Can I use the portal during combat?
No. Clear or disengage first, then travel with the whole party in the portal room.
At A Glance
A Dungeon Settlers dungeon run is a four-person expedition through randomized floors: pause combat, steal resources, watch depletion and stay, then leave through the portal with every member in the room. Dungeon Settlers (Steam 2798330, CanOpener) does not teleport stragglers. Early Access currently sells the first two regions. Verified September 5, 2026 · Steam.
You cannot portal during combat. Third-party snapshots describe depletion counting 5 → 0 per floor, then a region drop penalty around −50% at 0 — TBA versus live Early Access. Stay time is a mood tax even if you win every fight.
| Fact | Detail |
|---|---|
| Platform | PC (Windows · macOS) · Steam Deck Playable |
| Party | Up to 4 expedition members |
| Floors | Randomized rooms · regular / elite / boss · merchants and events |
| Portal | Travel or return — all four must be in the portal room |
| In combat | Portal locked until the fight ends or you disengage |
| Depletion | Third-party snapshot: per floor 5 → 0; at 0, region drops −50% (TBA vs live EA) |
| Stay | Dungeon-stay mood penalties scale with days below and management difficulty |
| Death | Permanent death — no revival |
| Related | Combat · mood & stress · resources |
Fight smarter
Matched by build plan, shared topics, and guide progression — not random related links.
How do I start a Dungeon Settlers dungeon expedition?
From the settlement portal you choose destination, four members, and carried items. That is the whole expedition setup. If research is idle and beds are missing, you are starting a run to pay for a camp that cannot receive you.
- Do01Queue a research node so camp time is not wasted
- Do02Repair durability and dump extra weight — Overloaded is a death sentence in halls
- Do03Set food and Aid Kit policies so auto-eat does not steal expedition meals
- Do04Form four: front, damage, range, support (see recruitment)
- Do05Enter, pause on first contact, do not portal-travel mid-fight
- Do06Keep the party in one room when you intend to use the floor portal
- Do07Leave with loot before stay and depletion both go red
The dungeon is the mine
Barren land does not spawn bones, clay, or carapace in useful amounts. Every crafting ladder on equipment assumes you come back alive with a floor pile. Treat the first run as a shopping trip, not a region clear. Early Access only guarantees two regions end-to-end — you do not need to “finish the game” on day one.
Floors shuffle rooms: fights, resource nodes, events, traveling merchants, the occasional safe floor. Dynamic day/night and weather can apply; hostile factions can fight each other. None of that cancels depletion or stay. Sightseeing is a mood bill.
Pack for the walk home
Weight is checked on the way out too. If the mage is Severely Overloaded with ore, they miss the portal room and you get a missing-person incident. Split stacks. Use C pick habits from settlement when you dump at camp so the next run starts clean.
What happens if someone is not in the portal room?
Interacting with a dungeon portal to go deeper or return home checks occupancy. Units not in that room are marked missing and processed as dead. Permadeath does not care that they were “just in the hallway.”
| Rule | What to do |
|---|---|
| Whole party in the portal room | Pause, select everyone, walk them onto the tiles, then travel |
| Someone looting next door | Cancel travel; box-move them in; then travel |
| Downed in another room | Aid Kit or carry first — do not portal “to save time” |
| In combat | Portal is unusable; finish or break contact |
| Wait for Orders on | Use it so people stop wandering during the count |
Missing is not a slap on the wrist
The guide-level rule is brutal on purpose. Dungeon Settlers will not pathfind a straggler through fog for you. If you click the portal because three portraits are nearby, you can delete the fourth. Count bodies. Count them again after a pause.
Carrying a Near Death ally still requires them to be in the room when you travel — a corpse or a carried body in the wrong chamber is the same failure. Rescue rules live on combat; the portal only cares about presence.
Wait for Orders is an extract tool
Auto Skill and idle behaviour will send people into side rooms for shinies. Flip Wait for Orders before you start the portal interaction so the four-person party holds formation. Auto Skill energy thresholds are a combat setting; extract is a movement setting.
How does depletion work from 5 to 0?
Community extracts describe each floor tracking depletion from 5 down to 0. Farming the same tiles burns the counter. At 0, those dumps apply about −50% drops to the region until recovery (duration TBA per difficulty). Re-check the live HUD — do not treat the 5 / −50% pair as a CanOpener guarantee.
Image pendingstaticDepletion or floor HUD if visible; otherwise portal room with party stacked07:20–07:40
Leave loot on the table if you still need this region
A beginner who scrapes a floor to 0 to “finish the bones” then wonders why the next three expeditions are empty is following the UI, not the economy. If you still need clay or carapace this week, extract at 2–1 remaining rather than celebrating 0. The resources page is the shopping list; depletion is the stock market.
Depletion is not the same as stay. You can have a high stay penalty on a floor that is still at depletion 4 if you fought slowly. You can also vacuum a floor to 0 in a short stay if you never stop looting. Watch both meters.
Region penalty is the real cost
If a dump’s −50% line is still live, it taxes the region, not one empty room. That is why rotating floors matters. Exact node tables stay version-locked and TBA; play the HUD you see, not a screenshot from another build.
How does dungeon stay punish a long floor?
Dungeon stay is a staged mood penalty for time spent below. It scales with days in the dungeon and management difficulty. High stages can reach harsh negatives (community tables cite figures up to about −24 at the top band — treat exact breakpoints as TBA for your difficulty).
Winning fights does not pause the clock
Stay is not a combat score. Clearing elites while the stay stage climbs still sends the four home miserable, hungry, and close to Mental Collapse. Mood & stress explains the HUD: positive mood drains stress, negative mood fills it, collapse can kill. The expedition decision is simply: shorter floors until bedrooms and food policies exist.
Monsters also respawn or patrol if you linger. A “safe” cleared hallway is a timer, not a base. Safe floors exist as a mechanic — use them to regroup, not to live underground.
Difficulty is a stay multiplier
Higher management difficulty is not only harder rats. It is a meaner stay curve. If your first colony is already eating mood alive, drop difficulty or cut the run in half before you blame recruitment portraits.
When should I leave instead of pushing deeper?
Leave when any one of these is true: a member is Near Death without a clean Aid Kit path, stay just jumped a stage, depletion is about to 0 and you still need this region, weight is Severely Overloaded, or you cannot stack four people in the portal room without a fight on the tiles.
| Signal | Action |
|---|---|
| Head or torso health in the red | Pause, disengage, combat rescue — then home |
| Stay stage up | Finish the current room only if the portal is adjacent |
| Depletion 1 and you need drops later | Extract; do not tap 0 |
| Merchant / event greed | Buy or skip; do not start a second fight “on the way” |
| Camp research idle | You already stole enough — go process it |
Deeper is rarer and meaner
Official copy: valuable resources sit deeper. That is a mid-game sentence. A beginner party without inscriptions, repairs, or food policy should bounce at the first portal home, dump loot, and reset stay. Pushing because the floor “looks clear” is how permadeath tutorials happen.
You cannot portal to skip a fight
If aggro is live, the portal will not save you. Clear, line-of-sight break, or die. Plan extracts from rooms you already own. The combat page is the pause-queue half of that plan.
Expedition mistakes that mark people missing
Each row is a wipe you can prevent with a pause and a headcount.
| Mistake | Fix |
|---|---|
| Travel with a straggler | All four in the portal room — pause and count |
| Portal click during combat | Finish the fight first |
| Farm to depletion 0 | Leave earlier if you still need the region |
| Ignore stay because HP is full | Mood kills later; extract |
| One mule carries the floor | Split weight; Strength on haulers |
| No Wait for Orders on extract | Hold formation before travel |
| Second floor with broken gear | Repair on equipment at camp |
| Idle research at home | You stole time from research |
Headcount is the skill
The dungeon is random. The portal rule is not. If you can stack four bodies and leave with depletion still above 0, you are playing Dungeon Settlers as designed. The beginner guide is the camp-side order; this page is the below-side order.
Dungeon Settlers dungeon expedition FAQ
What if a member is not in the portal room?
They can be marked missing and treated as dead. Pause, move everyone in, then interact.
How does depletion work?
Third-party snapshots describe a per-floor 5 → 0 counter and about −50% region drops at 0 until recovery. Treat those numbers as TBA vs live EA and read the in-game HUD. Leave earlier if you still need loot from that region.
What is dungeon stay?
Time-in-dungeon mood penalties that scale with days and management difficulty. Long floors punish even winning parties.
How many people go on an expedition?
Up to four through the portal. Extra colonists stay at camp as labour and permadeath replacements.
What should I read next?
Last verified?
September 5, 2026
Related pages
Matched by build plan, shared topics, and guide progression — not random related links.