Orna Dungeon Encounters

Introduction

Once your character reaches level 50 (tier 3) you will unlock the ability to enter Gauntlets and Dungeons to slay the foul demons and beasts within! You will need gauntlet keys to enter but don't worry, there are plenty of opportunities to find these by playing the game normally. One of the best ways early on is to kill as many bosses in the world that you can, also keep an eye out for quests giving keys as a reward.
Dungeons and your menu Gauntlet are effectively the same content, just that Dungeons are statically located on the world map and your menu Gauntlet is of course accessible wherever you are. All dungeons and your gauntlet have individual cooldowns, they are not shared, allowing you to complete many many dungeons if time allows.

Dungeon Tiers

What you may have realised if you've completed a number of dungeons already through different levels, is that the number and type of monster you encounter within Dungeons actually changes depending on what tier of Dungeon you have entered. You can actually change the tier of dungeon (up to your tier) with the drop down menu. If you enter without changing anything the game will create a dungeon of your current tier automatically.

Each Dungeon Tier has a set number of mobs/bosses that will appear within the dungeon. For example a tier 5 dungeon has 3 extra floors and 2 extra bosses than any tier 1 - 4 dungeons, but also certain floors will have a certain tier of mob that always spawns. The mobs within those tiers are always random. Any mob can spawn in dungeons except from weather specific mobs, so it's a great place to farm water biome mobs for example. There also exists dungeon-only mobs which can be lucrative also.

Dungeon Encounters

The infographic below is a useful resource showing what tiers of mobs spawn in each tier of dungeon, as well as what floors you will find bosses on. 
The X-axis dictates which tier of Dungeon you are entering and Y-axis shows how deep or how many floors and therefore number of mobs the relevant tier of Dungeon contains within.

Orna Dungeon Encounters

Bear in mind if you are doing Boss Dungeons the tier of bosses will be the same as if you were doing a normal dungeon. Typically any Boss floors can actually be a random Boss of lower tiers also.
Excluding Tier 10-11, the final boss at each tier should be within a tier range of the Dungeon tier - 2. For example in a tier 9 dungeon the final boss could be tier 7, 8 or 9.

Dungeon Completion Rewards

Completing a Dungeon grants extra rewards compared to the actualy killing of monsters inside. Please note that these rewards are unavailable in Endless Dungeon Mode because it requires you to actually complete the Dungeon... Endless Mode has not been completed by anyone as of yet!

You will always receive some extra Orns and some random materials on completing any Dungeon. You can also receive items:

• Random Unknown Origin Items (can have elemental res)
• Quest Items: Previously completed story quest or NPC quest items (can be of improved qualities and gear can have elemental res). This is how you get your second Band of Gods and Aldons Hats etc.
• Hard Mode (normal or boss) increase the amount of Orns and materials you receive. It also ensures any item drop is of at least superior quality. Probably the best way to find Ornate Old Nothren Crown if you're lucky!

Godforging

After reaching the Orna end-game one of the greatest min-max mechanics is Godforging your gear, taking it from level 12 (Demonforged) to its max potential at level 13. Apart from killing Mammons out in the world you have the possibility of Godforging gear in tier 10-11 dungeons by killing Arisen Superbosses (Bosses with yellow glowing aura) with at least one Demonforged item equipped in your loadout.

Tier 10 contains 13 bosses in total where 5 of which are Arisen Superbosses and can Godforge your gear. These bosses can only spawn on the final floor of tier 10 dungeons, and on floors 16 and 25 of tier 11 dungeons, giving max level characters (tier 11, lvl 250) double the odds of finding an Arisen Superboss and therefore doubling their realistic chances of Godforging gear per dungeon.

Finding Gauntlet Keys

How to find keys in the early game. You do not need to buy them from the runeshop (although feel free to support the game). The best way is to kill as many Great Mimics and world bosses you see, a lot of them drop keys. In fact I'll list all the bosses who drop keys up to tier 5 below, if you spot these out in the world make a beeline to them and take them down ASAP!

Raid bosses are also a great source of keys, and another good reason you should join an active kingdom as soon as you feel like it. From the tier 5 raid boss Starlord onwards, you can get gauntlet keys as drops even if you're not at that tier yet. All you need to do is tag the boss with at least 1 point of damage, anything above zero will get you into the loot drop. You will not receive gear pieces above your tier, but auxiliary items like gauntlet keys, dowsing rods and potions are all available to drop for lower tiers.

​That's why it's important to try and tag all the raid bosses. You will need to be selective about what skill you use, you'll need an armour/resistance penetrating skill like Double Edge to do damage to higher tier raid bosses.