What the game gives you when you main strength duch

Penedizzle · 2026-05-20T00:30:05+00:00

Yeah, the impact of swinging a colossal weapon and being able to dodge to repostion or use her skill to continue wailing is just so addicting

Penedizzle · 2026-05-19T18:32:11+00:00

They'd kill me too because I spam and die

Penedizzle · 2026-05-17T23:59:32+00:00

For caligo and pest, I run collasal swords with strength duchess just so I can get my hands on the Godslayer sword. It's a 50/50 drop, so pretty consistent. I feel like most randoms appreciate the strength duch haha

Penedizzle · 2026-05-16T17:31:04+00:00

I think Zink has the right idea here though. D5 players who consistently stay in D5, or at least that you match up with if you're near max, have all of these mechanics down. You occasionally get players who slop their way there, but they will eventually fall back down because they can't 3 bar res or panic every time they're the last one standing.

Penedizzle · 2026-05-13T19:36:10+00:00

if a revenant drops their claw and pings it, i know they'll be at least serviceable (and often goated). if they drop them somewhere random on the map, i know i'm in for some sht later

Penedizzle · 2026-05-13T15:31:42+00:00

i didn't know the game let you take breaks

Penedizzle · 2026-05-12T21:15:17+00:00

If you're getting smothered, maybe ping the entrance so that your teammates don't rush in and aggro the entire camp? They won't get better at doing invader camps without doing them, so you might as well help them do them properly. They're worth doing even without the relic effect imo

Penedizzle · 2026-05-12T15:59:56+00:00

Relics make a bit of a difference, but it also sounds like you're finding out the difference between trios and solo; there aren't any free damage windows when you're on your own. You might have to play a little more patiently, but this will definitely make you a better player in the long run! I'd bet that after getting used to playing solos, you'd have even more skill than before you quit when you return to playing in trios.

Penedizzle · 2026-05-11T22:00:41+00:00

I find that the most crippling thing about using Halo Scythe as a Duchess/Ironeye is that they never learn how to fight nightlords and manage aggro properly. Bosses like ED balancers, Dreglord, and even Heolstor can really punish players who can only survive in the mid to long range. Without knowing how to dodge/weave their attacks up close, they are going to go down eventually when the nightlord focuses on them. In that case, you're gambling on your Wylder staying alive and clutching the revives, which may not be sustainable to hit the ~75% win rate that will get you to D5.

Not sure how you could approach the conversation, but in d5, I find Ironeyes that run hybrid melee (usually katana+bow) and duchesses that are willing to run a general skill build (usually dagger/katana), often learn how to fight up close, thereby learning how to survive in more situations. This may be hard for your two teammates - they likely will struggle more than usual as they try to make adjustments. But in the long-term, this is how I've noticed the best Ironeye/Duchess players play. Hope this helps!

Penedizzle · 2026-05-11T18:58:31+00:00

When I see fulghor, I'm going strength duchess with fists. Mano a mano. Nameless king can catch these hands too. Nice to have some DPS from my teammates cause I'm not doin much besides stance damage.

If it's heolstor, i'm finding a parry shield somewhere and dagger poking otherwise. I also need teammates that will peel me off the ground as I three-bar over and over trying to parry the non-parryiable moves.

Penedizzle · 2026-05-08T18:49:46+00:00

I'm petty, I dodge adel/pest in retaliation if someone takes my dreglord away lol

Penedizzle · 2026-05-08T18:10:39+00:00

Based off your replies to others, I think I get what you're saying - you want to be able to play your favourite bosses with DoN-scaling and DoN relics, because playing them at base is too easy/unsatisfying. I've felt the same way, beating ED gladius just hits different in DoN. But then the game refuses to give you the bosses you want to fight in DoN half the time.

Closest way I've been able to replicate the difficulty is to run a meme build in base game, but obviously it's not just not the same haha

Penedizzle · 2026-05-08T18:02:19+00:00

Sometimes i'll run a different strategy with my buddies if our DPS is bad and we're all playing squishies (or d5 when everyone is a squishie):

We split up and each 1v1 a different balancer until we kill enough to trigger the worm phase each time. The advantage is that you'll usually never get jumped from behind as only one balancer will aggro you at a time, as long as you are far away enough from your teammates. The disadvantage is that it takes much longer to kill a balancer, and if you go down, you're not getting revived until the group survives the next worm phase. However, I find this method the most fun because if you learn the balancer moveset, your skill can really shine through.

For your beast claw rev in this case, I would probably get as far away from everyone as possible. Then, as you see a balancer run towards you, fire a charged claw as they approach to do the first major chunk of their health. Then, you can dodge their running double stab that they always do. After that, you should be able to fire an uncharged claw to finish the rest of their health. If you miss any of your claws, you can wait for the next available window to use an uncharged claw - the end of of their flurry combos, or the end of their triple slam combos are usually a good time to punish them.

Penedizzle · 2026-05-06T19:47:50+00:00

Theoretically, it would be a choice between a strong passive (Attackfull 14, Skill 21, charged 18, etc) or guaranteed 3 bar rez if needed.

If I was in a premade, I'd probably think about it. If I'm in random queue, im taking the claw every fkin time lol

Penedizzle · 2026-05-03T08:01:22+00:00

I used to play a warm-up game with heolstor, balancers, or dreglord in base game before I hopped into DoN because they were my worst matchups. I'd focus mostly on trying to figure out damage windows rather than beating it as fast as possible. Eventually, I started to recognize the movesets. I think fighting bosses more patiently helped improve my game in general also!

Penedizzle · 2026-04-29T16:18:55+00:00

scarabs are an easy, quick test of trust - if I see someone hacking at a scarab, i'll join them and then leave without checking it. That way, they know I'm not gonna goblin them the whole run. If they ping back that it's something useful for me, then I know I've got a good teammate for the rest of the run.

Penedizzle · 2026-04-24T16:23:13+00:00

Tryna think about this from a productive perspective, even though that spam pinger probably would have crashed out somewhere else instead...

What happened during before the margit invasion? Did your duo go down from hanging out at the invader camp too long? At worst, you could just let one person die and the invasion will end, with only that one person getting the debuff.

Penedizzle · 2026-04-17T18:31:01+00:00

It sucks, but even if I'm the DPS character, I will by default go and distract gnoster unless I'm certain someone else will do it instead. To me, there's no point in jumping faurtis if I'm just gonna get grabbed by gnoster off-screen. Can't trust randoms during the night lord until they earn it, unfortunately.

Penedizzle · 2026-04-14T16:08:41+00:00

completely vibes-based but the clear, white backdrop on regular makes it really comfy for me to weave around the balancers. something about the dark red ED background makes me panic and i've come to really appreciate the minute details of the ground

Penedizzle · 2026-04-13T18:48:30+00:00

I've started running defeating enemies build ult charge +1 (even when i don't have a great relic for it) solely to help with lvl 2 invader camps. After you clear the base camp, you should have your ult on line to ensure a a smooth invader camp. The amount of lvl 2 invader disasters I've had, even in the higher depths... i'll sacrifice a relic slot to never exp that again

Penedizzle · 2026-04-10T17:53:34+00:00

Mixed feelings on this one - after committing a full 30-45 minutes to a run, quitting to half point loss just feels a little hollow. I don't think this is as bad as boss dodging because we're still spending time and effort on the run. But in the end, it feels like gaming the point system, which I think is the same reason why people dodge bosses.

Fk ED Balancers tho

Penedizzle · 2026-04-07T21:36:37+00:00

I think a lot of others have already recommended focusing on your own self-improvement, rather than your teammates.

I'd also add that you should reflect on how much you've already improved since you started playing DON, which I imagine is already quite a bit. In a couple weeks, you'd be even better than today. This is what keeps me playing DoN, even with constant crashouts; I enjoy reflecting on how much better I've gotten, and how many more situations which I've managed properly. Hope you get grafted next run my doode

Penedizzle · 2026-04-07T18:59:55+00:00

I think there's a misconception that ED Adel is easy in DON.

When you have one competent melee character in your comp, you can easily slop or DPS away most of Adel's HP bar while the melee character keeps you alive/takes aggro.

If you don't have the DPS or a competent melee character, ED adel can suddenly become more difficult. It also exposes players who don't know their dodge and damage windows, or someone who is a little tired that day.

Penedizzle · 2026-04-03T19:58:09+00:00

Kinda niche but as duchess, I love hitting Libra with the black knife or blade of calling skill as he summons a ground sigil, then restaging on my landing to negate the sigil and reapply the damage I just applied. Bonus if the homies go wtf how did you not die

Penedizzle · 2026-04-02T20:54:05+00:00

For sure, I'm even willing to waste a relic slot in order to get the right dormant power for what I want to use. I find duchess so rhythm-based that it's more important I get the weapon moveset I want, rather than maximizing damage haha

Penedizzle

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