I have a question regarding the chaotic rifts in the Price of Power quest in Shadow of Nerekhall. The rules state that when a hero starts their turn in, or moves into a chaitic rift, they must resomve the rift's effect. The outcome is either none or disfavourable for the hero.

My question is: Why would a hero ever move into a chaotic rift when there is no benefit from doing so?

They could get thrown in or push in.

Changlings can force heroes to move into those spaces as well as other monsters the OL could potentially use.

Please note, it says TILE, not SPACE. That is, if a map piece (55A, etc) has a chaotic rift and you are on or move into any space on 55A, you have to deal with the rift.

Yeah, as Zaltyre said, if the hero starts his turn in, or moves into the TILE containing the rift, the bad things happen.

Honestly, this quest is a complete gong show for the heroes, especially the first part of it.

I have played the quest from both sides, and I've analyzed it carefully, and I think it is nearly impossible for the heroes to win unless the Overlord deliberately plays badly.

The problem is the heroes are often tempted to try it since the Encounter 1 reward is extremely tempting.

The fact that Tristayne can teleport to the changelings, there are doors blocking the main arteries, and the heroes have so much ground to cover makes it hard enough. Add in easy attribute tests for the Overlord, powerful and difficult to avoid rift abilities and a mostly useless Ironbound mechanic (Why do heroes only get 2 move with an ironbound when the OL gets 4?!) and its just a mess.

The second part is more balanced, but it still is Overlord favored considering he will get another rift in an absolutely crucial spot as a result of winning the first encounter.

Steer clear of this quest at all costs heroes!

Please note, it says TILE, not SPACE. That is, if a map piece (55A, etc) has a chaotic rift and you are on or move into any space on 55A, you have to deal with the rift.

Ah, thanks for clarifying this! Now everything makes sense.

Is is mentioned that if an ironbound is within 3 spaces of a chaotic rift, that chaotic rift's effect is ignored.

Does this apply to all cases wherein an effect would be triggered? So for instance, if an ironbound is within 3 spaces of a chaotic rift and a hero steps on the tile, the hero would no longer have to suffer the effect?

Yes

Yes

Welp, that must be why the Ironbound only gets 2 movement.

Another thing which makes it very hard for the heroes is that IB can move only once in their turn, whereas OL can move them twice. Therefore there is no backtracing possible if the OL moves an IB away from a rift.

Still, we (heroes) recently managed to win this encounter. I will post a session report shortly, but I think the only chance for the heroes in this encounter is an all out attack on Tristayne in turn 1. Forget about the villagers - hunt the bastard down! This will prevent Tristayne corrupting the adjacent villager, because with the heroes close by he would be too vunerable in turn 2. Therefore, he is forced to teleport out at the start of the OL turn before changelings can be moved close to the other villagers. The top right villager is then more or less save for the heroes to grab (if they like). Still, putting more pressure on Tristayne is more important I think.

Although the OL teleproted out in our case we still managed to kill him off in turn 2. Admittedly, we have some big guns in the team: Astarra as Runemaster and Elder Mok as bard. Still, we lost all previous quests (Intro, Prey, Rat-King) in this campaign so far. Anybody else feels that SoN is really hard on the heroes against a competent OL?

We just won Intro and Prey. Not going to straight out say it's the OL being bad.

Another thing which makes it very hard for the heroes is that IB can move only once in their turn, whereas OL can move them twice. Therefore there is no backtracing possible if the OL moves an IB away from a rift.

Still, we (heroes) recently managed to win this encounter. I will post a session report shortly, but I think the only chance for the heroes in this encounter is an all out attack on Tristayne in turn 1. Forget about the villagers - hunt the bastard down! This will prevent Tristayne corrupting the adjacent villager, because with the heroes close by he would be too vunerable in turn 2. Therefore, he is forced to teleport out at the start of the OL turn before changelings can be moved close to the other villagers. The top right villager is then more or less save for the heroes to grab (if they like). Still, putting more pressure on Tristayne is more important I think.

Although the OL teleproted out in our case we still managed to kill him off in turn 2. Admittedly, we have some big guns in the team: Astarra as Runemaster and Elder Mok as bard. Still, we lost all previous quests (Intro, Prey, Rat-King) in this campaign so far. Anybody else feels that SoN is really hard on the heroes against a competent OL?

You're right. It's unbelievable but I got beaten as the overlord within 5 minutes, basically in round 1 at the hands of only the 2nd hero. One ranged attack from a hexer and two attacks from Logan (with crossbow and skills leading to pierce 3 and using special feat) were already enough to put down Tristayne. Crazy.

Luckily, I put things straight in the 2nd encounter and went on a hero-slaughtering spree

Another thing which makes it very hard for the heroes is that IB can move only once in their turn, whereas OL can move them twice. Therefore there is no backtracing possible if the OL moves an IB away from a rift.

How? I interpreted the rules as "'Each IB activitates twice" as once by the OL, and once by the heroes. As such, they turnen out to be totally useless and there was not much I could do to stop the heroes from winning the game in 3 turns.

The quest text states that each IB is activated twice in each round. Once by the heroes, once by the OL. In the OL turn the IB behave like normal monsters and can perform 2 move actions . According to the quest, during the heroes turn they are restricted to 1 attack and 1 move action .