I may be picking up one of the campaign expansions soon, and I'm wondering which one is considered the better of the two. Thoughts?

Regardless of which one I chose however, I'm probably going to incorporate the Divine Favor rule from Sea of Blood (the heroes are worth 1 more/less CP per death for every 25 CP between the heroes and overlord).

Also, any other suggestions for houserules for either campaign?

LinkN said:

I'd suggest RtL purely because it has had most of the bugs ironed out already. SoB is still new and there are a number of issues - and possibly some that have not even been discovered yet.

Campaign houserules aren't really necessary IMO. RtL is very finely balanced if people play well . Unfortunately, a few tactical or strategic errors at the wrong time can have really heavy consequences, particularly to the 'feel' of a campaign. Consequently it is important, particularly for the heroes, to do some research and planning before they start playing. They could be investing 60-100 hrs in the game, they really should do a couple of hours or so prepping. And by prepping I mean check out the OL's upgrade paths, understand critical CT points, do some research here or on BGG about hero strategies (blitz for one, though there are different 'levels' of blitzing.

The sad thing is that the heroes are the ones that actually drive the game, yet they almost never invest any time in understanding it. Consequently they drive at the wrong speed or in the wrong direction and then are dissatisfied about where they end up...

I'm sure you will get lots of advice to incorporate other houserules too. Most people prefer to adapt the game to them, rather than adapt themselves to the game (fair enough, that is their prerogative).
However, I'd advise caution in adapting houserules without a deal of considered thought. Some changes have large effects that are not apparent immediately. Other changes are suiatble for one game, but not another.
As an example, a lot of people talk about importing the 'raze 5 cities' from SoB into RtL in place of the 'Tamalir raze' victory condition - or more accurately, meld the two rules together and say you must raze 4 cities and then tamalir. Now this is strictly a lot harder than either previous condition. Cities in RtL and cities in SoB are not the same. The ease of razing is not the same. The ease of getting to them is not the same. The number of Lts is not the same. In particular, Tamalir is vastly more difficult to raze than any other ciy in either game because a) the heroes can improve the walls considerably and b) the heroes can get to tamalir within 1 week from anywhere on the map!

Well, Sea of Blood is just Road to Legend but with a bunch of extra crap*. Does the idea of pirate ships w/ cannons and sea monsters in your Descent campaign appeal to you, if so, get SoB, if not get RtL. If you're a hardcore Descent fan, get both (so you have even more encounter cards and rumor cards).

*the extra crap is actually pretty cool, but it does add that much more rules you have to keep track of.

Alright, thanks for the input. The campaign would mostly be for one other person, so I think I'll let him pick whether he wants the land-based campaign or the sea-based one.

Any input on using the Divine Favor rule in RtL, though? I think it's a pretty good way to give a small advantage to the underdog, which is good considering that if one side gets a big enough lead it just gets harder and harder for the other side to catch up normally.

LinkN said:

It seems that way doesn't it.

OTOH, it isn't necessary for the CT score to be balanced. Indeed, I think that the OL must be ahead because he will inevitable be unable to spend a substantial chunk of his CT near the end of the campaign (assuming there is a final battle) due to time constraints.
However this is a serious mental switch for hero players to get their heads around....

All except our first games of RtL have been so finely balanced in the end that I don't see the need to modify RtL.
Strictly speaking Divine Favour is a SoB rule, not an Advanced Campaign rule. It hasn't been designed or tested for RtL (by FFG, though it is debatable whether much of their Descent expansion stuff has been tested in any meaningful way) and RtL hasn't been design or tested with Divine Favour. I guess I see it as a crutch for groups whose players aren't of balanced skills levels.

I'm lucky that I have one regular opponent at a very close (and I think reasonably high, through experience in Descent, Descent Advanced Campaigns and decades of strategic and tactical boardgames and miniature games) skill level. We both make mistakes but they often cancel and are usually small errors that have local small effects (a few CT from a kill gained or lost) rather than major strategic errors or tactical playstyles that have serious long-term consequences.

Well, since SoB came out after RtL, it could be that FFG just didn't think of the rule until after RtL had come out. But, this all depends on whether or not it's intended for the OL and heroes to have similar CP values by the end of the game; if not, it won't really do much good.