I overlord for my group, more often than not. And when I OL, I have a near-unbroken string of brutal victories.
Last night, we had Mad Carthos, Battlemage Jaes, and Steelhorns attempting The Hall of the Monkey Kings, supposedly one of the easier quests. Steelhorns had Bear Tattoo, Furr the Spirit Wolf, and Weapon Mastery - good offense and defence, and grapple to protect Carthos. Carthos had Spiritwalker, Necromancy, and Sharr the Brightwing - awesome combination. Jaes had Blessing, Telekinesis, and Ox Tattoo - maybe not as good as the other sets but still solid. They seemed all set to take it on... and then they died, painfully and repeatedly.
Carthos died first, just after opening Area 3. He'd killed two of the Razorwings before they even got to act and had one of them as a zombie, but the others managed to exploit grapple's "only one held per square" rule to squeeze past Steelhorns and get to him, and a Skeleton Patrol provided enough firepower to take him down. Now that every monster was out of the room, Jaes entered to open runes and get working on the music box (clever use of fatigue potions made this not too bad) while Steelhorns held the door and kept line of site down the hall while killing things out there.
Bad move, as it turns out. A Beastman War Party, with Dark Servant for another Master Beastman, meant that they and the Master Razorwing (peasant in disguise) were swinging for massive damage. Eighteen health sounds like a lot until things are swinging at you for 9's and 10's against three armor. Beastmen have +1 damage; with two Masters that's Command x2 so effectively +3 damage. Doom was out, so they did average 7.8 damage, and the masters were doing average 9.3. That, plus the master razorwing, plus the couple skeletons that were left, meant Steelhorn dropped in a single round.
After that they recovered a little. With the music box solved, the first bronze treasure opened (Crystal Shield, Cloak of Deception, Gauntlets of Power - nothing offensive but all useful), and a couple runes to recoup conquest, they headed over to Area 2.
This is where things got pearshaped. Stalling them with more skellies got me Horde of the Things just before they were ready to open, and their starting gambit only actually managed to kill the two beastmen I clogged the door with, and maybe one of the minions. So when I summoned Bane Spiders to pincir them, and brought the Blood Ape out, they managed not to make any forward progress into the room or kill any more of the skeletons. Bane Spiders went down fast, but the Blood Ape soaked several good hits and ended the round still alive and in good position. So when I summoned another Beastman War Party and hammered into them with arrows backed by Pierce and Command and Doom, the entire party got shredded. All three fell, leaving a meagre two Conquest left.
So, they pull themselves together, come charging out of the portal at the bottom, manage to kill the blood ape and the master beastman... and then I summoned a Master Manticore behind them, used Rage, and proceeded to completely shred Mad Carthos.
Game over.
This seems pretty typical of my victories. Nasty, brutish, and short. Or at least, short in terms of forward progress of the heroes. I can almost invariably tangle them up and make them waste time by spawning in inconvenient places, pegging heroes with rest or guard orders placed, using traps to interrupt key bits of movement, etc. And then, when they're all tied up with that, I'll build up the threat so that when they enter a new zone I can bring down the pain. It works brutally effectively - I've had several different sets of players, and every single group gets crushed. Last time we did Last Wishes I even let them pick their skills, so of course Nanok was there with a Ring of Protection and Enduring for ridiculous armor, Talhia with Leadership for guard orders every turn, etc. And it was still a slog, we had to cancel due to time but they were struggling.
So I ask you guys, is there anything you think I'm doing wrong? Is the OL not intended to be played this brutally? Am I screwing up some major rules issues? Or should a good team be able to roll with it and win anyway?
And, if it's simply that I can outplay the rest of my group by too big a margin, can you make any recommendations to even the score? I do play heroes occasionally and let other people OL, but I prefer OLing and the rest of the group prefers playing the hero side. Is our group simply doomed to failure if we persist in that?