may be worth checking as they have chances to drop legendary weapons, about ~5%. For example, the Ice Crystals in Mountaintops have an interactable that can drop those items. There are specific locations that are capable of doing so, but I'm not including those in this guide.

These are general guides for routing on an average run, you don't have to follow them exactly.

(Clip #5) - Routing for Noklateo

 This video also supports the section above with Deep of Night Numbers. I learn how to take Worm Aggro at Depth 5 and no-hit the aggro after 3 tries. Due to understanding the numbers of how to not get 1-shot, I tank hits as Revenant, mess up, and then figure out my own way of dealing with worm aggro.

Crater

After the Night 1 Boss, finish up any remaining POIs needed. Try to head to the crater before the First circle of Day 2 starts closing. This is a general path. In order to fully complete this path and Step 4, you need a decent DPS party. If you cleared the entirety of the dormant drops in the castle on Day 1, you can try killing the Fallingstar Beast or Valiant Gargoyle. Likewise if you didn’t finish castle Day 1, and aren’t at least level 10 after Night 1, you can quickly kill the mobs at the castle for more runes  before heading to the crater. Skip certain checkpoints if running low on time.

Mountaintops

After the Night 1 Boss, finish up any remaining POIs needed, and try to head to the Mountaintop before the First circle of Day 2 starts closing. Although the mobs are easy, and the circle is in your favor for the Mountaintop, it’s better to go slightly early, so you can get through the Ice Dragon for a guaranteed yellow item. Same strategy as crater, wipe out most of the Castle Day 1, shoot for 10-11. Wrap up POIs and kill castle at the start of Day 2 quickly for dormant powers and leave before the first circle.

There is an alternate path which I didn't include in the drawing. At Step 3, you can go North to the Giant Crows, then to the Demi Human Sword Master, then to the Snowfield Trolls. This path is recommended for collecting Frostbite damage if you have this map with Caligo, or went early Day 2.

Noklateo

Head for Noklateo immediately after killing the Night 1 boss. That extra field boss or POI probably isn’t worth it. You should be around level 9-10, if pathed efficiently on Day 1 with Night Invaders. If tight on time, make sure to prioritize Astel for the revive/guaranteed legendary. Path 6 is a bit wonky. Adjust if you already have good items and are tight on time/are a low dps team. 

You want to duplicate Damage Negation at Full HP, Less Likely to be Targeted (for ED Libra), after killing Astel. At Depth 5, having two Damage Negation at Full HP, is much better than killing all the remaining ~2-3 bosses after killing Astel. If your team is already kitted out, have high DPS, or need items, you can kill the Dragonkin Soldier first in Path 6, but that consumes time for duplication. The duplication room has a lot of mobs and clearing them can burn more time than you think. The circle might be closing in as you kill those bosses, depending on how much DPS your trio does.

*Note that there is a Mausoleum Knight with a dormant drop, and purple+ tier chest at path/arrow 3->4, which is not shown in this map

Rotted Woods

Like the Mountaintops and Crater, you want to ideally leave Castle before the First circle of Day 2 starts closing. If you already cleared Castle for the dormant powers, pick up any remaining POIs, and head straight towards the woods. Level 10 is enough. There's no point in clearing the any other mini or great bosses outside of the woods, unless there are no Blood/Red bosses in the woods. Target the Blood/Red great bosses or easy ones first. The Rotted woods are pretty flexible on routing, and there are many extra runes you can get from clearing the trash mobs.

Find the Favor of the Rotted Woods buff by process of elimination because you want to save time from having to go to the Fort/Location Reveal. The second circle generally closes in towards the middle of the Woods, slightly toward the south.  While killing the bosses, you’ll be near ⅔ of the buff locations, so you’ll know exactly which location has the buff, and you can see it from a far distance. If you happen to walk near one of the locations earlier, before attacking the bosses right away, you can grab it immediately and save time.

"Is clearing the Fort worth it for the chance at a Scarlet Rot weapon?"

Maybe, if you brought a purple smithing stone with you, and it's Adel. You likely have good items from killing the bosses, and scarlet rot gets tougher and tougher to apply to the Nightlords anyway. Not worth the time where you can kill another boss instead.

Great Hollows

The formula for Great Hollows at Depth 5 has already been solved, it has the potential to give you more items and runes than any other map. Because graces are less accessible in this map, Defeating Enemies Charges Art Gauge is a must have, even though consuming your flasks with the Crystal buff recharges your ultimate. There are also many clumps of enemies that can overwhelm you if you don't have aoe to deal with them.

The most important thing to know is that Divine Towers are no longer worth doing in Deep of Night, which is a contrast to the base game. In the base game, you could do them at level 9-10 and get to level 15 easily with some decent items. In Deep of Night scaling, they are extremely tanky and time wasting. They become a time trap much like Evergaols getting blood variants did. They don't give many items/passvies for the time spent.

 In Deep of Night, items get buffed, can have great passives and you can even get good ones from regular trash red mobs, red mini bosses. To best set yourself up for success, you need to be getting the most opportunities for good ones, for less time spent. 

General Routing Formula:

1. Day 1 clear easy POIs depending on where you are for lvl 5-7. Look for Crystal spawns to unlock the great Crystal. Clear the easy South Castle mini-bosses for dormant powers and avoid the tougher fights like Cleanrot Knights or Divine Beast warriors.

2. Day 2. Immediately beeline for the North Castle no matter what and clear as much as it as you can. The Day 2 circle can cut off the North castle, so it's important to extract as much value as you can, since you extracted some from the South castle on Day 1 already.

In Depth - Explanation/Reasoning:

1. Focus on breaking Crystals Day 1 to unlock the Favor of the Great Hollow. Kill mini bosses/mobs/POIs, but don't over do it. Depending on the circle, it might be worth clearing the church for duplication or the West ruins, as that's a very easy way to get to level 8-10. You can clear few crystals on Day 1, focus on mini-bosses for levels/items, but this could potentially waste even more time on Day 2. You should have time to clear some of the South castle after, as they have some easy sewer/hallway mobs like Banished Knights, Omens, and Curseblades, and Hippos. Avoid fighting the high-poise monsters like Cleanrot Knights or the Divine Beast Warrior. You can come back to them later if the Day 2 circle closes on the south castle. The reason you should clear the South Castle first, always, is because of those low-poise, bleed susceptible mini bosses are easier to deal with.

2. On Day 2, focus on clearing the Castle at the North side of the map. There are so many mini bosses, great-bosses, chests in the castles which can also give you legendary items. They could be blood variants as well. It's important as you get as many loot opportunities versus 2-3 high grade/legendary items per tower which might not have good passives. On Day 2, if the circle closes on you, just take the teleporter to the South castle.

3. There are still Night Invaders in East Ruins, underground/South Church,  Underground Ruins. They are still worth going for, especially if two are available. The chances for good damage negation passives is very high. But if the circle isn't in your favor, or you don't have spells/Defeating Enemies fills Art Gauge, then they are fine to skip. Some games, it's better to skip them for more loot/dormant powers from the castle because of difficult circle routing.

(Clip #6) - Great Hollows Double Castle Meta with bottom Spawn. Not perfect pathing now, but it was enough when it first released.

(Clip #7) - Double Castle Meta with Top Spawn. The top spawn is slightly harder, but is dealt with by using status ailments. Not perfect pathing now, but it was enough when it first released.

Boss Guides/Resources from Creators that I've used

1. Chris Chrass: https://www.youtube.com/@Chris_Chrass (All Boss attacks breakdowns).

2. Frame/Collider Data for Boss Attacks like Everdark Gladius's Map AOE/Transition move: https://youtu.be/zuS8ujML18o?si=FXgbTMGI0spf7tvz&t=788 by: https://www.youtube.com/@Babe1Babe2 (Helps with how to time your dodges, by understanding when the damage colliders appear).

Boss Resistances

Credit: https://www.reddit.com/r/Nightreign/comments/1pg7gtt/updated_boss_weakness_chart/

Having the right elements for the bosses can increase your damage way more than you'd expect. For example, Libra takes +35% more damage from holy, while only taking +20% more from fire. He also deals holy affinity damage from his sigil attacks. Holy spells can be even better than Frenzy weapons, which deal fire damage. 

The weaknesses don't have to be followed to a tee. Shattering Crystal might not be effective on Gnoster (Moth), but it completely destroys Animus who has no resistances when it is separated. It does does fine against Faurtis (Scorpion).  However, they can be a major part of the equation of your overall damage. Especially using Fire on Everdark Caligo to break her armor faster.

I could provide more examples at Depth 5 where people won't take weakness countering weapons which can make runs much harder or end in failures. I'm talking stuff Raider using bone fists with a bad passive on Everdark Gladius instead of Holy Claws. Those fists have a tiny range, which make it hard to hit Gladius. Players often don't think about small things like that. 

*Note that Animus for Everdark Gnoster is not included in this chart. Animus has no Resistances and is vulnerable to any attack from melees and casters, but shares the damage negation of a bug when it possesses one of the them.

(Clip #8) - Animus's 15 Second Damage Window

(Clip #9) - Dodging Gnoster's Enhanced Rain with regular sprint

(Clip #10) - Experienced random players (Wylder, 1200 hours) aggressively hunting down Enhanced Gnoster and stance-breaking it. 

Only 2 Evergaols, 1 Night Invader, with Animus's Damage Negation while possessing Gnoster

Normal Gnoster

1. Have anyone lure regular Gnoster away from Faurtis in Phase 1, so you don't get cross-fired. It doesn't matter who it is. Even if you're the Guardian and no one else is, you can do it.

2. When combined Gnoster/Faurtis starts shouting charges at you, you can surge sprint the entire attack mid range without dodging. Once they charge past you, wait to recover stam and surgesprint again. If up close, dodge 2-3 times while sprinting to avoid the missiles from Gnoster.

3. When Faurtius goes underground and tunnels/charges towards you, you can just hold block with any weapon, and you won't get hurt. His tunnel attack does 100% physical damage, all characters, and all weapons can block the attack entirely. It'll just consume all your stamina and stagger you a bit.

*No accompanying video for normal Gnoster. I didn't save any unique runs. I also burnt out so I left a lot of the normal bosses without clips. It also helps reduce the guide length.

(Clip #11)- Extreme Carrying a Duo (16 Minutes) at Depth 5 ED Libra

The duo dropped multiple "Less Likely to be targeted" passives I tried to give them. We also have no items/damage negation because they wanted to skip castle and spam Evergaols.

This is also really good example of how playing with randoms can actually be better. If you only play with friends and never read guides, you might get stuck or learn slower. You never know what you can learn from your random. If they only played Duos together, they might never have encountered me and see me ping Less Likely to be Targeted like 10 times. Maybe they learned from this game. Much of what I know and what is this guide is the knowledge I've gained from randoms.

It also shows many players still aren't aware of how useful it is in Depth 5. I'm not mad at my randoms because now I'm searching for games like these as a challenge (to aura farm). 

(Clip #12) - Depth 5 Everdark Libra - Revenant Hard Carry Example

It's not easy, but it's easier than it looks with enough practice and patience. Everdark Libra has a smaller moveset than his normal version. I lost to Everdark Libra at Depth 5 three times in a row before this run. Each run before it, I noticed that I could slow down my DPS to stay alive, and that he is easier to deal with than his regular version when you have Less Likely to be targeted. 

My teammates also decided to both go Glass cannon, had Less Likely to be Targeted, but died often. In the end, they didn't do much DPS to Libra since they were dead.

(Clip #13) - Depth 5 ED Libra without Less Likely To be Targeted or "Damage"

Ironeye didn't contribute much in terms of damage in this fight even with "Less Likely to be Targeted".  That's because he stopped proccing status ailments and shot Libra from so far, that his arrows only did 70-100 damage per hit due to projectile drop-off. I cheese Everdark Libra with Discus of Light which appears to not do a lot of damage. It starts at 200 per tick. But I do have damage ups, and its range, FP efficiency is enough to bring it to 400, or 800 damage per 3 FP.

Normal Libra

Most people know how to fight Normal Libra, but I still find teammates that 3-bar a lot in the fight, due to the punishing damage/scaling with madness and attacks. When Libra becomes enhanced after meditating, he can actually catch your team off guard by spawning a bunch of sigils and projectile sigils which rotate fast and kill you with madness buildup and multi-hits. 

1. Your team comps might not have the ultimates/attacks/poise break to break Libra’s sigil/meditation at later stages. It’s fine, but focus on dodging before hitting while he’s enhanced. 

2. If your teammates get downed, you can revive them when Libra starts meditating again.

3. If you really want to min-max the fight, you can save your frenzy spells. When your team is unable to break his meditation bubbles/sigils, you can start applying frenzy, to make him simmer down a bit.

(Clip #14) - Reviving 3-bar teammates due to Normal Enhanced Libra attacks

(Clip #15) - Random Wylder Carries Team in Depth 5 Everdark Maris Fight (Example of how to to solo-carry)

(Clip #16) - Easy Everdark Maris when everyone knows that one mechanics

When everyone knows that you can clear all the bubbles around your area by yourself, with Storm Ruler light attacks and FP/Stamina management,  ED Maris becomes a lot easier. That's one boss mechanic that is a must-know, that makes a huge difference. Below is a routine run before the Balancer relics became meta.

Normal Maris

1. Killing the suicide Jellyfish bombs will do damage and poise damage to Maris. It’s worth it for your trio to focus on killing them, so you don't get bombarded with explosions as well. Aoe spells help, and they still have low HP at Depth 5.

2. Everyone should have at least one lightning weapon or Ultimate to break Maris’s stance when he triggers Sleep skill. Sprint towards him as soon as he starts running away to cast his Sleep skill.

3. Clear one or two tentacles around you so you don’t get killed off-screen.

4. If desperate, have a melee comp with no bows/range, you can run away from the exploding teardrop nuke. But if you have range, then you should probably kill at least one and help your teammates out.

*Note there is no accompanying video for Normal Maris

(Clip #17) - How to deal with many types of Everdark Gladius attacks in Trios 

Depth 5 Everdark Gladius with many examples. I had less likely to be targeted +12 to help me revive teammates easier, while the others drew aggro. Black flame is a flame spell, so don't use it on Gladius like if you can avoid it. 

Both the other Revenant and I weren't able to get solid holy spells/weapons due to RNG. I was afraid to use Radagon's Ring of Light after the first phase due to the cast animation time.

00:00 Radagon's Ring of Light

01:24 Ground Aoe Dodge

03:44 Gladius Aura Farm Buffs Himself if you attack him. I'm not sure why the other Revenant attacked Gladius during the aura farm, whether they knew the mechanic, or believed that Gladius would one shot everyone regardless of the damage buff. I would still not recommend attacking him at Depth 5, because I had enough damage negation to survive his attacks, and hitting him could've put the damage over to one-shot me.

05:28 Dodging Phase Transition Torpedo Attack (w/ Aggro) in Trios

07:55 Dodging Phase Transition Torpedo Attack (w/o Aggro) in Trios.

(Clip #18) - Depth 5 Everdark Gladius Video of Revenant clutching with Triple Rings of Light

I could've probably clutched with Discus of Light only, but Triple rings of light does make it way easier to clutch. 

The Duchess contributed a lot here and dropped me the wending grace that I didn't need, while the Ironeye seemed not to be familiar with the fight even at Depth 5. A lot of times Clutching/Carrying isn't done alone, usually there is another teammate who can contribute a great deal if you can pick them up.

Normal Gladius

I would recommend watching a moveset video on Youtube if you struggle to clear him. Earlier in the guide I mentioned when Nightreign first released, it took me 15 hours of gameplay to beat Regular Gladius for the first time with randoms. 

1. His clones are super weak to holy and will get staggered very quickly with holy damage. 

*Note, there is an accompanying video of regular Gladius!

1. The purpose of this accompanying video is showing how you can mess around at Depth 5 when you have an understanding of numbers with damage negation, damage, and boss mechanics.

2. I'm using Ornamental Straight Swords as Revenant, at Depth 5 because I was bored and don't find Regular Gladius challenging anymore. I had Discus of Light just in case. With the passives and hours I have in the game, I wanted to mess around with the swords for fun. My relics are the general 1000 Vigor, incant build I use often. An example of Depth 5 not being a one-shot fest. My relics didn't contribute much at all for the weapon I ended up using.

(Clip #19) - Depth 5 Regular Gladius- Ornamental Straight Sword Revenant with Incant Relics

(Clip #20) - Depth 5 Ironeye and Undertaker Cancelling Everdark Caligo's Frostbite

(Clip #21)- Depth 5 Everdark Caligo's Damage Window during Phase Transition

*Note I have two 40% Damage Negation at Full HP equipped and 1000 vigor in this clip. X * 0.6 * 0.6 = 800 damage was dealt to me (video guide had the wrong math). You can kind of extrapolate how much damage the transition attack does. Roughly around 2222 (2000-2500) damage. I'm also teaching/duoing with a friend who is the Recluse. They are good at dodging the phase transition attack, and they dodged it here while I failed.  Normally if I don't have good damage negation, I would run away to be safe.

(Clip #22) - Depth 3 Everdark Caligo Clutch Example

Showcases decision-making when Reviving with Revenant and summons. 

It also shows how knowing how to dodge some key mechanics would save the run. I was low HP. I knew that Sebastian's roar can revive 2 bars on his own. Since Caligo was diving, I had to position away from the Wylder, just enough, so that Sebastian wouldn't get hit or de-summoned. It also is another example of the damage you lose when your teammates gets downed, and what it looks like with all teammates up. ED Caligo feels tanky, but fire armor breaks contribute a lot to the fight. This is a pretty old video.

(Clip #23) - Depth 5 Everdark Caligo - General Build/Dragon Communion/Melee Hybrid Undertaker

This is an example of me a super generic build without a lot of crazy damage ups. I had enough FP to use Dragon Communion on Undertaker to break Everdark Caligo's armor super quickly. 

Normal Caligo

1. Stay under her legs always except for when she stands up cast an ice breath downwards.

2. When Caligo flies away and disappears, she can cast a map aoe ice breath, follow the sound cue to find the pillar to block the attack. 

3. Beware of invisible ice shards that take a while to spawn/appear. Taking Damage Causes X Buildup can hurt here, but it's manageable.

4. When Caligo flies away and disappears, and you hear ice cracking, sprint towards the noise as fast as possible, and you can damage it while it is casting the spell. The ice ceiling has a hole above Caligo, so you won't get damaged if you make it to the boss.

5. To dodge her breath attacks, dodge into the breath soon as you are barely touching the iced air - Clip #22, 0:02. Takes a bit to get used to the hitbox.

*Note there is no accompanying video for Regular Caligo 

(Clip #24) - Colossal Parry Revenant practice to learn Heolstor's Moveset before Deep of Night was Released

This is an example for how much room for error you get to learn in the base game by soloing. You don't have to solo every boss to learn them, I didn't for Libra. I actually learned how to fight Heolstor from trios only before this, and watching a moveset analysis video

But I spent 10-20 runs learning how to solo, and you really get to understand the boss attacks from these runs. It doesn't teach you much about the trio skills needed too, but it's a stark contrast to Deep of Night, where you get little room for error to learn. And it's another tool to get really good at aura farming specifically. 

A full base game solo run video can be found in - Clip #31 for Normal Balancers.

Fulghor

Everdark Fulghor

Free win? 

The reason I wouldn’t consider Everdark Fulghor a free win, even though he has a simple moveset because:

1. If your ranged characters aren’t used to dodging him at close range, or his aggro switches, it could make the fight much harder for the team. Many people start getting lazy in this fight since Fulghor is considered one of the easiest Everdarks to learn for valid reasons, which can also quickly kill runs.

2.  For whatever reason, Less Likely to be Targeted seems to work the least on Fulghor. Two arrows from the Ironeye, and Fulghor will 180 snipe and kill the glass cannon Ironeye/Recluse with an arrow who didn’t want to pick up damage negation (I remember this vividly and it has happened more than I’d like to have seen in Depth 5). I wish I kept the receipts.

3. Laziness. If you’ve soloed him as melee or fought him frequently with melee, you can confidently dodge his attacks. I’ve also soloed him with Colossal Sword Revenant, so I can solo carry and build my ult to revive. Other characters have to put in more work to revive teammates. People start getting lazy as you can massively DPS him with bleed or spells/lightning, so a run can spiral out of control if people start getting downed.

Actual Boss Mechanic Tips

1. For Fulghor’s ultimate / ground aoe exploding arrow, you have many options. The simplest option is to run far away, or past him. However, sometimes I struggle to run away as Revenant, due to the character’s limited stamina. It can still be good to learn how to dodge the arrow explosion with a dodge roll. If you master that, you can Revive teammates while he is charging the arrow. He will track one player with a glowing light and aim the arrow. The arrow itself can hit you, so you might want to strafe to the side a bit, as he’ll lock onto one location eventually. Lots of aura farming potential.

2. His fast/sudden arrow snipe is mostly dodged by muscle memory. Seems scary, but play him enough and you’ll get used to it, and he can switch his aggro, do a 180 and snipe you or your teammate if you're not prepared. He can do two of them in a row when his HP gets low.

3. Fulghor’s triple attack with two swings and a slam is surprisingly easy to ledeal with. Before every attack he charges his sword while on his heels, dodge the initial swing, and simply spam dodge again to dodge the second swing (might need to wait a bit if Duchess, but I don’t remember), and wait a bit to dodge the third swing/slam.

4. Dodging Fulghor’s 10 hit combo can be easier than you think. 

   1. Get close to him

   2. Dodge initial swing, spam Second dodge/spam after it 

   3. Surge sprint away for the rest of his attacks

(Clip #25) - Depth 5 Everdark Fulghor failed clutch, ending my 19 win streak at 9999.

Recluse struggled to survive basic attacks

Wylder does fine, but struggles to dodge basic attacks. 

I had lazy/sloppy plays, couldn't find a Dragon Cult incant as Revenant, and I failed to clutch a combo due to panic, when I knew how to. In the beginning, we are busting Fulghor for 20k damage, as people start getting downed, and we start playing more cautiously and missing, our damage plummets.

Normal Fulghor

Free win?

1. Fulghor’s goo arm attacks are not really dodgeable at medium range due to the aoe of the goo being flung along with the swing. You can jump over the goo. The best way to survive the goo is to dodge close range to Fulghor. Casters are very susceptible to dying to the goo attacks since they are usually mid range or in casting range, where they can get hit by Fulghor speedy movement + goo aoe. You can avoid the goo attacks by being far away in the first place and surge sprinting, but if you’re in mid range, you want to dodge into him.

2. Fulghor will also frequently charge his holy spear attack that shoots a spear underneath everyone, which you need to cancel using lightning/charge attacks/poise damage. However, lightning on its own may not cancel his charged attack. If he has the visual lightning debuff on his armor, you may need to melee him as well to cancel the attack. For example, two light attack Lightning Spears seals, sometimes doesn’t cancel the attack/break his poise due to that existing debuff. Prepare yourself mentally for him to slam the ground and shoot a spear from underneath you, if his attack doesn't get cancelled.

*Note there is intentionally no accompanying video for Normal Fulghor 

Adel

Everdark Adel

Free win?

This boss is also labeled as one of the easiest Everdarks, but he can still be tough in Deep of Night, and there are still min-max things you can do to help your runs. He does look more scary than he actually is with his ground explosions and lightning.

1. Everdark Adel is tough, because if your Melee is not comfortable weaving in attacks while dodging, your team DPS will drop significantly. It is even tougher when you don’t have Ironeye, or a Recluse on your team, or multiple range. The caster will likely take aggro if the melee aren’t hitting often, and have way less time to DPS if they are trying to stay alive. I’ve had plenty of Guardians/Executors who were pretty much cosmetic to the fight, because they played full survival, and were not comfortable with weaving in attacks.

2. Super min-maxy, but I recommend drawing aggro and fighting Adel, away from the hill where he casts the tornado/whirlwind. By pre-positioning far away from the whirlwind, where he casts at the same spot every time, you can easily reach the Spirit Streams and won’t get killed by the tornado expansion. It’s not worth ulting and staying inside either, as Adel also dives into the middle of the tornado. 

3. You can jump or dodge to avoid the ground explosions. 

4. The melee characters and Ironeye can cancel the tornado summon, but it’s only practical for Ironeye and maybe Wylder, as you have to run away from the lightning storm first, and then get to him before the tornado spawns to cancel it. Ironeye has range.

5. In this fight, you can charge your ult by dodging his grabs that have a sound queue. If you dodge into boss grabs in Nightreign, it will charge your ult a decent amount. As Revenant, if I dodge all of Adel’s attacks, I can solo carry by quickly charging my ult and revive my teammates, rinse and repeat.

6. Adel has a lot of lightning aoe with his chomps, I recommend watching moveset analysis videos for this, and his ground explosion can be jumped or dodged easily with patience. For one lighting AOE chomp, it's best to dodge twice into it.

(Clip #26) - Depth 5 Everdark Adel Duoing due to connection issues, Dual Greatsword Faith Duchesse, Black Flame Revenant with no Damage Negation

In this match, I lost connection twice, we barely got any POIs done, our third teammate was never able to reconnect. We have unoptimized builds, blue weapons, everything that could go wrong, went wrong. But we were still able to win, with the Duchess contributing a lot here with dual greatswords and damage negation. Everdark Adel/Adel is a boss I learned solely from playing trios and watching boss moveset analysis videos.

Normal Adel 

Free win? 

1. Certain characters can free your teammates from a grab with poison/charge attacks.

2. You learn the grab to charge your ult, dodge/jump ground waves, delayed chomp, etc.

3. Not much many hidden tricks to unveil for this boss, I would recommend watching using a moveset analysis video if you struggle with Adel. He's scary to learn the first time.

*Note there is an accompanying video for the normal version! It's an example of "perfect routing/pathing" where we also do 3 Evergaols which weren't that important since only the Ironeye benefited from it. There's also a vigor Raider who did a great job taking aggro.

(Clip #27) - Depth 5 Normal Adel with Non-Meta builds, okay relics. Melt run. Routing Formula used (no voice-over, just Expedition results Map)

Our team comprises of Vigor Raider, Ironeye with default Evergaol Relic, and me with my Night Invader + Vigor setup. I like this run because it contains two of the top 3 weakest characters in Deep of Night, yet we were still fine.

1. I like it because the routing starting from 03:29, skips the first Evergaol, following my personal routing section/formula below to a tee. 

2. . Because we got Crucible Knights at Castle, we were able to deal with Red Banished Knights on late Day 1, after clearing castle with no issues

3. . Normally I only have time to path for 1 or 2 Evergaols with a map and Night Invader camps spread like these, but we were able to get 3. 

4. I did get lucky with items to proc and counter status effects on Adel. You can see that Frost does lot of damage once it triggers Frostbite. The Scarlet Rot Incant was given to me by the Raider. Another example of the first skill you need to learn for Trios for item sharing, if you get a good item for someone else.

Balancers

Everdark Balancers

Argubly the hardest fight you can counter ace in Deep of Night. But a coordinated team can cheese this boss easier than Everdark Libra, without RNG. The video below isn't as smooth as other fights I've completed at Depth 5, but the idea is there, and I deal with worm aggro due to having low stamina. Best and most consistent strategy is to keep running/kiting. 

1. If you permanently kite the Balancers away from the pack, you only have to deal with 2-3 at a time for the rest of the fights. Each time a Balancer dies, one other Balancer will charge at someone with the most aggro, that person should focus on dodging the initial stab.

2. If you kite the worm, you can avoid getting body slammed at close range, the giant flower/phase end aoe, which I do properly the third worm phase in this video below.

3. The falling spears can be avoided by simply strafing to where each explosion ended.

4. The shockwaves can be jumped, run away from the worm to avoid getting hit by the initial ground slam, as it's very hard to dodge while under the worm. I'm not sure if it's possible to dodge both the worm slam and the shockwave at the same time.

5. The wave of gold can be jumped.

6. The worm does a straight charge that can be easily dodged by surge sprinting to the left or right. One of the skills you need to learn is to identify that straight charge vs the slither charge

7. The slithering of the worm and hitbox is kind of janky, he does a figure 8 pattern, but I found it best to keep running. If desperate, run and dodge towards he two holes are in the number "8" to dodge them.

8. The window to revive your teammates is during the phase end of the worm, where it does the giant flower bleed attack.

9. After the worm dies, a cluster of balancers will spawn at the location of its death, so you want to be as far away from that cluster as possible, so you can lure only 2 balancers again.

10. If you have a ton of vigor/damage negation, you can attack the worm during the flower attack, and burst the blobs on his body to deal damage and stance break/cancel the attack. Most people will run away from the phase end/flower attack to save flasks.

(Clip #28) (re-using Clip #5) - Depth 5 Everdark Balancers fight where I lgo over ED Balancers strategy, and how to survive worm aggro as Revenant. Also a routing/commentary guide included in the video for Noklateo. As I mentioned in Clip #2, it also shows that you can tank Depth 5 hits even as a squishy with enough Negations.

Normal Balancers

1. This fight actually is more trivial than you'd expect with a general strategy. The general strategy has two roles:

   1. One person holds aggro from the Lead Valkyrie and focuses on staying alive. After your teammates do enough damage to the balancers, the Lead Valkyrie will switch aggro. It seems really difficult to transfer aggro unless your or your teammates do damage to other Valkyrie, so be prepared to deal with having aggro for some time.

   2. The other two clear the rest of the balancers by fighting one or two at a time, separately or together.  The balancers have low hp, short range attack, and easy stagger. Any AOE spells will work  great. Single target is actually perfectly fine too, if not even better in certain situations.

2. Know how to deal with all of the movesets of the three valkyrie weapon types. There is always one valkyrie with a hammer.  The others are hallberds/spears. It's important to know how to dodge all three weapon types, in case you get aggro from the lead valkyrie. Your role if you get aggro from the lead valkyrie, is to stay alive, while your teammates clear the normal balancers.

   1. The hammer attacks can best be avoided by running away, or jumped if desperate.

   2. The halberd attacks have a short range but wide swing, and can be strafed.  The lead Balancer will shoot some projectile swings which can easily be on sight or like heolstor's projectiles.

   3. The spear/poke attacks are better off dodged with side rolls or forward rolls, not backwards rolls. 

3. For Melees, the valkyries are easily staggerable.

4. Parrying (Wylder's Buckler Parry) or Carian retaliation is effective, but it is harder to pull off in trios with latency, and little room for error. I wouldn't recommend losing a passive slot to it unless you're trying to clip farm.

5. To dodge the big aoe phase transition attack, it is best to regular sprint backwards/to the side, away from the group of valkyries.

   1. The damage from the 6 shockwaves is from the explosion itself, not the initial hitbox/visual when the Valkyries charge through. In order to dodge those attacks, you have to dodge the hitbox of the explosion from the ground, which occurs slightly after the ground has broken. You can regular sprint from the initial attacks, for the final attack surge sprinting works, but you might be out of stam. You can wait a bit to dodge the ground explosion which is more reliable.

   2. The falling spears attack can be blocked with any weapon and any character. It is 100% physical. It is also dodgeable. If you ran to the side enough, you might not even have to dodge the spears.

(Clip #29)- Depth 5 Regular Balancers Duo/Quitter. Dealing with Aggro from Regular Balancers at the end of this video.

Dreglord

1. The Dreglord has so many punish and revive windows. Even with the scarlet rot debuff making Damage Negation at Full HP less useful later in the fight, it is possible to fight the boss at lvl 12 for 10-20 minutes at Depth 5. 

2. One of his multi-hit/swings attacks can be dodge with one roll, and you never have to move again while it swings. He can get staggered easily, he might take a breather sometimes after doing certain combos like a double slam. Pay attention to these punish windows, as knowing is also important for reviving your teammates or doing a lot of damage.

3. There are two meatball slams, and they have slightly different timings to dodge

   1. The tiny meatball slams you want to dodge about when he slams.

   2. The phase transition/giant meatball explosion/chargeup, you want to dodge slightly after his slam. When the sound cue goes off for those 2 slams, is what you need to dodge

4. For his triple/quad ground pound with has hammer, you can strafe backwards and jump over the waves from the slam. After the third slam, you need to strafe to the side, or dodge to the side, to dodge the fourth hit, where he jumps at you.

(Clip #30) - Depth 5 Dreglord, low team resources, newbie/scared Scholar.

Sometimes in my videos, I get hate comments about damage. But little do they know how much Discus of Light contribute to a fight, can do in 3 quick casts, and saves me so much FP for healing.  It's not Revenant's job to take aggro, but I take a bit more here due to this comment I got in another video. The real reason these fights drag on is when one teammate is struggling. In this video there was no one to take aggro besides aggro. However, part of the fault lies on a failure to item share from Recluse.

Guide for Solo Expeditions

Someone asked if I had any tips for soloing so I've included a few:

1. The key thing to note is that you have less time/pois to work with, but the enemy HP is relatively low. I do have a run where I run Colossal Sword Revenant on the regular Balancers below. I die to the Grafted Scion like 3 times, it would've been easier if I just had hoarfrost stomp or bleed. It took me like 10-20 runs just to figure out how to get to 13-15 solo for Heolstor back then. My tips are: 

2. Learn the damage/punish windows for all the mobs/bosses. I'm aggressively hitting the bosses on Day 2 with a Colossal Sword while dodging. The only way to "skip" some fights is to use the Wraith Calling bell. Know which bosses you don't want to fight/take too much time 

3. For routing, I recommend spawning the Rotted Woods shifting earth. Can't go wrong. I gather stuff like Wraith Calling Bell and Starlight shards on Day 1. Castle Immediately. Then I spend all of Day 2 fighting bosses in the Woods. You get a HP buff and partial restoration for some more tanking 

4. Unlike trioing, there is no pressure to fail. All you're doing is using up your own time for learning. If something bad happens you can just run it again right away and use some runs just to experiment.

(Clip #31) - Base Game Solo run to learn Normal Balancers

In this video, you'll learn the importance of damage/punish windows when doing solo runs. It's also a mini tutorial on how to prioritize POIs, cheese bosses with Wraith Calling Bell, and melee-ing formidable bosses.

Core-6 Relic Effects by Nightfarer

I will include the reasoning for some effects, as they are not obvious. These are generally the most common/useful/bang-for-your-buck ones you'll encounter without my specific examples. These core utility relics will help you the most with easing the difficulty of the entire game. 

They increase the pace of your team in which you kill trash mobs or bosses, revive, time-saving, etc. Vigor ones enable you to avoid getting one shot in most games. Most of them in not-so-obvious ways. I include the 6 minimum slots assuming you only get 1 useful line. Some Nightfarers don't need all 6. 

For specific numbers not covered of the effects try: https://relics.pro/compendium

3 Relic effects worth dedicating a single slot for everyone

 I'm not including #2 and #3 as part of the core Nightfarer builds because they can be skipped in certain situations. 

1. Defeating Enemies Fills Art Gauge

2. Dark Night of the Fathom

   1. I don't consider this to as part of the Core 6, but it is a very solid, RNG-Free relic. I used for most of my climb as Revenant on launch. It helps surviving getting one-shot throughout all Depths, even 5.  The +100 HP (+5 Vigor) will help you reach the damage breakpoints I cover in Numbers to prevent getting One-Shot & Damage Formula. It's used a bit less often Post-Deep of Night because of the Increases Maximum HP (10%) that can show up on DoN relics. But it can be considered an essential for Raider even still.

3. Attack power increased for each Night Invader defeated +7% (Depths 3-5)

Why is Attack power increased for each Evergaol prisoner defeated +5% not recommended anymore? 

As explained above, Evergaols become an accessory POI. It is a potential noob trap in Deep of Night- especially doing one at level 3 when your team has no items. I've explained the reasoning in the relic section above if you skipped to this section.

Wylder 

Regular Chalice

1. [Wylder] +1 Additional Skill Usage. (Mobility, Successive Attacks Negate Damage, Character Skill inflicts Blood Loss) 

2. The Will of Balance - Red Balancers  (Occasionally Nullify Attacks When Damage Negation is Lowered" can save getting one-shot, save a flask, etc)

3. [Wylder] Art activation spreads fire in area - Underrated effect. It will help you the most with defeating the Red Lobsters in Great hollows and Night Invaders. The leftover fire does a lot of damage, and increase your reviving/clutch potential significantly.

Deep of Night Chalice

1. [Wylder] Character Skill inflicts Blood Loss

2. Defeating Enemies Fills Art Gauge 0 or +1 (Covered this in above sections)

3. Partial HP Restoration upon Post-Damage Attacks +1/2

Ironeye

Regular Chalice

1. [Ironeye] +1 Additional Skill Usage  (Long I-Frame, Mark Application, Reviving)

Deep of Night Chalice

1. [Ironeye] Character Skill Inflicts Heavy Poison Damage on Poisoned Enemies

2. Defeating Enemies Fills Art Gauge and/or +1 (If you don't run this on Ironeye, I hate you)

3. [Ironeye] Art Charge Activation Adds Poison Effect (300 poison. Can go without but chains with #1 and #2 for clearing trash mobs and chunking mini-bosses.)

Duchess

Regular Chalice

1. [Duchess] Improved Character Skill Attack Power (You could go without it.  Skill on 2000 damage = 1000. Relic +10% = 1200)

2. Max FP increased for each Sorcerer's Rise unlocked (+18% FP per Rise)

Deep of Night Chalice

3. [Duchess] Use Character Skill for Brief Invulnerability (Another i-frame)

4. Defeating Enemies Fills Art Gauge and/or +1

Recluse

Regular Chalice

1. [Recluse] Activating Ultimate Art raises Max HP (+50% HP for 30 seconds AND until you get hit!!!) It got buffed and old wikis are wrong. Now think about the chain effects of having Defeating Enemies fills your art Gauge that I listed earlier). 

Deep of Night Chalice

1. Defeating Enemies Fills Art Gauge 0 or +1

Executor

Regular Chalice

1. The Will of Balance - Red Balancers 

Deep of Night Chalice

1. Defeating Enemies Fills Art Gauge and/or +1 (Executor has best Ultimate in the game as explained above)

2. Successful guarding fills more of the Art gauge (Aura farming/clutching only)

3. Partial HP Restoration upon Post-Damage Attacks +1/2 (Extremely tankiness with Rivers of Blood + Successive Attacks Negate Damage)

Revenant

1. Changes compatible armament's incantation to [Beast Claw, Lightning Spear, O Flame] at the start of expedition. (Relic, RNG, DLC Only). These can also be seen as Utility Relics. As broken as Beast Claw is, you can just use it as a temporarily early-game utility incant if you want. At the time of when I created the first version of the guide, it was not available, and I used whatever I found during the expedition. Was still fine.

2. [Revenant] Trigger ghostflame explosion during Ultimate Art activation

   1. This one is more opinionated. The reason why I've brought this relic effect for 95% of my games is subtle. Many Ultimates give a hidden benefit with the staggers they offer. 

   2. Ghostflame explosion lets you: Run into a POI/Group of Mobs -> Ult -> Enemies Are Now Staggered/Fall Down -> Revenant can freely cast spells without dying and kill them. Especially useful for the early game.Much more useful without DLC's starting spell relics

3. Max FP increased for each Sorcerer's Rise unlocked (+18% FP per Rise). Needed for Giantsflame builds. The more FP the better, because you can just spam heal if you run out of Flasks. You also open up your options to use expensive incants like Elden Stars, Dragonfire, etc.

Deep of Night Chalice

1. Defeating Enemies Fills Art Gauge

Raider

Regular Chalice

1. Vigor/ Dark Night of Fathom. Ideally 1600+ Vigor at lvl 15 at Depth 5.

Deep of Night Chalice

1. [Raider] Hit With Character Skill to Reduce Enemy Attack Power

2. Increased Maximum HP (+10%)

3. Partial HP Restoration upon Post-Damage Attacks +1/2 

Guardian `

Unfortunately Guardian is pretty Relic Heavy to play comfortably and do his job. Some of these combos come with default relics or only require 2 good relics lines.

Regular Chalice

1. [Guardian] Successful guards send out shockwaves while ability is active

2. [Guardian] Slowly restores nearby allies' HP while Art is active

3. Stamina Recovery upon Landing Attacks

Deep of Night Chalice

1. Successful guarding fills more of the Art gauge (This + Defeating is still good)

2. Partial HP Restoration upon Post-Damage Attacks +1/2 

Undertaker

Regular Chalice

1. [Undertaker] Activating Ultimate Art increases attack power

Deep of Night Chalice

1. Defeating Enemies Fills Art Gauge and/or +1

2. Partial HP Restoration upon Post-Damage Attacks +1/2 

Scholar

Regular Chalice

1. The Will of Balance - Red Balancers 

Deep of Night Chalice

1. [Scholar] Improved Endurance and Dexterity, Reduced Intelligence and Arcane

2. Items confer effect to all nearby allies

3. Defeating Enemies Fills Art Gauge and/or +1

Defeating Enemies Fills Art Gauge is "Mandatory" for Deep of Night. Here's Why

As always, you can win without the effect. The video below is a demonstration of changing pace of the expedition and provides value by staggering enemies/mobs, giving your team damage windows, aoe/cc for clearing mobs, and some damage. This is why I rank it the #1 relic line. It also is more effective in some ways as a Duo, due to bosses having lower relative poise scaling.

(Clip #32) Duo-ing Depth 5 Normal Balancers with a Revenant/Disconnect

 In this full run, I take aggro as Wylder and track all of the times we used Defeating Enemies Fills Art Gauge/Ults to help cheese POIs and poise break bosses.

Other Resources for Relic Builds

Here is a site with the list of relic effects and if they can be stacked: https://relics.pro/compendium

Best builds Video by Pike Analysis (Post-DLC): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oHhliGbsYRY

After my 777th Revenant expedition, I played Wylder for ~150 expeditions. Of those 150 expeditions, 70 of them were on a winstreak in Depth 5. No dodging, no edited relics, no starting spell,  just a core/generic build. 

Around 10 of those games I duoed into trios with a random with a friend I made. Some of those expeditions had players with Edited Relics. Only a few of them particularly skilled compared to other Depth 5 players I encounter. The 70 streak ended due to a common routing mistake I made. Failure to account for the third player disconnecting and then fighting a Red Royal Revenant too early on Day 1. I failed to help/carry both newbies.

Main Go-to/lazy Revenant relic setup used for 9999, 20, 19 winstreak Pre-DLC (not important, only 10/18 useful lines)

As I analyzed in the relic section, I chose to have roll vigor to give me the base chances of surviving one hit, though I still need to find around +50-60% damage negation in total during a run. I don't want to lock in every run to run full glass cannon, or need more damage negation because I didn't run vigor. I can't wait to get better relics, but you don't really get a choice.

This Evergaol + Invader relic setup below looks crazy at first glance, but I've only used this setup 2 times? Why didn't I use it while climbing.

The first relic looks great, until it isn’t. I don’t want lines to become useless if I don’t get a specific incantation and troll my team. Fundamentalist Incantations pretty much requires me to have Discus of Light or Triple Rings of Light to get value out of it. I don’t get those every game, due to the bad incant pool and incant combos. I can go 10-12 games without seeing the incants. Power up while fighting alongside family is not that great at Depth 5 for me. I can get 10% damage for 10 seconds- the time Frederick stays alive on the field. Maybe Revenant summons will get buffed in the future. It sure is lucky and insane, but I quickly swapped out of it and prefer to run a hybrid vigor/general damage build.

Relic Setup in November 26, 2025

I kept adjusting my relics as I find better ones. But I tried to slot in Maris from time to time because I liked having the Continuous Hp Recovery to top off my health and save on a heal/flask. But Revenant can self heal in fights anyway. They don't matter that much, but the reason why I adjusted is because the Madness buildup ruined an ED Libra solo carry, so I got rid of that relic. There are still about 6 not very helpful lines here, so only 12/18 slots are filled, and RNG is nice to me in some ways after 600 hours, others not.

On average, I'm only boosting my damage about 1.4x, but that was always  solid for me, as I like having 1000 vigor to help make damage negation better, instead of 780 vigor with full glass cannon.

The other main reason is I get easily bored using the same spell over and over again. I like the variety of using whatever I get during a run.

First Depth 5 Game - 9/27/2025

Reaching 9999 - October, 30, 2025

Battle Record - Summary in November 12, 2025

Closing Thoughts/More Game Profile / Unimportant Information / If you're curious and made it this far

Luck can play a huge factor in your climb with bosses, but you should be prepared to fight any boss and not play the hope game. As players get better and better, the climb can become easier. Most of my gametime (95%) of the time, I was playing solo randoms, and teaching a friend what I learned. I went from 6000-9999 with random trios.

On average, from checking Steam profiles of my teammates, it takes a player about 400 hours to reach Depth 5. If I had all of this knowledge beforehand, it would’ve saved me many runs, and I could’ve climbed in less time. Just need to play the game and have fun naturally, for all of the stuff to sink in and perform under pressure. I still panic sometimes, less often, but that's the thrill of the game. 

Plenty solo climb to 9999 with bad relics, non min-max strategies, and found different things worked for them. What’s the same in every climb, and not RNG dependent, is that the players knew how to deal with most of the boss mechanics, and understand routing/opportunity cost of their decisions/tradeoffs. Analyze your own games, playstyle, your trios/friends (this guide is for people who don’t have many), have fun, instead of blindly following this guide, metas, or other strategies.