Hello, my name is Sam.I'm starting a new Campaign with 6 heroes and one Overlord,

one thing i don't understand is the market, it said on the rules, the number indicated on the map is the number of items that the market flip up. Is that indicated on the copper, silver, or Gold treasures or the normal weapons and armor/shields?

Second is since I'm playing with 6 heroes, some of the items in the market will be sold out quickly, should I photocopy some extra items as a backup or just leave it like that?

Third is there any homebrew items/weapons/armors/skills/town upgrades I can try?

The number of items purchaseables in the market, corresponding to the capaign level you are in (copper, silver or gold), also called "market rate", is indicated on the left of the icon representing each city in Terrinoth. It represents the number of cards that the party can draw EACH GAME WEEK from the corresponding treasure deck, wich are currently in store in that city, and is a well different thing respect the "market cards" (double-sided cards, with the cost reported in the lower part of them...) wicch are ALWAYS in store (in each city with an own market).

The treasure cards drawn in this way must remain there untill 1) the party purchases them or 2) a new week begins.

In fact, when a new week begins, the party has to reshuffle the treasure deck and, if they are still in that city, re-draw the same number of treasure cards to put in store...Of course, they will do the same thing when arrive in an other city (obviously if it has a market).

Now, if I can tell my opinion 'bout your way to play the game with 6 heroes.......well I think that's uncorrect! Yes, you can always use the house-rules as you wish and make the game more funny and various, but I really believe that 6 heroes are too much....!!

So, if you want to play a sane competition in a RtL Campaign (fantastic experience!), is better you play normally with 4 heroes: is the only way to leave well balanced the game.

And....no, don't make copies of the cards: this game is already complete, believe me!!!

thank you for your tips, but isn't there rules to make 6 players enjoy descent the game together?

sammwon said:

I think that trying a RtL campaign with 6 heroes is just stretching possibilities a little (ok, actually a huge amount - I think it is undoable without a complete rewrite, although 5 hero campaigns have been done with some rules adjustments). 6 Heroes doing a quest though is much more 'fudgable', although I still think it is stretching just a little bit too far. Anyway, on with the answer...

7 players you mean? (6 Heroes and 1 OL). No there isn't any rules for that. Even the 5 hero rules are cobbled together by players with some balancing risks and issues and completely unofficial.

Their is a basic scaling system designed by FFG for 2-3-4 hero groups, but even that is badly designed and inherently flawed.

There are a number of problems with varying numbers of heroes.
1. Hero LOS to prevent spawning is massively important. More than 4 heroes or less than 3 heroes and LOS coverage is too dramatically different from the base game.
2. Because most monsters die in one attack for most of the game, what becomes critical is the number of part-actions available to the hero party. Every hero you add adds 2 part-actions to the hero party's resources for killing monsters.
3. 1+2. #1 and #2 compound each other. If you increase the number of heroes then the OL will have fewer monsters overall because he will have less opportunities to spawn them. And the heroes will have more part-actions with which to kill those fewer monsters. THe same problem happens in reverse with fewer heroes. 2 heros usually can't prevent spawning very much so there are more monsters and less hero part-actions with which to kill them.
4. Resources. Shop resources are limited. This creates a fine balance within a party. Increasing the size of the party means that all shop resources will become scarce. For example, there are only 2 chainmail suits. So with a larger party more heroes will have to start with just leather. The OL is likely to 'pick on' those leather armoured heroes rather than the chainmail armoured heroes, thus basically negating the effect of the chainmail to some extent. At the other end of the scale, with so many treasures coming out you are almost certain to get a good balance/variety of treasures which makes the overall party ever stronger.
5. Skills/abilities. Increasing the number of heroes increases significantly the chance of getting just the right skills needed for any particular task. Sometimes you need an Acrobat to run through a wall of monsters and activate a glyph. Sometimes you need a spiritwalker to get one hero through an obstacle of some sort so that another hero can then attack powerfully from behind the obstacle. Sometimes you need a heavy-hitter with damage bonuses.

Now some of these problems can be solved by making changes to the rules. Some of them even slightly work to partially cancel each other out. Mostly they can be partially got around, but not completely. However the more you try and stretch things beyond their natural shape the less workable and more unbalance the game is likely to become. 6 heroes is a biiiiiig stretch.

Last, but not least.... Although you might have a very stable gaming group, the biggest problem with RtL for some people is getting the same group together for 90 hrs of gaming, be it 20-30 sessions of 2-4 hrs each or 9 sessions of 10 hrs each. Needing 7 people is really going to stress that!