History YMMV / CuriousExpedition

** Declining most of the sidequests. Majority of them are just not worth doing, due to their reward not only being worth less than the costs needed to fulfil them in the first place, but other factors further making the profits insufficient to cover the risk of derailing the expedition. Stealing the idol from a village, tracking down a specific hyena or finding and rescuing a lost explorer are all quests that, while technically feasible, aren't really worth the hassle, while they can also potentially lead to a [[TotalPartyKill TPK]] due to pure random factors. This also comes with the fact that accepting quests and then failing them can affect your reputation negatively. On the flip side, ''always'' accepting the deserter quest is an easy source of extra cash, especially since his medal (the proof of killing him) was reworked into a weightless item all the way back in the beta, thus not even taking a slot in the inventory.

** Majority of sidequests are just not worth doing, due to their reward not only being worth less than the costs needed to fulfil them in the first place, but other factors further making the profits insufficient to cover the risk of derailing the expedition. Stealing the idol from a village, tracking down a specific hyena or finding and rescuing a lost explorer are all quests that, while technically feasible, aren't really worth the hassle, while they can also potentially lead to a [[TotalPartyKill TPK]] due to pure random factors. This also comes with the fact that accepting quests and then failing them can affect your reputation negatively. On the flip side, ''always'' accepting the deserter quest is an easy source of extra cash, especially since his medal (the proof of killing him) was reworked into a weightless item all the way back in the beta, thus not even taking a slot in the inventory.

** Except for going for an achievement, certain situations will be always avoided like fire. The list includes things like accepting the mission to find the lost adventurer, fighting the GiantEnemyCrab, having abomination(s) in the party, or opening the Schrodinger's box, as doing any of those things can easily lead to a [[TotalPartyKill TPK]].

** Harriet Tubman's unique perk, Dream Visions, has a very small chance of revealing a still unknown and unexplored location on a map. A single, randomly selected location. When her Sanity is 70 or more. While resting in a campsite or a village. And the game favours locations that are very close to the party anyway, making it moot.

** Except for going for an achievement, certain situations will be always avoided like fire. The list includes things like accepting the mission to find the lost adventurer, fighting the GiantEnemyCrab, having abomination(s) in the party, or opening the Schrodinger's box, as doing any of those things can easily lead to a [[TotalPartyKill TPK]].

* HighTierScrappy: The explorers aren't really balanced against each other, while you still have to fulfill often extreme achievements to unlock many of them. Some start with flat-out better perks, items, and/or followers than the rest. This also means there are a few greatly underpowered examples.
** Aleister Crowley starts with not one, but ''three'' Cultists. Cultists are by far the worst party members, as they come with only red dice and their perk doesn't prevent the nasty effects of Coca Leaves, all while each cultist can at any given time turn into an Abomination. If that wasn't enough, Crowley's perk, Occult Vision, reveals [[CircleOfStandingStones Stone Circles]] upon loading a new map. If no circles were generated — tough luck! To even unlock Crowley, one must finish each expedition with positive standing, which just leaves the bitter taste given how damn useless he is.
** Harriet Tubman's unique perk, Dream Visions, has a very small chance of revealing a still unknown and unexplored location on a map. A single, randomly selected location. When her Sanity is 70 or more. While resting in a campsite or a village. And the game favours locations that are very close to the party anyway, making it moot. To get Tubman unlocked, one must finish a single expedition with at least 3 natives in the expedition, out of 4 possible party members. Unless openly gearing for unlocking her, such situation is highly unlikely and even outright counter-productive.

* LowTierLetdown: Just like explorers, companions aren't balanced either. Two types stand out the most:

** Dion Fortune isn't bad on her own, but she's ''painfully'' average for an explorer that requires a NonStandardGameOver to even unlock. And triggering said game-over might even be impossible, as it requires specific circumstances to match at the map start to even ''try'' it (it's still up to chance if it will happen). For all the trouble, you get an explorer that has a basic, common perk, lackluster dice and the starting companions are poorly matched (Scottish Soldier is good for combat-oriented gameplay, Missionary is only good for a PacifistRun). She also starts with coca leaves as her sanity-restoring item, making the Scottish Soldier's perk useless.

* LowTierLetdown: Just like explorers, followers aren't balanced either. Two types stand out the most:

* LowTierScrappy: Just like explorers, followers aren't balanced either. Two types stand out the most:

** Unlocking platinum frames for all explorers. This requires to unlock all explorers first[[note]]Which will take at least two successfully finished runs of the game, as Dion Fortune is unlocked by NonStandardGameOver, plus Lovecraft is notoriously hard to unlock in the current build, [[LuckBasedMission requiring to find and loot the Necronomicon]][[/note]] and then win the game by being first in the overall score. With each of them. ''[[HarderThanHard While playing on Hard difficulty]]''. This includes playing as all of the [[TierInducedScrappy Tier-Induced Scrappies]]. Currently less than 1% of all players managed to pull this off.

* TierInducedScrappy: The explorers aren't really balanced against each other. Some start with flat-out better perks, items, and/or followers than the rest. This also means there are a few greatly underpowered examples. And there are also followers themselves, with few types of them paling by comparison.
** Aleister Crowley starts with not one, but ''three'' Cultists. Cultists are by far the worst party members, as they come with only red dice and their perk doesn't prevent the nasty effects of Coca Leaves, all while each cultist can at any given time turn into an Abomination. If that wasn't enough, Crowley's perk, Occult Vision, reveals [[CircleOfStandingStones Stone Circles]] upon loading a new map. If no circles were generated — tough luck! And the tough requirements to even unlock Crowley (finishing each expedition with positive standing) just leaves the bitter taste.
** Harriet Tubman's unique perk, Dream Visions, has a very small chance of revealing a still unknown and unexplored location on a map. A single, randomly selected location. When her Sanity is 70 or more. While resting in a campsite or a village. And the game favours locations that are very close to the party anyway, making it moot.
** As already noted, Cultists are more harmful than useful. Their perk doesn't prevent bad ailments from using Coca Leaves, their dice is crap, and there is a never-ending risk they will turn into an Abomination and start causing serious trouble, like eating other party members or starting a fight.
** Unless the pacifist route is picked, Missionaries are just as bad. They provide a single, unupgraded green dice regardless of level, have the lowest Toughness of all followers, can't lift too much, and they might randomly lose one of their perks, meaning resting in Missions will require payment anyway. In a pacifist run, however, the extra sanity they provide is more than enough to overcome other issues.

** Harriet Tubman's unique perk, Dream Visions, has a very small chance of revealing a still unknown and unexplored location on a map. A single, randomly selected location. When her Sanity is 70 or more. And the game favours locations that are very close to the party anyway, making it moot.

* FirstInstallmentWins: The first game received generally favourable reviews and was well-received by players. [[VideoGame/CuriousExpedition2 The sequel]], meanwhile. is highly divisive, both in general reception and [[BrokenBase even within the fandom]].

* CrossesTheLineTwice: Main source of humor in the game comes from picking up [[PulpMagazine pulp fiction]] and dial it up to absurdity. This way all those things that didn't really age well since Victorian era and early 20th century can be instead turned into jokes.

** Hunting parties consisting of British Soldier and Cook can almost completely ignore Sanity and actively seek confrontation with animals after first two expeditions. Due to the combination, each combat will instantly restore 25 points of Sanity and provide a lot of meat. Once cooked, it grants 15 points ''per unit''.
** Reloading new game until the expedition starts with a mission to find a missing wife of a wealthy foreigner. Unlike other starting quests, this one provides a small fund bonus upon completion, making a ''huge'' difference in early game.
** Special companions ([[WebVideo/{{Jimquisition}} Diplomat Jim Sterling]], [[Franchise/{{Tintin}} Tim Timster with Luis]] and [[spoiler: yeti]]) are just so much better than anything of regular classes, you're going to get them 9 out of 10 cases. Sterling is the most obvious example, ''especially'' if you have a Parsi Trader in your party, since he has better dice (not only upgraded, but of two different types), more Toughness and never starts with any ailments, making him far more useful.
** Regardless if you want to keep Tim Timster as a member of your expedition, his dog, Luis, doesn't use a companion slot. Not only that, but he has unique dice: one has eye icon, just like support (blue) die, the other comes with special taunt icon. This way you have a half-decent companion that adds useful die, is effective in combat, counts as an animal (so isn't affected by the various nasty results of depleted sanity) and doesn't take a slot. And there is absolutely no downside of dismissing Timster while still in London's port, while keeping his dog.

** Except for going for an achievement, certain situations will be always avoided like fire. The list includes things like accepting the mission to find lost adventurer, fighting the GiantEnemyCrab, having abomination(s) in the party or opening the Schrodinger's box, as doing any of those things can easily lead to a [[TotalPartyKill TPK]].
** Due to the way how difficulty is scaled with each expedition, if a second or third expedition gets a map with a portal to another dimension (or a spell to summon a portal is gained by that point), going for that portal will outweight any other considerations. Portal worlds have LizardFolk native villages, allowing to recruit potent dinosaurs into the party, which are superior to any other pack animals. Portal worlds also have very high chance of spawning shrines, providing blessings to human companions. And since they are visited so early on, they are safe(ish) even for pacifist expeditions. From 4th expedition onward, portal worlds are usually too dangerous to bother, leading to reverse situation - avoidance of going through the portal.
* FirstInstallmentWins: The first game received generally favourable reviews and was well-received by players. [[VideoGame/CuriousExpedition2 The sequel]] meanwhile is highly divisive, both in general reception and [[BrokenBase even within fandom]].

** Unlocking platinum frames for all explorers. This requires to unlock all explorers first[[note]]Which will take at least two successfully finished runs of the game, as Dion Fortune is unlocked by NonStandardGameOver, plus Lovecraft is notoriously hard to unlock in current build, [[LuckBasedMission requiring to find and loot Necronomicon]][[/note]] and then win the game by being first in the overall score. With each of them. ''[[HarderThanHard While playing on Hard difficulty]]''. This includes playing as all of the [[TierInducedScrappy Tier-Induced Scrappies]]. Currently less than 1% of all players managed to pull this off.
** To a far lesser extent, the achievement for ressurecting 10 of the dead expedition members, as it is a LuckBasedMission - you not only have to lose someone and survive the loss, but then find the right location on the map and have sufficient amount of treasures to sacrifice to bring the dead character back.
* TierInducedScrappy: The explorers aren't really balanced against each other. Some start with flat-out better perks, items and/or followers than the rest. This also means there are few greatly underpowered examples. And there are also followers themselves, with few types of them paling by comparison.
** Aleister Crowley starts with not one, but ''three'' Cultists. Cultists are by far the worst party memebers, as they come with only red dice and their perk doesn't prevent the nasty effects of Coca Leaves, all while each cultist can at any given time turn into an Abomination. If that wasn't enough, Crowley's perk, Occult Vision, reveals [[CircleOfStandingStones Stone Circles]] upon loading new map. If no circles were generated - tough luck! And the tough requirements to even unlock Crowley (finishing each expedition with positive standing) just leaves the bitter taste.
** Harriet Tubman's unique perk, Dream Visions, has a very small chance of revealing still unknown and unexplored location on a map. A single, randomly selected location. When her Sanity is 70 or more. And the game favours locations that are very close to the party anyway, making it moot.
** As already noted, Cultists are more harmful than useful. Their perk doesn't prevent bad ailments from using Coca Leaves, their dice is crap and there is a never-ending risk they will turn into an Abomination and start cause serious trouble, like eating other party members or starting a fight.
** Unless pacifist route is picked, Missionaries are just as bad. They provide a single, unupgraded green dice regardless of level, have lowest Toughness of all followers, can't lift too much and they might randomly lose one of their perks, meaning resting in Missions will require payment anyway. In pacifist run, however, the extra sanity they provide is more than enough to overcome other issues.
* ViewerGenderConfusion: A lot of walkthrough and tutorials refer to [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dion_Fortune Dion Fortune]] with masculine pronouns.

* FirstInstallmentWins: The first game received generally favourable reviews and was well-received by players. The sequel meanwhile is highly divisive, both in general reception and [[BrokenBase even within fandom]].

* ViewerGenderConfusion: A lot of walkthrough and tutorials refer to [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dion_Fortune Dion Fortune]] with masculine pronouns.

** Unlocking platinum frames for all explorers. This requires to: unlock all explorers first[[note]]Which will take at least two successfully finished runs of the game, as Dion Fortune is unlocked by NonStandardGameOver, plus Lovecraft is notoriously hard to unlock in current build, [[LuckBasedMission requiring to find and loot Necronomicon]][[/note]] and then win the game by being first in the overall score. With each of them. ''[[HarderThanHard While playing on Hard difficulty]]''. This uncludes playing as all of the [[TierInducedScrappy Tier-Induced Scrappies]]. Currently less than 1% of all players managed to pull this off.

* ComplacentGamingSyndrome:

** Regardless if you want to keep Tim Timster as a member of your expedition, his dog, Luis, doesn't use a companion slot. Not only that, but he has unique dice: one has eye icon, just like support (blue) die, the other comes with special taunt icon. And there is absolutely no downside of dismissing Timster while still in London's port, while keeping his dog.

** Reloading new game until the expedition starts with a mission to find a missing wife of a wealthy foreigner. Unlike other starting quests, this one provides a small fund bonus upon completion, making a ''huge'' difference in early game.