Hi there,

after playing much RtL certain questions put up in my mind.

1) Why is some terrain marked red on the levels in the RtL-rulebook? Is this to be considered corrupted terrain?

2) Are there any levels containing the masses of new traps, obstacles and stuff that came along with AoD and WoD? Like the scything blades, the great pit or the boulders?

3) Does the overlord start with any treachery in the game? With all four expansions, there is a really fat pile of overlord cards containing a treachery gem, and even with upgrading all to maximum he would add a maximum of eight or nine of them, which seems a real waste.

4) Are there any different rules for the Feat cards of ToI wenn used in RtL?

5) Am I just too stupid to understand or are the rules so badly written?

6) Not exactly RtL, but when a heroe fell into a pit and spends a movement point, is he than placed next to the pit (e.g. moving normally) or is he just considered climbing out and needs another point to get in an adjacent space?

7) Are the different overlords comparable in strength or do they vary greatly? We currently have the spider queen who seems pretty weak.

Thanks in advance!

8) Is the lieutenant allowed to be placed directly on an escape field and to flee the board in his first turn during an encounter?

9) How much money do the heroes get from money piles?

1, That is the area that you are not allowed to place the starting monsters. Then the overlord places the level’s leader as indicated, chooses his minions (usually group C requires WoD and group D AoD) and deploys them anywhere except the red-shaded areas. He may ignore LOS and abilities that interfere with spawning.

2, not sure on levels containing any traps by default as I haven't played all of them or even looked at all of them but should be able to get the new traps in with treachery cards.

3, Not that I have seen, you start with 0 and are able to buy points for conquest points/XP which then at the start of a dungeon you can use to customize your deck.

4, I don't have ToI so I don't know

5, I think most of the rules are pretty clear and overall there isn't much confusion about rules, there is some additional FAQs and discussions that I have read concerning rules so that my play into my understanding.

6, Figures may climb out to an adjacent space for 2 MPs

7, From my initial look there seems to be different strengths and weakness for the avatars. I think each could be played to realitive same potential.

8, I don't see why not my recollection of encounters is that overlord figures can be placed anywhere but the starting area for the heroes.

9, 400

I will have to disagree on 2 answers.

5) The rules are poorly written. You can still get most of the rules figured out but I still feel the rule set is not up to par with other rule sets of similar games.

7) While I agree the differences between the avatars are not as great as some on this board will suggest; humanoids as a group are simply bad. If your avatar has those as its 25 point upgrade you will have a distinct disadvantage. Additionally, event treachery is the most powerful in the game because of crushing blow. I know the new rules state you can only get one of these cards instead of 2 but being able to buy the card early because that treachery is cheap for your avatar is a good advantage.

Thanks a lot so far!

Stefan said:

1. +1 Aric

2. Not really. RtL is designed on the assumption that you don't have any other expansion (as is all of FFG's Descent stuff) so there is no level that requires any of the expansions. Thus there is no level that will have set uses of expansion traps etc. The 4 ToI levels do include levels with ice, because they are released with ToI so you have to have ToI to use them. You can still use teh expansion traps and terrain through Treachery if you desire.

3. No. If the OL has maxed his treachery that's quite enough in a Lt encounter already!

4. Essentially no. ToI doesn't even mention Feats for RtL and there were initial doubts from many people that they should be used at all. However FFG clarified that Feats should be used the same way in RtL as in vanilla Descent and the removal of Telekinesis and Bear Tattoo kept the balance pretty well overall.

5. Possibly? If so, you'd not be alone!
There are a lot of rules that are easily missed. There are a lot of intuitive leaps that people seem to make that are simply not in the rules and are not supposed to be and so people intuitively screw up. There are a few badly screwed up rules.
And yes, the rules are very badly written. When properly put together and parsed correctly they are often much clearer than they appear to be (especially when you add in the FAQ). But they are badly arranged, appallingly badly proof read (contain a large number of obvious errors), sometimes contradictory (usually due to one of the obvious errors) and badly in need of an accurate glossary/classification type section.

6. +1 Aric

7. They vary greatly. The spider queen is actually one of the nastiest. Traps can just slaughter a party badly unless they have just the right skill.characters sets. And the Spider Queen is very strong outdoors with Lts. Slaggoroth with a full treachery load is the most broken thing I've yet seen in RtL. Conversely, she is relatively weak personally (her Avatar in the final battle). Humanoid based avatars are very nasty against weak players (humanoids hit real hard and are pretty tough but they have an extreme weakness that good players will exploit) but a pathetic joke against good players or the right characters/skills (Kirga and Boggs will make dungeons a joke). OTOH the Titan, IIRC, has a very good Keep location and very useful Lt. With a good start he can have the heroes in real trouble with many cities being seiged and razed in quick time. The Eldritch based OLs are strongest in the dungeons, but generally weaker on the OL map. An OL's overall power is a mix of Avatar strength, Lt/outdoor strength, dungeon strength, Treachery choices, Keep location and Avatar Special. Each has strengths and weakness and suits a different playstyle.

8. Yes

9. +1 Aric

Thanks again! But what does treachery has to do with a lt. encounter? Did I miss something again? And is there any possibility to get the relics in RtL?

Corbon said:

Do your heroes buy any health upgrades? Are traps deadly still if they do? I have not played the spider queen yet and I am wondering how she works out.

Stefan said:

You can use your trechery to buy cards in Lt encounters.

granor said:

Yes and yes.

With a single trapmaster in play (Slaggorath provides it) Traps do 3 extra damage. Thats 5 damage for a pit trap! (and straight through Armour too of course). In Lt encounters, with a bunch of 'normal' Pit Traps and crushing Blocks etc, she can do phenomenal amounts of damage that ignores armour and pretty much guarantee killing 1-2 heroes just from traps alone, even if some have upgraded wounds.

In addition her upgrade (that you can start with) that allows you to put two traps aside to use whenever you feel like is extremely useful. Not only is her deck 2 cards smaller, she effectively starts with 5 cards instead of 3, can choose two of them (as long as they are traps) and they are 'safe' from Wind Pact and Feats that remove cards from hand. That makes a big difference when heroes are blitzing. She can guarantee a Dark Charm in the first dungeon, and probably anogther nasty trap. If she has (2 trap) treachery she can guarantee that the first chest you open will contain not a treasure, but a dark relic, which suitable chosen can cause the dropping of one treasure as well as replacing a great 'new' one with a nasty Dark Relic. Thats like both Crushing blows in one card and a free Dark Relic thrown in for bonus!

We haven't played the Demon Lord yet, and the Sorcerer king only briefly, but of the rest Spider Queen was the nastiest. She looks to have a weakish Avatar but she doesn't need to let it come to that, and I think her Avatar might even be better than it looks at first glance due to the dungeon specials.

Thanks a lot! That helps.

Corbon said:

Corbon are you suggesting the spider queen is good because of the card trapmaster? The card that is 1 in a deck of 48? I understand having a Lt give you the card but to suggest they will be in the right place to reinforce all the time is sumply mistaken. The card cost 16 to put into play. Quite cheap for a power card really. I am not sure I would play this before evil genious though even as the spider queen.

Without this traps are 1 cheaper and deal one more damage.

I simply do not understand how the kills you list above are really effective. Given the fact that it would take three trap cards to kill a hero (assume 5 damage each card and the hero has a health upgrade) how do you kill heroes quickly? In my overlord deck I counted 1 dark charm (a trap card useful for any avatar), 4 chest trap cards, 3 door trap cards, and 4 space trap cards(my count could be off). When you factor in the deck totals at 48 cards the usefull trap card % is very low.

The door trap cards are neally useless as you only get one door per level and that any party that is thinking straight will have the heathiest member open the door.

The chest cards seem equally contingent on the heroes play. Of course I agree that having a low health hero open a chest will happen more often. But again you really only get 1 chest per level most of the time.

The space cards seem to be your best bet but you only have 4 in the entire deck. Enough to kill one hero. And of course this skips the fact that on a roll of a blank most traps do nothing. Am I missing something here?

granor said:

Spider Queen is good because a number of her options synergise very well. The Trapmaster example was in direct response to someone asking about whether she was still effective if heroes upgrades their wounds.

The Into My Parlour card (should be an automatic choice for pregame spending) is quite incredibly useful. She gets her two best traps 'in hand' automatically (effectively giving her 5 cards at the start), they are safe from Wind Pact (an important consideration, though often overlooked) and her deck size is reduced by two.
It also tends to reduce hero options. You know that there is almost certainly a Dark Charm available to the OL whenever he wants and it can be used at the perfect moment. Like when 2 heroes are resting behind the taunting, Guarding tank. The blasting mage will almost certainly them be used, Spiritwalking if he can, on the tank, disrupting all three orders - so you end up either not using orders as often or spending extra MP to discard weapons (which means you can't Guard effectively). Well, actually you just end up wearing it, since try to avoid a special use like that results in greater net harm through lost opportunities.
Similarly, every desperate lunge to do something must have some fatigue in reserve. You just know that if you battle and spend your last 3 fatigue to get in position to hit the boss twice with your best damage-dealer, that a crushing block will come down and you will lose both attacks. Or if your last hero limps to the portal with his last fatigue to get him through, that a pit will open under his feet at the doorway when he doesn't have 2 fatigue left to spend and then a spawn will kill him next turn. So you have to keep something in reserve all the time, thus lessoning your overall capacity as a hero. Into My Parlour doesn't even need to be successfully used to have an effect!

Having the extra cards available at the start is particularly important when heroes are playing smart and fleeing often - most of the other OL's don't get enough opportunity to power up with cards (options) and/or the threat to play them. She starts with her best options always available, and effectively more threat that she can use too.

Further, Traps are the main (almost only?) source of OL's capabilities in dungeons by mid-silver if the heroes are good players. By mid silver most hero parties should be clearing nearly all the starting monsters in a dungeon on their first turn, and leaving few if any useful spawn spots available. Not always of course, but often enough to be frustrating.

Her trap treachery is cheap and plentiful and can be used to add more traps into her deck at the expense of useless spawn cards.
You think Crushing Blow is bad. Wait until you pick up a Dark Relic in place of that magnificent new treasure you thought you found - and worse, you have to drop your other cool treasure in order to accomodate the Relic!

Her Beast specialty means her Lts are powerful (beasts are the most common Lt support creature type). When you add in some trap treachery to screw up hero plans/actions and make the heroes much more vulnerable, that makes Lt encounters significantly more dangerous.
Slaggorath (with Trapmaster) is a real beast and the most broken thing I have found so far in 5 different campaigns. Spiders are really nasty outdoors because you can't get past them - they block passages expertly, are difficult or impossible to knockback, and will usually have at least one toe in a tree so that you can only kill one per attack and have to get adjacent to even do that (and just as you get adjacent, down goes that space trap!). That means that Slaggorath can sit at the back more safely than any other Lt - and can still battle multiple heroes each turn through the webs that her Master minions lay down! The heroes will rarely be able to choose to escape either, unless they have acrobat or fly and get lucky escaping webs, because there are so many spiders blocking the way completely in the narrow passageways. So the heroes do have to actually fight their way through everything. Meanwhile the traps are doing +3 damage (and not costing too much threat), the spiders are spitting burning, piercing damage at them (not to mention Web and Poison). If the heroes avoid a TPK guess what, good news. Slaggoroath can move three trails to the heroes if the heroes are within range (this is the real killer), so can probably do it all again next turn (the spider queens keep is in the northeast and if she is smart about what/where her other Lts are working then the heroes should be forced to be operating in that area. There are a lot of locations within 3 spaces when you are in the north...)
Eg, at Silver level, Gold spiders are M7, WGG, Poison (masters add Au, Web). The spider special upgrade, though expensive, adds Burn and Pierce 2. That's a lot of pain just from the 4 normal and 3 master spiders, not to mention Slaggorath's WGYAgAg Pierce 2 attack that can battle and hits every hero in a web unless it rolls X. Meanwhile 2 points of Trap treachery gets you 2 Pit Traps, doing 5 damage each through armour and costing only 1 threat to play, and 2 Crushing Blocks doing 5-7pts of damage each through armour and costing 5 threat to play.

The Spider Queen is easily the best Avatar we have seen (everything except Demon Prince so far) if up against good hero players. I rather suspect that against weaker hero players the other avatars become more useful, making the spider queen seem less useful.
She is also one of the most fun. The OL rarely sits frustrated and out of options, as easily happens with the Humanoid avatars and even the Sorcerer King (who specialises in-dungeon, so is really screwed once the heroes are powered up enough to be doing levels in 2-3 turns as he just can't draw enough cards).

Corbon said:

I missed the fact that you can get this card with your first purchase. I guess I am just too used to gettting siege engines.

This makes all your arguments make sense. Even removes the % usefull traps in the deck argument I made.

Thank you for taking the time to explain.

Yea, she can be very brutal to play against. I'm playing in a campaign right now against her, and I don't want to jump into a dungeon for just a level because of that Into my Parlour ability, which, combined with the trap treachery the OL has, means a guaranteed dark charm or even animate weapons (it could be dark relic, but we try to avoid using that and crushing blow too much, because we area little less cutthroat ). It makes it a bit less inviting when you can expect to average a TPK on the very first level on a dungeon, thus making the blitz option much less viable; even if you move quick enough to keep the OL from getting the threat for animate weapons, he would be able to pick up some smaller traps to cause some trouble for you. Besides, with 5 cards in hand fromt he start, it's not difficult to get the 20 or so threat needed for animate weapons.

And I see what Corbon means with the lieutenant encounters, particularly with Slaggaroth, who I thankfully haven't had to face yet . With a little luck and the OL's over-expectations, I've managed to kill both the Farrows that he has brought out, leaving him currently lietenantless, but once I get out of this dungeon I went in to, I expect he will be buying Slaggaroth, along with Diamond beasts for moving in to gold level, and combined with the burning spider upgrade and 3 trap, 1 monster, and 2 event treachery, I foresee a very rough time to come of ol' slaggoroth.

From what I hear, she doesn't do too well in the final battle, so I'm hoping that will be the case in my game, but she should have quite some hp from getting conquest on the way up, and along with a bunch of overlord upgrades and the Brother Against Brother plot, it might not go so easy.