Can you move named monsters?

Can you move master monsters?

Thanks!

Yes, you can move any of the above. They took telekinesis out of the advanced campaign because it allowed the heroes to move a LT in the middle of them, and then they beat him to death before the OL could do anything. Same thing with level leaders.

Sorry...should have included in original post...

Do you think a hero could roll for a ranged/magic attack and be short on range.....spend some stamina to pull the monster into range...and then the attack does not miss?

In our scenario the hero had Immolation, and I allowed it as OL solely because I liked the idea (and I thought of it). =P

Mage throws fireball..mage grabs monster like Darth Vader and pulls him closer...fireball & monster collide resulting in exploding flaming death!

MMMmmm ::claps::

But was it legal?

Ohh, and thanks for first answer!

No, you have to fully resolve the attack before you can do anything else.

You can use Telekinesis to move a monster closer before you attack it, but once you roll the dice, it's too late.

You also can't move, drink a potion, etc. in the middle of the attack in order to make it succeed.

You can spend fatigue to add black dice to the roll, though--after the initial roll, one at a time, up to a maximum of 5 black dice (total).

Rereading and thinking...

SamVines...I'm not sure I understand your explanation as to why it was taken out of RtL. (I only play Vanilla + WoD by the way so far)

In Vanilla, the heros could then levitate my named monster (master of the dungeon) over to them and all take battle actions against him and do the same thing as you describe them doing to an Lt.

...where's the difference, if any?

Thanks again!

*SamVimes* not Vines

In Road to Legend, the dungeon maps tend to be very small, and the exit is usually blocked by a rune-locked door. The heroes generally get the rune-key upon killing the level leader. What telekinesis allows is for the heroes to move the leader (which is also one of the only ways to generate CT for the heroes), kill him, and then race out of the level, picking up the treasure chest/gold piles on the way out. The result is a dungeon level that lasts maybe 2 hero turns, 1 OL turn, before it is over.

Lt's are an expensive uber-monster that moves about on the world map, allowing the OL to accomplish his goals, and harass the hero party. However, when they die, that's it. They are dead for the whole campaign (except for Kreig). In encounters with LT's, the heroes telekinese the LT and then kill him, which ends the encounter. The result is a one turn screw-fest.

Road to Legend also allows the heroes to substantially increase their maximum fatigue, and to purchase exactly the skills they want (with some caveats) rather than getting them randomly, making skills like Telekinesis much easier to abuse systematically. Telekinesis was still allowed in the original version of the extended campaign, but was removed in errata based on player complaints.

Some players still consider Telekinesis to be problematic in vanilla, but not as many.

They should just change it to were you can't move named monsters with it.

The Art Guy said:

Telekinesis is extremely abusable without ever touching named monsters. Having 9-13 (with a fatigue potion, ++ in RtL) extra movement options that can be spent on any hero or any (non-named for the sake of argument) monster is incredibly powerful.
- All your other heroes can move 3-5 spaces with Telekinesis and then Battle (for the cost of one potion your group moves forwards a full move or more and still has 6-7 attacks/orders left)
- monsters can be 'clumped' for sweep attacks or AOE weapons.
- a runner (10+move + the 6-13 fatigue) can get anywhere , including through a solid mob of monsters and including moving a blocking monster from a chest so it can be opened etc
- webbed or grappled heroes can be moved
- heroes can be moved out of or through difficult terrain
- monsters can be moved from defensive locations (eg elevated)
- monsters with 1wound left can be moved into pits
- melee monsters can be moved beyond their attacking reach, effectively nullifying them for an entire turn

It was even more powerful in RtL with greater fatigue values common, the changed rules for using glyphs (must start your turn next to the glyph to use it) and the OL having greater control of monster placement. The game is a lot more fun without it, even for the heroes (who now have a much greater challenge in pulling off the miracle plays) but especially for the OL.

I think a lot of those are less significant (at least in vanilla) than you're making them out to be.

• You seem to imply 9-13 fatigue is plausible for a hero in vanilla, and that's not true, even with a potion. Heroes have 3-5 base fatigue, which means 10 maximum (9 after spending 1 to drink the potion if you don't have other movement points to spare).
• Heroes can already move farther with fatigue, and use fatigue to batlte and still move into position. Letting hero X pay the fatigue for hero Y to move is useful, but only occasionally, especially if Telekinesis is on a random hero and not necessarily the hero with the most fatigue. You can also move monsters closer to heroes instead of vice versa, but there's usually more monsters than heroes, which makes that inefficient.
• Pushing melee monsters out of range is usually only marginally more efficient than spending fatigue to move out of their range yourself.
• Heroes can also already spend fatigue to inflict about 1 extra damage when making an attack, and monsters rarely end up with only 1 wound left unless you're attacking them, so the ability to finish monsters off with pits is marginal. Again, there are some situations where you can't just use normal fatigue options (you're at max dice, another hero has fatigue but you don't, etc.), and every once in a while you can throw monsters into more damaging terrain like lava or scything blades, but these situations are rare.
• Many "defensive locations" (elevated ground, trees, etc.) exist only in Road to Legend--stuff from the base game and other expansions is almost strictly hazardous (fog is the only defensive thing that comes to mind)
• Where a runner can get depends heavily on dungeon construction, and this tends to be less of an issue with the larger dungeons of vanilla compared to RtL. If the runner is the one with Telekinesis, they don't get any extra movement from it except by negating the movement penalties for mud and pits (and moving monsters out of the way); if the runner isn't the one with telekinesis, then he can give the runner a head start, but can't do nearly as much to move monsters or negate terrain, because he needs LOS to the target and can't use it as an interrupt during the runner's turn.

Clumping monsters for AoE is potentially pretty awesome, although that's partly because AoE weapons are stupidly powerful in Descent. On the flip side, in vanilla, there's a good chance you won't get any AoE weapon draws the entire quest.

Telekinesis can do a lot of nifty stuff, but almost all of it is highly situational.

Antistone said:

2. Letting hero X, who has little combat capability, pay the fatigue to move hero Y, who has a lot of combat capability, into position for a battle is often, not occasionally useful. The combat capabilities of heroes is almost always widely variable, and usually (not always) the slower heroes are the better at combat.

3. It can cost one point to render a big melee monster useless - something really nasty like a Troll or Giant. Often that is considerably cheaper than several points spread through several heroes. It also enables the fatigue point to be spent by someone other than the one in most danger - again, you have efficiency improvements by letting the combat specialists focus on combat and the support guys focus on support.

4. Yes this is rare. And incredibly valuable when it happens.

5. True, my bad.

6. Yes, but either moving monsters out of the way or getting a few extra spaces of movement is often (or regularly) vital. It can mean the difference between the runner making it through to a glyph and exiting to town (whereupon a combat specialists leaps out from town to battle) or an isolated runner getting swarmed (or rather, not making the big run play because he can't do it safely). In particular, having the Telekinesis on the runner can prevent or reduce blocking tactics such as dropping a crushing block beside a minor monster to completely block a corridor -which, Acrobat aside, completely kills a run action unless the hero is One Fist and can use his free hook attack.

Everything is situational. The point is that telekinesis has a lot of really nifty applications that are not dependent on Named Monsters and is very powerful. Preventing it's use on named monsters is a extremely minor nerf IMO.

The last vanilla game I played (about a month ago) was won by a stunning last turn play from a doomed position involving Telekinesis (1 point only), one hero (Aurim) passing a gold melee (the stonecutter thing that rolls stealth dice - RGGYSt, ~=2dam, ~~=5dam IIRC) weapon to the mage (Jaes) and the melee feat card that allowed one attack to change all other dice as desired except the red one.
Aurim with stone cutter in backpack and telekinesis but only 1 wound left (hero team down to 1 CT) teke's Jaes backwards, adjacent so that he can give him the stone cutter because he can't risk moving himself as a pit trap or crushing block will win the game for the OL. Jaes then advanced and killed the boss using his Feat card to change all the dice to maximise surges and does something like 26 damage to the boss, killing it. Such a minor manipulation, repositioning a hero 1 space before his turn began, but critical. Sure, it's situational, but these sorts of situations come up every game, and often just about every turn!

These discussions are kind of amusing, because I'm fairly confident that your intuitions are skewed one way by RtL and my intuitions are skewed the other way by Enduring Evil.

1. Even if 13 fatigue is theoretically possible, listing the range as 9-13 is blatantly misrepresentative when 5 is vastly more likely than 13. I'm not sure exactly how many heroes have 5 base fatigue and start with at least 1 wizardry skill and start with at least 1 subterfuge skill, but I'm sure it's less than the five you found that meet only the first two of those conditions, and even if you're playing one of those select heroes, drawing Telekinesis and Skilled at the same time is something like a 1 in 100 fluke (depending on the expansions used, the category of the hero's third skill, and the redraw strategy used). Most groups will never see that happen in a vanilla game, even if they specifically try for it.

2. Even slow heroes frequently have enough fatigue to take a melee battle action without any help. And the tendency towards stronger fighters having less fatigue is slight, and based mostly on the facts that ranged heroes are most likely to have lots of fatigue and that ranged weapons tend to be weak (of course, ranged heroes are also unlikely to have Telekinesis). The difference between starting with 2 or 3 trait dice in your main weapon is fairly slight, especially if the hero with 2 dice has more fatigue to buy boosts, and I'm not even sure if high fatigue and split traits are correlated at all.

I suppose you could specifically give the slow hero the best weapon and the fast, Telekinesis hero the last pick, but a group without Telekinesis simply won't do that.

3. If you have a bunch of heroes exactly equal distance from one big monster, Telekinesis is often cheaper. If the heroes are different distances from multiple monsters, normal movement is often cheaper. I think the latter is more likely, especially if we're ignoring named monsters. Of course, neither situation is common, since even ogres and giants rarely survive long enough to take a turn.

The last game I played where Telekinesis was drawn, it was really effective. But only because the quest prominently featured rolling boulders.

Antistone said:

0. Yes, I'll readily concede that, but they are still fun discussions. And I have played not-RtL a little recently.

1. You seem to be forgetting that 9-13 extra points represents 5-7 fatigue and a fatigue potion, not 9-13 fatigue!. Heroes that have a chance of starting with 5-7 fatigue and Telekinesis include Grey Kerr, Aurim, Jaes, Sahla, Astarra, Varikas, Mok, Red Scorpion, Zyla and Landrec. Landrec of course is more likely to try and focus on combat, since he already gets 3 dice, +2 surges and all three skills in Magical stuff. Of the others, only Astarra has a tight trait dice focus, and with her great speed/fatigue/special combo and low CT value she is already a prime runner/support candidate. I'd have to argue that a 5+F with Telekinesis is pretty much at least as likely to come up as most other 'combos', and likely to be a relatively weak fighter to boot, on average. Groups that know of the utility are far more likely to grab it at every opportunity too.
SInce I got exactly that draw in my recent vanilla game (Aurim w Telekinesis, doesn't even need Skilled or Tiger Tattoo) I'd have to argue that it is quite reasonable, not the near impossibility that you claim (which is possibly exacerbated by you thinking of a higher fatigue requirement?)

2. We can agree to disagree. Slow heroes are inconsistant in their ability to move 3-4 spaces and battle. I maintain that having someone else pay for that movement (and at a lower proportional cost of their total fatigue too) is greatly benefiical. Further, they will also then have their fatigue still available for use in combat should it be necessary.
Generally I find that the reason slow heroes are the best fighters is because they are melee heroes. Melee weapons are better than ranged weapons certainly, but they are also substantially better than magic weapons, at least early on. A 3 trait melee hero will universally kill a tier 1 monster with one hit and a shop weapon. Even a 3 trait magic user can be embarrassed all too easily, sometimes even with bronze treasures! So early on in particular it can be extremely valuable to get the melee guys up front fast (and they often have better armour as well) while still battling.

3. Sure. Still, IME, even in vanilla, fatigue is a precious resource for the real fighters in a group, used to get into the exact best position for an attack (say to take advantage of cleaving, quickcasting or rapid fire) and to get to the best blocking position afterwards. I generally see it being extremely useful for a 3rd party to be spending the extra fatigue for additional things like this rather than he 'warrior' having to cover something extra.
As far as the big, slow monsters go (Trolls mostly when spawned), they are usually spawned behind the party in our games (no spawning spots in front more often than not) and other monsters used to slow the party down while they catch up. In such cases, sending them backwards a space or two is often not only far more efficient but also the only option. Alternatively they are already on the board in front of the party so the heroes actually want to go towards them rather than away, but want to stay out of reach all the same. In both cases, telekinesis is not only more efficient on a points for space differential but also directionally.

1. I understand what 9-13 means. I'm saying that having a hero in the party with Telekinesis and 3 max fatigue is vastly more likely than having a hero with Telekinesis and 7 max fatigue. By at least a factor of 10, I'm pretty sure, and I'd estimate closer to a factor of 50. Max fatigue 5 is pretty common, but that's the low end of your quoted range, and that's just dishonest. Quoting 5-13 would still sound unfairly optimistic, but at least it'd be technically correct; 5-9 is much more representative.

Technically, you could have Telekinesis and eight max fatigue, but that's even more ridiculous.

Incidentally, I'm pretty sure Landrec only gets 2 wizardry skills. He's actually one of only few that has a chance of starting with Telekinesis and 7 max fatigue. I believe Lyssa and Zyla also qualify...that may be it.

3. I don't think I've ever seen a 2x2 melee spawn in any vanilla game, though I didn't get AoD until after our Enduring Evil playtesting was underway, so the only 2x2 monsters we could even theoretically spawn were treachery spawns from WoD. Of the melee ones, the ogre spawn does only a single normal ogre, and the golem costs 3 treachery, so they're both pretty worthless. I remember the troll treachery spawn looked good, but that's one card from one expansion--I don't think there's even a non-treachery version, though I may be mistaken.

Fighting big melee monsters is usually due to finding them on the map, not having them spawned. And even in the case of a spawn, you can't Telekinese it before its first turn, and you can probably kill it before its second turn.

In Enduring Evil, large spawns are more common, of course. Had one game where the overlord spawned a demon and a dragon both on the turn we opened up the boss room. Would've been more if we'd opened the gold chests and then the door instead of vice versa. Fun times.

SamVimes said:

Wait, does flipping town glyphs result in CT then?

Yes. Everything that gives Conquest in vanilla Descent still gives it in RtL.

Antistone said:

1. Ok, thats complete bollocks.
There is basically one character (Carthos) that has any significant chance of getting Telekinesis with 3 fatigue. Only Eliam and Validor can also draw telekinesis and both of those have significant other uses for fatigue and are more than likely to prefer just about any other skill so likely to drop Telekinesis if they do draw it. Even if they keep it thats a total of 3 characters and 5 (6 counting Carthos' redraw) draw options.

There are 5 heroes with 5 fatigue and a Wizardry draw. Three of those have Rogue skills and could get to 7 fatigue by drawing Skilled. Red Scorpion can also get to 7 fatigue but less face it - nobody who has a choice will take her and she has to get all three skills matching which is negligible on top of negligible.
There are also 4 heroes with 4 fatigue and both wizardry and Rogue/Warrior skills that can have a 5+ fatigue and Telekinesis.

In summary, 3F+Teke is basically about as likely as 7F+Teke. Your estimate of 50x more likely is ...well, I object to your calling my use of 13 dishonest (in an amused, friendly argument sort of way ), so I can't call it dishonest - though I pretty much just did!
Certainly 5 fatigue (9) is much more common, as would even be 4 fatigue. Even 6 fatigue is relatively rare. OTOH this discussion is about how powerful Telekinesis can be, so quoting the lower end of the scale all the time is pretty pointless. One doesn't discuss how useful Unmoveable is without reference to the Knight combo or to Talia for example.

3. Well, in that case I will claim better knowledge of the fully expanded game than you for this one. The Troll treachery spawn is one of the best in the game and just about an automatic first expenditure of Spawn Treachery. With an Aim, a Troll will often one shot every hero he can hit (and he Sweeps). Even without an Aim he still can do so, though he will miss a lot. And he is a big, nasty, hard to kill brut that blocks a corridor completely. I've seen a troll spawn in every vanilla game I've ever played since AoD came out I think.
The ogre spawn is also useful for knockback (not to mention being another big, tough blocker), though that one is significantly rarer.

So the number of characters that can get 3F+Tele is equal to the number of characters that can get 7F+Tele (excluding the statistically insignificant Red Scorpion perfect storm), but the 7F requires that you draw one more specific skill than than the 3F combo (Skilled+Tele vs. just Tele), resulting in about a 1:10 or 1:20 less frequent draw (approximate odds of drawing exactly the subterfuge skill you want). Sounds like I was pretty close. 1:50 was high--didn't realize there was such a strong negative correlation between having low fatigue and having wizardry skills, though with the conquest slanting and the stat-balancing conventions, I guess it makes sense--but I was certainly in the ballpark.

If you're explicitly talking about extreme cases, that's one thing (though Descent has so much randomness involved that I question whether that's helpful), but if you're going to give a representative range of values (which is what you implied), you can't include values on one end of your range that are immensely less probable than values you excluded on the other end of your range. You probably should've included 3F if you were even going to include 6F, but excluding 4F and including 7F is totally inexcusable (in terms of purveying statistics). That's obviously considering only the very high end, but presented as if it were an unbiased sampling.