Old Road

The Old Road is the very first Location in which the player find himself after lauching the Game and creating a savefile. It begin after "Road Home", the second cinematic of the game, in which the Stage Coach carrying you to Hamlet suffer an accident because of the apparent madness of its driver. The Old Road is supposely located in the Weald, as the background and music both match with the ones you find in this region.

The player have to get through the Old Road to reach Hamlet. It serve as a tutorial to How to progress/find your way into a dungeon, along with tutorials for battle and curios investigation.

Reynauld and Dismas
On the Old Road, you will always begin your adventure with this two characters: Reynauld (Crusader level 0) and Dismas (Highwayman level 0).

Reynauld is a crusader. He possess the combat skills Smite, Zealous Accusation, Stunning Blow and Bulwark of Faith. He has the quirk Warrior of Light, which is really useful for the beginning of the game. But he is also God Fearing and most importantly, Kleptomaniac, which implies he can steal some of the loot the player get. Its advised to interact with curios and loots (battle rewards) with Dismas instead of Reynauld.

Dismas is a highwayman. He own the combat skills Pistol Shot, Grapeshot Blast, Tracking Shot and Open Vein. He possess 2 positive quirks, Hard Noggin and Quick Reflexes and also 1 negative quirk, Known Cheat, which is not troublesome for the dungeon.

These features are not randomly generated. The player will always beggin the game with these 2 characters, and their skills/quirks will always remain the same at the beginning.

Map and content
The Old Road is the easiest dungeon in the game. There are only 2 rooms: the entrance room (where you begin) is directly connected to the last room. You have to pass through one corridor to do it and complete your first quest: reach Hamlet alive. But that could be harder that it look to do so.

Halfway through the corridor, you will encounter one Briggand Cutthroat, alone, and the explanation on the combat system. This fight is relatively easy, the Cutthroat have low stun and bleed resistance (Stunning Blow/Open Vein) and also low health.

Just after that, you will find the first curio (with tutorial): a Traveler's Tent, which will more likely give you loot than stress for the first time (not sure). In the New game+, the Traveler's Tent is replaced by the Transcendent Terror which, instead of any loot, bring you +100 stress, and a resolve test on the character you use to investigate the curio, making you begin your adventure with an afflicted hero.

After passing through the corridor, you'll enter the room which is a Battle Room with a chest (an Trapped Strongbox). You'll meet a Brigand Bloodletter (1rst and 2nd position) along with a Brigand Fusilier (3rd position). You'll have to beat them in order to finish the quest.

Strategie
The Old Road is definitely the easiest dungeon in the game, but it don't mean that it will be without danger. The fact that you only have 2 heroes without any trinket equiped, that both Reynauld and Dismas don't have any healing abilities (in the beginning) and that your heroes can be surprised (even by the Cutthroat) make even the easiest fight potentially deadly. Having to deal with an afflicted hero in the New game+ just make it more difficult. As a matter of fact, its not rare to loose one of your 2 heroes in this tutorial and to have to restart from the beginning because, once you reach hamlet, this death don't allow you to have a correct team of 4 for your first quest into the ruins.

So, to have a good start, its advised to put an end to the fights as quickly as possible. To finish the Cutthroat with 2 attacks is possible and you can ignore the Fusilier to focus the Bloodletter before he perform bleed attack that could bring your heroes to a fast death. Stunning him is possible, but you have 50% chance to fail (Stunning Blow at 100% but 50% resistance). There is nothing more you can really do, except pray not to be too unlucky.

Quest Reward
After beating the Bloodletter and the Fusilier, you'll have completed the quest and the game will propose you to go to Hamlet. Don't open the Trapped Strongbox before quitting! After that you'll get the quest reward: 5000 gold as a starting financial base to buy the provision for your first quest, along with the loot you got. Then, you'll reach Hamlet and begin your adventure.

There is also an achievement of the game which request you to make Reynauld and Dismas survive until the very end, and bring them on the quest to defeat the final boss within the Darkest Dungeon. This achievement is one of the hardest to get, considering they can even die in the tutorial.