We were looking to start a new MoB/CtH campaign, but my wife claimed she likes quests of the subj more than the official ones, so we decided to give it a shot.

I'd posting our playthrough progress here, along with the photos.

We're commited to play it 100% painted

Played Intro and another scenario so far - waiting for BGG photo approval to submit it.

Party:

Reynhart the Worthy - Skirmisher

Ispher - Apothecary

Lindel - Thief

Seer Kel - Hexer

Impressions thus far:

At first, seems to be impossible to heroes, but very tightly balanced. We like that scenarios are much easier to comprehend and explain than the official ones.

At first, seems to be impossible to heroes, but very tightly balanced. We like that scenarios are much easier to comprehend and explain than the official ones.

I'm flattered, and looking forward to hearing about this campaign.

EDIT: Also, please double-check the quest vault for the latest version of the quests (if you're using the PDF from BGG, there have been a few edits since that version was posted).

We're using v3 from here: https://boardgamegeek.com/filepage/119675/legacy-timmorran , I take it is the latest one?

Alright, time for pictures!

The heroes:

Monster setup in the Intro:

Intro ending. I won by re-rolling defense roll of 1 into defence roll of 2 for a Flesh Moulder - so the heroes couldn't make it to the Meeting place. That was veeeery close!

Loose Ends hero setup:

Loose Ends Monster setup:

Trolls. Love their Backswing!

Loose Ends ending. Heroes made it, but I've played pretty loose and forgot to use OL cards in few instances. All in all, I think this is a very difficult quest as a first quest after Into.

You actually threw the villagers into the pit? That's great. Your minis look really good.

v3 is mostly up to date. Since then, there have been some tweaks to:

-Loose Ends (I changed one of the open group traits, but your heroes squeezed out the win without that boost).

-Sunken Treasures- reinforcements changed

-Hired Swords: reinforcements changed

Any other changes are just typographical problems, but nothing that affects gameplay. I try to save the full pdf updates for major batches of revisions, and just make comment notes in the interim.

If you have any doubts about a quest, the latest version will always be the one in the vault.

Thanks Zaltyre!

As I said, I played pretty loose, I think Loose Ends (pun unintended) does require some boost for heroes.

Quick report for playing 1st encounter of Puzzle Pieces. I took Golems as the open group, and heroes didn't make it even to the first door. I think it is way too hard for them, because there is a serious choke point early on. You need either to limit OL ability to block heroes movement or give them more time. 6 turns (less, if you take a possibility of knock outs) is definitely too short.

Thank you for the input. I'm not too worried about the first encounter because the advantage the OL gets in encounter 2 is relatively minor (he just gets to know which stairway leads where). I am a bit surprised the heroes were stopped so soon, so I'll keep that in mind, though.

I intentionally made the time limit short because I didn't want the quest (as a whole) to drag, and encounter 2 has the possibility to take a long time (if the heroes need to explore both staircases it can require a good deal of doubling back). In any case, thank you for the suggestion, I'll consider ways to improve it.

Some pics for Encounter 1
Hero setup:

Respectable villagers in the tavern:

Monster setup:

Encounter ends. Heroes didn't even make it to the front door:

We played Encounter 2 last night (pics are coming).

Heroes didn't make it to the final room either.

Here are my thoughts.

I really love this quest, but I think it is largely skewed towards OL, and for certain hero parties it is almost undoable.

I love the general idea: having multiple chambers and hidden staircases really feels thematic.

Why I think it is skewed: just like in Shadow Rune, the encounters are, essentially, races with narrow choke points and no alternate routes.

For parties that cannot:

1) Easily kill big monsters (hard in the beginning of 1st Act)

2) Move monsters (lie Astarra)

3) Walk through the monsters

Not sure also about reinforcements. I can simply spawn dragons in the final room - there is a very little chance you'd be able to kill more than one per turn.

As I said, I really enjoyed the thematic feel of the quest, but I think it needs more balancing for certain open groups/parties.

Thank you for the feedback. If I can ask, did your group find the correct staircase first? Which open groups were chosen?

No, they found red staircase first. While this randomness adds an interesting twist to the scenario, it feels like it affects chances of winning way too much, like in that quest in SR, where you roll a die in the end of Enc. 1 to find out the outcome.

My open groups were: Deep Elves (green room), Shades (blue room), Shadow Dragons (white, final room). The heroes hardly made it to the final room (and not even all of them), we wrapped it up when they picked the third chest.

My plan was that they gonna meet dragons anyway, and two other open groups were taken such as that they can travel around the map and wreak havoc.

I might have fixed it this way:

-Reinforcements only for the rats

-Monsters can't use stairs

-Somehow limit use of large monsters/make more options for going around - eliminate clogging

Well, rats are useful after the first staircase is revealed, because if it is the wrong room, hero(s) need to come back - and you can block them there. So that change is nice.

I don't think you need to throw in extra $ - our heroes made 200 gold, which is more than average, with that fix, it would have been 275, which would make it questionable why one would win it instead of just going for the chests.

As I told, I don't see how heroes are making through the last room with shadow dragons. Worse, you can place them in a way that when you enter, you'd be always in contact - so you'd need to spend a surge. It looks like unless you're capable of moving/passing through monsters, you're unlikely to pass - unless you can kill two shadow dragons per turn (as they keep spawning).

Remember that only one hero needs to make it off the exit to win. In a 4 hero game (the only game where you have 2 shadow dragons) if 3 of your heroes can't kill a dragon so the last hero can move, you've got rotten luck or a lackluster party.

The reward might be a bit much. Since I already published it, I might wait for more feedback.

Yeah, but you have another dragon that blocks your way, so you kinda move 2-3 spaces per turn. And then you have monsters from other open groups breathing in your neck from behind.

That's a good point. I'll give it some thought.

Second Encounter photos!

Hero Setup:

Monsters:

Final outcome:

Alright, we played two more quests
King of Dirt started well for the heroes with them collecting all ST on the first map and allowing only one worm in. On the second map they ran out of luck - the diary was in the very last chest (on the spider's den). Initially, it looked like they'd make it, but I used bone horrors to Lash Lindel in the corner and block him there with spiders. Worm king and worms would basically sap fatigue and prevent heroes from doing anything. They collected all the chests though.

Thoughts:

A really big luck factor on where is the map. If it is in the chest near the entrance - that is WAAAAAY different from when it is in Spider's Den. Reinforcements are spawning too fast - especially provided they are big monsters and can block everything. At the end, the game was no fun - even without the timer, the heroes just can't do anything being paralyzed all the times.

Hired Swords

That was actually a very close game won by heroes. I took Hulks and Hellhounds as OG. The deal maker was Carve the path from the Skirmisher. He was able to quickly move past monsters and engage heroes. On the last turn he was able to kill two heroes at once because of using it after Stamina potion. If he didn't, the hero that was further away was actually standing in front of the red OT. That was basically a culmination of what I love in Descent: a very close game won at the last moment, that could have gone either way.

More thought on the campaign:

While I really love the job you've done thematically and mechanically, I got two recurring issues with the campaign. First, there are usually way too many reinforcements. Second, virtually all the maps have choke points. Third, random luck (where the marker is) could REA-A-ALLY make it or break it. All these things remind me of TSR, while I'd prefer more of a HoB feel. If heroes are unable to move monsters or walk through them, they are screwed.

I'd really love to see you making another campaign utilizing all the contents (with other H&M sets and undead expansions) with less blocking/reinforcement creeping and maybe more variative maps. But thanks a lot for what you've done already, I love being able to use more than 1 expansion's contents.

As always, thanks for the feedback.

I'll address your general thoughts first, because it informs what I have to say about the specific quests. Let me start by saying that I, too, have had bad campaign experiences (as well as good ones). When designing these quests, I tried to address some of the problems I've run into.

First, there are usually way too many reinforcements.

There are a lot of reinforcements. Some of the most disappointing quests I've played have been cakewalks for the heroes. More than that, they've been boring . Specifically, I think this happens when:

-A group that does not reinforce can be wiped out before it activates (starts the map near the entrance)

-The reinforcements are slow enough that one or two heroes can keep the monsters "contained" while the others move about with no real threat.

The overlord is a player, too. If all he's doing is drawing cards and counting damage as his monsters get defeated, he's going to be bored. The overlord (like the heroes) needs an objective beyond stalling. To accomplish objectives, he needs monsters. Reinforcements also encourage the heroes to keep moving.

Second, virtually all the maps have choke points.

I really did try not to have too many of these, but unfortunately, all of the maps connect at 2x2 sections. It's difficult to keep a hallway wider than 2 spaces everywhere.

Third, random luck (where the marker is) could REA-A-ALLY make it or break it.

While uncertainty keeps the maps replayable and unpredictable, I did my best to keep the randomness within limits. That is, when designing and testing these maps, I would try to make iit so the location of the token didn't skew the outcome TOO much. That's a tricky thing to do, and it can probably be improved.

For King of Dirt, the last time I played the campaign, the journal was in the bottom left of the map (in the caverns). The party was: Master Thorn (Runemaster), Mordrog (Champion), Sahla (Prophet), and Tetherys (Bounty Hunter). The heroes came out with a win. My assessment of bane spiders is that they are not particularly durable, so reinforcing one per round isn't unreasonable. If the OL wants to spawn a plague worm instead, that's a little more troublesome, but they have to reinforce on the entrance (farther from where the heroes are trying to be). The second encounter was also intentionally designed to force the heroes to move quickly. The only monsters being killed should be the ones they need to kill (to emphasize this point, the master plague worm is unkillable).

Regarding hired swords, I'm glad that worked out. Last play of that map (same party as above) the heroes also won by a fairly slim margin, which was great. May I ask which heroes were picked to be the lieutenants?

By the way, I AM planning to make another campaign, but I want to hear more what people think about this one, first. The LoT hasn't gotten a tremendous amount of feedback, and if it's not being played, it's harder to justify making another. Playthrough reports like this are encouraging.

I got your point about connectors - therefore I've mentioned HoB. Yes, bigger maps mean longer playtime, but you see that there is almost always an alternative route.

As for the heroes, I wanted to go lighter on heroes + I wanted to pick the ones that were already painted, so I went very suboptimal with Syndrael + Leoric + Avric + Jaine