... unfortunately I think Descent may finally be dead for me.

And when I say finished the campaign, I actually mean gave up on during the second encounter of the quest before the finale...

This time was the Heirs of Blood campaign, two players; one overlord and the other controlling two heroes; Hawthorn as knight and Laurel as Wildlander.

I really want to like this game but every time it just refuses to feel balanced and fun for more than 2-3 quests before the scales start drastically shifting in one sides favour. The snowball effect is just too prominent I'm finding.

This campaign was fun for the first few quests. Interesting story and objectives. I'd won the intro quest, the next two were close but I'd lost but then it started happening that the games were becoming less close and I was instead starting to get steamrolled hard. Near the end of the campaign I wasn't even able to get half way through an encounter without getting stuck in an infinite KO/Revive scenario. Multiple games ended that way; "Revive hawthorn, recover 4hp, revive laurel, recover 5hp and a fatigue your turn". *Both proceed to be killed again* Repeat.

Even the rules allowing an additional attack/2hp didn't cut it. At the start the OL quickly thought it was OP, but after the second quest she'd realised that no, it isn't.

It got to the stage where I actually didn't want to play because it was so pointless; I literally would have no chance at winning. My SO finally convinced me to give it another go tonight and sure enough, half way through the first encounter I had lost. I tried hard, I really did but it was futile. We both decided to call the campaign quits as the fun had just gone. There was no competitiveness left.

Every campaign I've played has been the same; some with me as OL, some with me as hero, and even one with a full group of five people. Each one shifted to one side dominating the other in the latter half of the game.

I really hoped HoB would be different but this has worked out potentially worse than previous campaigns. I think Descent may now only survive on my shelf as a scrum game if it's lucky; no more campaigns, only once off random quests. I'm so highly disappointed that I couldn't get it to work but I'm afraid I'm done.

I honestly have yet to pay through a full campaign but I've felt the same feelings. I ended up in an endless KO revive cycle with my two heroes and it just sucked. My wife and I have had more fun with the co-op expansions.

I'm curious if anyone has ever tried switching rewards at the end of a quest so that the loser gets the greater reward. To make this work, all players would need to continue playing their best. It would hopefully lead to a situation where things tend to be more balanced as the losers get more powerful after a quest than the winners. Hopefully the balance would be better. You'd just have to get over being "punished" for winning. You'd need to think of it as an auto-handicap.

Given the experience you have expressed, why do you continue to play the game with only 2 heroes? 2 heroes in general favors the OL.

3 Heroes favors the heroes, and most have found that 4 heroes is the most balanced game. Why not try playing a campaign with 3 or 4 heroes?

I have honestly never played the game with 2 heroes before, but it sounds like a balancing mess from the reports I've heard.

It is not too difficult for even one person to play with 3 or 4 heroes, in my view. A 4 hero setup provides the best Descent experience, in my opinion. 3 heroes would favor the hero side, which might be good if they've been on a losing streak..

If that is what you feel like and alll players have the same amount of expirience in descent, try to change the OL with a hero after every quest.

Write down the exp and let them purchase the OL cards (and returning the ones bought by another player to the bos).

The same for hero exp of course.

Also: I don't know why but as a OL I found there is almost never a real "just kill the heros every turn and they can do nothing", if a hero survives he can get 2 people up and in no time all have survived. In a two hero game one dead hero let's you lose half of your actions, that's one of the reasons it's better to play with 3 or 4 heros.

Also after the first act the heros are able to buy any first act marked card... And if at least the tank get's a good armor and has increases health from his skills it's pretty impossible to kill him for the OL without loosing most of his monster activations... Which is almost never worth it. Because a grey and black dice together are a pretty reliable 2 or more shields on almost every attack.

I'm curious if anyone has ever tried switching rewards at the end of a quest so that the loser gets the greater reward. To make this work, all players would need to continue playing their best. It would hopefully lead to a situation where things tend to be more balanced as the losers get more powerful after a quest than the winners. Hopefully the balance would be better. You'd just have to get over being "punished" for winning. You'd need to think of it as an auto-handicap.

I was half thinking of something along these lines. But instead of swapping rewards, may just giving both sides the winning rewards instead of just the winner. Winner could still choose the map, and would obviously need to receive relics. But when it comes to gold and exp, at least it would stay relatively even.

I'm fine with the winner getting more rewards, but I'm of the strong opinion that the loser should choose the next scenario.

I'm fine with the winner getting more rewards, but I'm of the strong opinion that the loser should choose the next scenario.

This is an interesting thought. Have you actually tried this with any of the newer campaigns (NOT Shadow Rune)?

I would be interested in hearing feedback on how it goes. Once I heal from my surgery, I may actually try this myself to see what happens.

I've played the whole LoR campaign this way, loser chooses. We totally think this helps to balance the campaign, and we'll apply it to every campaign afterwards.

I think that 2-hero campaigns are winnable, but only with very specific heroes. You cannot just choose any two that please you. You must choose two that maximize actions, that have healing potential and that have complementary attributes.

One pair that I'd like to try (if I didn't always play with the same 5 players, thus 4 heroes) are the new Okaluk & Rakash (or the Conversion Kit Brother Glyr) as Apothecary and the new Challara as Necromancer. 4 figures would mean more health on the board, more attacks and better blocking possibilities. As soon as the Apothecary gets Bottled Courage, he'd be able to dish out 3 attacks a turn with one action to spare (like a rest) PLUS plop out 2 elixirs a turn. If the Apothecary is Okaluk, the team would be able to get out of a full KO for free, then kill everything around them. If it is Brother Glyr, the additional health would make the full KO less likely in the first place, and the free rest would give either movement or 1 more attack and 2 elixirs at a key moment. Glyr's 4/1/3/3 attributes would nicely complement Challara's 3/4/3/1, Okaluk's 3/2/3/3 slightly less so.

Syndrael as a Beastmaster with a robust (12 health) Apothecary would also make a good team. With 4xp there would be 3 figures worth 37 health on the board, with additional protection from the wolf, good movement potential and healing capabilities. An OL would need lots monsters (which, against 2 heroes, he doesn't have) and cards to get a full KO on that.

Imo most comments here are spot on.

You shouldn't play with 2 heroes and you should always bring a healer that can deal with conditions.

Your hero party needs to be picked as a group, meaning you need to keep an eye on a balanced group. If you pick one or two weaker heroes (10hp and below) you should always consider a fitting healer(hero or class) with some kind of burst-heal.

If the game starts to feel like it's gonna tip the scales, I found it helpfull to give the losing team an advantage by either let them choose the next quest (small advantage) or reward both winning and losing parties with the rewards for winning the quest (big advantage) as much as possible, as well as probably giving out bonus gold if the heroes didn't get many search tokens.

Also I don't quite understand what campaigns you did play and who won them. Did always the same person play OL, did the heroes win a campaign (if so which one and whom did the hero-party consist of)?

I also expirienced this snowballness of Descent although only in play-groups where one side had significantly better understandings of the game or one group weren't quite able to remember what their adversaries were capable of.

2 hero teams you say?

Then just Elder Mok (Apothecary) & High Mage Quellen (Necromancer) that $#!t

Let the cheapness rain down like the great flood!

I have played all the campaigns available for Descent and I have to agree with the OP that after the first 2 or three quests it snowballs one way or the other. Road to Legend seems a much better way to play Descent

Our campaigns never seem to snowball, quite the opposite. Act I is usually pretty easy for the OL, but the balance shifts in favor of the heroes in Act II. The Finale can usually go either way.

I've had a few snowball campaigns, but I also have had several which do not do this. My most recent campaign (I was one of 4 heroes playing Legacy of Timmorran) the hero/ol win split was 5/7 overall (h,o,o,o,h,o,h,h,o,h,o,o).

Snowballing does happen, but so far it has not ruined our experience of the game. We've left one campaign at the interlude because it was just too gloomy for the heroes.

My most recent campaign (I was one of 4 heroes playing Legacy of Timmorran) the hero/ol win split was 5/7 overall (h,o,o,o,h,o,h,h,o,h,o,o).

Zaltyre ...

While I would disagree, it strikes me that the above won/loss pattern would represent snow balling to many players on this forum. I have played with some people (and for obvious reasons I no longer do) who actually think winning two quests in a row is "snow balling".

My most recent campaign (I was one of 4 heroes playing Legacy of Timmorran) the hero/ol win split was 5/7 overall (h,o,o, o ,h, o , h , h ,o,h,o,o).

Zaltyre ...

While I would disagree, it strikes me that the above won/loss pattern would represent snow balling to many players on this forum. I have played with some people (and for obvious reasons I no longer do) who actually think winning two quests in a row is "snow balling".

To that I would respond the campaign win/loss got more mixed as the campaign went on, not less. The longest stretch of wins (3) was in the first 4 quests. After that, there was no more than a back-to-back win for either side (one back-to-back each for heroes and the overlord, I might add).

By the way, I've added a little formatting. I've underlined the interlude and bolded the rumor quests. So, without rumors, it went (h,o,o,h,h,o,h,o,o)

If (alternating) stretches of 2 wins is "snowball", I think the expectation for "not snowball" is unrealistic. That is, I don't think it's realistic to expect every campaign to literally alternate winner after each quest. I think we agree on that point.

Well for the campaign I played above, the ratio was something like this:

H (intro), O , O , O, O (interlude), O, O, O (lost all hope)

The two in bold were very close games and I have no problem with having lost. They felt balanced and I feel I could have won with a few better plays/bit of luck.

After that though it started to get sour. The third overlord win was a bit of a beating; sure it happens, what harm.

Then we hit the Interlude and it was apparent that half way through I didn't stand a chance.

Then Act II came around and it only got worse...

Third ACT II quest we decided to call it quits after the first encounter.

We're going to give the RtL campaigns a go (now that Kindred Fire is going to be free) and see how that goes.

We were originally going to play 1 hero each, but after some of the comments here I might consider running two heroes each.

Should make it feel a little more epic too.

To some of the other comments regarding overlord/heroes etc. We swapped roles of overlord between us for each campaign so it wasn't the same overlord every campaign.

It also wasn't an issue of the overlord always winning/heroes always winning. It was a case of whichever side started to win more often, continued to get more and more overpowered.

Well for the campaign I played above, the ratio was something like this:

H (intro), O , O , O, O (interlude), O, O, O (lost all hope)

Now THAT... is a snowball...

Personally, I've played Shadow Rune, Labyrinth of Ruin, Shadows of Nerekhall, Mists of Bilehall and now started Rise of all goblins.

Our group has not had it that bad, but there was some snowballing in the OL's favour, especially at the beginning, when you only have your starting items/skills and are saving up for a big bang, or don't have enough gold to afford better equipment. Usually, once everyone has done a few upgrades, it tips back and act 2 is more teeter-totter.

I would suggest, like everyone above, trying it with more than 2 heroes. Try a 3 hero game if you want a more hero-centric game. One of the campaigns my group played was a 3 hero game and that one was almost a snowball in the hero's favour. (almost... because like Zaltyre said, if anything but alternating win/loss is a snowball, games of chance are not your thing)

We're going to give the RtL campaigns a go (now that Kindred Fire is going to be free ) and see how that goes.

Where, may I ask, did you here this? I had not heard this.

We're going to give the RtL campaigns a go (now that Kindred Fire is going to be free ) and see how that goes.

Where, may I ask, did you here this? I had not heard this.

It's official, posted to the FFG facebook yesterday.

The Kindred Fire campaign for Road to Legend is imminent, and, !!!!!!!!!!!!! – it's going to be downloadable for free.

And while you're waiting for its release, you might as well take a peek at this album of new screenshots.

We're going to give the RtL campaigns a go (now that Kindred Fire is going to be free ) and see how that goes.

Where, may I ask, did you here this? I had not heard this.

It was announced... here in this link some people are talking about it: https://community.fantasyflightgames.com/topic/220046-kindred-fire/page-3

I'm fine with the winner getting more rewards, but I'm of the strong opinion that the loser should choose the next scenario.

This is an interesting thought. Have you actually tried this with any of the newer campaigns (NOT Shadow Rune)?

I would be interested in hearing feedback on how it goes. Once I heal from my surgery, I may actually try this myself to see what happens.

I've played almost every campaign this way. It keeps the winner honest.

Honestly, blthe most common problem I've run into is the heroes overpower the Oal, especially for a group of min/maxers. I've toyed with not letting the heroes collect gold on used/unused items (eg force them to give it up and sell it) and using one less shop card. Both tone down the heroes some.

For 2 hero games, it favors the overlord slightly, but in the one campaign I ran with just 2 heroes, we couldn't find an easy way to scale down the OL.

Every time I see this argument it's because the player isn't really playing the game the way they're supposed to. OLs that try to go easy or players treating it like an RPG. Look at the objectives and rethink what you need to do to achieve them. Look at what your opponent has and try to figure out what they are doing to get you down in health. Is the OL even completing objectives?

I'm fine with the winner getting more rewards, but I'm of the strong opinion that the loser should choose the next scenario.

This is an interesting thought. Have you actually tried this with any of the newer campaigns (NOT Shadow Rune)?

I would be interested in hearing feedback on how it goes. Once I heal from my surgery, I may actually try this myself to see what happens.

I've played almost every campaign this way. It keeps the winner honest.

Honestly, blthe most common problem I've run into is the heroes overpower the Oal, especially for a group of min/maxers. I've toyed with not letting the heroes collect gold on used/unused items (eg force them to give it up and sell it) and using one less shop card. Both tone down the heroes some.

For 2 hero games, it favors the overlord slightly, but in the one campaign I ran with just 2 heroes, we couldn't find an easy way to scale down the OL.

Every time I see this argument it's because the player isn't really playing the game the way they're supposed to. OLs that try to go easy or players treating it like an RPG. Look at the objectives and rethink what you need to do to achieve them. Look at what your opponent has and try to figure out what they are doing to get you down in health. Is the OL even completing objectives?

Yeah I expirienced similar things. Opponents claiming the game is imbalanced and snowballing, when at the same time in act II, I knew better than themselves what their heroes can do and were reminding them every turn of their skills.

@OP

so was the one who won as OL on the winning hero team as well?

What were your hero teams in both campaigns?