Ok so the overlord preview is up. Good information and lots of cards. Discuss.

www.fantasyflightgames.com/edge_news.asp

Interesting stuff.

First of all, turn summary cards, yummy. Now I don't have to keep creating and uploading turn summary cards (i have one for the first edition if needed).

Overlord cards

For the Cataclysm Campaign in the 1st edition, I had a lot of fun seeing the heroes sweat over the time pressure of losing conquest tokens, so it will be interesting to see what keeps heroes from dilly dallying in the 2nd ed.

I really like the idea of the customization, especially if heroes use the same strategy over and over (Bogran shielding or breach and clear blast spamming).

Monster cards

Monster ability rules on the cards, even more yummy! Now I don't have to create any monster ability summary-- you know the drill.

The group number looks like it will balance the difficulty between 2 and 4 heroes. Despite a monster being stronger in the 1st ed, that extra hero getting that extra attack appeared easier for the heroes, and I had listed how many monsters would appear based on the number of players in Cataclysm JotD.

Traits seem neat as well, since each quest can have a theme or similar monsters, and might mean that heroes have to change their gameplay to suit the situation than what they are used to and learn something new.

It's looking like not all the quests will be find named boss and kill them, if the barely readable quest in the preview is anything to go by. Plus the OL is guaranteed spawns every turn the heroes can not prevent that will get to act before the heroes do, so that should keep some pressure up.

It looks like my wife will enjoy playing the overlord even more now thanks to the customization options.

The most important piece of information gleaned from this, that the converted first edition cards are indeed integrated into second edition quest content.

I thought they may be very limited, but the preview shows us how easily they can interract with Second edition.

I am more excited now than I initially was.

Is it July yet?

Is it?

Is it!!?

At first I didn't know how this would work, but after looking over the latest OL preview it is all starting to make sense. Now I just want to see how they categorized all of the enemy units. From the few they showed they kinda make sense, but I would argue that some of them can fit into more categories then just two. Maybe down the road they might have one that would be able to be played in all types.

The one thing that really stuck out in my mind was the updated sorcerers card. It has a feat type move just like the heroes and it is named summon. From the little that I was able to make out on the card behind the sorcerers card it states something on the lines of: Choosing a monster to summon in an empty space. That is a cool ability that I did not see coming from a unit like him. Our OL hated using the sorcerers before since he has the worst luck with them, but maybe this will redeem themselves.

I am still not clear on how the OL wins against the heroes. Right now it looks like to me that if the heroes don't finish the objectives they lose. More of a RPG vibe then the first edition. I hope that the next preview will be more clear cut on the winning and losing conditions of the game. Otherwise, I have no clue what next weeks preview will look like. Any ideas?

I am also impressed with them for releasing a new updated hero card from the first edition on their facebook page every week. At least they give us some power with our votes. Granted the one I voted for came in second. Hopefully this week my vote for Ispher will help him win.

kerred said:

Dilly-dallying in what way?

OL CARDS

Somewhat, i was stuned with the "overloard draw one card at the start of his turn" but when i look closly on some cards, there are mechanic "hero resists your card, draw a new one".

I am also happy, that you can modify your deck much further then in 1E. It seems that you now make much more strategic decisions abour your deck build.

LIEUTNANTS

They are alive… weee

MONSTER GROUPS

Well, that is a nice move! Encounters will now have more thematic sense

Deleted post. Deleted post.

Deleted post. Deleted post.

No line of site for spawning…

No Conquest points…

This ain't your Daddy's shotgun, cowboy!

I think I need clarification on what the "Monster Group Limitation" icons mean.

Does it mean the following: 2:1 ratio, 3:1 ration & 4:1 ratio. Therefor meaning: you could have 4 goblin archers with 2 heroes, 9 goblin archers with 3 heroes and 16 goblin archers with 4 heroes.

Is that right?

Kozanator said:

You could have 2 goblin archers minions with 2 heroes, 3 goblin archers minions with 3 heroes and 4 goblin archers minions with 4 heroes.

Minions are white figures.

And with each group you could have 1 master goblin archer. Red goblin archer figure.

The group limit numbers are not ratios. They are simply how many of each type (minion and master) you can have with a given number of heroes.

Thank you for the clarification. That sounds much better.

I really like everything I've seen so far. I can't wait to read the rules and try it out. I loved Decent v1 although to be fair I was just getting into it end of last year and have not really played the expansions extensively. But it really seems that they have made and effort to fix some of the gripes I've heard from people who I tried to teach the game to.

One more thing, I'm really excited about the campaign. I am in the middle of my first Road to Legend campaign with a friend and we started at copper. We've put in about 8 all day sessions starting in January and we are just now reaching the halfway point of silver. It's fairly close in points with a slight edge to the heroes. I absolutely love it but it's just taking forever. I don't think I'll ever do it again just because of how much time you need to commit to it (from copper at least). And that's my only gripe - it takes forever. I'm looking forward to a scaled down (time/commitment) campaign that is more theme oriented, rather than "kill the boss" oriented.

As far as 1E being to complex, I've never had a problem explaining the game to people but there is a lot to manage when you throw in all the expansions. I'm looking forward to the more streamlined rules and hopefully my girlfriend will like this one and play it with me.

We already know about the OL having the ability to specialize his deck to fit his playing stay with the example of the Saboteur class. So, do we know what the other classes are or might be?

IronRavenstorm said:

If they follow the general pattern of the RtL "classes" then there will be specialisation in traps, monsters and spells.

Hope the next preview states the game's objectives, and how to gain and spend XPs. How does the OL win? By getting a certain number of knockouts? Will this then mean that games will still end in the middle of a quest as the OL reaches his objective? Is that how he gets XP for campaign play as well? Stuff like that.

Columbob said:

The next preview will likely be about objectives and how to gain (though not spend) XP.

I imagine the objectives for each quest are specific to that quest. So for example, for A Fat Goblin, I imagine the encounter ends once all bundles of crops have been either stolen or stored. Then each side gains XP according to how many bundles they collected. Probably the OL can also get bonus XP for achieving a TPK.

Hopefully the OL won't need to constantly prey on the weaker members of the team either.

Columbob said:

From what we can tell, the OL needs to have every member of the hero party defeated simultaneously to achieve a TPK.

Well in the 1st Edition, you couldn't just waste turn after turn resting, shopping, and re-arranging before opening the next door.

kerred said:

It's looking like there's no chance for heroes to really do any of that often in second edition. It's looking like the town has been completely phased out, as well as buying equipment or skills with gold. And it looks like the rest order has become a possible skill since i didn't see any mention of all heroes being able to do it.