Bonds of the Wild announced.

Really liking the look of this pack, hellhounds, deep elves and KOBOLDS!

2 Scouts and 2 Mages is a good mix-up after a lot of warriors recently as well.

Kobolds look reasonably well re-balanced as well. In fact i have a sneaky feeling they may actually be even more powerful/flexible then before!

Interesting

So, now Brightblaze will be part of Challara's figure, and its own token on the map too? That's wierd...

PS.: One can see here that now Act I minion Hellhounds don't have anymore Fire Breath, nor Master has Aura 1, but another surge that I can't read.

So, now Brightblaze will be part of Challara's figure, and its own token on the map too? That's wierd...

That is weird. The same with Skye. Maybe someone will mod them?

Bonds of the Wild announced.

Really liking the look of this pack, hellhounds, deep elves and KOBOLDS!

2 Scouts and 2 Mages is a good mix-up after a lot of warriors recently as well.

Kobolds look reasonably well re-balanced as well. In fact i have a sneaky feeling they may actually be even more powerful/flexible then before!

If I'm reading this right, I think they might be slightly stronger, if you can keep the masters on the map (so unlike the CK where you had to kill your masters)

As long as there are master kobolds on the map and you have room in your group, you get kobold reinforcements... at the beginning of .. EVERY... OL turn.

Bam! Bam! Bam!

I really like the card art again. The art (and even the minis) for the last Hero and Monster collection seemed off on a few characters such as Silhouette and Mordrogg. Their faces and bodies were really angular and didn't match the rest, although Lord Hawthorne looked great. I have to say that the art/mini for Challara might be one of the better ones of the series.

Reaper Miniatures has a nice familiar mini set that you can use for a hawk replacement (it's fairly small). I already had one use with the Conversion Kit. We'll have to find two other ones if you want to ditch the tokens.

Hellhounds! I can barely contain my excitement.

I'm excited for Deep Elves, as I've never used them. Actually I never had all three of those monsters!

I am really positivly surprised about how good the art for this new hero&monster pack truly is.

The artwork looks good and the miniatures finally are back to normal proportions. So let's hope the final minis look as good as the renders they released today.

Nevertheless I am pretty stoked about these monsters. Until now I never used the deep elves, but I was close a few times and decided against them because I felt that they were somehow lacking.

Yes they are faster than normal monsters, but only marginally. Yes they are stealthy, but they are melee attackers with bad defense. Yes they have a high natural pierce, but even when basically ignoring defense they only do 4 damage maximum and average at 2-3.

Needless to say I'm very excited to see how FFG updated them. Going from their trend of carving a special niche for each monster I'm stoked to see how they change these monsters if at all.

Last but not least the change to the kobolds is really cool. You can't use them to block passages from the beginning anymore, but if you place them inteligently they can easily come in full waves. The fact that 3 kobold masters (or better said kobold shamans) can spawn 3 kobolds each turn could really lead to some interesting decisions and niches for this monstergroup. Do you want to bring the masters to the fight because they hit harder? Do you use kobolds for an open group that normally can not reinforce? Where to position them so they come in full strength yet won't be slaughtered before they reach their target?

After so many disapointing H&M packs (especially the Ogre-remake and the very low quality hero-art and miniatures of the last one) this is something I truly look forward to

Kobolds look stronger than they initially were, there is no more clogging of small passages right away but Spawner is a ridiculously strong skill. In a game were actions means everything gaining 3 more monster per turn ignoring any reinforcements you might already have doesn't sound really balanced to me ...

Is it just me or this is pack all about bringing familiar tokens to the game?

I am super giddy with the selections on this pack. Its almost custom made for me.

Some observations and opinions:

- Challara's art looks great, though I imagined a somewhat older lady a la Michelle Pfeiffer in Stardust, which would have given the roster more variety. Brightblaze is plain fierce.
- Sculpts all look great.
- From what I can see, I think Lyssa's and Vyrah's art is from the style/artist I tend to disfavor, which stresses me as they were my most awaited for heroes, though no major offenses at glance [ Edit post-release: Art looks pretty good for them ]. I wish, though, they would have given Lyssa an odder skin color (grey?) to avoid the Josie and the Pssy Cats effect.
- They could have easily tweaked their looks to differentiated Ronan and Vyrah more, starting with not giving a cape/sword to both. I made a joke once around here that they looked like brothers, maybe they went with that. -.-
- I think they changed Lyssa's ability. I can see "you perform" in the card, and her old ability was a defensive one, in which she didn't "perform" anything. She might have been made a 5/8/5/Black and given a small ability related to attacks or attribute tests? I liked how a defensive ability/bonus rounded the unique 5/8/5, so I hope that stays.
- New mechanical version of kobolds. I embrace changes to it, but we will see.

Kobolds got a BIG nerf, so that's nice.

Yeah, they can generate unlimited monsters, but the minions are so weak and it's on a per turn basis that they're quite a bit weaker than their original incarnation. I can think of a few good places to use them, so they weren't nerfed into oblivion, but they're not the instantly clogging monstrosities that take forever to get past that they used to be.

Agree with the new art work being a step back in the right direction and the character distribution is certainly refreshing.

And more familiar wielding heroes is always a cool thing, i think birghtblaze will be ludicrously good in the early game before petering out after an act 2 quest or so - although time will tell with that.

In regards to Kobolds im somewhat torn, i think whitewing has summed up what my inital reaction was , that they where nerfed as they don't all start on the map meaning actions don't have to wasted immediately, but that spawner keeps a steady supply up. Considering a lot of quests allow for one monster a turn reinforcement the ability to potentially generate 3 additonal monsters a turn is pretty huge.

I foresee blasting being even more critical then it previsouly was.

So Challara has the brightblaze token and if you make her a necromancer, you have a skeleton token as well... So it kinda gives heroes 6 characters.

If you make the scouts stalker and shadowwalker, and Lyssa a geomancer or conjurer...wow, that's gonna be a lot of playable tokens for the heroes

So Challara has the brightblaze token and if you make her a necromancer, you have a skeleton token as well... So it kinda gives heroes 6 characters.

If you make the scouts stalker and shadowwalker, and Lyssa a geomancer or conjurer...wow, that's gonna be a lot of playable tokens for the heroes

Make a party with Challara as the Geomancer, make the warrior a Beast master, and the other two scouts with stalker and Shadow walker

I'm getting worried for Challara's comparative damage output.*

Many abilities provide a bonus +1 damage of some sort, but this provides an extra full attack to any monster.

It's not just extra damage output at the beginning:

- Double opportunity to stun or immobilize in a strategic situation.

- Brightblaze can also heal, so its presence is really not as limited with area-heal classes.

- Its also a full defensive ability: an attack you spend trying to get Brightblaze out is an attack missed against the heroes.

With 6hp and what I think is a black dice, I'm thinking around 3 turns fighting in Act 1, and the Feat would bring it again for another ~3. Most encounters are around 7 rounds, so that's most of the encounter. I don't think a -1 in Speed compensates that (Comparing it to 4/10/4 mages), specially when mages are

[uPDATE: The defense die is grey ]

This does fix my issue, though I'm still contemplating if this familiar should receive just the weapon's dice (or at least not the condition surges).

brightblaze definitely has a grey die, if that makes it any better

Brightblaze will almost certainly fall off hard though, he cannot be revived (bar her once per encounter action), early game will be very useful, mid to late game anything from nuisance to minimal i imagine.

I'd get the pack for even the kobolds on their own. So much painting fun

Wow, this one has me really excited! Look at all those familiars in one pack! And they finally revived one of my favorite monsters of all - 'dem kobolds!

I was fully expecting them to have been nerfed into oblivion with the removal of Split, but I'm actually quite happy with what they've done with them! I don't agree with Whitewing at all that they received a big nerf.

In fact, in some ways I think they are actually more powerful than they were before! In the majority of the newer Descent maps, the game does not allow you to reinforce your open groups. This is likely done to prevent having to play-balance reinforcements of every new type of monster they come up with. However, kobolds don't care, as they reinforce anyway no matter where you use them!

And, not only does it take them a mere 3 turns to reach the same numbers they were in in the CK, if the heroes fail to clear out all the masters in one turn then it actually becomes worse for them than the CK versions would, as more kobolds appear to replace the fallen ones! Just imagine a Kobold group with the Enchanter card Rings of Zhol'alam http://descent2e.wikia.com/wiki/Rings_Of_Zhol%27alam What an absolute nightmare for any melee character to have to hack through! If they tried, they would be faceplanting shortly thereafter.

In my experience on maps where I use kobolds, the heroes will rarely be able to engage them on their first turn appearing on the map. With these new kobolds, the OL should take even greater care to ensure that never happens. If the heroes fail to engage, the OL can just fall back with the kobolds on their turn to allow them to swell their numbers further. Now the heroes have to either recklessly charge at the fleeing kobolds to keep the numbers down, or just resign themselves to eventually fighting the kobolds at their full blocking strength. And of course, these new kobolds make even better targets for Call of the Ravens! Awesome stuff..

I wonder if they might actually be too powerful now. If the heroes don't take some kind of reliable Blast or AoE damage to respond to the possibility of these kobolds, they are just hooped. They simply don't have enough actions to deal with the tide of rapidly reinforcing bodies.

However, to compensate, Challara just got uberly buffed and looks like a very solid mage contender! Brightblaze is way more interesting than it was before, acting as a quest-long additional mobile attack action. What's more, its not a paper tiger like the Wolf and Reanimate were. 6 health and gray dice is very respectable!

The OL will have to devote considerable resources to bringing down the familiar in Act I, and its still a nuisance in Act II given the Feat being able to both revive it and grant a free attack! But if they ignore the familiar, than Challara becomes a machine with how many attacks she can dish out. Given the right weapon Runemaster Challara could completely clear out a hallway in one turn... *gulp* Time to break out Verminous's deck to protect 'dem kobolds methinks!

Can't wait to see more of this preview. I hope Skye and Pico are just as cool. This one is shaping up to be my favorite H&M yet!

Is Pico going to be represented in plastic as well? I can't really tell from the Ronan miniature in the images...Skye and Brightblaze are looking cool as part of the minis, hope Pico will be too.

I wish they would add a skeleton mini for the necromancer class. Anybody know a good proxy for this?

Krieg in Descent 1st edition would have worked ( https://boardgamegeek.com/boardgameaccessory/75831/descent-road-legend-lieutenants-krieg-relentless )

But you'll be paying a lot for him these days.

I agree that figures for every familiar would be a really nice addition.

Also, anybody have a good way of storing all their minis after painting, like to carry around? A little off-topic I know.

Descent really has tons of em.