Let Imperial Assault debut, garner support, bring more player interest back to the table and yes, let Imperial Assault phase out Descent 2.[...] This will allow FFG game designers to go back to the drawing-board and create Descent (3rd,) complete with a fresh new additude and proper dungeon delving experience.

Come on, man

I fail to see what is innerly wrong with Descent 2 for not being a "reveal next room" dungeon delver. I get that a % of the Descent 1 fans did not get exactly what they expected with Descent 2, but does that invalidate this game for providing a different gaming experience? So what you are saying is, "sky is is not falling but btw I did not like Descent 2 anyway"? How does that contribute to the discussion as for how people that enjoy D2 as it is should react to the latest anouncement? X-Wing will show end of support next month, so I claim. Let me go to their community and say that it's the best news ever because I've always hated the game anyway? Really? Plus the fact that it's a stretch to believe that most players in the Descent community would actually enjoy a D1-like game rather than D2 for the next installment. What if I prefer having an overlord, and a preset map of the dungeon? Or is it too much heresy for your taste? Let's stop assuming things here.

Descent 3 will certainly be awesome, but that's not the game I am playing or invest in currently. I'm not paying money nor invest time in things so the next version making everything unusable will become better. Descent 3.0 should be implemented once Descent 2.0 has stagnated, which it has not as for yet. Is descent 2 so full of flaws so that the next inevitable step would be to release a brand new installment? With all the H&M collections being pumped out? Seriously, man? Just discussing here, meaning no offense but you can't just say these things and not expecting people to find it strange to say the least...

Otherwise I agree that the newcoming Imperial Assault fan base will also comprise of new players that may well be interested into Descent, but in all honestly I don't think many of them will be willing to invest in a second class game that might not have a future.

I have all of Descent First and Second Edition. Quite frankly, I enjoy Descent First Edition far more than Second Edition. But I still buy Second Edition as it simply is a different gaming experience. I approach each one as a separate entity. Both have their strengths and weaknesses.

I look forward to Imperial Assault, as I am a Star Wars fan, and because they have made some changes to the mechanics in IA which I think will benefit Descent fans long term.

You only need to watch the video recap for IA, and see what they did for LOS rules. The IA LOS rules are far superior to what exists within Descent Second Edition. So much so, that I am tempted to utilize them for Descent Second Edition.

On the other hand, Kobolds ARE the monster type you're talking about - there is virtually never a reason to use a different monster group if Kobolds are available.

With the reinforcement rule, Giants are always a better choice.

It's impossible to tell if you're serious or not, so please choose your answer:

"Ha ha... yeah, unless of course Wendigos are available, right?"

or

"Hahahahahahahahahahahah... no."

On the other hand, Kobolds ARE the monster type you're talking about - there is virtually never a reason to use a different monster group if Kobolds are available.

With the reinforcement rule, Giants are always a better choice.

It's impossible to tell if you're serious or not, so please choose your answer:

"Ha ha... yeah, unless of course Wendigos are available, right?"

or

"Hahahahahahahahahahahah... no."

Giant can handle blast far better, and it's always better to reinforce a giant than a master kobold.

furthermore if playing 3 heroes

I believe you need to re-read my post Sir. In it, I opined that tactical miniatures games (DESCENT 2 among them) are fun to play. I also opined that I did not agree with the direction the game has gone; nowhere in the post does it say that I hate or dislike the game. You read but you do not listen. also, my opinion is just that, an opinion; one clearly not shared by many on this forum perhaps, but one just the same.

I am well aware of FFG's commitment to creating quality merchandise and believe that they will not allow a "Bread and Butter" title like Descent to fade into obscurity; they are commited to supporting their games and taking care of their consumers. For this reason, gamers like you and I continue to support them (FFG) and will continue to do so as long as they remain true to this belief.

What does this have to do with the price of beans in Asia? I don't believe IA to be a second-class game. I think it is a brilliant move by this company to create this game at a time when they can capitalize on the Star-Wars license. This strategy will (likely) see an influx in overall profit shares/profitability and will allow FFG to continue to create quality games and expansions for titles currently in circulation. Also, hopefully, it will bridge that si-fi/fantasy gap and get more gamers who may not enjoy the Fantasy genre to become curious enough about the Descent title to pick up a copy since the two are similar in gameplay.

Okay, so you chose the the "hahahaha... no" answer, I guess :-)

While, yes, all things considered, there are definitely some (far from "always") situations where I'd prefer to reinforce a master giant than a master kobold, the problem is this - in order to reinforce a giant rather than a kobold, you need to have chosen giants rather than kobolds. That is virtually always going to be the wrong choice. In fact, I'll go so far as to say I'm not sure I can even imagine a specifically constructed scenario where I would prefer to play giants rather than kobolds. Although if someone wanted to make one and put it up on the quest vault, I'd be happy to be proven wrong. There is nothing that an overlord needs to do to win games that giants are better at than kobolds, and kobolds are far less susceptible to bad (or good) die rolls.

Okay, I can see some ridiculous scenarios where I would prefer giants. An 8x2 corridor, with an entrance and exit, exit is the respawn point, so the OL gets a giant which blocks the exit and is in melee range every turn. And the OL's victory condition is... hmm. Actually, I STILL might prefer kobolds, depending on the hero group and whatever the OL's victory condition is.

I'm not sure where you get the idea that "giants handle blast far better"... it suggests you haven't played kobolds much, which is fine - nobody seems to except for me :-) Anyway, Kobolds are not particularly worried about blast - in fact, depending on the specifics of the scenario, I would be more worried about blast with my giants. (8 damage to 2 giants worries me more than taking 3 kobolds off the board.) Just like any monster, you need to be aware of your heroes' ability - to blast, and to do other things - and you need to play around their capabilities.

Dear lord, I threadjacked ANOTHER thread with Kobolds Uber Alles. Sorry, OP!

In case some people have missed it, Imperial Assault IS Descent 3.0 from both functional and business perspective.

It's clear that Imperial Assault is surfing on the wave of Descent, an already proven game and still very popular. Take the best parts of it, improve the few things that were a bit crappy, and replace the minis by Star Wars collector figures, which every SW addict will be wanting to invest in even if it implies ignoring the rest of the box contents. They target both Descent players to invite them to diversify their gaming experience, and of course all Star Wars afficiodanos. People who really love Descent are likely to invest in Imperial Assault bar the few who dislike the franchise. More money, and a streamlined way to support two major product lines at the same time. They just need to replicate what they are doing currently for Descent. Content shouldn't be a hassle to throw out given the huge story material around the Star Wars license.

A fantastic way to promote a new game is to build upon one that has been working great, dust it off (theme-wise Descent is not a new game really) and put the most awesome franchise in the world on top of it, GenCon package, profit. There will be a huge wave of customers willing to purchase the product.

I don't blame FFG for making this marketing decision.

However, one game has to be inevitably ahead of the other one, and Descent will unfortunaley bite the bullet and become second in priority next to Imperial Assault. Even worse, because of the competition, Descent will lose further attention and lose fans because there is simply a much better alternative to it currently on the market. Think Arkham Horror and Eldritch Horror. Oh I'm sure Descent will still get played in many circles, but we should be able to see a noteable change in the way the product is supported and within the community. Fans may therefore lose interest in a subpar product since all design efforts and support are clearly going to go towards the new game. Want a new LoS mechanism? Look no further, here's Imperial Assault!

You would probably ask yourself why FFG would take the risk for bringing down (or putting in decline, whichever terminology you prefer) one of their flag games. But when you think about it, there is no loss. FFG know well Imperial Assault will get the huge success people are predicting, probably even better than Descent actually, They know that a great % of Descent fans will equally invest into Imperial Assault, building further up the online community for the new game, and that the rather small % of Descent fans who dislike the Star Wars franchise will carry on buying Descent products anyway as they have always done.

But think about Descent now. Sure, you can throw out tiles for every type of landscape there is, all monsters from various mythologies, 57 more elves each with unique bow made of 100 different trees etc. But in terms of skills and mechanisms, don't you feel like we have gone deep already? Not implying that we've reached the bottom of the bag by any means, but don't you think given the latest releases that the quality and creativity has somehow reached a certain level of stagnation? Sure, you can design a new type of Healer and come up with a cool OL card, but isn't it all overlapping in a way in order to preserve game balance? The further you go, the more you affect game balance and the gaming experience in general. Going off with a new mechanism can break a game, as we've seen with BBTM. So following this logic, as the risk grows bigger to introduce flaws to an established game like Descent, can it possibly be a part of the decision that FFG think it would be easier to design content for Imperial Assault than Descent? Or at least start fresh, which probably allows for early mistakes instead of having to integrate a new mechanism to 253 others, plus that said mechanism has to provide something to the game experience?

I know this is all a business, but considering Descent and its current competitors on the market, I find very strange to see this type of decision being made, unless they think the sci-fi title they just announced can compete with its fantasy competitors. Again, the franchise matters a huge deal in the equation.

I guess it is still possible that it won't disrupt Descent as much as I think it will, at least in terms of release frequency and support (although quality may well decrease), but I don't think for a second the fan base will remain intact once Imperial Assault gets released on the market.

And finally, I think it would have been slightly more diplomatic towards the Descent fan base to announce this game BEFORE GenCon, even if it would have implied not revealing its contents before GenCon. They could have gotten their surprise effect in another way than this. Because right now it feels like a "take this right in your face, pal" to every Descent fan expecting news for his favorite game and only being provided with the information that the exact same game is being released by the same company with all the goodies and the "Star Wars awesomeness" combined. Feels tough on us.

I think IA is a threat to Descent as well.

As it is mechanically very similar I think it takes up the same designers as Descent would. Furthermore it is kind of a risky move for FFG to release IA and put many resources into it, as they only own the license for so long. So I guess this game will be wether hit or miss, as I don't see them pulling the resources from Descent for a moderatly successfull game, however I can see that 2015 will all be Star-Wars and no Descent just in case the game takes off.

Personally I'm not that stoked for IA. While I think a few core mechanics are better (alternating turns, LOS) some mechanics can go either way (no miss, no clearly stronger defense dice, no classes but character specific skills) and some things are looking rather boring (the imperial forces have no kind of skills or deck of cards and can only choose who to reinforce, no tricks up his sleeves, all the surprises come from the quest book which imo could hinder replayabilty a lot). In short, as much as I can judge it from the demo, playing as the imperial forces seems to be extremely boring, or at least much more boring than playing the OL in Descent.

As most of the people who actually spend money on the game will be playing the antagonist I see this to be the most problematic aspect of the game. Furthermore all the hidden information will make an automated AI rather complicated and I thought one of the great things about Descent is the OL mechanic. The demo seemed to be rather unwinnable for the imperial forces and I think the antagonist could very well go the way of D&D GM, making the game more of an set storyline you expirience while rolling a few insignificant dice-rolls.

All in all what truns me off the most in IA are the really bland aesthtics compared to Descent. While Descent had big variety of vibrant colors and a lot of very different shapes and monsters, Star Wars will be white, brown, black and a little bit of red and of course a lot of metal (if they don't include Ep 1-3 and I sincirely hope they won't for obvious thematic reasons). The miniatures will be either human-like or robots, the maps will be sci-fi black/blue, grey/white and maybe some jungle and desert-style. I know people who have no problem with that. I however think this bland and monotonous aesthetics will turn me off playing this game as excessivly as Descent.

There's a thread on BGG about the differences between IA and D2e, it seems like it mixes the best parts of 1st and 2nd ed. Plus some new features.

I'll be getting IA but I agree it'll be bad news for descent.

Fantasy is still popular so I don't think D2e will be stuck on a shelf. I just wish they would do a terrinoth skirmish game or rpg so I can get as much use out of my descent stuff as I can the IA stuff.

To address the fear of IA "taking over" Descent... "Naw bro... naw..."

Yes Star Wars is a hell of an IP to reckon with, and yes it's going to sell like hotcakes, but if you think FFG, the biggest board game company out there right now doesn't have the power to keep rolling steady updates for descent you might want to think again.

Also a game like IA is just great for board games in general. Think about it this way: you pick up IA and it's SUPER easy to get people to play. Why? Cause f-ing Star Wars that's why. I'm not the biggest Star Wars fan, but I know a whole group of people who would be down to play "Star Wars: The board game" without knowing they are getting into a FFG epic.

But then what about after? "Hey wasn't that fun shooting ewoks and stuff? Easy right? ... You want to hunt some freaking dragons?

Don't worry about Descent people. If you have all the second edition stuff you have a HUGE amount of game, and with a new expansion just dropping last week and 2 hero/monsters packs (yea I know they are 1st edition stuff, but you still get a new quest) this isn't stopping any time soon. I wouldn't be surprised if we see another big box in Jan/Feb, but even if we don't, I've got more content than I can handle right now.

Edit: Spelling/Grammar (blech)

Oh, and according to SteveO, the actual physical card quality is lower than in previous expansions, although I don't have that level of attention to detail.

Well, they feel thinner to me, anyway. I seem to recall others agreeing when I first brought it up, too.

That said, I'm still not entirely convinced that it isn't my imagination. =P

I've heard people say that PoD cards are somehow noticeably different from regular cards in other game lines, and 'm wondering if perhaps FFG has simply moved all their card production to PoD in order to unify the "feel" of the cards. If they have, I suspect that's what I'm noticing here - I haven't bought any PoDs for anything as yet.

They seem to be holding up well enough under play (ie: they aren't tearing or fading super quick, as I had feared they might,) but it's still a bit annoying.

I would agree that SoN is not my favourite expansion for D2E, and I'm also hesitant about picking up Manor of Ravens. I may yet cave in though, I do really like the looks of that Marshall class...

Oh, and according to SteveO, the actual physical card quality is lower than in previous expansions, although I don't have that level of attention to detail.

Well, they feel thinner to me, anyway. I seem to recall others agreeing when I first brought it up, too.

That said, I'm still not entirely convinced that it isn't my imagination. =P

I've heard people say that PoD cards are somehow noticeably different from regular cards in other game lines, and 'm wondering if perhaps FFG has simply moved all their card production to PoD in order to unify the "feel" of the cards. If they have, I suspect that's what I'm noticing here - I haven't bought any PoDs for anything as yet.

They seem to be holding up well enough under play (ie: they aren't tearing or fading super quick, as I had feared they might,) but it's still a bit annoying.

I would agree that SoN is not my favourite expansion for D2E, and I'm also hesitant about picking up Manor of Ravens. I may yet cave in though, I do really like the looks of that Marshall class...

So do you dislike SoN just because of the component-quality or did the monsters/campaign/classes not hold up as well.

What expansion do you like better and what makes it better than SoN?

I think people underestimate the effect Imperial Assault will have on Descent. I personally don't care anyway, as somebody pointed out earlier there is so much content in Descent currently to warrant several years of play and we probably don't "need" in fact more expansions to enjoy the game because of the plethora of combinations you may have every time you run a campaign. I'm also sure FFG has both means and motivation to drive both product lines and basically keeping everybody happy.

What I´m concerned about is that IA will drain the Descent fan base and shift development focus from FFG, even if you deny that it will, for the reason that Imperial Assault is Descent 3.0 so you have to try hard sticking to the old system while they release the goodies in the new system. Bluntly put, there is zero reason now to further develop the D2 system other than releasing quests and H&M collections while a new system is on its way, very likely to shape up the future system used in D3E. I´m sure more expansions with new classes and skills will be released for Descent, but that would be just to keep us busy with more content while the big drawing lines for the system itself are being defined in Imperial Assault.

Gaming industry or not, putting two exact copies of the same product in your product line will invariably generate competition between the two products and generally require a lot of investment and support to keep alive. Like I said earlier, the Star Wars franchise is the only reason why this product came to life, and for me the only reason why it's so is because this game will very likely sell better than Descent. It's a marketing operation, you have the right to be happy about it because you can just acquire your copy in due time, but at the end of the day it is a way to suck more money from you more than releasing stuff to make you happy. It is a brilliant calculation and a perfect timing for the anouncement by FFG. Not saying that it's wrong, this is a business, but people should realize that such release is not made to "diversify" the game experience, or "build a bridge between sci-fi and fantasy". These are the cute words. By the way it's not just sci-fi, it's Star Wars, and most of you have already your hand at your wallet when reading these words.

I am also concerned that the game bringing Descent off his throne will have flaws. I am concerned about game balance, some of this being justified by the fact imperials do not look like they can do anything at all compared to the heroes (but I hope I´m wrong). I´m afraid that this marketing operation left out some quality in the design during the process. Again, I hope I´m wrong. But I wouldn't be surprised if it does, I´ve seen the exact same things in other businesses. It always comes at the cost of something, quality above all. The worst that can happen is that FFG think that whatever what's in the rules, the SW minis are so awesome that we will have plenty of people to buy them. Let's just hope they won't play the game. Nah, that would be a stretch, but not completely imposible either. Seriously, I hope IA is a good game. But 100$ a copy only seems to confirm my fears.

The people on these forums often own several FFG games already and will likely pick up Imperial Assault, most of you say so anyway. From the outsider's perspective though, I don't think many will be able to invest in both games for cost reasons. For the same reason that I cannot see myself invest in Myth while I put up with Descent. The Star Wars license means that it is likely that most SW fans will want to get every mini there is in IA. Honestly, if you were buying the game (and assuming you like it), wouldn't you want to play with more SW characters and therefore wait for these products to hit the market and get them once they get released? I would. Between playing Han Solo and a random Elf hero, there is one choice that is way cooler than the other one. Or so does most people think I´m not a Star Wars fan, but I wouldn't mind having a light saber in my shop items deck, lol.

So yeah, Descent will lose some steam and this might also imply a resurgence for Myth and Arcadia Quest in the competition for the number 1 fantasy adventure game.

Of course there are players like myself that aren't huge fans of Star Wars. Yeah, I enjoyed the movies, but I'm just not into the games and I will probably give IA a miss. Descent on the other hand I really like! I have all the 1e sets and all the 2e sets. I'm sure there are plenty of players out their like myself that will continue to purchase new expansions as they come out. Sure, it may lose some impetus while they crank out IA expansions, but I very much doubt they will just flat out stop producing sets. There is still plenty of room to expand this game and offer new campaigns. I am looking forward to expansions that may focus on some of the previously released Runebound expansions (Desert, Jungle, Artic) and I would be particularly thrilled to see them take another crack at a seafaring campaign!!!

And as for the co-op version of the game. If they will be producing POD sets, then I am sure we will see more and more of them in the future.

Now if only they would make an expansion to RuneWars!

If only they would release D2e hero's for runewars.

The thing I miss most about 1st edition is that all the terrinoth games were linked together.

It made descent seem like it was part of a much bigger world, D2e is just getting more generic fantasy setting with each expansion.

Generic fantasy setting will lose out to star wars, rich fantasy setting with ties to other games would stand a better chance of holding onto players.

If I play imperial assault I know I can use the same characters in xwing, armada, the card game and the rpg. The thing that drew me to descent in the first place D2e has lost and star wars has gained.

If I play imperial assault I know I can use the same characters in xwing, armada, the card game and the rpg. The thing that drew me to descent in the first place D2e has lost and star wars has gained.

There's the conversion kit for D2E, giving you your old D1E heroes. If you're not into that kit, the hero and monster collections are doing the same thing. 20 or so of the D1E heroes are in Runewars.

Quoting, copy/paste, and probably a bunch of other things don't seem to work at all for me right now on these forums, so please bear with me

Responding to mulletcheese:

I see what you mean, but you cannot have this depth in the storyline in a game that focuses on running short encounters. One of the main appeals of Descent 2E is that you can play this thing without having to spend a ton of time running just one quest, like you would do if you played a role playing game. It is closer to an arcade game, obviously framed by a campaign mechanism to link your events together and allow some depth to some extent in the way you build up your characters and carry on your adventure with friends and foes coming back and so on. So of course, the storyline gets shortened and you might not feel a total immersion as a result, but you can also throw in as much fluff as you want and expand the game with your own knowledge of the Terrinoth world if you and your playgroup think it would spice up your experience. My players want to know about the story behind the characters and the quests they´re playing, but above all they want to rush into the action as soon as possible. They also play role playing game, but the mindset is different with Descent. So yeah, the fantasy theme is streamlined and probably a lot more anonymous compared to heavier games, but it also implies a gain in accessibility that I believe makes the game what it is. Of course you are free to either like it or prefer games that emphasize a lot more on the background story. I like the latter too but I can't afford the time investment, so to me D2E is the perfect game in its genre.

If I play imperial assault I know I can use the same characters in xwing, armada, the card game and the rpg. The thing that drew me to descent in the first place D2e has lost and star wars has gained.

There's the conversion kit for D2E, giving you your old D1E heroes. If you're not into that kit, the hero and monster collections are doing the same thing. 20 or so of the D1E heroes are in Runewars.

Which was exactly the point I was making.

D1e had this cross game use of hero's, villains and monsters that tied these seperate games into a larger fantasy setting. All the games were better for it as it moved them generic fantasy settings into the terrinoth world.

D2e did away with that, the conversion kit was added to make D1e fans happier about a reboot, but aside from that and the use of the farrow family in the core game it's in no way tied to the terrinoth setting. It's just generic fantasy with a runebound sticker on the box, nothing new from D2e has impacted any of the other games.

IA comes with a rich setting used by other FFG games, D2e could have a far richer setting if FFG wanted to.

So yeah, the fantasy theme is streamlined and probably a lot more anonymous compared to heavier games, but it also implies a gain in accessibility that I believe makes the game what it is. Of course you are free to either like it or prefer games that emphasize a lot more on the background story. I like the latter too but I can't afford the time investment, so to me D2E is the perfect game in its genre.

The accessibility is one of the things that makes D2e great, I love long drawn out games but now I have job/wife/kids all my really long games stay on the shelf but I can always make time for D2e.

A system can be streamlined without the theme suffering, a good game system emphasizes the setting.

In D1e hero's were killed and resurrected back at the town, portals were used to journey back to the dungeon. I never really cared for that explanation but at least it had an explanation and the portals gave as sense of progression during the dungeon crawl.

In D2e hero's are unkillable, no explanation given.

In IA when a hero is knocked out their sheet is flipped over to the wounded side, the wounded side has one less hero ability (like using you once per encounter ability in D2e). If the hero is knocked out again they are forced to retreat and are removed from the map, but can still come back for the next mission. If all hero's are wounded the overlord wins.

The last one is an example of a really good system, it makes thematic sense and brings a host of tactical options into play that the other systems don't. The ability to wound the hero's gives the overlord a sense of achievement and adds an element of peril to the hero's that would otherwise be missing. It could lead to some very tense situations. Even though it's an improved system it's every bit as quick.

D2e did away with that, the conversion kit was added to make D1e fans happier about a reboot, but aside from that and the use of the farrow family in the core game it's in no way tied to the terrinoth setting. It's just generic fantasy with a runebound sticker on the box, nothing new from D2e has impacted any of the other games.

I disagree that the game line is entirely generic, although I will admit that it has been slowly losing its fluffy connections as the expansions wear on. Perhaps that's a result of pumping out too many expansions and not enough time to think up proper stories, or perhaps it's because the designers who started the line seem to have since left the company. It's hard to say.

The Shadow Rune campaign is absolutely flush with references to Terrinoth lore. In addition to the Farrows, Baron Zachareth was originally introduced in the Runewars expansion as a somewhat suspicious character - whose ploys for world domination have now been revealed.

Belthir, as a hybrid, was a tie-in to the Dragonlords which dominated Runebound 2E. References were made to the Dragon Wars, the Curse of the Empty Throne, and the use of rocs as mounts in one of the later quests could be seen as a connection to Runewars army units (and now to BattleLore 2.0.)

Lair of the Wyrm was also well-connected with the introduction of Valyndra as "believed to be the first Dragonlord to create hybrid soldiers."

Unfortunately, the same cannot be said for later expansions that came about after Adam Sadler's departure. Shadows of Nerekhall was particularly disappointing in the lack of fluff to connect it to the rest of the world (other than Nerekhall itself, there's not much in the way of references to other Terrinoth lore.)

I think that the idea of recycling the same heroes across multiple game lines was a great way to save money in ages past, but I think it also presented FFG with a logistical nightmare. Each new expansion to one game implied a similar expansion was coming for the others that would introduce the same heroes in the other games. They were effectively making a commitment to multiple game lines by choosing to expand just one. I suspect that's why they stopped releasing the same heroes in each line when they put out DungeonQuest and Mists of Zanaga (and now D2E) each with their own heroes.

I agree that the lore connections between the games could be stronger, but there are probably ways to do that without re-releasing the same figures in 4 different boxes. The core set of D2E did well in this regard. It wold be nice if further expansions could get back to that mentality.

I personally liked about the 2nd edition of Descent that it was faster to play than the first edition. After playing 3 campaigns now, (Shadowrune, Labyrinth of ruin, Nerekhall) i see many flaws. The game is balanced at low levels, but once the players get some weapons and skills, the balance breaks badly.

1. After a scenario, each of the hero's get's one XP, this accumulates to 4 XP for the group + weapons. A overlord gets 1 XP.

It tends to get the balance in one direction very fast towards the hero's. The only counter balance for it is, that the quests get's a bit harder, but mostly in a way that there are race conditions created, where there are limited turns for scenario, and its not important to fight the monsters, mostly the monsters are a way to block the hero's, or spending actions on fighting them, instead of pursuing the scenario objective.

I would certainly prefer a knockout scenario, where the players get a certain amount of respwans per scenario, and the campaign mode needs to be revamped so there is a more linear progression between the players and overlord power balance.

I think the Starwars Assault game looks promising, but without special FX for the Imperium player i assume it gets boring when you cant play some cards.

I just smoked the heroes on the last Nerekhall campaign. /shrug

Imperial Assault has a lot of ground to cover to get to the size of Descent & all its expansions. Also people will start to OD on the whole Star Wars thing, especially if the new films are garbage.

Imperial Assault getting all the attention in the company could be a thing though, good point. Hope Descent has an evangelist at FFG. Agree about the lack of effort towards lore/fluff/richness of character development in Nerekhall. Some of those maps were huge though, and still some nice mechanics going on in the quests, if a bit close to becoming convoluted.

Also agree about the immortal heroes. Dumb. I get it, but still dumb. Maybe offer another mode of play in addition to epic & campaign play. It's FFGs problem to figure out the details