In elementaryOS Loki, I have only been able to make DnsCrypt to work properly (when manually setting the DNS server address in the gui Network Settings to 127.0.0.1 or whatever other address starting with 127.0.0...) by commenting the line in /etc/NetworkManager/NetworkManager.conf that says
dns=dnsmasq
I still don't properly understand what dnsmasq does. What could be negative consequences/downsides of disabling dnsmasq? What is one giving up, by disabling its use by the Network Manager?