Question about Barghest group in Road to Legend App Tutorial mission

By maddenman7, in Descent: Journeys in the Dark

a) Video of this part in the two links provided below:

https://youtu.be/BU88a_pveOQ?t=31m11s

https://youtu.be/hcHQwtWOc3w?t=5m5s

On the app the first two actions that are listed are:

1) To move closer (within range of as many heroes as possible) to set up...

2) Howl (which does minor damage if successful)

At any rate since you probably are only going to do the first two steps repeatedly when do the Barghest groups actually attack? Or is this something that they ignore as it is my understanding that you only do the steps listed in the app? Since there isn't an attack step it seems like these minions are VERY weak.

b) One last small question - you are supposed to remove the "Secret Room (if any)" card from the Search deck but my core set didn't have one. Is this a promo card?

Edited by MaddenMan

1) Some barghest activations will tell them to attack- this particular one does not. Just listen to the app.

2) Remove secret passage, nothing,and treasure chest cards. This is in the rules.

Edited by Zaltyre

2) Remove secret passage, nothing,and treasure chest cards. This is in the rules.

But my question was about the Secret Room card, is there one contained in the core set or am I missing a card? Thanks!

The Secret Room mechanic was introduced into Expansions ( the earliest being Lair of the Wyrm) so it is not in the base game. You should note that RtL doesn't use Secret Rooms (to my knowledge.)

No it's not in the Core Set, it was introduced with Lair of the Wyrm, the first small box expansion.

Note on the Barghests: In the Goblins "finale" Quest I am playing now, it starts with them on the map and within Howling range. Plus, each successful Howl (i.e. every time the Hero fails the Attribute test), an additional 1 Health damage is done per their Special Effect for that Activation.

Because they are all in range of all my Heroes, they each Howl twice, forcing six Attribute tests per Hero and suffer 1 Fatigue and 1 Health for each fail. Two of my Heroes have Willpower 2. :(

Brutal.

No it's not in the Core Set, it was introduced with Lair of the Wyrm, the first small box expansion.

Note on the Barghests: In the Goblins "finale" Quest I am playing now, it starts with them on the map and within Howling range. Plus, each successful Howl (i.e. every time the Hero fails the Attribute test), an additional 1 Health damage is done per their Special Effect for that Activation.

Because they are all in range of all my Heroes, they each Howl twice, forcing six Attribute tests per Hero and suffer 1 Fatigue and 1 Health for each fail. Two of my Heroes have Willpower 2. :(

Brutal.

OMG that makes total sense now - thanks for the clarification!!!

The Secret Room mechanic was introduced into Expansions ( the earliest being Lair of the Wyrm) so it is not in the base game. You should note that RtL doesn't use Secret Rooms (to my knowledge.)

Ok thanks!!

At any rate since you probably are only going to do the first two steps repeatedly when do the Barghest groups actually attack? Or is this something that they ignore as it is my understanding that you only do the steps listed in the app? Since there isn't an attack step it seems like these minions are VERY weak.

You will notice as you progress and through repeated playthroughs that each monster group has a number of variable activation instructions and special effects associated (these effects are supposed to to give the monsters advantage similar to when a human overlord player would play an overlord card).

You may see the same exact activation instructions two rounds in a row sometimes, but trust me when I say that there are different ones. In my experience, Barghest sometimes will try to get close to as many heroes as possible so that they are all in range of Howl (a very good power because it drains Stamina, vital for Heroes in this game). Sometimes Barghest will surround a hero to potentially cut it off from the rest of the group, other times they will be instructed to move in, attack and retreat thus forcing heroes to spend movement points or skills to counter attack on their turn.

The app doesn't track movement, and a simple A.I. will never be as devious as a human player (that's why the rule book for RtL has a section for decision making and interpretation for the odd non-sensical activation). However, it's been my experiencing with the Print on Demand Co-ops and the current app that FFG has done a bang up job on making their monster groups behave in a manner that utilizes good tactics for each monster's particular abilities and general strategy.

if you end up buying expansion, you will see how devious the monster activations are, since the app will randomly choose those expansion monsters for open groups.

No it's not in the Core Set, it was introduced with Lair of the Wyrm, the first small box expansion.

Note on the Barghests: In the Goblins "finale" Quest I am playing now, it starts with them on the map and within Howling range. Plus, each successful Howl (i.e. every time the Hero fails the Attribute test), an additional 1 Health damage is done per their Special Effect for that Activation.

Because they are all in range of all my Heroes, they each Howl twice, forcing six Attribute tests per Hero and suffer 1 Fatigue and 1 Health for each fail. Two of my Heroes have Willpower 2. :(

Brutal.

Our Finale had Razorwings spawn with the Goblin Archers instead. Even after we killed the whole group and moved on to the next rooms, every few rounds those **** bloodsucking bats keep re-spawning near the Entrance.

The app keeps giving them the effect of +3 Speed + Engage + Attack & Retreat OR Engage + Attack + Free Retreat Action .

They swoop in, bleed us almost dry, then vanish around the corner out of our LOS, sneaky winged rats.

I'd never think I'd say this about Razorwings, but that's BRUTAL!!!

Between that, Goblin Archers, Lava Beattles & Bandits I am loving this app!!!

No it's not in the Core Set, it was introduced with Lair of the Wyrm, the first small box expansion.

Note on the Barghests: In the Goblins "finale" Quest I am playing now, it starts with them on the map and within Howling range. Plus, each successful Howl (i.e. every time the Hero fails the Attribute test), an additional 1 Health damage is done per their Special Effect for that Activation.

Because they are all in range of all my Heroes, they each Howl twice, forcing six Attribute tests per Hero and suffer 1 Fatigue and 1 Health for each fail. Two of my Heroes have Willpower 2. :(

Brutal.

Sometimes they will give you howl with a range of 6 and doom if they get you.... and if you get after that the other activation and have still doom on you.... you get 2 damage and 1 fatigue for every failed attribute test....

So I totally agree.... "brutal" seems to be the right word for them.

Though as a OL I have also used them on the heros to damage them without defence rolls.... Most heros tend to spend all/most Stamina to move and if they let the Barghests come too close they often get hit by at least 4 Howls + attacks from other monster groups (favorable from many small monsters like Fire Imps or Goblin Archers)

i'm not sure if this comes up anywhere else, or if this is a tutorial only thing. The minion barghest have an action that says "Use 'Howl' on at least 2 heroes". If i just go by the wording then if it can't use howl on more than one hero then the barghest doesn't use Howl, but that seems like a waste. How do y'all read it?

i'm not sure if this comes up anywhere else, or if this is a tutorial only thing. The minion barghest have an action that says "Use 'Howl' on at least 2 heroes". If i just go by the wording then if it can't use howl on more than one hero then the barghest doesn't use Howl, but that seems like a waste. How do y'all read it?

Personally, going by the Descision Making segment of the RtL rulebook, page 10, whenever I find that the monsters make sub optimal choices I try to take a few seconds to think like the overlord and choose for them.

That is to say I try to never let actions go to waste if I can help it. You're free to play it whatever way you want, but since the app does not keep track of map positions I find some times the monsters don't make the best choices. It is to be expected in opposition controlled by AI.

The players can scale difficulty in this way and I enjoy having the flexibility in the rules to do so.

No it's not in the Core Set, it was introduced with Lair of the Wyrm, the first small box expansion.

Note on the Barghests: In the Goblins "finale" Quest I am playing now, it starts with them on the map and within Howling range. Plus, each successful Howl (i.e. every time the Hero fails the Attribute test), an additional 1 Health damage is done per their Special Effect for that Activation.

Because they are all in range of all my Heroes, they each Howl twice, forcing six Attribute tests per Hero and suffer 1 Fatigue and 1 Health for each fail. Two of my Heroes have Willpower 2. :(

Brutal.

****, you're gonna have a bad time. Willpower is probably the most tested attribute in RTL. I wouldn't have more than one hero below 3 Willpower.

i'm not sure if this comes up anywhere else, or if this is a tutorial only thing. The minion barghest have an action that says "Use 'Howl' on at least 2 heroes". If i just go by the wording then if it can't use howl on more than one hero then the barghest doesn't use Howl, but that seems like a waste. How do y'all read it?

You're reading it correctly, but in that situation you would skip it and either continue or take it to the top...for example:

-> Spot as many heros as possible.

-> use howl on at least 2 heroes

-> engage the closest hero

In this scenario, if you couldn't use the howl, you'd just engage the closest. If you take out the 3rd action it would be something like this:

"Spot as many heroes as possible" means 1 movement action. So, let's say that with 4 movement points you could spot 1 hero. Okay, cool. However, you can't howl 2 heroes. But, when you spotted the first hero you gained some distance. So now let's say you had 1 movement point left over and now you have to "spot as many heroes as possible" again. So you would do another move action and leave you with 5 movement points. Now you can spot 3 heroes. You still wouldn't do the howl cause now your 2 actions are done for the barghest, but there's a pretty good chance that the Barghest has a decent vantage point now that it has spotted 3 heroes.

Is this the most optimum turn for a Barghest? Probably not, but I also don't think the 2nd example happens often. And if it did? Oh well. The game is balanced around the AI not being the greatest. Sometimes you're gonna get attacked by 4 goblin archers that get an innate +2 damage. You win some you lose some with the monster AI haha.

Edited by JulianLeite

I use howl on at last one hero if possible. This one that I think need one more additional instruction or modify slightly. But you can take your own decisions.