I would like to ask the community for input regarding the Death Rage card from the Berserker class deck. Basically it allows you +1 damage for each 2 damage on the Hero sheet if you spend a surge for it. Combined with the other Berserker class card giving you a free surge, and a hero with high health, that can turn into a **** load of damage.

Here is the thing. I am going to play Gryvorn Unleashed (Finale of the Shadow Rune campaign) but I need a strategy as for keeping Death Rage in check somehow. What I don't want is to fight a severely injured Grisban who will then insta-kill Gryvorn or Zachareth with sick +5/+6 damage with an already deadly weapon (Rage Blade).

I was thinking like this:

Encounter 1:

- Try to make Splig run away with his ritual component (the only one I wish to save)

- Make Belthir and Sir Alric destroy as many search tokens as possible. I want no health/stamina potion in encounter 2!

- Keep all OL cards for encounter 2

- Damage the heroes as much as possible?

- No plot cards.

Encounter 2:

- Crushing Exhaustion the heroes while in range (Mirklace deck, willpower test - they fail then they suck up their whole stamina, plus it stays on them until they rest, so they have to waste an attack action)

- Alpha-strike (well, in my turn) Augur with all or most OL cards.

- Don't hurt Grisban much and Dominion him with Zachareth if in contact to force him to waste fatigue or move actions to get close again.

- Dark Charm Logan to shoot himself and finish him off.

- Kill Grisban. How? Death Rage will kill Gryvorn if I miss my opportunity.

Any condition is particular I could use from Zachareth (Subdue)? Curse and Weakened seem best for close range, but Immobilized (obv. not for Logan) can be handy. thoughts?

Logan wields Ice Storm too, which is a real pain. Maybe I should kill him first so I can move :-/

Weakened would be a great condition to hit grisban with, but you don't want to be simultaneously encouraging him to rest, since he discards it anyway- use Zachareth's shadow bolt against Grisban. Alternately, attack Grisban with Gryvorn, then use Dominion to move Grisban away- he won't have 2 attacks, that way, at least.

If you can keep Grisban close to max fatigue, he won't be able to use Death Rage much. I would also consider knocking him out first instead of last. You may have to fight through some more healing, but if he does manage to get off Death Rage, it'll be while Gryvorn has higher health, and you may be able to adjust your plan afterward. If you save attacking Grisban until later, you might not be able to respond after Death Rage because it might be the killing blow.

Yeah, keep in mind knocking him out takes away all the fatigue. My strategy vs. the berserker in cases like this is to start by whittling him down just a little bit while knocking out his supporters, then suddenly piling on a huge amount of damage.

Time of Need from Augur (Disciple) secures the stamina required to afford Death Rage every turn. But yeah, kill the support first then go for a one-shot to finish him off. Will let you know how it went (we play on thursday night).

Doesnt time of need just give the disciple(and not the Beserker) 2 movement points and regenerate 2 fatigue ? or am i missing something ?

Card in question:

He's got his heroic feat which can recover 2 fatigue for the berserker, but I don't see what Time of Need has to do with anything- I don't know any steady way the disciple has of recovering fatigue for other heroes.

Also, since Death Rage gets stronger when the berserker is damaged, I would definitely hold off on attacking him too much until you're sure you can kill him- that is, don't just damage him significantly and then leave him alive.

Yeah you're right, I think I'm confused with the name of said ability, I am referring to the ability writing off two fatigues and two damage to all heroes within 3 spaces if I am not mistaken again.

And said ability was not printed on a class card It was Augur's hero skill. Sorry about the confusion.

Anyway, things went very fast yesterday, thought I would give you a short synopsis.

In Encounter 1, I got completely destroyed as the OL and could save none of the ritual components. I managed to destroy most search tokens though, bar 2 of them. One gave them a stamina potion, the other gave them the shop II armor giving you a black defense dice. It was kind of an "oh ****" moment as they handed over the armor to Augur, my prime target for encounter 2. They left Sir Alric with only two life points at the end of their first turn (why the hell does he have to start so close to the heroes). Alric destroyed the first search token instead of attacking as it was pointless to slap the face of a random dude anyway, and threw himself in the way for the heroes, trying to block LoS between the heroes and Belthir. Belthir tried to fly south but the next hero attack immobilized him. I Shifting Earth:ed the heroes sitting 4 squares away from him to bring them into reach (well, Belthir has Reach too) and although immobilized he performed an attack and destroyed the southern search token. I thought that was justice and he could die happy. He got slaughtered afterwards. Splig is just too fat and slow. He cannot even move to the component, take it and stand by the door in the same round. Since the hallways were full of heroes I decided to destroy the two western tokens while carrying the component. The heroes went for him and thought I would play Dash and move 9 spaces away (which would have been completely pointless because of Logan and his Ice Storm), so I played Blood Rage on Splig and tried to get some damage on Augur prior to Encounter 2. He sat 5 damages away from death and the encounter was over instantly. Heroes were confident.

In Encounter 2 my heroes did not even consider searching the tokens as I had anticipated. They spent fatigue to reach the corridor leading to the throne room and began to shoot from there, with additional attack from Grisban's heroic feat. That was really greedy as range was either 6 or 7 depending on hero. They missed every attack and passed to me. I played Dark Charm on Logan, he passed the test only barely so I threw another OL card away and used the staff to force a re-roll. He failed, used Lucky Charm, and failed again. He shot Augur with his bow and killed the man instantly, using the buff from Expert Blow (much needed). Then Gryvorn got Frenzy:ed, stepped ahead and did two attacks with 11 damage each on Logan, who died as well. Grisban attacked twice but only managed to scratch the dragon. I got my second turn and dealt 15 overall damage to Grisban (3 points away from death). He responded with resting to get rid of his fatigue and did his death rage to deal a good 12 damage to Gryvorn. He died afterwards. Zachy attacked once but he was only a spectator to the carnage. I considered eating him up just for the lulz but did not want to intimidate my heroes more than necessary. Victory had to be savoured.

I think overconfidence in combat is what killed them. Until now I only had cannon fodder to throw at the heroes but Gryvorn needed to be micro-managed. Immobilize condition would have changed the deal completely but I did not give them a second chance to inflict it. Obviously, one could say I was lucky enough to pull out Dark Charm, effectively killing one of the heroes before I even took my turn. That's life.

The last time I fought Gryvorn as a hero, our Runemaster acquired "Ice Storm" from a travel card on the way to the finale- it completely changed our strategy (and the outcome,) and Gryvorn was defeated soundly, as we just kept our distance.

The last time I fought Gryvorn as a hero, our Runemaster acquired "Ice Storm" from a travel card on the way to the finale- it completely changed our strategy (and the outcome,) and Gryvorn was defeated soundly, as we just kept our distance.

Yeah, this weapon was by far the most annoying of all the gear the heroes managed to gather through the campaign.

Runic sorcery is awesome for that purpose, totally worth the 2xp in my opinion. Incredibly annoying as an OL to have your large monsters/lieutenants immobilised.

Yea runic sorcery totally breaks the last encounter. As I recall last time we played that one, the runemaster just immobilized the dragon and that was basically over. The dragon could not attack as no one was stupid enough to get in melee range.

Yea runic sorcery totally breaks the last encounter. As I recall last time we played that one, the runemaster just immobilized the dragon and that was basically over. The dragon could not attack as no one was stupid enough to get in melee range.

Fortunately for me, I was able to get enough wins in act 2 to play the other finale, so Gryvorn wasn't even involved.