Dungeon Rats Walkthrough Guide, Best Builds

Dungeon Rats Walkthrough Guide

Welcome to my walkthrough guide for Dungeon Rats, a cRPG developed by Iron Tower Studios. Released in 2016, Dungeon Rats is a turn-based cRPG notable for its tactical combat, tough combat encounter design and employment of crafting, alchemy and strict resource management.

As it pertains to cRPG Design, Dungeon Rats is rated as Well Above Average.

Casual gamers are not the target demographic of Dungeon Rats. As was made clear in Best cRPG Dungeons, you can't just waltz in and beat Dungeon Rats, you have to actually get good. There is no instant gratification or gentle learning curve in sight. Dungeon Rats was developed for cRPG connoisseurs and tactics aficionados, not run-of-the-mill gamers who only play cakewalk cRPGs.

Dungeon Rats was built on the Torque 3D engine as per the reactive Age of Decadence (2015), of which it is a welcome combat-based spin-off. Whereas in AoD the player was able to engage in non-linear questing as well as solve quests by non-combat means, Dungeon Rats is mostly about killing, looting and exploring. It could be said that Dungeon Rats is to Age of Decadence what Icewind Dale is to Planescape: Torment -- better.

Thankfully, Dungeon Rats is not big on lore and story. There is some, and it can be interesting, but I'm not covering it other than through a few screencaps.

The Object of Dungeon Rats

In Dungeon Rats, you assume the role of a prisoner attempting to escape from your captors. Alone or in a party of up to four, you progressively take over an entire subterranean region, wiping out gangs and their leaders along the way. You kill, you loot. And then you craft items, repair items, brew potions and skill-up. Almost without exception, you're killing anyone or anything that stands in your way.

This is as raw as fights for survival get.

Dungeon Rats Tips

Readers who have played X-COM, Jagged Alliance 2, Silent Storm and ToEE are going to feel at home with Dungeon Rats.

Those who enjoy difficult and unforgiving games are also going to be in their element. As per the above four juggernauts, DR isn't for casuals, generalist gamers and other peasants. 

There is no player-activated resting (at all) or in-combat saving or healing (other than through an extremely rare potion that grants permanent 1 HP regeneration per turn). Most healing is done by consuming rations post-combat. Rations are itemized in limited quantities or auto-harvested post-combat (living off slain fauna). The ongoing impact of bleeding and poison dmg can be stopped in-combat with healing salves and antidotes.

There are no merchants. In Dungeon Rats, cRPG itemization wholly consists in looting corpses and placeables / objects.

Itemization is strictly static. That is, it is unrandomized and does not scale to party skill level or size.

There is no level scaling whatsoever. An enemy is what it is, regardless of party skill level or size.

Combat is lethal. Positioning and executing the correct attacks at key moments is important.

Due to the tight and disciplined cRPG combat encounter design, the battles can sort of feel like Chess. Consolidation is key. Thinking ahead, seeing patterns, anticipating AI movements and attacks, and utilizing the environment to limit avenues of approach and incoming attacks.

Crafting & Alchemy are important skills; they're integral. It's possible to get by without one or the other, or even both, but it's much, much more difficult.

Crafting is about forging arms & armor. But it also governs the ability to pick locks and sharpen weapons with a whetstone. Don't underestimate what sharpening a weapon can do for you.

There are missables and fail-states are possible (bad build, bad resource management, bad player).

Halfway in, you're going to wish you did such and such, and didn't do such and such. Push on, and resist the temptation to restart: that's what replays are for.

Don't turn your back on the aggro: it is going to rip you a new asshole if you do that. Back off if you're on your last legs because the enemy WILL finish you off. Archers are going to prioritize you.

Rotating on the square of occupation consumes 1 AP. Make sure you're facing the right way.

I wouldn't diversify skills too much. Focus, focus, focus! This is a game in which we are forced to make tough build choices. You MUST focus or your character is going to suck ass.

What the best build is depends on party composition and mode of play (solo, Ironman). That said, the best builds are focused ones. Search for [1.1] for builds.

Think as much about how to build a companion as you would your own character. Think about how each party member complements one another on the battlefield, and in camp (alchemy, crafting).

Due to the inclusion of crafting mechanics, weapon choice is not crucial providing we learn to actually use the weapon in respect to positioning, special attacks and party composition (if any). In addition, it is best that the weapon / attack align with the prime attribute/s (Str, Dex, Pe). For example, Str doesn't synergize with swords and daggers, only axes and hammers (and Block).

Dump Constitution only if you want to die and reload often. Newbies need Con. 30 HPs isn't enough in this game. Not even with max Dodge or Heavy Armor / Block. With low Con, you're dead meat if you get poisoned or start bleeding. 30 HPs is an utter joke. Don't go glass cannon unless you're an expert.

Strength isn't the be-all and end-all of melee damage. Knife fighters and Swordsmen (Dex-based) can employ Critical Strike. Not to mention stacking bleeding and poison. Strength is more for Bashers and Blockers.

Snipers (bow, crossbow, throwing) rely on Perception, not Dex.

But Dex is useful to ALL characters since it governs our action point (AP) pool. The more APs we have, the more we can do on our turn (movement rate + attack rate).

Intelligence is my fave dumpstat. The loss of skillpoints didn't seem to impact my skillset much.

Dodge is superior for tanking in early-to-mid-game, Block late-game.

You don't actually need to make a combatant if you're playing with a party of damage-dealers. You can make a charismatic Alchemist and Crafter, and still win. Just make sure you can actually survive on the battlefield. You could throw bombs, nets and so on to make yourself useful.

Moving diagonally across squares consumes double AP. Two-handed melee weapons can attack diagonally across squares, which saves AP expenditure on movement.

Note that two-handed spears get handy on-enemy-approach attacks (interrupt attacks) which knock the enemy back one square (and can happen several times in a row), but cannot attack adjacent squares that are not diagonally adjacent (we need to step back a square). Imagine how Knights move in Chess: spears can also attack like that.

Don't forget to employ nets for immobilization and bombs for crowd control.

Don't ignore belt slots (the two belt bags): they give you the versatility in combat that is often needed. For example, let's say you don't have enough APs to swing your primary weapon yet again on this turn. But you have enough APs to whip out a dagger and get in a stab. Nice. Works best with Swordsmen due to the synergy of swords and daggers.

Continuing with belt bags, imagine a sniper wielding a heavy crossbow but also packing two hand crossbows... that's going to facilitate a nice opening volley.

During the initial positional phase of combat (pre-combat phase), you can set your equipment, reload weapons, apply poisons etc.

Combatants are able to delay their turn through the "Wait" feature. This can be useful if we want to immobilize / knock down enemies before attempting to land devastating blows.

Try to pin archers and spearmen against walls and placeables so they can't step away.

Prioritize bomb-throwing alchemists. The quicker we kill them, the safer we are. And the more bombs we can loot from their corpses.

It is possible to line up ranged attacks such that, if the first enemy dodges the projectile, it may hit any enemy behind them. Note this is also true of friendly fire (and for the enemy, too).

Remember that unwanted items can be decomposed in order to extract raw materials (cloth, leather, wood, metal), which can be used to repair and craft wanted items. Make sure you're adding the schematics before decomposing arms & armor (right-click, add).

Dump all the crap you don't want, and can't break down, into corpses. There is nothing worse than inventory clutter.

The ruleset is built into the game. RTFM.

If you want to be able to recruit any of the Dungen Rats companions, you must start with a Charisma score of 10. In addition, someone in the party must attain Crafting >=8. However, I recommend Cha 8. This grants us a party of four (3 companions) as well as access to all but two companions in the game (which come late).

If you want to get all stat bonuses (Str +1, Dex +1, Con +1), it is best to start with Con 7 or Str 9. In addition, someone in the party must attain Crafting >=8. The stat gains are possible by inserting three jars into the machine located in the Ancient Facility. One jar is found in Part III, one in Part VII and one in Part XII.

In addition, concoction of the Regeneration Potion requires an Alchemy score >=7.

Raw Materials totals (aggressive decomposition):

• Lumber (1887, 188.7 lbs)
• Cloth (73, 7.3 lbs)
• Leather (693, 69.3 lbs)
• Hardened Leather (861, 86.1 lbs)
• Bronze (654, 65.4 lbs)
• Iron (2428, 242,8 lbs)
• Steel (2592, 259.2 lbs)
• Blue Steel (231, 23.1 lbs)
• Sky Metal (147, 14.7 lbs)
• Ant Chitin (300, 30.0 lbs)
• Scorpion Carapace (390, 39.0 lbs)
• Worm Exoskeleton (325, 32.5 lbs)

Solo: Murderous Psychopath skillpoint total (Int 4): x470 SPs. 

Dungeon Rats Difficulty

For players new to tactics cRPGs, play on Nice Guy difficulty. The game is going to be hard enough for newbies on Nice Guy. Or with Tough Bastard if you're feeling lucky.

If you've played the above-mentioned tactics cRPGs, play on Murderous Psychopath.

Do not play on solo or Ironman Mode unless you've played DR before, and know exactly what it is that you are doing (or are a masochist).

Chargen: clean-slate character:

I started with a Basher build but then restarted as a Swordsman who eventually wielded a Sky Metal forged Gladius. I can't tell you how satisfying that build was, especially when I pulled off arterial strikes on heavily armored foes.

Emperor's Gladius, Enforcer's Gladius [link] [link]

Dungeon Rats Best Builds

[1.1] 

The best build in Dungeon Rats is the build that is tailored to itemization employment, party composition and tactical playstyle. The following Dungeon Rats build remarks are based on four-person parties. I can't imagine anyone wanting to conduct a maiden run of DR without a full party. Thus, a Charisma score >=8 is required.

Now, again, I can't imagine anyone wanting to sacrifice any more points on Cha just to gain access to a couple more companions (Yngvar and Guardian). So that leaves us with a pool of 12 stat points to assign. Every other stat is now at four, so which do we raise and dump?

As I said above, dumping Con on a maiden run is a big no-no. 30 HPs is a joke. But the better we are at the game, the fewer HPs we can get by with. I recommend Con 8 unless we are going to be a sniper or have Str >=9 (because otherwise we miss out on one stat bonus). This also gives us solid poison resistance, which effect is common and lethal.

So with Con 8 and Cha 8 we have only 8 statpoints remaining. These we tailor to our weapons.

An important question is, What weapon/s do we want to wield? Because the weapon dictates our playstyle; how we play the game. The weapon-based stats (Str, Dex, Per) impact our to-hit chance for certain weapon groupings. So Str is for hammers and axes (+ block: shield), Dex is for swords, daggers and spears, and Per is for all weapons but also grants a bonus on top for bows, crossbow and throwing. 

Of these weapon-based stats, Dex is the most important to consider because on top of impacting our skill for three weapons (sword, dagger and spear), it modifies our action points (mobility and attack rate) as well as our initiative after the first turn (we always go first on turn 1, but after that the order in which combatants may act is based on Dex). Thus, I go for Dex 9 (we can get to 10 from a stat bonus).

Now we've narrowed things down a bit. We only have 3 statpoints remaining. As mentioned above, I'm not a fan of Int outside of solo play. It does not impact Critical Strike like I thought it might. All it does is grant us a skillpoint bonus after each battle. My walkthrough records the skillpoint yield at Int 4, and I think that's enough. Thus, dump.

So basically, those remaining points are going to go into Str. For archers, Con must bow to Per.

Thus, we have something like:

• Big Basher: 9-8-7-4-4-8
• General Melee: 7-9-8-4-4-8
• Archer: 8-8-4-8-4-8 (you still need Strength on archers)

Next, we need to think about skills. In party-based games, unless we really want to do it ourselves, we can eliminate Alchemy and Crafting from the equation right away because companions such as Cyrus, Hieron and Ismail are skilled enough.

Dodge or Block? I recommend Dodge for newbies because it's great from early-to-mid game. Don't get me wrong, Block shines as well, and becomes more powerful than Dodge later when deadly archers step up. Marksmen and two-handed bashers also roll with Dodge.

Critical Strike is nice if we lack big Strength bonuses (up to 40% and beyond with Berserk potions). It's especially useful for knife fighters and marksmen.

All that is left then are the weapon skills. Check the synergies between stat and weapon, and then tailor accordingly.

As the character is being built in-game, keep its to-hit and defense peaking (weapon skill and Dodge or Block). Or for ranged and to a lesser extent knife fighters, to-hit and criticals (CS).

It's possible to dump Cha and go for a full-on power-gaming build. We only gain access to one companion but we can still enlist the services of Hieron for Crafting and Ismail for Alchemy (skill levels 5/6). We won't have access to the best potions, bombs and arms & armor crafts, but we can certainly get through the campaign with what we can find, and with what they can concoct, assemble and craft.

It begins at Rock Bottom:

cRPG Blog	4. Barca	9. Scaurus	14. Praefectus
Dungeon Rats Walkthrough	5. Old Town	10. Enforcer	15. Centurion
1. Rock Bottom	6. Roxana	11. Construct	16. Alchemy Dungeon Rats
2. Bug Hunt	7. Elder Worm	12. Guardian Demon	17. Companions Dungeon Rats
3. Fire Ant Queen	8. Democritus	13. Emperor	18. Arms & Armor Dungeon Rats

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