Hi everybody,

We just finished the third session of our RTL campaign, and maybe I'm just a little frustrated because the hero party got such a ridiculously bad beating, but I still think there's (objectively) some things broken with the rules that I wanted to ask about just to see if we were doing something wrong.

The main problem is about the skeleton archers.
While I would have found above line hilarious in Vanilla Descent, the thing is that the Overlord upgraded eldritch monsters to silver level this session and now the skeletons are so incredibly imbalanced that it makes little baby Jesus cry.

We actually killed a Lieutenant (Sir Alric Farrow) that session without taking a single loss, but we can't do the same with a standard group of skeleton archers anymore, which is quite insane.

First off, why are they so incredibly fast ? They are skeletons , for crying out loud, yet they move 6 spaces? Are they on rollerblades?
Then they have an auto-range of 2 (3 for masters) and a minimum additional range of 2 (blue and yellow dice).
Do the math. That gives them a minimal action radius of 10 (that's right, ten ) spaces. Given the typical dungeon size in RTL, this means they can start their turn like anywhere on the map and still hit you. This is even made worse by the fact that our Overlord chose the Sorcerer King as his Avatar and has the Snipers card in play. Which means 2 additional range (bringing us up to a minimum action radius of 12) and the ability to ignore one obstacle.

In Vanilla Descent (as in every other dungeon crawler as well), the theory is to have the tanks blocking while the archer and the mage of the group do some damage from a safer distance.
This concept is completely broken now, though. With these hellish archers, neither is there such a thing as "blocking", nor such a thing as "a safe distance" anymore. They just hit you. Period.

And it's not like they do lousy damage. Our Overlord actually started killing the heroes in turn ("so who was next to die... oh right") instead of just hitting on the weakest one constantly... to keep the frustration down a little. Again, this would be hilarious if it wasn't so sad.
The same ludicrous speed/range that always keeps the skeleton archers in range of the group's ranged fighters also keeps them well clear of the tanks most of the time.

How retarded do you have to be to design a monster class which basically ignores all range restrictions? And give it high damage, too? And, on top of that, make its master version undying? And to not notice this obvious folly in playtesting?
(And to have such totally worthless crap like bane spiders on the other hand?)

Sorry, but I just find it very hard to wrap my mind around that.

The Overlord made > 40 XP that day while we made < 10.

I have read on this board and elsewhere that things get better for the heroes on silver and gold campaign levels. However, I can't see that happening at all. Which brings me to some more questions...

1 . How are we supposed to avoid heavy damage if the best armor in the game has a defense of 4 (a gold item, though), the best shield avoids a maximum of 4 damage (again, a gold item) and we constantly receive damages of 10+ already on COPPER level? How is this disastrous imbalance ever to improve?

2 . Once badly damaged, how are you ever supposed to heal? Potions are both limited and awfully weak. You could drink one every turn and still couldn't compensate for the damage you receive. You also can't heal in town, really, because that gives you only 5 points back while costing you two rounds... totally not worth it. The only way of getting your full health back is... well, dying. How's that going to improve?

I seriously hope we overlooked some rules that balance out this stuff, or our group might very well lose interest in this game... so if anyone could help me out here, that would be highly appreciated.

Elagabal said:

1. I dont think you should consistantly be taking 10+ damage in COPPER? Are your Heroes playing well? My own experience tells me that the Heroes should almost always be using their first turn advantage to drop as much as they can. If the Heroes try to play too defensive and slowly move thru the dungeon they will run into way more problems like what you describe. The worst experiences we have had in dungeons are when the Heroes barely move out on that first turn and essentially yield the first round of attacks to the Overlord.

2. The way my group read the rules, the turn you port back to town you can visit the Temple and heal 5 (paying 25 gold). The very next turn you can move back in thru the Portal and fight. So you only "lose" 1 turn by healing not 2. Heh, hope we read it right in the rules but thats how we do it. I do admit though, those Potions only healing 3 makes them pretty useless. Its almost always better it seems to carry Fatigue Potions and especially in the Copper age those Power Potions.

Elagabal said:

Snipers for the Skeletons is possibly one of the best upgrades ever.

You killed Alric in Copper without a loss. Stop complaining right now because that is not something easily done.

The whole rant on Skeletons. Skeletons are the weakest monster in the game. They die at the drop of a hat. You have to do 4 wounds to a basic Skeleton to kill it. If you can't move with fatigue, battle and kill 2 skeletons every turn, you are doing something wrong. Don't blame the skeletons. "Minimal action radius"? If that Skeleton has to move 4 spaces to get LOS on you, he's got 2 movement left which means you should be able to get to him with fatigue, especially in a RtL dungeon. A mage who manages to get the Blast rune in Copper can clear an entire room of Skeletons by looking in there. They are horrible weak defensively.

Okay, >40XP? Was that one dungeon or two? You should always flee before giving the OL enough CT to be able to upgrade a monster class after the first dungeon.

1) Are you sure you are playing things right? I can't think of a single monster that at their Copper level can put out 10+ damage. Maybe a Troll, but certainly not Skeletons. Even a Silver level Skeleton shouldn't be doing that much damage. What are you being hit with to cause that much damage?

2) I'll give you this potions suck. Always plan on drinking two back to back.

From looking at everything, I really think you are playing something wrong or missing a few rules here and there.

First of all, Sniper Skeletons are the strongest example of the breed...and are considered to be one of the biggest pains in Copper, where you can't just blast them as soon as they show up. Silver and Gold weapons let the heroes brush away skeletons like so much trash, so you won't face the same trouble in the later levels. Furthermore, facing Sniper Skeletons requires a larger focus on battle tactics:

1) Hide behind corners with Guard orders
2) Use Dodge orders to retreat
3) Use Fatigue to close the gap and attack
4) Cover Line of Sight so Skeletons don't spawn and kill you
5) If all else fails, grab the loot and Run away

Finally, let's see, short list of somewhat common things that do 10+ damage in Copper

uhh

Silver Master Beastmen on a good roll
Master Dark Priests, especially Silver Master Dark Priests
Trolls (1 red treachery...)
Probably common if you see 3 Master Beastment on the field at once, bunched up
Slaggorath?
Alric (maybe)

Are you doing pierce damage correctly? Skeletons should not be rolling more than 5 to 6 damage (even that is uncommon in copper), even if they have 3-4 Pierce. Pierce is not additional damage: it only reduces armor. 10+ damage is odd, to say the least. Besides, there are Other items that help reduce damage or add armor, so it's not uncommon to see heroes with 7-9 armor or too much damage absorption. Trust me, the heroes have several options for damage absorption/negation, and later can avoid most damage from monsters by killing them all and locking down Line of Sight.

As for question 2, it's supposed to be hard for you to heal when badly damaged. That's part of the point. Think of it like an arcade brawler (King of Dragons, Knights of the Round, Final Fight, etc.): you're going to die. A lot. The Overlord must kill the heroes repeatedly in order to rack up Conquest tokens: if every hero is worth 4 conquest (high estimate) and it takes you 28 game-weeks to go through copper level (very high estimate), the Overlord still would have to rack up 18 hero kills in order to get 100 conquest and keep the conquest totals even (which, by the way, means the overlord is losing ). So if you die, say, 10 times for every 15 conquest you collect in copper, you're probably holding your own.

However, I'm going to go ahead and assume that 5 and 3 points of healing are too low for you because it's common for your group to receive 10+ points of damage. Other groups rarely see damage numbers so high: usually, the hardier heroes take 0-3 damage from the toughest monsters, and the less armored heroes try to stay out of combat or die rather quickly. If you only get hit for 1 hit point per attack, 5 healing is worth spending 1 turn getting into position by the glyph and another turn going to town, and that's generally been my experience with heroes packing 5-7 armor points. Even against Skeletons..

What are your stats? it always helps to know what the situation is when looking to give advice. Maybe your overlord's found a new and fascinating way to break the game.

First off, thanks for all the replies. This is truly a great board!
Now, let me try to go through your answers one by one...

"I dont think you should consistantly be taking 10+ damage in COPPER?"
My apologies for being unclear, when I said that we receive 10+ damage every turn, I meant that's the value the monsters deal out, before armor is subtracted and such. It is still harsh considering our heroes have armor ratings of 2-5. You get dropped pretty quickly by stuff like that.

"My own experience tells me that the Heroes should almost always be using their first turn advantage to drop as much as they can."
Mine, too. And yes, we use our advantage of being first to move in a dungeon. We don't linger around uselessly. Problem is, though, that our movement points almost never suffice to hit a monster in the first round, so it doesn't make much difference.

"The way my group read the rules, the turn you port back to town you can visit the Temple and heal 5 (paying 25 gold). The very next turn you can move back in thru the Portal and fight. So you only "lose" 1 turn by healing not 2."
Yes, but since you need to end your previous turn on or next to a glyph in order to use it kinda makes that turn a loss, too.

"If you can't move with fatigue, battle and kill 2 skeletons every turn, you are doing something wrong."
Uhm, we can move like 3-5 spaces by using fatigue only. Skeletons can hit us from 6 spaces away without even doing a particularly good roll, it's the range they automatically have. And they usually retreat a few spaces after having taken their shot, too (after all, they have 6 movement points to waste). So no, that doesn't work, which was my very rant in the first place. No OL with two brain cells would put a skeleton so close to the heroes that they can get to it by using fatigue only. Why would he, with that kind of range and movement?

"A mage who manages to get the Blast rune in Copper can clear an entire room of Skeletons by looking in there. They are horrible weak defensively."
That may be. However, our mage doesn't have a blast rune yet (we kinda had bad luck with drawing treasures). And even if he had, he'd have to roll awfully well to cover the range. See previous point.

"Okay, >40XP? Was that one dungeon or two?"
That was one outdoor encounter (against the lieutenant) and the first two levels of one dungeon.

"You should always flee before giving the OL enough CT to be able to upgrade a monster class after the first dungeon."
And by doing that, we achieve... what, exactly? It's not like there will be no skeletons or sorcerers in the next dungeon. Btw, the OL won't be allowed to upgrade another monster class before we reach silver level.

Lastly, I'll go through Thundercles list of strategies...
"1) Hide behind corners with Guard orders"
And what would force the overlord to move past that corner? Time is playing for him, so he can wait for us to attack him .
"2) Use Dodge orders to retreat"
Which costs one action without any guarantee of doing any good. Forcing a reroll is kinda uneffective when the second roll is not much worse than the first... and our OL is very lucky with the dice...
"3) Use Fatigue to close the gap and attack"
Not enough fatigue to close that kind of gap, buddy. Again, skeletons have movement 6 and auto-range 6, plus they can shoot through one obstacle... the OL just has to cram the corridors with cheaper monsters to delay us and then kill us with the skeletons from like a mile away... seriously, did anyone get the point of my rant at all?
"4) Cover Line of Sight so Skeletons don't spawn and kill you"
See 3. Nice theory, but not doable due to the incredible range of skeletons. You'd have to cover every single space of the dungeon at all times. By doing that, we'd spread out our hero group so thin that we'd have like 1 or 2 figures left who can do any fighting on the front... yeah, that won't work.
"5) If all else fails, grab the loot and Run away"
Cos' constantly dying will be much more fun in the next dungeon?

Hi,

Elagabal said:

A normal silver skeleton rolls a blue, green and yellow die. This amounts to a maximum damage of 6 before applying armor.

-Kylearan

Elagabal said:

I still can't wrap my head around what monster you are running into in Copper that is dealing 10+ damage a hit. Certainly not skeletons.

As for fleeing, its to give you another crack at a dungeon without an Eldrtich silver upgrade. Yes, skeletons with Sniper stink. Silver level skeletons with sniper are far far worse. Giving the OL a ton of CT by stubbornly moving through a dungeon just to reach the end does nothing but help the OL and put you behind the game.

As for the movement thing, I should have specified I guess. With a ranged or magic user, you should be able to use fatigue to move, battle and move back in most situations. For melee guys, declaring an advance and then boosting that with fatigue should get you into striking distance.

The heroes I'm playing against do a stratagy like this:

Use all but 1 of thier fatigue to move, drink a fatigue potion using the movement point from thier last fatigue thay have, then use thier now filled up fatigue to continue moving, and then do a double attack. (They usually only buy fatigue potions, they hardly ever buy healing potions)

If they can't reach the creatures with that then instead of wasting the fatigue and fatigue potion they do a move with thier actual movement and then do a guard order, which the moment I would move any of my stuff near enough to attack they interrupt me with thier attack.

Big Remy said:

Erm... huh? The eldritch silver upgrade is global . It doesn't go away by leaving a dungeon and entering the next.

@ solmead: Good tips, however you'd need plenty of fatigue potions for the first to work and a very good range roll for the second. But well, yeah, it's the best strategy I guess, thanks for the input.

Elagabal said:

He means: "Leave before the OL can upgrade his skeletons to silver"

If they're already silver, well, you're already screwed.

You haven't answered why anything is rolling 10+ damage before armor on your dice. That remains a mystery.

Finally, with fatigue and no fatigue potions, the slowest melee heroes have a movement range of 6 if they make one attack. However, skeletons don't need to be killed by melee heroes: they're the weakest creature in the game, and any self-respecting ranged hero should be able to take the copper ones out in one blow. Most heroes have "Minimum Attack Radii" of 10 or more, and you should be able to keep fatigue high if you want to win this game. The goal behind raiding a dungeon for its loot is that copper treasures make it much easier to lay waste to your foes, and Money is the limiting factor for hero upgrades.

So, I personally think your group missed a rule somewhere, because Descent Tactics aren't rocket science. They aren't even LRC circuits-hard, really. Can you please explain how you're getting hit for 10+ damage before armor in Copper?

I believe he means 10+ damage per OL turn, i.e total damage from several monsters. Carry on

10+ damage spread across multiple attacks? Why is this hurting anyone ?

He means: "Leave before the OL can upgrade his skeletons to silver"
If they're already silver, well, you're already screwed.

Sorry, but that's like the most worthless advise ever. Mainly because that ship has long sailed now, but also
because you can't really avoid it forever... what do you want to do, just stop playing when the OL gets near
25 XP and never go back to the game?

You haven't answered why anything is rolling 10+ damage before armor on your dice. That remains a mystery.

I checked back with the cards and yeah, I have exaggerated a bit out of frustration. Not much, though.
Skeletons do 8, the elite version 11, sorcerers 9 and their elite version 12.
This is with piercing already added. And yeah, I know it's not the same as damage, but it makes no difference
as long as you armor isn't <3.

Finally, with fatigue and no fatigue potions, the slowest melee heroes have a movement range of 6 if they make one attack. However, skeletons don't need to be killed by melee heroes: they're the weakest creature in the game, and any self-respecting ranged hero should be able to take the copper ones out in one blow.

The copper ones weren't the problem.

Anyway, from what I've heard so far I guess our real problem is lousy weaponry. We had a lot of bad luck with both looting and buying treasure cards... not many blanks for the looting and a lot of "gold" cards in the market.
Our archer can't drop a silver skeleton in one shot, our mage can if he gets lucky, but he has no blast rune.
So I guess we just need to get better there.

Hi,

Elagabal said:

It's not the most worthless advice ever. In fact, it's the best advice you can get, and maybe you shouldn't reject advice from players who have played the game a lot more than you have so easily.

The idea behind this advice is that you leave a dungeon after quickly looting the chest and activating the glyph, before the OL has built up a lot of threat, power cards and/or has drawn dangerous card combinations. That way, you stay ahead of the CT curve, and will have better equipment and maybe even better skills once the inevitable silver upgrade happens. (That this makes for a rather boring opening game is another matter...)

Silver eldritch with sniper are tough, but hardly unbeatable if you play smart.

Elagabal said:

But this is max damage, which will happen rarely. A normal silver skelli will do max damage only about 22% of the time, and it's worse for the master because it rolls 4 dice instead of 3.

Skellies will get one turn to fire on the heroes before smart heroes kill most of them. On the second turn, only one or two should still stand. Even assuming no skellie misses, this should only be enough to kill one hero, if at all.

-Kylearan

Elagabal said:

Then your Heroes are going to get their asses handed to them the entire way through Copper and make life very easy for the OL. The Heroes need to control as much as possible how much CT the OL gains for the entire Copper level. Depending on what plot he is using, you are going to give him all the CT he needs to buy plot advancement cards playing that way.

Allrighty, now I got it. Won't help us much for this campaign anymore, but something to keep in mind for the future.

I think its the way it's being explained thats got you.

If you enter the first dungeon of the game and allow the OL to get 25xp that means all the following weeks he will have one monster catagory upgraded to silver, but if you spread that out for 3-5 week and not allow him to get 25 xp until then, you have that many more weeks worth of dungeon treasure gathering and shopping to equip your heroes better for dealing with the "inevitable" silver upgrade.

Bravo McWilley said:

Exactly, and yes I was doing an absolutely horrible job of getting this point across.

Your best bet vs sniper skeletons is to get taunt ASAP. Snipers makes it easier for the skeletons to see and shoot at the taunter, so they will have to shoot at him or at someone else from a very long range. Add a dodge order to the taunter and then you can laugh at skeletons.

Bravo McWilley said:

Yeah, I got that now, although it took me a while.

I have to tell you, though, I still consider that a slightly broken concept. Since you'd spend the first few weeks avoiding any real confrontation and run from all stronger monsters, you kinda avoid a big part of the fun, too, don't you agree?

@ Badend: Thanks for the tip about Taunt . I was thinking the same thing and we'll try to get that.

Elagabal said:

Firstly, its a combative game that seesaws in balance from one side to the other. The greater the volume of 'game time' you play when you are advantaged, the better of you will be. Increasing your game time when the other side is at an advantage is not only stupid, it increases the other sides advantage so that you will never get your 'turn'.
If you can't follow the concept of a wider gameplay experience than just cleaning out dungeons then RtL is not for you (this is a general, not personal comment).

Secondly, I think you misunderstand the concept slightly. You don't need to avoid all confrontation. You simply need to balance the potential gains and losses at all times (understanding that CT are not the only potential gains/losses, but cash and treasure picks are also in he mix). In general, you can probably finish most first levels and maybe do a loot and scoot on the second before pulling out. Only run early if the first level is a particularly tough one.
Basically, well equipped heroes with a single skill/trait upgrade and/or a single secret master upgrade can usually trash even most silver monsters pretty easily. So getting to the 'well equipped' stage while keeping CT scores to a minimum is desirable. Then you have a much easier time through the later part of the level and will be correspondingly ahead at the start of the next level.
Oh, and there will still be plenty of stand up ding-dong battles later on, you just want a chance to get equipped well enough to compete when they happen.

Elagabal said:

Unless I am mistaken Taunt works only within 5 spaces. So no forced long-shots on skellies... And it is just a minor nuisance for a skilled OL.

Parathion said:

I'm dealing with a taunting Nanok with 7 armor right now and I have sniping silver skeletons. Certainly it's a bit frusting at times to have to attack Nanok knowing I will most likely do no damage. However, snipers can shoot a really long ways so if they can stay out of the 5 space range for taunt they have free reign on target selection. Also, careful/clever positioning of the shooters, other monsters or crushing blocks can get around the taunt restrictions. So, taunt is a thorn in the OL side, but it can be dealt with. It's like a puzzle. And massed skeletons boosted by a couple points of command can make even a high armor taunter nervous.