Ok, so this will be another official Playthrough thread, designed to keep any upcoming questions in one topic. I'll also talk about quest playthroughs, progress and anything else.

Years ago, the Free city of Nerekhall was plagued by rumors of wizards practicing dark magics and attempts of summoning demons from otherwordly planes. Those tasked to uncover this root of this darkness were often eliminated and the experiments were left unchecked. That was when Gargan Mirklace appeared, succeeding in opening a dark portal to the realm of the Ynfearnal. With great effort, the Daqan Lords and Baronies of Terrinoth fought back and was able to defeat Mirklace and close the portal. Although he was defeated, his body was never recovered. After much debate, the city of Nerekhall was spared from total destruction and the task of rebuilding began. Years have gone by since, though the city is still considered to be an embarrassment. what's more, talk of nefarious purposes have started to surface again. The Citadel has tasked four heroes to investigate these foul rumors and hopefully put an end to their source.

I'll be using Alys Raines as Marshall, Andira Runehand as a Disciple, Lindel as a Bounty Hunter and Ravaella Lightfoot as a Conjurer.

The Overlord will be starting off with Basic I as the OL Deck and has selected the Ariad Plot Deck.

Starting Questions:

Lindel's Heroic: When it says change the die to a different result, I suppose it means I can pick up the dice and land it on what result I want?

I think so. It must be similar to other abilities that allows to choose a result, instead of a re-roll.

I think so. It must be similar to other abilities that allows to choose a result, instead of a re-roll.

Confirmed. Lindel's feat is essentially 'decide your blue die results.'

Introduction- A Demonstration

In this quest, the heroes must defeat Tristayne before 4 citizens become possessed and walked off the map. The matter is complicated by the fact that he's protected by an Ironbound, which the heroes must literally defeat before they can even work on Trystayne.

The OL used his first turn to move the Flesh Moulders into the square, the intent on having the master keep Tystayne healthy. The Changelings moved swiftly towards the nearest citizens. The OL should have played Dash to move them onto the citizens and that may have awarded him a citizen, but I digress. Tristayne did some attacking as did the Ironbound, mainly focusing on Alys Raines. Lindel targeted the master Flesh Moulder, Basically one shotting him. he then turned his attention to Tristayne. The Ironbound blocked his attacks, taking the brunt of the damage. Andira moved onto the platform, next to Tristayne, preventing him from moving right. Ravaella also used an image to keep him from going anywhere from the left. The heroes then focused on the task at hand.

Flesh Moulder attacks, Ravage attacks and the Ironbound managed to KO Alys a few times, but luckily Ravaella was adjacent to her and able to revive her every turn. Realizing the Ironbound would need to be dealt with first, Lindel targeted it using his Bounty Hunter technique. With combined attacks from the heroes, they were able to swiftly remove it from the equation. Damage had accrued on Tristayne as well due to Andira's heroic ability. Alys was able to smack Tristayne in the face with the hammer from her starting position with no defense penalties as her starting weapon has Reach. Due to poor defense rolls, the monsters and Tristayne were dealt with quite easily.

Right before Tristayne was defeated by Alys, Ravaella risked a movement and search action, revealing one search token. It turned out to be a Treasure Chest and she was rewarded with a Lifedrain Scepter. The Changelings ended up removing no citizens from the map, so the heroes were also rewarded with 175 Gold for their efforts.

Heroes win and Tristayne runs!

How many rounds was that? I am rather surprised the OL didn't even get 1.

It was over on the 4th round.

In the middle of playing "The Incident" right now and need a question answered. It says Celia is treated as a hero figure but cannot use attack or search actions. Then, she can revive heroes, correct?

I don't remember specifically what actions it says she CAN perform. If it says all but search and attack, the answer is yes, she can.

Playing the Incident. Going to retcon this due to missed damage triggers, misplaced damage markers, the fact that the heroes are pretty much KO locked and there seems to be virtually nothing anyone can do. Using Kobolds as the open group and they are just making this whole quest a mess. Them combined with the Rat Swarms, pretty much makes damage a fixed value for the monsters and there's just no way the heroes can compete. They have pretty much been divided and surrounded making any chance of fighting back non-existent.

Playing the Incident. Going to retcon this due to missed damage triggers, misplaced damage markers, the fact that the heroes are pretty much KO locked and there seems to be virtually nothing anyone can do. Using Kobolds as the open group and they are just making this whole quest a mess. Them combined with the Rat Swarms, pretty much makes damage a fixed value for the monsters and there's just no way the heroes can compete. They have pretty much been divided and surrounded making any chance of fighting back non-existent.

Kobolds are rough, there is no getting around it. Both times I've played this map as an OL (no kobolds either time) it was a close map. I won once, the heroes won the other.

Got a question on the Bounty Hunter Ability "Chosen Target". When you track a monster, that is use the target token, does it stay on the monster until it's defeated? Can you use Chosen Target to switch to another tracked monster?

Also with the Conjurer. Do image tokens remain on the board even if the Conjurer is knocked out?

Regarding the tracking token, yes to both questions. It stays on the monster until it is defeated, or until the bounty hunter uses chosen target again and tracks a different monster. (see the paragraph in the MoR rulebook '...takes the tracking token from its current location...'

Image tokens do indeed remain on the map even if the conjurer is knocked out, as there is no effect which causes them to be discarded. As was answered in the questions posted in the 'treaty of champions' topic, the tokens would retain any benefits from skills that don't explicitly require the action or presence of the conjurer (so, it would still cost an extra MP to move next to one if the conjurer had bought 'illusory path.')

Just to verify: Andira's Heroic Ability only effects other heroes, correct?

Secondly the Conjurer can create more then one images at a time, barring Fatigue limits, correct?

Referring to 'Crusade' Andira, no- it also includes her, as she is a hero within 3 spaces of herself. It doesn't say 'another hero.'

Yes- the number of image tokens on the map is limited by the supply (4.) The conjurer cannot summon an image by suffering wound, she must be able to actually spend fatigue to summon one. There is no limit on how many she can summon per turn.

OK, nice to know. I haven't been counting Andira. Between her and Alys as Marshal, it hurts monsters to even attack them.

Act 1 Quest: The Incident.

So after finishing the Intro, The Overlord Purchased then Plan Ahead Universal Card ( usually the first card I purchase.) Also picked up a few Plot Cards. With their experience the heroes aquired some new skills: Alys picked up Shockwave, Andira picks up Armor of Faith, Ravaella picks up Illusory Path and Lindel gets Lie in Wait. A visit to the shop yielded nothing of value, so the heroes didn't pick up a single thing. Next of, they traveled to the next quest "The Incident."

I pretty much retconned this quest on the first try. Simply put, if the heroes aren't very careful with how they proceed, things can get out of hand fast.

The open group I used was Kobolds. I pretty much figured they went well with the theme of pests constantly harassing the heroes. Indeed, this happened really well. The first attempt saw the heroes get divided and then pretty much KO locked early on. Lindel was escorting Celia around the map, but it only made the heroes weaker in the starting area. It wasn't really a contest and I wanted to see a little bit more of a competitive result.

So the second time, I kept the Heroes and Celia close. Initially the heroes were able to fend off the coming waves of Rats, Spiders and Kobolds. The Overlord Never really allowed the Master Kobolds to move from the southern areas of the map. The continuous waves of Kobolds would keep coming

The heroes countered this with some damaging Shockwave attacks from Alys. Combined with Andira's ability to generate damage on attacking mobs, they two were able to deal out repercussions to attacking mobs. They also broke a the northern green tunnel, so the monsters could only come from the south and right. After Celia grabbed the two research points from the western hallway and the top central room, the heroes worked their way toward the room with the white tunnel. The Northen exit crumbled. It was here that they found themselves in a predicament, as Rats closed in from the left as Kobolds marched upwards from the south. Right before an attempt was made to escape this Pincer attack through the white tunnel, Lindel got Koed. Fortunately, Ravaella kept the Kobolds at bay y creating image tokens in the two space entranceway. They had to spend movement points to even get near the images, but were successful in removing them.

As the heroes tried to make their escape, the OL slowed them down, using a Pit Trap on Andira and a Tripwire on Alys. They got through the tunnel anyway, but no one could close it behind them. Pursuers followed. Celia grabbed the third Research Token as the middle exit crumbled.

Pressed for time, Celia ran on ahead. Unfortunately she got cornered by Rats and was chewed up. The heroes were too far away to revive her, having been slowed down by the pursuers and cut off in front as well. They managed to snag the third search token as time ran out.

Result: The Heroes are Battered, Bleeding, Poisoned and Exhausted, coming away with 175 Gold for their efforts. The Overlord wins the quest, Gaining "The Scholar" Corrupted Citizen Card as well as succeeding in knocking out Lindel and Andira, coming away with 4 plot tokens.

Observations: OL should use Kobolds if possible in this quest. They are such a hindrance, it's not even funny, as the master will continue to Spawn 3 per OL turn and can send them in droves at the heroes. You can force Surges with your Dark Might Basic Cards and together with Rats ( who never miss and usually Surge on their own) you can create quite the damaging situation. As if that wasn't bad enough, the Rats can inflict Bleeding, which can cause Fatigue problems. Top it off with the Master Cave Spider Web ability and the heroes will be hard pressed to win this quest.

The Heroes picked up a few new abilities during the Experience Phase.

Alys- Zealous Fire

Andira- Cleansing Touch

Rendiel- Not So Fast

Ravealla- Many Friends

A couple good shop items also appeared. The heroes wound up flat broke but Alys picked up a Guardian Axe and Andira has a Bone Blade.

The Overlord saw him play yet another Rumor Quest card ( One of the Manor of Ravens Quests). Anyhow, he purchased the first Shadowmancer Class Card Exploding Rift. With his threat tokens, he picked up The Ritual Continues and the Ariad Agent card from the Plot Deck.

Next the Overlord picked the next quest: Burning Harvest.

The Travel step saw all the heroes take one Fatigue.

Burning Harvest- The First Quest in the Crown of Destiny mini plotline. The Heroes have to take out Mughin, a huge Giant before he collects gems and leaves the area. He had 24 Health. The Open Group were Ettins. So the Heroes go from fighting small vermin to mammoth sized foes.

The first room was filled with Lava Beetles, but the heroes cleared these out with ease. The OL started out with two Dash Cards, which he used on Muhgin. Muhgin quickly moved south, snatching up the first gem in the pit room. The Ettins did not move from the Exit room. The Heroes went through the right side door as Mughin walked into the large cave from the other side to ****** the second gem. The Heroes managed to scrape him up a little before he was able to Dash from the room, back towards his starting area. Since Mughin was far out or reach at this point and following him would be slow, the Heroes backed up. The Second Giant did not pursue, guarding the way to Muhgin. The Lava Beetles however did manage to skitter into range, harrassing the heroes with blast attacks. Seeking to go through the door and deal with the Ettins, Rendiel searched the token in the Ettin room and found a secret room, which ended up being the Brigand's Quarters. Exploring the room, he immediately did a free test and revealed a Cave Spider. Meanwhile Ravealla had been Koed by a Lava Beetle Attack.

On the next turn, Ravealla was revived by Andira who then tried to atack the minion Ettin and did absolutely no damage. Ravealla darted into the Secret Room, searching a Challenge Token. The attribute ended up being Strength upon which she failed (her stat being 1!) and which thus gave a Dash card back to the OL. Rendiel's free test ended up revealing a Zombie. Now the room could only be shut by taking out the monsters. Rendiel Killed the spider with his first attack, but couldn't do away with the Zombie. Meanwhile on the outside, due to accrued damage on attacks, the minion Ettin fell.

The OL's next turn saw the Master Ettin step forward, take hold of Andira and hurl her three spaces into a group of Lava Beetles. To make matter's worse the minion Giant was close enough to club her on the head, stunning her. The Zombie inside the secret room stepped forward and sank his teeth into Rendiel. At this point, he was barely standing anyway, so it only took one Heart to knock him out. The OL used the Dash on Mughin as he quickly snatched up the fourth gem and made it to the Ettin room. On the cusp of victory.

Ravealla took out the Zombie, closing the Secret room. The Heroes obtained some Chainmail for their efforts which Andira equipped. Rendiel's body was moved to the outside, where Andira was able to move and stand him up.( Having overlooked the Stun effect). Rendiel and then Ravealla moved to the exit tiles, blocking Mughin from going that way. Ravealla also left an image token in the southern room. At this point everyone was trying to inflict damage on Muhgin now that he was close enough.

The OL went for the win, as he moved the master Ettin over to Ravealla. A Throw would move her out of the way for Muhgin. As he tried to grasp her, she successfully wormed free! ( Passed the Strength test.) The Lava Beetles then went to work, trying to get either Andira or Alys moved from the southern doorway. One of the attacks managed to KO Alys. Muhgin then walked south, past them into the first room. The heroes now needed to kill him on this round or he would successfully escape through the hero entrance.

Andira ( having realized she had been stunned) removed the condition by using an action and then revived Alys. Rendiel and Alys both popped their heroics. First Rendiel did 5 damage to Muhgin and Alys used a stanima to move one space and Perform an attack. Popping her Heroic, she used a Shockwave on her second attack. The impact killed the master Lava beetle next to Muhgin.

This was the last attack and Muhgin only had 3 Health left. On the OL's turn he left.

Ol wins. Or... does he?

Actually I came up with a conundrum as I was typing up this summary. See, Andira has Cleaning Touch. As such, she can clear her Stun and then had enough fatigue to move and perform an attack. I rolled the appropriate dice to see if she would have done enough damage. Well she did and the combined damage would have been enough to kill Muhgin.

This quest was really close. What do you think I should do? Should I award the victory to the heroes or to the OL? If the OL wins he would receive 6 threat tokens, another rumor card and the Fire Gems OL Card. If the Heroes win, He would only get 4 threat tokens.

It's up to you how you want to handle it, but in multi-person play we never replay mistakes after other dice have been rolled. That is, if a hero (or OL) forgets to use an ability, he has the opportunity to correct himself until dice get rolled, since that constitutes extra knowledge about what he 'should' or 'shouldn't' have done. In this case, the only difference is that the person who forgot to use an ability and the person who benefited are the same person.

I'll reward it to the OL. I already doled out rewards anyway. That will teach me ( the heroes) to double check everything I guess.

Thank you for sharing your experience with this solo play through.

I find it useful ahead of my groups SoN campaign. Also I am looking forward to introducing rumour cards to the campaign.

I will have all three small expansions and at least one HoM rumour quest (Bonds of the Wild).

Are you finding the plot deck you chose useful as overlord?

I have Trystain as my only agent/plot deck at the moment, which rules out summoning an agent.

I'm glad you're enjoying my summaries. As I said, I chose the Ariad Plot Deck. As the OL, I usually spend the Threat tokens initially to purchase the Plot Cards. I have put http://descent2e.wikia.com/wiki/Intricate_Schemes to use on one occasion and also find http://descent2e.wikia.com/wiki/The_Ritual_Continues is helpful as well for when you monsters aren't really doing anything.

Anyway, Onto the Summary:

The Hero's name is LINDEL not Rendiel. So from this point on, I'll refer to him by his proper name.

So the OL got the Fire Gems OL Reward from the previous quest as well as a few more Plot Cards. He also got to draw a Rumor Card. Saved three Threat Tokens for future use.

The Shop phase netted the Heroes a Blessed Shield, which is now under new ownership by Andira.

The OL played Intricate Schemes allowing the heroes to pick the next Quest while the OL netted three threat tokens.

The heroes chose Respected Citizen as the next quest.

During the Travel Phase, the heroes were escorted to their destination and thus did not have to go through any more travel cards. The OL however played Atrocities. Appalled by the sight of a wrecked caravan ( I guess in some obscure part of the city), Alys suffered a fatigue and gained the Weakened condition. Then the OL got to draw another Rumor Card.

Respected Citizen.

In this scenario, the heroes need to catch and knock out a suspicious character ( with their fists) before he can escape through the exit on the other side of the map. Unfortunately the tavern they find him in is occupied by Zombies and plaza is suddenly suffering from a Ynfearnal Hulk infestation. I chose Hellhounds for the Open Group, who were currently terrorizing the marketplace.

Anyhow, Alys charged into the group of Zombies sending a Shockwave through most of them. The others then helped pick off 3 out of the 5 zombies. As Betram ran down the Alleyway, the Hellhounds made towards the heroes. The Ynfearnal Hulks walked around and spent their actions on The Ritual Continues Plot Card.

The Heroes took minimal damage from attacks, though Alys was the most targeted of the bunch. They were able to succeed in killing the rest of The Zombies as well as a Master and Minion Hellhound. As Betram fled though, one of the Hellhounds used the Hunt ability to move Andira into the market place. Betram continued to flee while the heroes fought with the rest of the Hellhounds. The Minion Hulk came around the south into the MArket place to get involved with the fighting. Andira left the area to continue the chase on Betram, joining Lindel as he rushed up the corridor, snagging a sreatch token and then punching Betram. Betram kept rolling Shields on the die so the damage was about 1 to 2 hearts for every attack. Alys stayed behind to mop up the trash in the marketplace while the rest gave chase.

Unfortunately, the heroes misjudged the distance Betram needed to escape ( thought they had an extra turn to KO him.) However, as the Master Hulk knocked back Lindel, He made his escape.

OL Wins Encounter 1, gaining the Scoundrel respected Citizen Card. The Heroes come away with 2 Search Tokens and go into Encounter 2.

To be Continued.

I have taken a look at the Ariad plot deck and like it a lot.

Fortunately I also found Ariad going for a good price and have ordered it.

Looks like I might use the Ariad plot deck for my SoN campaign, assuming the new agents from Mist of Bilehall are not getting released any time soon.

I have found Hell Hounds very useful and use them a lot, the hunt ability is great if there is a lava pit or similar close by.

Question real fast. Can A Hero spend a Fatigue to gain a movement point to move out of a pit space? I would assume the answer is no here, but I thought I'd double check.

Question real fast. Can A Hero spend a Fatigue to gain a movement point to move out of a pit space? I would assume the answer is no here, but I thought I'd double check.

Used to be yes (unfortunately,) but the errata thankfully changed that. You cannot spend movement points to get out of a pit space- this includes MP gained from any source. Movement not involving movement points (move X spaces, move up to your speed) or non-movement abilities that let you place your figure a number of spaces away would all work to get out of a pit space, in addition to the typical "climb out" action.

Thought that was the case. Anywho... time for Campaign update:

So the Second Encounter saw the Heroes enter a mysterious area. Elementals stood at the entrance to greet them as a Huge Master Ynfearnal Hulk named Maalik roared a greeting. Thieves sat huddled in corners, victims for the supposed beast. The heroes supposed Betram had already fell victim here. They could hear the howling of Wraiths as they hovered about the dark. ( Wraiths being the Open Group.)

The Heroes charged in, actually making short work of the Elementals. The OL sent the Wraiths in to try and instill the Doom effect on them while they were busy with the Elementals. The Master Elemental kept spawning, so the heroes kept on dealing with it. As they moved in to the central room, giving attention to the darting Wraiths, they went to also save the thieves. But...

They were Too Late By Far! The Thieves transformed into Changelings! The OL used his newly obtained Scoundrel Corrupt citizen card, allowing the Master Changeling to have +1 health per hero, roll an extra brown defense die, have an extra 3 MPs per activation and could attack twice. Ouch. Maalik, the Ynfearnal then Bloodrushed toward Alys, was dealt considerable damage as she was Charged. The Master Changeling finished her off. The rest of the monster closed on on Lindel, but he managed to dodge and weave ( Monsters either miss or he rolls 3 Shields against hard hitting attacks) managing to stay up with one heart left.

After that round, the heroes were able to return the favor, doing damage on the ambushing Changelings as well as picking off the Wraiths. Andira was able to revive Alys off of her Heroic Feat as well as kill a minion Changeling. Alys was able to kill a monster and then waltz over to Ravealla to hand her a Health Potion. She used it on Lindel, who now rejuvenated was able to help pick off more of the monsters. As considerable less monsters were there to attack each round, the heroes managed to keep from getting anyone Koed again, with the exception of Alys who got Koed once more.

In the end, the heroes were actually trying not to kill Maalik, as they wanted the search tokens. Somehow, Maalik was brought down to one heart. He did however get to smack Alys around one more time. Andira had to jump into a pit to get to the last search token. In the end, all tokens were grabbed.

Heroes defeat Maalik and win the quest! They manage to come away with 300 Gold and an Ironbound Ruin found in a Treasure chest. The OL managed to obtain the Scoundrel Citizen Card, but lost it in the second encounter. He does however up his threat token count to 9.

It looks as if the next quest will bring the Heroes to the Manor of Ravens.