Descent Newbie Questions

By SWfanforever, in Descent: Journeys in the Dark

Hello! I had to apologize on the Talisman forums before I started my post because I'm sure I asked a lot of some basic newbie questions but this is a hobby my family and I recently got into and we had a lot of questions on Talisman and Battlelore. We recently got Descent for Christmas and already had some questions. So again, thank you for taking the time to read and reply. It is greatly appreciated.

1. The first quest Acolyte of Saradyn...In the quest book it says if the goblin archers stay in the caravan tile at the at the end of a turn or 2 they receive 2 fatique tokens. Do they each receive 2 or is it 2 total (1 each). Also, I have read the rule book and I thought it said monsters do not take fatique tokens...that it gets converted to damage. I do understand the quest book overrules the rule book.

2. Reinforcements in Acolyte of Saradyn: it says up to 2 goblin archers get be place in the lair every turn. Does that mean if you move them out of that tile you could just keep adding?

I will have more questions on this game. My kids and I love it but this one seems pretty complicated, but we love these games and the community here that assists other non seasoned gamers like us. Thank you!

1. The number of goblins on the campsite does not matter. If there is one (or more) at the beginning of the Overlord turn (as the heroes did not manage to kill it) the OL receives 1 fatigue token. If there is one (or more) at the end of the OL turn (because there was one to begin with or because the OL moved one onto that tile) the OL receives 1 fatigue token. Thus, the OL can receive 2 tokens max. per turn. These fatigue tokens do not represent fatigue spent and are not associated with the goblins in any way. They are just to keep track of the win condition of the OL.

2. The group size of all monsters depends on the number of heroes in the game. Refer to the back of the monster card to see the corresponding icons for that. If a quest rule includes "respecting group limits", the group limit is the maximum number of monsters of that group that can be on the map at any given time. In this quest the OL may place 2 goblins at the end of his turn on the lair, if that would not exceed the group limit for goblins on the whole map. It does not matter on which tile other goblins are.

Hope this helps. From my experience you have to read the rules very carefully multiple times to get the core rules right. Do not let this disencourage you. It's a great game and well worth the effort.

Edited by Sadgit
On 2/10/2017 at 2:08 PM, Sadgit said:

1. The number of goblins on the campsite does not matter. If there is one (or more) at the beginning of the Overlord turn (as the heroes did not manage to kill it) the OL receives 1 fatigue token. If there is one (or more) at the end of the OL turn (because there was one to begin with or because the OL moved one onto that tile) the OL receives 1 fatigue token. Thus, the OL can receive 2 tokens max. per turn. These fatigue tokens do not represent fatigue spent and are not associated with the goblins in any way. They are just to keep track of the win condition of the OL.

2. The group size of all monsters depends on the number of heroes in the game. Refer to the back of the monster card to see the corresponding icons for that. If a quest rule includes "respecting group limits", the group limit is the maximum number of monsters of that group that can be on the map at any given time. In this quest the OL may place 2 goblins at the end of his turn on the lair, if that would not exceed the group limit for goblins on the whole map. It does not matter on which tile other goblins are.

Hope this helps. From my experience you have to read the rules very carefully multiple times to get the core rules right. Do not let this disencourage you. It's a great game and well worth the effort.

Thanks for the reply Sadgit. The quest book for this quest doesn't mention goblin archers on the camp site. It specially th OL receiving 1 fatigue token if 1 or more archers are on the caravan site. It also mentions the lair as the tile for the reinforcemens to be deployed. I didn't see any mention of the camp site tile.

So, typically in the game, fatigue tokens seem like a "negative", but here they are not? They are merely used as a counter? So you could use any token?

I've been reading the rule/quest books and have been having a rough time absorbing the rules. Not sure why orif thereis an easier way to grasp them. Its just my kids and myself playing and we don't have any access to any seasoned gamers on Descent. I really want to learn it and show my kids that board games can be just as fun as a video game or better.

Sorry for the confusion on the names of the tiles. I do have the German version only and that's why I messed that up.

Reinforcements of goblin archers are to tile 4A

OL receives fatigue tokens when goblins are on tile 9A at the start or end of the OL turn.

And yes, you could uses different things as counters instead of fatigue tokens.

I would recommend to test play quests solo before playing them with your kids. You could also play Road to Legend solo to learn the rules.

Hello all,

I am also new to this game. My friends and I have fell in love with this game and are still in the process of running the core box and will be starting act 2 soon. I have bought several heroes and monster box sets and two more expansions so my first question is even though we are on box one do the other expansions get added to the core box so that the players can chose any hero from those sets and the overlord has access to the new monsters and also the new act 1 and 2 gear to the store? And my second question is can two players chose to pick from the same class but different archetypes such as one player playing a berserker and one playing a knight? Thanks for the help

8 hours ago, mirdin01 said:

Hello all,

I am also new to this game. My friends and I have fell in love with this game and are still in the process of running the core box and will be starting act 2 soon. I have bought several heroes and monster box sets and two more expansions so my first question is even though we are on box one do the other expansions get added to the core box so that the players can chose any hero from those sets and the overlord has access to the new monsters and also the new act 1 and 2 gear to the store? And my second question is can two players chose to pick from the same class but different archetypes such as one player playing a berserker and one playing a knight? Thanks for the help

1) All expansion's pieces can be added to a central "pool" and played with together. It is highly recommended that you do this BEFORE beginning a campaign, and not during the middle of it.

2) Yes. Two players can choose to player two different classes from the same Archetype. You can have 4 healers if you want, or 3 warriors and 1 scout, or whatever combination you desire. What you cannot do is have two players playing the same CLASS. Of course, this would be difficult as you only have a single set of cards for each class.

Edited by any2cards

Nevertheless i recommand that at least one Healer is picked up. You can play with one warrior each and add a healer that you more or less play together.

Thank you all for the quick response. I am holding off on adding the new additions until the second box set but have two players both wanting to play both fighter archtypes and the third playing a mage so will see how that goes.