This Thursday, we are finally at the end of Act 1. We play one map every 2 weeks, so it's taken us a while.

The heroes are getting stronger and stronger and my job is harder and harder.

Now we are faced with Interlude 1.

I have to get the casket off the heroes. How am I going to do that?

Can any cunning Overlords recommend some monster choices for me and some strategy?

As there are reinforcements I was going to go for some big monsters. There are 3 open groups, so I thought Giants, Merroids and maybe skeleton archer (V1 conversion kit).

Advice for a nervous Lord of Darkness welcome.

Some info regarding your heroes would be useful, it's difficult to target hero weaknesses without knowing what they are.

What are your overlord cards? What's your plot deck? What are your resources in general (expansions, etc.).

Thanks for reply. I've been discussing with someone from my local game shop (some 400kms away) and he tells me it looks pretty bad if Grisban has the casket.

I don't know about plot decks. My OV cards tend to be Blood Rage. I am basically using the core set, though I have Trollfens, Nerakhall and Ruins.

Grisban the Thirsty (berserker), Dezra the Vile (Necromancer), Logan Lashley (thief), Syndrael (Beastmaster). Grisban is the toughest. He's got 18 HP (Brute card).

I played this once as an OL, it was really difficult for me and I lost in the end. Once the heroes gave the casket to their beefiest hero (Steelhorns as a Berserker with Brute as well) and made sure he was always away from danger, basically letting the entire team be his meat shield, I just could not get to him.

I tried using a fast monster, Razorwing bats (this was before any of the expansions came out) to chase heroes down and hopefully stun the casket carrier, but they were always only able to nip at the heroes in the back.

I think I picked beastmen for the part where monsters ambush the heroes (if I am remembering the quest correctly) my hopes were for them to do as much damage as possible and soften up the casket carrier.

My final pick was Demon Lord, my rationale for that was they have range and sorcery so while they chase the heroes they can convert the access range into more damage, and their size might make them harder to deal with.

But the heroes just slaughtered all my monsters and threw themselves at the re-spawns to buy time for the casket carrier to escape. In the end my monsters were parading down the zig-zag map always to far behind to really make a difference.

I am sure now with all the expansions there are much better monster choices, and I am sure my choices were not the best either in hindsight. I also wish I had more movement interfering OL cards, I went Warlord but that specialty is not that useful in a race quest like this. Web Trap would have sorta worked, it tests strength so Steelhorns would have passed but the rest of heroes would have failed and thus be separated if Steelhorns decides to run off ahead without them.

Remember that both you and the heroes are trying to get the casket to the same place here. This interlude is not about stopping the heroes- it's about stealing the casket from them at the proper moment.

Do you have the Shield of Zorek's favor? If so, it makes this encounter much easier with it on Zachareth.

You want to immobilize or stun. Gris is slow so try to drain his fatigue and slow him down as much as possible. Take advantage of Zac's special abilities.

Aside from this, you should get a few lieutenant packs.

You want to immobilize or stun. Gris is slow so try to drain his fatigue and slow him down as much as possible. Take advantage of Zac's special abilities.

Aside from this, you should get a few lieutenant packs.

Right, except Grisban can remove condition cards when he rests. The smart thing for the heroes to do might actually be not to give Grisban the casket, but give it to Logan. He can't be immobilized, and especially if he's got "Tumble," he can make it off the map very reliably.

Honestly, with a team like that (the heroes), I'd just go ham on them with damage. Dezra is an awful hero, and has no synergy with necromancer at all. She's not particularly durable, should go down quick. Syn'Drael is a great warrior, but the beastmaster is one of the worst classes to use with her, should be fine there. Grisben is tanky but not all that great, without help he'll go down quick. Logan is an amazing treasure hunter but not the best thief, he should be fairly squishy. The big thing to note is that they do not have a healer, which means simply wearing them down with damage should be effective. Get them all low, then come out with a big burst attack with an overlord card combo, steal the casket and run, keeping them down with monsters.

I agree with Whitewing's assessment. The lack of a healer at least means that the damage you do will stick- you definitely need to time your moves such that if you knock a hero down, you knock down another hero with him to compromise everyone's actions if possible.

Thanks very much, folks. Some very detailed analysis here.

Unfortunately they have the Staff of Light which will provide healing power.

And, excuse my ignorance, how does one acquire the Shield of Zorak's favour?

I will do my best tomorrow night. Thanks again! Awesome support as always from these forums.

Shield of Zorek's Favor is from Death on the WIng.

The Staff of Light makes things slightly more irritating, but it isn't really enough healing, and nowhere near as much as a dedicated healer can put out. They're still light on healing.

Thx guys.

Can anyone put forward some monster choices? I was definitely going to include giants in the 3 open groups.

Yeah but it still takes the action to rest.

Do you have access to the CK monsters? You mentioning giants make me think so.

I recently won this quest against a similar, but imo better party (grisban as a berserker, but they had a healer, runemaster and knight as well)

For this quest I did go the high damage route. I opted for that instead of conditions, because conditions allow the heroes to stay together while high damage tears their group apart.

So I chose Nagas (high damage, ranged, large), Ogres (high damage, knockback, master is undying) and Wendigos (fast, can attack twice, high damage).

spoilers: The Nagas were at the top of the map, blocking easy eaccess and doing pretty good damage while Grisban couldn't counter (they are ranged) Then as soon as possible I reinforced the ogres and walked them to the first water tile along with the wendigos and eventually the Nagas as I reinforced them. As soon as they opened the door they were greated with wendigos blocking easy entrance 2 ogres that eventually threw the party inside the wendigo pit freeing up a path to grisban and the nagas finally finishing off the weakened grisban with the help of the ogres. Then with a dash Zacherath obtained the casket and moved past the room full of monsters sprinting to the end.

Grisbanes ability to remove a condition card seems great on paper but between his low movement and average stamina making him waste an action to get rid of immobilize (and it dosent help against stun) slows him down so much.

Giants are a good pick but i really like Merroids for flail and immobilize. Given how squishy the group is without a healer Medusa's might be a good pick as well as high group damage output and conditions will whittle the heroes down.

As others have suggested the best way to win this quest is to steal the casket near the end and make a run for it.

I'd also recommend Barghests, for their howl ability. Grisban has low stamina, and three or four Barghests howling in his face should drain him right down to the bone (to say nothing of what it does to the other heroes).

Just to let folks know, we played the game last night. It was long and not yet finished, so we took photos and wrote stats down to continue next week.

Monsters I went with Medusa, Wendigo and Giants, and now have collected my hoard at the waterfall before the exit. The heroes are about to enter this space. The Necromancer is KO, Snydreal on 2 HP. Grisban still has the casket and is on 14/18HP. A giant and a Wendigo block the exit.

Thanks to the community for giving me a fighting chance and I'll report back.

BTW. One question. Can the thief use his Greedy card (reveal searches over 3 tiles) across the pit?

You can count spaces across pits (and water, and lava.) The only terrain that blocks counting is obstacles.

Sounds like you are dragging them down slowly, much as planned. Good job.

Just make sure that you direct enough firepower to keep grisbane isolated (if heroes cant pick up their teammates then you are in a wonderful position to keep them down as the VERY best they can hope for is 6 health and 2 stamina on a stand up and no turn!) and he will go down in relatively short order even with his hp boost.

As i suggested them how have the Medusa's been for you?