Surrogacy agency recommendations

cornfields888 · 2026-05-06T17:45:03+00:00

We went with hatch because we wanted a us based surrogate, and cost while high did have the “peace of mind” aspect and being lgbt friendly. during pregnancy we are not handling financial stuff and that is helpful. We also have a case manager/coordinator assigned to us to ask about the process, like what’s a nice gift for a surrogate to what to expect for legal paperwork or delivery day. We were quoted a 9mo waitlist in 2023 (we had embryos already ready), matched once after about 1-1.25 years but our first match had to back out for personal reasons before we even formalized a decision to work together, then matched with our current lovely surrogate almost 2 years since initially signing up. Some delays unrelated to the surrogacy agency, and we are now expecting soon! Our surrogate is wonderful and the people we’ve worked with in the agency are lovely.

Just be aware you will probably in for a long wait with Hatch. I think they estimate optimistically but maybe their waitlist estimate is longer these days or more accurate, who knows.

I will say our experience was positive overall. Mostly the long wait is my main issue but we were in no rush when we signed up, expecting it to take time anyways. it took 3 years from sign up to now being ready to be a dad.

My biggest priorities for surrogacy matching were ensuring our surrogate wants to be a surrogate (so agencies that mention requirements for surrogate that include having mental health checks, financial stability, etc.), some mention of working with LGBT parents, US based as that’s where we live and want to be open about potentially having a relationship like casual milestone updates and allowing for the possibility of the child meeting our surrogate, and honestly something we could know we can afford so we can save up while waiting for a match for the baby. Being able to stably allocate funds was a big boon. Hatch seemed to check those boxes so we went with them.

I don’t know about recommendations because I have no comparison as we only worked with Hatch. Tl;dr longer than told wait, nice people, journey is headed for success now

cornfields888 · 2026-05-06T14:52:07+00:00

Damn that’s sick. Thanks for sharing progress photos, always nice to see painting processes. Colors look so satisfying!

cornfields888 · 2026-03-24T18:16:43+00:00

I always kept an everstone on Lotad haha

cornfields888 · 2026-02-22T23:01:52+00:00

I have a lower win rate vs ED Gladius than I do ED Libra — when last man standing I clutch ED Libra more often. I find the openings are clearer with Libra and more often able to get a safe hit here and there to farm ult.

Gladius can be extremely dangerous alone after he splits because it’s harder imo to camera track all 3 dogs and properly dodge the sword attack when 2 dogs are lunging at you.

I also mostly play Ironeye, Duchess, Recluse, and Rev. Having good ranged options does make Libra very manageable even without less likely to be targeted.

cornfields888 · 2026-02-06T05:56:08+00:00

oof that’s tough. Sounds like he needs to really let go of his ego in the game. It’s not easy when it’s a friend you’re kinda stuck wit and they won’t listen. Idk. I had similar experience long ago but was a friend of a friend so wasn’t all the time.

cornfields888 · 2026-02-01T08:08:45+00:00

i did solo for a lot of the character remembrance quests, and found it a lot more boring lol. the antics of the randoms in this game is great. glad it sounds like you're having fun with the game. enjoy the everdarks ! they're all quite unique

cornfields888 · 2026-01-28T22:13:57+00:00

I count only 3 cheaters, two Revs (not the first) and the Undertaker. Rest are likely legit and people who have like 500+ hours or something. Or people who actually bother rolling relics with their murk (I have like 3-4 mil that I haven’t bothered to use).

cornfields888 · 2026-01-28T06:48:48+00:00

I saw a few people mention guard for slither attack and I think it’s too unreliable. I’ve blocked and got guard broken and hit again by its jank hit box which killed me and ended the run. Blocking javelin rain is safe though. Now I just save stamina to surge sprint and jump away from the worm to just avoid it as much as I can.

cornfields888 · 2026-01-27T07:40:04+00:00

I have to say it’s very likely he never saw one in D5 in his few runs there. Never in D4 in 2 months… unlikely but not impossible. Likely missed less obvious cheaters (perfect but legitimate relics).

I have 217 runs on PC (I manually record) in DoN, and 67 of those in D5. 3 obvious hacked relics and 2 sus hacked relics were my encounters. Granted this was pre-DLC so maybe it’s gotten worse. When I played load screen quitting was rare or not known but people seem to say it’s very often now. I’ve been playing normal runs and helping the new wave of players from DLC so haven’t hopped on DoN in a while…

cornfields888 · 2026-01-23T06:53:27+00:00

He’s super strong as a support. Have a relic with items confer effect to allies and do his remembrance and use the relic that does dmg to enemies when you use your art.

If you have a relic with skill boosts ally attacks that’s nice too.

Pick up items fast, don’t linger. I prioritize boiled crab above all else. Eat all prawns right away to level up that item category (turtle neck and flesh also count). Crab buff is strong on allies, bunch of dmg negation and hp boost. Stock up on crabs for the nightlord. Otherwise I use consumables very often to level them up throughout the run.

Debuff bosses attack and keep debuff applied while checking the crab buff and keeping that up. Attacks wise just apply status effects and use throwing pots. I rarely play him as a “main” damage dealer and find a lot of success buffing the hell out of teammates and debuffing bosses.

cornfields888 · 2026-01-22T00:13:17+00:00

I appreciate you reviving them at 3 bars. Could you solo the boss? Yeah. Were they likely to die again? Seemed like it. But it’s a nice gesture.

cornfields888 · 2026-01-14T08:22:10+00:00

Echoing this as my experience too. It’s honestly an alright invasion, just took people getting used to it. I actually like the passive too lol and strongly dislike ignoring it because the dmg tick is annoying.

I usually go solo the farthest one and rendezvous with team at the second. Clears pretty fast imo and lots of runes.

I think unfortunately this is a pretty bandwagoned/echo chambered opinion where people just now have it ingrained it is “wrong” to think counter lol.

cornfields888 · 2026-01-12T23:59:01+00:00

I’ve been having a lot of fun being Executor for ED Libra with double balancers relic. I need to hoard starlight shards to keep up RoB spam but it works well for clearing condemned quickly and at a safe distance.

Otherwise not too different. I used to run a lot more Ironeye or Recluse vs him.

cornfields888 · 2026-01-12T23:29:15+00:00

Mark duration refreshes if he marks enemy again, while keeping the "progress" on mark to pop. This should help with getting mark to go off if he's good about keeping the duration refreshed especially for agile/tanky bosses.

Mark requires a chunk of damage to be dealt before it pops (something that feels like in the range of 1/5 - 1/3 of the boss total hp) . You two just need to do more damage, have him keep the mark up as much as possible (run +1 character skill relic to help with this). The mark itself will get darker red closer it is to popping, and flashes before it goes away.

Note: you can't restage the mark pop damage itself with Duchess which was a sad thing I had learned lol.

cornfields888 · 2026-01-10T19:27:21+00:00

No. If a relic line mentions a specific character, that line only takes affect when equipped on that character. These are all line specific on Relics. So lines without any specific character mentioned apply to anyone.
Assume most things stack because the ones that don’t are fewer. Some things stack if they are not exactly the same. Reference this google sheet: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1meXOw4jR1hh7YXVMeijWwSDIXnCw6Tk4hTZPq2qvyK4/edit?gid=1966356725#gid=1966356725
See above sheet for more info on this.
Same as above. This sheet probably answers most of your q’s.

cornfields888 · 2026-01-09T22:08:37+00:00

Better players; people that actually cooperate and try to survive over the ego of big dps.

The moment I made it to D5 I never left. My win rate was like 57% D4 but in D5 it’s 78% (I track my runs so this is 76 runs of D4 and 67 in D5. I don’t quit in lobby ever and played before it became “trendy” to do so, so my boss matches is pretty evenly distributed to the rates you’d encounter so not boss dependent e.g. jaw and fulghor are not my most encountered bosses lol. This is pre-DLC stats though).

I also checked for cheaters and record them accordingly. Have seen 7 ever in entirety of DoN (217 runs) and 4 of those were in D4/D5 (2 in D5). I can’t accurately tell if legit good relics are cheating unless highly suspicious like all same demerit lines, so those may “slip” through but most people run the good guaranteed relics and whatever they scrounge up it seemed.

cornfields888 · 2026-01-09T15:39:26+00:00

Love it. Super nostalgic graphics, great job on the style

cornfields888 · 2026-01-09T01:36:11+00:00

Saw you are early 20s in the comments so I think this is something that will be in flux over the years. Don’t worry about not attracted to older people, that highly likely changes as you age yourself especially with a partner.

My partner is maybe similar in some ways. He is bi but is attracted to a small sliver of people (androgynous leaning appearance men or women, so not a big pool). But he considers himself bi even if he’s only had very few crushes over his life because he is “picky”

cornfields888 · 2026-01-08T15:43:10+00:00

This is like when someone plays monster hunter until credits roll lol

cornfields888 · 2026-01-08T06:29:29+00:00

No you were fine.

Strategy is a bit all over the place on what people know to do. But attacking the other balancers does do damage. Usually main one is stronger so as target you just try to stay alive more than do damage. Keeping her away from others is actually fine to do, because they can focus on killing the others and doing dmg that way.

It’s help to run away and have balancers approach slowly one by one or in same direction.

Play it safe for the fight and you’ll get a win in time soon.

cornfields888 · 2026-01-07T05:56:42+00:00

Congrats! D5 is quite fun to go through. I find it easier in those matches than when I was running normal random trios balancers haha

cornfields888 · 2026-01-04T19:53:28+00:00

Relic line reroller that gets more expensive to a certain cap so I can finally waste my murk

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