We just played the side quest " Stand at Thaurgrim's Rest " in RtL, and I haven't really seen any discussion about it, so I figured I'd start one.

Firstly, I'd like to say that it's a really neat idea for a quest - a sort of quasi-tower defense mission.

That being said, this quest is far too long for the rewards you get. It took us about 4 hours to complete, where most other side quests are about 2, and the rewards are similar. I suppose it's possible that if you get a perfect win, you may get something better, but as it stands, we lost 2 objectives but won the quest and got 5 fame and 90 gold.

Several turns from the end, we started laughing as the game just threw more and more at us. It became a slog, and sucked all the fun out of slaying monsters left and right.

Has anyone else played this one? If so, what are your thoughts?

Just played this one today.
I agree with you that its too long.

We played this one as our last side quest prior to the Nerekhall finales, so our team was basically maxed out in gear and skills.

However, despite the fact that we could clear every monster group on the same turn they spawned on, the whole thing took 3 hours to play and in fact we started suffering Major Perils by the end.

We never let any of the priests through to the ritual (in fact, they never even moved after the first turn), yet the reward was still only 5 fame and like 120 gold.. so a negligible improvement.

Good quest concept.. and the ballista are fun to use, but I would have preferred an execution which had a definitive goal other than surviving 'x' turns.

I played this one last night and we had a question about the movement of the Yinfernal Vessels.

At the end of each round, it says;
"Each Yinfernal Vessel gains movement points equal to the number of monster groups on the activation tracker." (or similar)

Then states;

"Each Yinfernal activates as a Master Dark Priest, with the following action list:
(action): Engage tile 10b, moving through obstructed squares as needed."

So, the question is, does the 'Engage 10b' count as a movement action? So would the Vessel gain 4 movement in addition to the movement points gained from the number of monster groups? Can the Vessel double move?

Here is the full description for Ynfernal Vessels:

Quote

Each Ynfernael Vessel gains movement points equal to the number of monster groups on the tracker. Then each Ynfernael Vessel activates as if it were a master Dark Priest using the following action:

[action] Engage tile 10B, moving through blocked spaces if necessary; each time an Ynfernael Vessel moves out of a space adjacent to 1 or more heroes, reduce its remaining movement points by 1.

After each Ynfernael Vessel activates, each adjacent hero tests [knowledge]. Each hero who fails suffers 1 random condition.

The gained movement points per monster group are in addition to any movement points gained by performing engage actions (= move actions). As there is only 1 possible action present in the action list, Ynfernal Vessels double move each activation if possible.

Just played this quest and it really is super hard. I got the feeling that something was off here. There is really no way to stop all these monsters and at the same time kill the vessels.

I barely managed to hold the ground until the boss showed up, but there was no way to win this. And I even had very few X rolls. I can't even imagine how I would have been destroyed if I had played this as my first sidequest.

Yeah we had a pretty tough time of it. Its not like you can even keep one hero up top with the Ballistae and have the rest in the thick blocking the way through, since they move THROUGH blocked spaces (the 'is necessary' is a little ambiguous). Not to mention the monster groups spawning on the ridge.

Pretty hard quest, although I am not sure how many Vessels are allowed to escape before the mission is considered a failure.

If 4 vessels escape the mission is a failure.

Worst quest I ever played. I just gave up (2+ hours of fast play). No visible progress made us get gave up as I actually though it was bugged. Many monsters got stuck on the highround as they cant use the ladder which was just ugh.