My issue with this first quest so far has been once the East-Gate leaves play, a crap ton of enemies that have built up in the staging area engage a bunch of quest-exhausted heroes and allies and kills most of my heroes (usually 2/3). I find this terribly annoying. This scenario feels a lot like Conflict, where you have to try not to quest too much too soon, but at the same time you have to at least neutralize the threat or you will get overwhelmed. Anyone else beat this yet, and how do you manage to do it? It would seem that once you finally flip to stage 2b it is relatively easy to win at that point. I could see this much easier with 2 or more players. At least you have way more options. Enough of me resorting to the scaling issue again.

DurinIII said:

sorry man... i cant help here (not yet, give it a few days...hopefully), but are the scaling issues present in khazd? i looked the quests over and they didnt seem too bad, but seeing a playings a whole different world as we know

Well, you know me Rich, I often complain about scaling issues. It's too early for me to say definitively one way or another, but man, these Orcs and Goblins are kicking my butt!

DurinIII said:

yes getting nostalgic over them posts haha.....there does seem to be alot of heavy enemies released, and if i remember rightly alot of surge cards which is an interesting point...but that obviously doesnt mean the scaling has to be off, so im not sure....on the plus side i noticed stray goblin (which by the way looks awesome) is alot less formidable solo

I haven't got my copy yet but I have it on order.. might take a while.. so here are smoe general tips

Quest always seam hard at first. If I have problems with a quest take some time to dissect it after a few trys. Like your playing a single player game so you are only revealing a single card each round baring quest effects I do not know of.. so go though the cards and get an idea of how much threat is getting added each turn. No point in questing for a billion when you only need 4 or 5 to keep the counters flowing. Another good trick is to go though and look at exactly what treacheries there are. Look closely, and decide on what will really blow you out and what you can live with. Then build some kind of counter into the deck, and have the patience to NEVER cast them unless your marked cards turn up. As for massive monsters, there is always Frodo. Some fast hitches and a support of the egals (tap for +4 defense minimum) or the duadane things makes him the king of blockers and the threat thing means no matter WHAT the creature, you will survive. Another cool trick for monsters is in fighting, you can put dmg on a weaker defense monster, and transfer that dmg across to the big hardcore one. If you are lucky there is a manageable monster with very high hit points... qed.. snare that ***** and instant death as soon as the "real" scary guy comes out.

I finally beat this quest solo after a few tries. Went with a Dain, Gimli, Bifur, Dwarf-Themed deck. For the first stage of the quest, or a least when the east gate was the active location, I quested as much as I could. I didn't want all the enemies filling up in the staging area like you said. Also, I risked using the cave torch as much as possible. Getting the extra progress tokens on locations is a real help, considering some of them are pretty high.

You are right that this quest is somewhat similar to conflict where you have to watch your questing, and build up your allies, especially before you get to stage 3. If you control it right, you can build up enough, so you have enough quest points to get past the last stage in a single round. This is probably the way to go, seeing the restriction to resources for stage three is so harsh.

Threat was the hardest thing to control in this scenario I think. In every game I lost, it was because of this. The doom 2, surge cards are pretty brutal, and I had nothing in my deck to stop them. In the game I won, I think I finished with a threat of 47, and that was with playing GG and Gandalf a couple times.

I'm currently having trouble with the second scenario right now, which seems to have way more enemies then the first. Difficulty 3 seems too low for it.

What's the difficulty score of the quest you're talking about? I should be getting my copy today so I can give my thoughts and I do plan on making a dwarf deck of some sort just for the hell of it.

Hey Will, difficulty 5 for the first quest in the set. I still haven't beaten it.

Just got it today. Played a few games, realized real quick that the threat builds up quick on you too! Only got as far as the bridge of khazad-dum once.

It sure does! I have found this quest to be quite challenging so far. Curse those Goblin Swordsmen!

I just played this quest and **** it's hard. You really have to push past the East Gate fast, but also have some allies to block any attacks that will surely head your way. I was lucky and only had 2 Goblin Swordsmans move down. But I didn't make it further than that. My questing power was overpowered by the high threat locations and that **** Goblin Scout that came up. What made it worse was I had few allies and nearly every shadow card was either a Goblin Swordsman or a Goblin Spearmen! I was soon overrun by 5 or so enemies... Oh, and Sudden Pitfall is evil! I lost Dain.

We had great difficulties in our 3 player games and still haven't beaten the first quest... spent tons of will the first round to start getting closer to the Bridge, plowed through East Gate, Strength of Willed the 2nd location and then got buried in high threat locations when the nasty events weren't slapping us around. Even Northern Trackers couldn't save us, lost Ironfoot when Beorn got flipped off the deck for the "cost vs HP" event and eventually called it quits on our last try after one player hit 50 threat. I can't even imagine how brutal it gets once you pass the Bridge! We thought maybe it was bad card luck or a bad shuffle, but we were no more successful on our 2nd try. This is difficulty 5? We're having more problems with this one than any quest besides Osgiliath!

Just had the first try at into the pit with 2 players. Nearly got out of stage one but wound up getting all three condition attachments on our heroes with no miner in sight the whole game. Was quite fun. Personally, if i was able to blow the doors off of these quests right out of the box i would be terribly disappointed. I just remember all the great battles i had (and still sometimes have) with JDtA and I'm hoping for more of that. Bring it on Moria!

2 of my hobbits and I played a couple of games tonight. Got no further than the bridge. Then, afterwards by myself, using a lore/leadership deck with what cards were left aftere they made their decks, I took glorfindel, Dain, and denethor all the way to 3b but got a doomed card that round that put me over 50. Had gandalf showed up, I think I could have won. I had a few rounds where kuz of the bridge and not getting very expensive cards, I stacked up resources with steward of gondor on glorfindel, so instead of fighting off my enemies in 2b, I just paid off the remaining quest tokens with my longboard mapmaker. Even though I would not have been able to collect resources on 3b, if I could have made 1 more round, I think I would have had enough tokens and will power to quest through.

Well I just won. I actually blew through it without trouble. I had good luck throughout to be honest. I used Bifur, Thalin and Dain and I got Gandalf and a few other good allies on my starting hand. Next draw was Steward of Gondor which I attached to Bifur, who at later turns got that belt allowing him to multipshere effectivly with all those resources. The encounter deck didn't put up much of a fight. Patrol Leader was sniped by Gandalf the 2nd turn allowing me to quest a lot but what was revealed was one location that replaced the active location, East Gate at the time, but I plowed through that turn and East Gate the next turn. Only a single Golbin Swordsman was on the field to meet me after East Gate was gone, which was damaged already thanks to Thalin and a my Gondorian Spearmen made quick work of him.

The start of the next turn was me looking at an empty staging area with First Hall as an active location, I plowed through that with having many dwarf allies beside me. The encounter deck revealed Burning Low treachery, but since there was nothing in the staging area, it had no effect. So, First Hall down, 10 progress on the quest so far and I traveled o Bridge of Khazad-Dum. Mineshaft was the new card revealed by the encounter deck, but even with it's 5 threat, I was able to explore the Bridge and make the mineshaft my new active location. Stage 2 of the quest begins, and I had to choose the Patrol Leader to enter the staging area, but of course, he was all alone at that point. I didn't kill him that round when he engaged, but he was at 1 health by turn's end. I then draw Longbeard Orc Slayer who killed Patrol Leader when he was played, allowing me to move onto Stage 3 before I even quested... The final turn was no contest. The encounter deck revealed a Goblin Follower, but his "when reveled" effect makes him engage the last player, so he didn't contribute threat, once again, the staging area was clear and I had exactly 12 will power to finish the quest off.

I doubt this will happen again, I got extremely lucky here but ****, it was cool. I'd figure the Golbin Patrol Leader would shrug off Gandalf's damage, or every other damage, but he went down without much of a fight. I'm going to try it again, but I have a feeling my luck has run out.

Soullos: just one thought, east gate is not affected by card effects, so we have always played that that one location you spoke of, cannot remember its name, does not kick east gate out.

Zjb12 said:

Ah, yeah you're right. I've always read that it is immune to player cards. Oops. So, that game would've been easier... Oh, I've played 2 more after than and couldn't get past East Gate again lol. Got Doomed 2, Surge cards twice in a row during setup on one game...

Just squeaked out my first win! Same deck mentioned last night. Denethor does help give some control and idea of when it is best to use the torch. Wow, I went into 3b this time though with only 1 leadership token. Wish I'd have had PoL for all the cards left at the end. Had a 46 threat with three enemies engaged, 2 Heros with only 1 hit point left, another with 3 left and two of my allies damaged as well. Risked it all two rounds in a row on the quest, except for Dain. (had to after the round where when I had 10 progress tokens I lost them all due to cave in!)

beat this first attempt solo. Used Dunhere, Bilbo and Dwalin (though he could be replaced, any good defence dude, as I never used his lower threat ability) + a Song Leadership Splash Steward, marks, warnings and Sneak attack. MVP is Riversong. Being able to peak at the encounter deck means you can quest the exact ammount needed, if there are dark locations in play you can see if it is safe to use torch, if it is USE it.. as that discards a card from encounter deck... kinda like a free Denathor ability. Get your army out... use marks on dunhere to kill off mobs in the staging area, then just run home... make sure steward is out, as then you can draw resources during 3b. Use warnings on your high defence hero (Dwalin for me) to soak up Patrolleader dmg . I ended with a high threat, my deck coudl do with some tweaks to make it more efficiant... if you like i can post the deck

It seamed WAY easy... maybe I played a rule wrong or somthing as it was my first go?

Booored, can you use steward of gondor to bypass the quest card?

Zjb12 said:

The quest card says you can not collect resources during the REFRESH phase. Any resource engine you use will still get you resources, even though you do not get the "normal" 1 for each hero. So in that phase, damadge on gloin will give you resources, steward will give you resources and that new miner guy that discards from your deck combo'd with gildor will give you resources... etc etc etc

Thanks! I think I actually had steward on when I won it the other day! Washed I had known that, wold have made it easier!

I got Khazad-Dum tonight and try the first quests against my Glorifindel, Frodo, Bilbo deck which is show very good results in Shadow of mirkwood cycle.....

What can i say? I play 4 games. Win only 1. 3 games i lose.......... Cool! Very hard quest and very interesting as well!

Khasad-Dum is something really good!

Glaurung said:

thought you'd like it glaurung!

Glaurung said:

Wait until you play it co-op. My buddy and I went 3-0 playing all three new quests in a row. So I'll beat you to the punch and say Khazad-dum is easy.

We both even created entirely new decks for ourselves (I used Beravor, Dunhere, Eowyn, and my friend used Thalin, Brand son of Bain, Legolas) just to see how we'd do against Flight from Moria. Still won.

It was fun (especially Flight from Moria), but still felt easy.