Darkest Dungeon®

The Fire’s Edge launched on August 18, introducing The Runaway and The Duelist—the first new DLC for Darkest Dungeon since 2020. It also added new combat mechanics, trinkets, and Hamlet districts, while the community mod scene delivered substantial new heroes, encounters, and equipment over the same stretch.

• The Fire’s Edge content: The Runaway brought Burn-based, position-flexible damage, while The Duelist used Defensive and Aggressive stances alongside Riposte. The DLC also added Academie Duello, Craftworks, and Archaeological Base Camp, each with new bounties.
• Fire’s Edge balance overhaul: More than 90% of trinkets were reworked, most trinkets gained a one-copy limit, and Apprentice bosses began dropping Rare trinkets instead of Very Rare ones. The September 3 changes also granted separate roster slots for The Runaway and The Duelist and retuned their health, skills, and signature trinkets.
• New hero mods: The Marchioness added a movement-and-control support class, Soulbinder bound and controlled lost souls, and The Exanimate combined healing with durability. The Pelagic Idol, The Uncrowned, and The Satyr - Merteno expanded the roster further, while the Milkmaid received a complete visual and gameplay overhaul.
• New encounters and dungeons: The Fiend Festival added a circus-themed dungeon with eight monsters, carnival games, a boss, and festival-grade trinkets. The Ringmaster arrived with two enemies and two trophy trinkets, while the Swine Scavenger became a Warrens miniboss with custom audiovisual assets and a unique reward.
• Mod ecosystem: Trinkets Plus 4.0 - Vintage extensively reworked the game’s trinkets, and the Mod Showcase returned with regular spotlights. The Crusader Skin Mod also brought Darkest Dungeon II’s character model to the original game, alongside restored auto-centering and controller options.

The Butcher's Circus surrender fix was the clearest gameplay change for Darkest Dungeon itself, preventing a player from winning immediately after surrendering. No new DLC, hero, region, or mode shipped for this game; Inhuman Bondage and Kingdoms were Darkest Dungeon II releases and were excluded.

• Butcher's Circus: The surrender exploit was fixed so a match could not be won immediately after surrendering.
• The Colour of Madness: The loot-window bug received repeated fixes.
• Mod and roster support: FMOD was reverted to its previous version because of mod incompatibilities, while the missing Dismiss Hero button was restored when switching between the Stage Coach Hero Sheet and Roster Hero Sheet.

The Unified Binary Build aligned Darkest Dungeon’s Steam, GOG, and Epic storefront versions under a shared game binary. The remaining tracked changes focused on Ubuntu compatibility and Steam installation issues rather than new playable content.

• Unified Binary Build: A common build covered Steam, GOG, and Epic, reducing storefront-specific differences in the game’s underlying version.
• Ubuntu Steam support: Solutions addressed launch problems affecting the Steam SNAP package on Ubuntu, including cases where the game failed to start when Steam was installed through App Install (SNAP).

Darkest Dungeon II’s 1.0 launch on Steam was the biggest related release, arriving with 12 playable characters across five acts and introducing The Flagellant. Its Chirurgeon’s Table update and The Binding Blade DLC followed, but no tracked item documented a new content drop for the original Darkest Dungeon itself.

• Darkest Dungeon II launch: The 1.0 release added The Flagellant, corpse art, hero palettes, weapon kits, driving-system improvements, and a revised first-time user experience.
• Chirurgeon’s Table: The free update added a new location, two minibosses, six champion enemies, and support for gamepads and Steam Deck.
• The Binding Blade: The DLC introduced The Duelist, The Crusader, and The Warlord mini-boss, with The Duelist switching between Defensive and Aggressive stances and The Crusader using Holy fire and Smite attacks.

Tracked sources for Darkest Dungeon® were limited between 2022-01-19 and 2023-01-19, with only 1 verified change captured in this window. The recorded activity centers on Steam Deck Support Integration and sits between Vestal Rework by Mr.Pepper on 2021-10-05 (modding) and Darkest Dungeon II Launch on 2023-05-08 (dlc_release), making this a light but still readable period in the game's history.

• Verified activity: 2022-10-06 - Steam Deck Support Integration: Update to better integrate and support Steam Deck features..
• What stands out: The period is defined more by a small number of isolated updates than by a large roadmap beat or expansion-sized release.
• Before this window: The closest earlier tracked activity was Vestal Rework by Mr.Pepper on 2021-10-05 (modding).
• After this window: The next tracked activity was Darkest Dungeon II Launch on 2023-05-08 (dlc_release).

The Butcher’s Circus launched as free DLC, adding PvP arena battles to Darkest Dungeon through a new Circus sub-Hamlet. It also introduced dedicated PvP skills and class balances, bot practice, and a six-week seasonal ranking structure.

• The Butcher’s Circus: The Circus added matchmaking, direct challenges, a separate party-selection screen, and an anti-cheat system without affecting the main campaign roster.
  • PvP turn order: Matches alternated player turns instead of using a traditional initiative roll, while the player who lost the opening coin flip received a first-round team buff.
  • Circus seasons: Six-week seasons added rank progression and exclusive banners.
  • Offline practice: Local bot files and improved bots enabled offline practice, though offline matches did not award prestige.
  • Circus support: Controller support, the Party Builder for saving five party-and-trinket configurations, and Mac/Linux support arrived alongside multiplayer stability improvements that reduced desyncs.
• Campaign and modding systems: The May 27 rules update expanded the tools available for custom content, adding conditional and round-based buffs, new trinket triggers, deathblow-related rules, and dungeon rules such as dots_can_deathblow. Two Circus-related town events also provided roster-wide stress relief after a match.
• Community-created content: The mod scene added substantial new heroes, enemies, bosses, and dungeons.
  • Pet Cemetery: This complete dungeon add-on added monsters, gems, quirks, items, provisions, quest maps, and secrets.
  • The Hierophant, The Mender, and The Vultist: These character mods added an inquisitor, a healing-focused support hero, and a Vestal/Occultist hybrid.
  • The Rotting King, Drowned Consumer, and Fungal Satyr: These mods added a Ruins bossfight and new Cove and Veteran-dungeon enemies.
  • The Ringmaster, The Chaplain, and The Powder Keg: These class mods expanded the roster with new skills, trinkets, and custom animations.
• Gameplay tuning: The Meditator quirk gained a camping stress-heal bonus, while Bloodmoon’s Radiant Light dodge bonus was reduced from 7.5% to 2.5% to match Stygian.

The February 19, 2019 maintenance update was the main release, doubling default modding resources and adding a command-line option that disabled monster preloading. It focused on controller, combat-state, and presentation fixes rather than adding a new hero, region, mode, or story content.

• Modding and loading: Darkest Dungeon doubled its default allocated resources for mods. The monster-preloading command-line argument addressed white-box issues, although disabling preloading caused stutter at battle start.
• Estate and controller handling: The Estate Summary district buttons no longer caused controller problems, Districts no longer blocked Character Sheet input, and roster scrolling worked correctly at high frame rates.
• Combat and progression fixes: The Fanatic background offset was corrected, retreating heroes had their combat-end buffs cleared, collected shards appeared on the raid results screen, and monster AOE Friendly skills worked correctly against mixed-size monster groups. Additional heart-attack variables were cleared so stress-relief activities worked for heroes lost in time and space.

The Color of Madness launched on June 19, 2018, adding its Farmstead and Endless Harvest content to Darkest Dungeon. The free Musketeer also joined the roster, while a major core-game balance update reshaped combat and class tuning.

• The Color of Madness: The DLC released on Steam, GOG, and Humble, bringing the Farmstead’s wave-based challenges and the Endless Harvest quest line.
• New Farmstead encounters: The Collector, Crocodillian, and Sleeper became potential bosses or minibosses in Farmstead content; The Hag also appeared in Endless Harvest.
• Endless Harvest systems: Endless Harvest began awarding XP and quirks at reward thresholds, paid out rewards even when a quest was abandoned, and introduced difficulty mutators after 200 kills. Battle-limited skills refreshed between wave groups rather than after every individual wave.
• Roster and progression: The Musketeer became available for free as a mirror class for the Arbalest, while the Nomad Wagon unlocked immediately upon reaching the Hamlet. Upgrade overrides were added for the Shieldbreaker, Flagellant, and Musketeer across different modes.
• Combat tuning: The June balance update adjusted front-rank area attacks including Hew, Rake, and Zealous Acc, changed Spire encounters and Brain behavior, reduced crit values to account for on-crit buffs, and tuned Focus Ring, Flesh Eaters, Drowned Captain, and Shadow Fade.
• Language and mod support: Official Korean localization was replaced and revised with a new font, Japanese localization arrived for Darkest Dungeon, The Crimson Court, and The Shieldbreaker, and modders gained Virtue-loss controls through Rules.json plus new “Was Hit” trinket effects.

The Crimson Court expansion arrived on June 19, 2017, adding the Courtyard region, a full faction of blood-cursed enemies, four unique bosses, sprawling persistent maps, Districts, set-based trinkets, and the Crimson Curse. Shieldbreaker followed on October 26 with a new tactical hero, while Radiant Mode offered a shorter campaign without removing the challenge.

• The Crimson Court: The expansion introduced the Flagellant, the wandering Fanatic, Affliction act-outs, Horror, Laudanum, and new Courtyard systems involving Blood, Invitations, Infestation, and Curse contagion. The July updates added the Gather the Blood quest and let the Fanatic drop The Cure.
• Shieldbreaker and Stealth: Shieldbreaker joined the roster with abilities designed to counter heavily protected monsters. The same release added Stealth for enemies such as the Brigand Fusilier, Crone, Pelagic Shaman, and Swine Slasher, alongside skills including Tracking Shot, Rallying Flare, Flash Powder, Vulnerability Hex, and Intimidate that could reveal or break it.
• Radiant Mode: The new mode reduced campaign completion time while preserving the game’s difficulty. Its surrounding changes added four Champion-level enemies—Bone Bearer, Hateful Virago, Swine Skiver, and Squiffy Ghast—plus a Trinket Recovery Quest, more flexible hero-level restrictions, a deck-based Stage Coach population system, and revised “Never Again” rules for returning to the Darkest Dungeon.
• Modding and localization: Steam Workshop support opened the door to shared community mods, while more settings and a “remove on battle complete” buff parameter expanded customization. A full simplified Chinese translation arrived alongside community improvements to the Russian and French translations.
• Balance and progression: Jester’s Finale received a major redesign that required setup through Solo, while the economy reduced hero treatment and upgrade costs and increased gold drops. The Crimson Curse, Blood availability, Fanatic abilities, Viscount, Crocodilian, trinket rarity, and Brigand Pounder all received targeted tuning.

The Town Events update added over 40 Hamlet events on May 19, 2016, including bonus recruits, extra supplies, facility closures, unique key art, and commentary. The Antiquarian joined alongside a new Stage Coach upgrade tree, while New Game Plus, Secret Rooms, and 64 achievements broadened the campaign.

• Town Events: The Hamlet gained more variety and consequences through named events and new lore rewards.
  • All Saints Day made Abbey treatments free for a week after the Ruins’ “Gather Holy Relics” quest.
  • Week of Death appeared in the Graveyard, and the Town Crier began appearing in stress-relief facilities.
  • Journal Pages could drop from Bookshelves and Book Stacks, expanding the Ancestor’s Journal.
• Antiquarian: The new Antiquarian class introduced gold-focused dungeon runs, including revised gold de-stacking when she died and the Get Down! skill.
  • The Stage Coach Upgrade Tree allowed higher-level heroes to enter the roster.
  • Heirloom Exchange let players trade heirloom types at a slight loss, while Trophy Trinkets returned to the Hamlet after a failed quest.
• Campaign systems: New Game Plus added a replay mode with its own criteria, crest, tutorial presentation, and achievement support.
  • Class-Specific Provisions gave heroes more specialized preparation choices.
  • Secret Rooms became discoverable without counting toward the 90% Explore Quest requirement.
  • Quest Rewards Randomization removed region-locked heirloom types, and the Roster Size Increase expanded the maximum roster through 28 heroes.
• Combat and progression balance: Leper received higher base damage, while Resolve XP thresholds for levels 4–6 fell to speed late-game advancement.
  • Highwayman gained Riposte on Duelist’s Advance and more Wicked Slice damage; Arbalest received Field Dressing and Blind Fire adjustments; and Jester’s Finale hit harder.
  • Vvulf appeared less often and stayed dead after defeat, while the Never Again trait eventually granted a 50% party XP bonus.
• Platform and language support: Linux Release moved out of beta, a 64-bit Version improved compatibility, and full text localization plus narrator subtitles expanded across eight languages, later adding Polish and Brazilian Portuguese.