(Skip to the numbered list below for the actual rule questions)
'lo...
I'm a forum newcomer here, I'm a moderately experienced Descent player, having been both hero and overlord, and played a fair share of games. I got a call up from one of my old gaming buddies that he wanted me to run a Road to Legend campaign (He owns all the Descent products except for Tomb of Ice, which he was thinking about buying this week if we end up getting a good campaign going). I said sure, I'll go get the rulebooks online and prepare for Saturday (a week away). I did thus, reading through the book, going over reference sheets, FAQs, etc.
Gameday comes... starting a fresh campaign at 10am and going until about 1:30am the next day. Marathon session. The heroes cleared 2 dungeons and 1 wilderness encounter. I mean, I think we did "a lot"... but a good chunk of the session was dedicated to deciphering the rules. All of us are rather experienced game players (The one who called me up actually owned a tabletop gaming store, promoting Descent and many other Fantasy Flight Games often, hence how I learned about the company in the first place), and so maybe we come to expect a higher level of rule layout, akin to that of Wizards of the Coast Dungeons and Dragons, especially for something as complex as Descent. To be honest, I think with all the expansions now, Descent (the series as a whole) could use a wholey re-written webbook that governs main game and all the expansions (playing in either "normal" mode or "Road to Legend Campaign Mode"), complete with proper orginization and an index. The whole set as it is currently feels "cobbled together" rule wise, but that's completely understandable given there isn't really a profit motive to publish such a book in print, and therefore sell it, nor has there been a product released that has included comprehensively trying to tie all the products together as a central feature. But, let's get down to business...
I'd like to find answers to the following questions, and forgive me for not having the actual games with me, as they're with my friend. More questions will come later when/if the other players get around to e-mailing me.
1.) RtL Dungeon... 38 I believe... "Throwing Rocks" (The one with the Master Giant Dungeon Leader who can throw rocks, heh). It's the dungeon where I gathered the whole majority of my conquest tokens... which lead to delerious giggles of helplessness (and some bouts of frustration) as I racked up constant kills. The ability for the Giant Dungeon Leader... I'd like to clarify his throwing rocks ability... a.) What does "Direction" mean in the cards text? Does it mean one of the 8 directions of movement in a straight line? or does it mean "towards" a target as if I were measuring range for a ranged attack? b.) How do the rocks handle collisions with walls? With other rocks (Well, "Rubble")? With pits? With other objects? c.) A subset of question "b.)", -if- rocks stop movement when colliding with a wall, if the player is on that space that the rock stops on, do they suffer the effects as if the rock had landed on their space normally? d.) If the Master Giant Dungeon Leader directs the rock through a square he occupies himself, does he suffer the affects as any other creature would? Overlord's monsters too? Naturally, rules for rock throwing seem to be only on a card, so there was limited print space.
How we played it: We considered the rock "direction" (after some debate) to be as if measuring range for a ranged attack, so not only could it move in the 8 normal "straight" directions, but it could move as if a ranged attack. We also considered walls to cause the rock to stop immediately, even if more movement was left (This is the one that caused around 4 deaths). Hence, if a hero was against a wall, and within range of a "rubble" marker, they were screwed. I survived by playing "ring arond the rosey" and throwing rocks at opportune moments. This lead them to surround my figure... in which case I buffed up the die, played a rage card, and completey decimated half of them surrounding me (This happened again later). There was much laughing later when they couldn't pierce my 7 armor while the giant had only one hit point left, which allowed him to slaughter one in that time he was alive. This single dungeon level completely tipped the game in my favor, allowing me to buy 3 additional lietenants. Maybe I was playing -real- smart, maybe they weren't playing all that smart. Maybe the dungeon is "broken" gameplay wise, and needs to be changed or clarified.
2.) Concerning the RtL campaign limitations (for Copper, Silver, and Gold Campaign Levels), specifically on "trait dice" (i.e. at Copper Campaign Level, no more than three trait dice can be silver power dice)... does this limitation apply to the power dice level achieved by boosting in dungeons by heroes spending fatigue and overlords spending threat? For example, if it's at copper campaign level, and the party is in a dungeon, a hero making attack at a monster has 5 black power dice, and upgrades all those dice via fatigue to gold power dice, is that legal or illegal? Suggestion: The term "Trait Dice" isn't mentioned anywhere else in the Road to Legend book or any of the other books, so it might help to either define "Trait Dice" or tell us what term we should replace "Trait Dice" with.
3.) Concerning effects that "ignore armor", do they ignore a character's armor score, equipment cards (and their abilities) that are the "Armor" type (or treated as such), or all of the above? Specifically (though I don't have the game on me), there's a cloak that allows you to prevent wounds by rolling a power die for every wound you recieve, and for every blank rolled, you recieve one less. I'm trying to narrow down if effects that ignore armor would also ignore the ability on this armor equipment card.
4.) When a "Master Monster" is killed in RtL, Master Monster being the Master variant of a monster, not a Dungeon Leader or Lieutenant, does the party recieve a 50 coin bounty for each one killed?
5.) In RtL, what's the difference between a Hero recuperating during a "Recuperate/Train" action, and a Hero who visits the temple under the "Train" circumstance? The only difference I can tell is the Hirst hero isn't at any building in town, and the second Hero is at the temple building in town. Both circumstances recover full health and fatigue for 50 coins. Is this some sort of printing error, or was this how it was meant to be? Can anyone think of how the either one might make a difference as it is printed currently in the game (i.e. some certain event or situation I'm not thinking of).
6.) On Page 14 of the RtL rulebook, it talks about how Overlords can spend threat 2 threat to make a monster move one extra space, or 2 threat to Add a black power die (or boost) a monster's attack during an encounter. Is this also allowed in RtL Dungeons? In Dungeons from other products?
Anyhoo... We still had a blast... just that the night could have been spent more effectively is all. Any help would be appreciated, and any answers or comments from the game designers or the FFG employees that answer questions on these boards would be extra appreciated. Thanks!
. If it was a post on this forum and you don't feel like looking it up, give me a keyword or two and I'll find it.
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