I'm new to the game but I love it already. I have some questions regarding skills and actions since I want to make sure we play the game correctly from the start.

Can someone please explain the difference between the following 3 as detailed as possible.

• "Exhaust this card"
• Bent arrow icon thingy
• "Flip"

And are there any skills that counts as "passives" and do not require any action at all or does all skills require an action point?

Exhaust this card: In MtG terms, you're tapping it. You are using it and then making it unavailable until it refreshes itself which is normally at the start of the player's turn but is sometimes something else, especially for some Overlord abilities (maybe just things from the lieutenant's plot decks; not 100% sure off-hand). In any case, you use it and then can't use it, after a certain amount of time, you can use it again.

Bent arrow icon thingy: Whatever follows, takes an action, 1 of the 2 that a character/figure is allowed on that turn.

Flip: You will see this on search cards. Once you use a potion or other item, you will flip it over. That is a 1-time use. Then at the end of the quest, you sell it for its designated gold value.

There are tons of abilities which are passive.

* Splig: Each time he is attacked, test his awareness. If he passes, a monster adjacent to him becomes the target of the attack.

* Augur Grisom: Each other hero within 3 spaces of you gains a health whenever they're attacked and don't take any damage.

* Ashrain: When a minion monster begins its activation adjacent to you, it is Stunned.

* Thief Skill Appraisal: After you draw a Search card, you may discard it to draw a new one.

* Beastmaster Skill Survivalist: You gain +2 health. Each hero adjacent to your wolf gains a brown defense die. While your wolf is adjacent to a hero, it gains a brown defense die.

Etc., etc.

"Exhaust this card"

Means that you turn your card sideways to indicate that it is exhausted, this skill cannot be used again until it has been refreshed (at the start of that players next turn).

Bent arrow icon

Indicates that it counts as 1 of your 2 actions to use the skill.

If this icon is not on the skill it does not take 1 action to use, though it often still requires the use of stamina

"Flip"

Means you flip the card over to show the back of the card, to indicate that the card has been used.

From the top of my head you do this with loot cards (potions etc) that you have used and with your hero card to indicate that the heroic feat has been used.

Regarding "passives"

There are several skills that would count as passive. That are for example skills and items that raises the heroes hit points/stamina/attributes.

These does not require any action, if they would have required an action it would have been marked with the "bent arrow icon thingy"

Hope this answered your questions.

These are quite similar and often happen at the same time, so yea, it might confuse one a bit. To keep it short:

• Exhausting cards - 'using' the benefit of a card that's limited to once per turn. Usually you signify exhausting by turning card sideways (so called 'tapping'), which means you cannot use this benefit untill you refresh it which happens at the beggining of the owner's turn - there are exceptions but if so, the card itself will tell you when you refresh it. Exhausting a card on itself is not an action. Also, an exhausted card can still provide you with some passive benefits. Happens mostly in case of items, like armors that passively increase your defense pool but give you an exhaust ability once per turn. TLDR: a once per turn effect that gives you a specific effect.
• Bent arrow icon - an action type. Using this does take one of your two avaible actions (be it a hero or monster). The bent icon on itself does not couse you to flip or exhaust card. However, in case of hero abilities I can't think of an example where such action (granted by abilities mostly) doesn't couse the card to be exhausted (see above). It's important because many monsters have such unique actions, which means they need to spend an action, not that they become exhausted or flipped over. TLDR: an action type, takes one of two actions, usually couses an exhaust of a card for heroes.
• Flip - act of turning card/token over to show it other side. Most of the times once flipped, the card/token stays that way unless some specific conditions are met. In the context of your other questions, I assume you ask how it works with search cards. It basicly means that once you use the search card you flip it to show it's backside to represent that this item is 'gone'. You don't throw it away for two reasons: 1) some classes make use of it (Treasure Hunter and Apothecary come to the mind mainly) 2) you still get the cold for 'used' card at the end of the quest

And are there any skills that counts as "passives" and do not require any action at all or does all skills require an action point?

Yes, however pure 'passive' hero abilities are rare (apart from the one on the hero sheet). Most of 'passive' hero abilities have the always active bonus and an exhaust effect. Do those require an action? Yes, if they have the bent arrow icon.

Hope it helps.

Thanks a lot guys that clears it up. It was the fact that "arrow" icon requires an action point while "exhaust" does not we were uncertain about.

So if a skill has neither one of "arrow icon" or "exhaust" that means that this skill/ability will trigger every time the conditions on the card are met, right?

But what confuses us is the Necromancer skill "Reanimate" has the "arrow icon" on it which means it requires an action but in the manual it says "Activating a familiar does not require an action". So this means that spawning the familiar requires an action but activating(as in moving/attacking) does not require an action?

All familiars activate on their own after their owner's turn is over if they are on the map. Also, none of them start on the map on their own. So all familiar based classes need to summon their familiar (which pretty much always uses an action) before it can be activated (because, it's not on the map yet). However, if the familiar survives to the next turn, it's owner doesn't have to use any actions for it to activate.

I hope that helped a bit.

Thanks a lot guys that clears it up. It was the fact that "arrow" icon requires an action point while "exhaust" does not we were uncertain about.

So if a skill has neither one of "arrow icon" or "exhaust" that means that this skill/ability will trigger every time the conditions on the card are met, right?

But what confuses us is the Necromancer skill "Reanimate" has the "arrow icon" on it which means it requires an action but in the manual it says "Activating a familiar does not require an action". So this means that spawning the familiar requires an action but activating(as in moving/attacking) does not require an action?

Yes to your first question, with the caveat that I think some things may have been errata'ed to limit them to once per turn or something, so if you're wondering about something specifically, check out FFG's game FAQ.

Correct on the second.

Yea that helps a lot so thanks again all of you =) We have only played the first two quests of the campaign so far so the errors we made does not make a big difference. But now we know the correct way to play it now.

I read the FAQ pdf and there were a few changes I took note of.

Quick question about the loot. If you for example finds a potion with gold value 25 then the heroes get to share those 25 gold and they do not get 25 gold each right?

Quick question about the loot. If you for example finds a potion with gold value 25 then the heroes get to share those 25 gold and they do not get 25 gold each right?

Correct. Heroes share their gold.

Yea that helps a lot so thanks again all of you =) We have only played the first two quests of the campaign so far so the errors we made does not make a big difference. But now we know the correct way to play it now.

I read the FAQ pdf and there were a few changes I took note of.

Quick question about the loot. If you for example finds a potion with gold value 25 then the heroes get to share those 25 gold and they do not get 25 gold each right?

Right. The potion is 1 item worth 25 gold. The only time that the gold item depends on the # of heroes are for things like quest rewards where it explicitly says that they win 25 gold for every hero in the party. For everything else, it's just worth whatever it's worth and when it's sold, it goes into the communal money fund.

Ok thanks. I play as the overlord so I don't wanna give them greedy bastards more then I have to

Regarding passive skills. The Berserker skill "Brute" reads "You gain 4 Health. Whenever you stand up or are revived by another hero, you recover 2 additional hearts". Does this means that if the characters base maximum health is 14 his maximum is now 18 and he gets to start with that since it is a passive skill?

Ok thanks. I play as the overlord so I don't wanna give them greedy bastards more then I have to

Regarding passive skills. The Berserker skill "Brute" reads "You gain 4 Health. Whenever you stand up or are revived by another hero, you recover 2 additional hearts". Does this means that if the characters base maximum health is 14 his maximum is now 18 and he gets to start with that since it is a passive skill?

That is correct, however, he still needs to buy that skill with xp though since it is not the berserks starting skill.

Ok thanks. Pretty good skill then. Yea he already did, just wanted to make sure that we are using it correctly =)

Now I won't bother you with my noob questions(at least for the coming hours) but I have a feeling that you will be hearing a lot more from me on this forum

Ok thanks. Pretty good skill then. Yea he already did, just wanted to make sure that we are using it correctly =)

Now I won't bother you with my noob questions(at least for the coming hours) but I have a feeling that you will be hearing a lot more from me on this forum

The rules can be quite complex at times and Im sure no one here minds helping you out with your questions.

Besides the errata there is also an unoffical FAQ over at boardgamegeeks that has alot of useful information.

http://boardgamegeek.com/wiki/page/Descent_Second_Edition_Unofficial_FAQ