Minecraft Dungeons II: the guide to everything the game does not tell you

Most people who find Minecraft Dungeons II frustrating are not playing badly. They are playing without knowing three or four rules the game never explained to them.

Here are those rules, and what they change in practice.

The two caps, before anything else

This is the most important thing in this guide, and the one that costs most when you do not know it.

You can only carry 100 echo shards. Everything you pick up beyond that is lost. Simply gone.

Emeralds stop at around 10,000. Same thing: past that, you are playing for free.

There is no alert when you hit these caps. You keep killing enemies, you keep seeing resources drop, and you gain nothing.

The rule to remember: spend before you set out. Before every long run, stop in town, empty your shards and your emeralds. Coming back with a full purse is always a loss.

Echo shards, and what they are really for

Three uses, and you need to know them to arbitrate.

1. Enchanting your gear.
2. Rerolling the effects on a piece you want to keep but whose roll does not suit you.
3. Upgrading the merchants in town.

They drop from soul corrupted enemies and in generated dungeons.

My advice on arbitration: merchants first, early in the game. It is counter-intuitive because you want immediate power, but an upgraded merchant improves everything you get afterwards, whereas an enchantment on a mid-game weapon will be thrown away in three hours.

Enchanting, and the rule that changes everything

The Enchantsmith unlocks after the fifth core mission. Before that, expect nothing.

After that, here is how it works, and this is where there is excellent news the game explains poorly.

Enchantment books stay in your collection permanently, and one book can be used on as many items as you like.

Read that twice. A book you find is not a consumable. It is a permanent unlock. Once you have it, you can apply that enchantment to every new weapon, indefinitely, paying only echo shards and enchantment points.

Which means finding a new book is always worth more than finding a good weapon. The weapon will be replaced. The book never will.

Initially the Enchantsmith can only apply level 1 enchantments. You spend 30 echo shards to unlock level 2, then 60 for level 3.

Those are substantial sums when your purse caps at 100. They are also the best investment in the game, because they apply to all your future enchantments. Do it as soon as you can.

The habit to build: every time you pick up a piece of gear you care about, go back to town and enchant it. And if you are short on shards, go and kill two or three rares or a boss, that is the fastest way to top up.

Talismans, the inverted trap

Talismans are this entry's new item type, and they do not follow the same rules as everything else.

Talismans gain levels. Your gear does not: a weapon stays at its power and ends up replaced.

The direct consequence: do not throw away a talisman because its numbers are low when you find it. One picked up early can stay useful far longer than it looks, provided you invest in it.

That is exactly the opposite instinct to the one you have with weapons, which is why so many players miss it.

Soul Storms

This is the game's timed content, and it is the only timed source of loot.

They appear at random each hour and run for around forty minutes.

The rule for using them is simple: if a storm is active in a region at or below your level, go there first. You will not know when it returns, whereas the rest of the content will wait for you.

It is also, it must be said, the bulk of the post-campaign content. You clear a storm in a few minutes, you leave with two pieces, and you wait for the next one. That is thin, and it is the main reason the endgame disappoints, but while it is the loop you may as well play it properly.

Mistakes in reading gear

Since the game displays no raw values and only gives you percentages, here is how to cope.

Always compare in the inventory, never from memory. The percentages do not tell you what they are a percentage of, so your intuition will be wrong.

Do not judge a weapon on its displayed number alone. With reusable enchantment books, a well-enchanted average weapon often beats a raw superior one. The base matters less than what you put on it.

And be wary of artifacts. If you are coming from the first Dungeons, be aware that many artifacts have been nerfed. Your old combinations no longer work, and it is not you playing badly.

Two ergonomic points to know before buying

These are not tips, they are warnings, and they save an unpleasant surprise.

There is no keyboard movement. The game plays on the pointer or a controller. If you are attached to your keyboard, plan for a pad.

And there is no transmog. Your best armour will be your appearance, whether you like it or not.

In co-op, the thing to understand

Multiplayer takes four players, locally on the same screen, online, or both mixed.

But you need to know that enemies scale with you, in numbers and health pools. Lots of groups describe the same sensation: the better geared you get, the harder it becomes, and progression feels cancelled out.

What works best under those conditions is specialising roles rather than everyone playing the same thing. Someone who holds enemies in place, someone hitting at range, someone healing and resetting with artifacts. Four identically built characters take the scaling head-on.

The summary in eight lines

1. Empty your shards and emeralds before every run, the caps are 100 and about 10,000.
2. The Enchantsmith arrives after core mission 5.
3. An enchantment book is permanent and reusable across all your items.
4. Unlock enchantment levels 2 and 3 as soon as possible, 30 then 60 shards.
5. Upgrade the merchants early, it benefits everything else.
6. Do not discard talismans, they gain levels.
7. Run to Soul Storms when they appear at or below your level.
8. In a group, split the roles, scaling punishes identical teams.

Found a book combination that breaks the game? That is exactly what we are after on the InsertCoins Discord.