I was looking but I cant find anything really specific on this, and now I'm frustrated (for obvious other reasons), so I'm going to ask. What type of action can a hero take in town? Specificly, are they alowed to take full actions (run/battle/advance/ready) or only half actions (one of any; attack/move/ready). In Other words are the heros alowed to run out of town, or declare battle and use fatique to come back and make two attacks, or etc. etc.

If so, and the running in town is allowed(because the Hero begins his turn in town declaring the action), can the Hero begin shop mode, use three movement, and use the remainder of the movement to come back on the table that same turn?

Now number two; How many potions can a hero drink in town? Does the hero use one movement per potion drank to no limit on potions they can drink in town, or can the hero only drink only one potion per turn as normal?

A hero in town in non RtL Decent declares an action as normal. So yes they can run use 3 movement to shop and then return to the dungeon. They can battle and fatigue themselves back to the dungeon.

As far as I know you can still only drink one potion per turn.

Awsome, now my players will belive me with out calling me a cheater.

They wanted to do pretty much anything they want in the town, as in breaking down those three movement for 'shop mode' to only use one point for 'buy' and save the rest for other things. Also they want to think that they can drink, lets say 3 healing potions, 1 fatigue potion and an Invulnerability potion... all in the same turn from within the safety of the town.

Somewhat related to the original question, can familiars enter town? What happens to a familiar when its master dies?

Zearthling said:

Yep, this time its you thats right and them stretching things. These things happen in Descent (especially early on)...

Being in Town does not change most (any) of the standard (dungeon) rules for Descent. All being in Town gives you is the ability to 'shop' for 3MP. Everything else is normal - actions, spending MP, potion drinking limit (the limit of 1 potion per turn is in the FAQ on pg 1) etc etc.

Of course, being in town does also give you the benefit of being away from the monsters...

There are no rules that would cause anything to happen to a familiar when its master dies. And familiars can't perform movement actions, which means they can't use glyphs to teleport, so it's not normally possible for them to enter town.

quartermostly's answers about the town are also correct. Shopping costs 3 movement, no matter how much or how little shopping you want to do; heroes in town are still subject to all the normal rules and restrictions of heroes in the dungeon; going to or from town costs 1 movement point. Also note that you can't teleport both to and from town on the same turn, which makes it harder for heroes to use the glyphs as shortcuts or to perform hit-and-run attacks, and heroes in town do not have line-of-sight to any part of the dungeon, which sometimes affords the overlord some nice spawning opportunities.

McRae said:

Familars may not enter the town, as they can not use glyphs or move when the player dies. They just stay where they are, and can move and act normally at the end of the players turn. (as long as they can function out of LoS)

except for Furr the spirt wolf who can't attack if he is not in LoS of his owner and at maximum 5 squares distance.

Ok in regards to familiars in the basic rule set, (I know its off topic but it's in regards to the same game, same rule set)

Page 14 in the manual states:

•A familiar does not count as a Hero for the purposes of spawning monsters unless its description states otherwise.

With that reading of the rules, then the only Familiar that acts as a LoS obstacle for the OverLord(as hero's do) is Boggs the Rat. Am I correct in this, or does Mata and Kata act much the same way for LoS and spawning?

*I just know my players are going to hate the awnser that comes back, because I know I'm right, and everyone dislikes poor lil Boggs when they draw his skill, so I just wanted to make sure I'm right in defense of the poor thing*

Boggs is the only familiar that has any affect on spawning whatsoever. And Boggs is therefore awesome.

And he is also not affected by the Gust of Wind card, making him doubly effective (and I have to throw in my usual WTF about the ruling on that one, still don't agree with it even though it makes sense to a degree).

Why would they even think that Mata and Kata would affect spawning?

Well because they want an easy win everytime {and this still rarely happens}! lol

Look at it this way... If I have 2 familiars that have LoS rules, the overlord ( that's mostly me at my tables ) would be seriously handi-capped in regards to spawning monsters. Example: Mata watches the area behind the Hero's and Kata watches the area behind Mata. Not much room to spawn monsters now right? And even if you do, it will take 2-4 turns moving them within range to attack the Hero's at the front of the line.

Funny thing is the party makes me give them a big crutch {in my oppinion} by not allowing me to take the normal starting threat, just because its not specificly in the rules, and they only saw the fact that I start even DJitD Quest #1 with one threat token for each hero recently here at the FAQ boards. But If some one else wants to try the OL position, you can bet they want that starting threat!

Oh, that's why your hero party likes the ferrets.

No, Mata and Kata are item holders. That's all.

Yes and Yes.

Thank you and thank you!

Zearthling said:

Wait, what? The overlord normally begins the game with 3 cards and zero threat, then collects 1 threat per hero (and draws 2 cards) at the start of each turn.

And 2-4 threat one time during the game one way or the other hardly qualifies as a "big crutch" for either side. That's probably less than the variance you get from the randomness in card draws or from monsters generating threat with surges.

Then take the example of 'basic campaign play' in the original Dscent Quest guide on the first page of the insert.

At an Average Hero Level of 2, the over lord draws +1 card (making your starting hand of cards for the OL 4 cards instead of 3) and +1 threat token per player. Now it says nowhere in starting setup to take one threat per Hero to start the game. But I do know I saw something to this same effect here at these forums stating something to the effect that this was a clerical error in the rule book, and the OverLord is supposed to draw one threat token per player to start with average Hero Levels at '1'. Whith that in mind, the above bonus for the OverLord concerning starting threat and adding +1 threat token per player to start the game suddenly makes sense. Tell me if im wrong, because now you have me slightly confused.

OK: you're wrong.

Straight out of the FAQ, first page, under "errata":

"A step is missing from the “Game Setup” rules on page 6 of the rulebook: The overlord player should start with 3 overlord cards and 0 threat tokens."

If someone on this forum told you differently, then I'm sorry, but they were wrong.

You're correct that the basic campaign play rules do say that you start with plus one threat per hero and that this implies that you would begin the game with threat in at least some quests, but since the rules clearly state that you don't normally start with any threat, that overrides. It's possible that they designed those rules when they weren't quite sure yet whether the overlord would start the game with any threat, or that there are some quests (existing or planned) where the quest instructions cause you to start with some threat, but the FAQ is more explicit and more recent than the basic campaign rules, so it wins.

Ok then I'm wrong about that. It's no sweat off my back anyway as I still win +70% of the games I sit in as OverLord with 0 starting threat for quest one in the original rules.

That's the spirit!

Zearthling said:

He's talking about the basic campaign mode varriant which is explained on the first page of the quest guide in JitD where players can reuse the same heroes from quest to quest and can gain "levels" by surviving quests and get to start out with bonus money/potions/treasure instead of just resetting entirely back to the default character settings, the OL then also gets a bonus based on the average level of the combined hero party including extra cards and starting threat. It's quite possible the OL is supposed to get threat with hero party base level of 1.

My copy is all the way on the other side of the house and can't be bothered to go get it at the moment, tho may not make much difference if it is an errata in the written rules but I do have a newer printing of the game and a bunch of the rules have been fixed from earlier printings (My core game skeleton/beastman cards are the same as in WoD, I now have 2 identical copies)