Well your thief, instead of running for treasures as you stated, could be chasing down and killing the 2 hp goblin archers. Surely he could put out enough damage for that. If you were using fatigue to move grisban (who plenty of people stated is pretty awful due to his low movement speed), the overlord could not legally use tripwire, as that requires a move action, not just a move. I would say use grisban and your runemaster as your top damage dealers to clear out the damage soaking blockers, and the thief and spiritspeaker to run around and chase the objective chasers. I would also recommend killing the objective seekers instead of running around and wasting precious actions on searching if your party is having their tail end handed to them that quickly. You don't have time to waste on a search, and can do that after you are no longer in danger of losing. If you were to go back and change your party, I would recommend tossing grisban, use syndrael instead, toss your hobbit for jain, and use the wildlander class. Switch runemaster for a necromancer for extra damage. I think your party composition is pretty slow and it is hurting your overall movement, which may be contributing to the overlord winning anything that has to do with race to win.

Losman2001 said:

Unfortunately, if playing by the rules, characters/classes may not be swapped out once a campaign has started.

That being said, it may be worth going back to the beginning and redesigning the party. I have seen Gisban be very effective, but the 3 movement can create more problems than his ability solves.

KristoffStark said:

Yeah, that's what I meant, if needs be, scrap the party and start anew.

Losman2001 said:

Well I would like to try out other class/party set ups - this was our first campaign so we were just winging it. Just so much time investment to get up to speed and learn all the classes, compared to how often we can play.

Maybe my dice rolls suck, but I found even the goblins weren't worth going after with the thief because 1dmg was usually my average output - I very early on gave up on combat with my character after several rolls of no damage getting through. So the strategy became run around and search to get the money to try and upgrade for the next quest and maybe catch up to the overlord in progress.

I'll stop complaining about the classes - since that's not really the point of this thread - until we try more of them. But it does seem confirmed that with the right (or wrong) hero party make up choices and just a small number of bad dice rolls on combat, that the OL can pretty much just block and run to victory on the quests we played. Guess I'm just not a fan of that play style so far - I don't feel like a hero conquering a dungeon.

I'm hoping there's more variety in the encounter design for act 2…

Certainly a change coming over from D1 of what dice rolls will mean, and how you progress through and encounter - still learning it all. But boy has it been frustrating experience so far. Surprisingly though, everyone seems willing to keep trying!

I'll definitely agree that D2 feels very different than D1 (which I still prefer). Hopefully you have better luck your next time around, and now you know the kind of nasty you are dealing with when it comes to the overlord and race objectives. And hey, I'm also not saying that it isn't a difficult strategy to contend against. I am very curious to see how your next roundabout goes.

Can any other OL's attest to this strategy in a real game sense? Is it really as bad as the OP says or was it just bad dice/char selection? I play the OL in my group and while I agree with the OL a bit in that, this is a game I am trying to win… I can definitely see where it would stop being fun regardless of what anyone thought of the tactic.

Again, looking to see if any other OL's have used this to the same effect.

Might I suggest a few simple additions to the rules?

For Heroes?
Solution to Monsters Blocking Spaces
Rolling (Cost a move action) - Attempt to sneak passed the monster. Make an Awareness check, but roll the two grey dice for 4 square monsters, roll brown and grey dice for 6 square monsters. If check succeeds place hero on any square adjacent to the monster.

For Overlords?
Solution to lack of Damage Output
If not enough damage is being dealt you could make a simple change such as auto damage based on size of monster. Size of 4 squares have Pierce 1 and Size of 6 squares have Pierce 2. If this still isn't enough make Pierce 3 for the 6 space monsters.

This will make large monsters deal more damage but also be easier to avoid for the weaker heroes. The heroes taking the hits will feel that they are contributions to the group synergy and the OL should feel the power of larger monsters.

KristoffStark said:

I can confirm Grisban is quite nasty when played effectively. I played him the entire duration at Realms of Terrinoth, and did very well, and one of my hero players is currently using him in our campaign and consistently being a major thorn in my side. Just saying.

I believe ya, but unless the OP can put him on rollerskates, it won't help him much with his current situation.

I'd also like to add that not all the quests are "balanced". Most quests are tilted in favor, one way or the other, towards OL/Heroes.

I'm sure this is by design, and entirely the reason the winner picks the next adventure to do. 9 times out of 10, the heroes should win the introduction, it is VERY slanted in heroes favor. After the win, the heroes need to pick an adventure they are prepared to win, not just whatever has the best rewards.

Everything in the adventure book is public knowledge. Use that to your advantage, you know the overlord will.

As I posted on the first page, I am an Overlord with the exact same experience.

As I said before, our solution to the problem of D2's lackluster combat was to house rule that monsters cannot take two move actions in the same turn (exception Dash cards).

This has forced me (the Overlord) to actually roll some attacks and makes it much harder to just block a hallway with a big beast.

HOWEVER, I still do manage to block hallways with big beasts (either ettin or shadow dragon due to the double gray defense die) and my smaller creatures still go for the objective above all else. Even with the house rule, I still have won every encounter (as Overlord).

Someone said something to the effect that the Overlord should pull punches to ensure the players have a good time. I couldn't disagree more. In fact, none of my group would play with me if they found out I was pulling punches as that ruins any concept of a fair competition (they don't want a pity win).

Descent is, and has always been, very much a competition between a group of four players and a single player (the Overlord). One side wins and the other side loses. It is not Dungeons & Dragons.

If the Overlord wins every time then there's a flaw in the rules of D2, not a flaw in the playstyle of the Overlord. My players agree with this sentiment, and for what it's worth, I don't think the heroes are doing anything wrong - the rules are flawed and we're thinking of returning to D1.

In the cardinals plight, the door doesn't open until they open it, using the key, not just finding it. And if the heroes left enough space for a dragon to block them … that was tottaly on them.

Well played OL!

Mrbob0069 said:

Mrbob, I edited that part out about the Cardinal's Plight. But we played it as you said, the door was still closed. AND they had to kill a master shadow dragon before they could even open it.

But when the Shadow Dragon is in the room with two heroes trying to kill it and another at the altar trying to heal the priest there was still just enough room to scoot the dragon past the first two on one turn, blocking them in. Then on the second turn I was able to move again and block the door. Granted, there were only three heroes, but also granted, had there been four I would have had TWO dragons instead of just one.

Some thoughts:

* ROLL RED DICE. Yellow dice won't take down a 2-Grey dice monster unless you have a special ability to back it up. Pierce +2 cancels a white die, as does the Longsword's Surge. Stun is good!

* BLOW THROUGH YOUR SPECIAL ABILITIES ASAP. The more monsters you mow down or Stun during your first turn, the fewer units he has on the board to control the terrain. Oh, and he'll have fewer units to attack you with.

* BLOW THROUGH YOUR FATIGUE. After you engage the monsters, you should be attacking twice per turn!

* SPEED IS ESSENTIAL: Players need to move ASAP to control the board.

We did this with 3 players as well, and on other side of door was shadow dragon. We knew that the OL can't open the door AND the monsters can't act until the door is open. So we used that to our advantage by NOT opening the door until we were all in place and had a full round of hero actions to use. We then opend the door (thief had a skill to do it with out an action), picked up key and ran, stamina stamina to cardinals door. Waiting in hall was Ranger elf girl and familiar. with Necro at heal alter. Once we saw the dragon the rest of the turn was spent NOT leaving a 2x3 space for him to stand in.

My point is, the heroes have the advantage of going first. If they choose to open the door when they have no actions left to react to what comes out. Thats jus poor playing on their part. The heroes have to play stratigicly too. not just rush forward like a raving band of maurauding orcs hoping to overpower the OL.

Funny, people over at BGG have no problem with blocking heroes.

"Setup: Goblins(?) and zombies placed all around the guests in the 2 rooms they can spawn in - as well as 4 across blocking entrance

Turn 1: Goblins activate - move 2 forward to open the door in the way (path is now clear to exit). with remaining goblins identify 3 partiers

Zombies activate - identify 3 other partiers (for a total of 6)

Note: any 'cultists' got to do stuff too

Turn 2: all of our 4 villagers were already in the hands of monsters - all monsters run (move 2x) and leave the map. Game over…."

So, the OL setup 5 creatures only a couple of spaces away from the group and somehow all of them survived the first turn? Did the 4 man group of heroes miss every attack they should have been taking to completely decimate the first room?

Mrbob0069 said:

The heroes went first, sure. Then I went and they saw that the guy they had to save lost almost half of his health under a barrage of zombie fists. After my second turn, they realized they had only two more turns, three if they were lucky, to get to him. That didn't leave any room for rest actions or healing. It was bad that they got spread out, sure. But the cleric was tied up using the altar to heal and the others went as fast as they could.

I've been at the same table and I'm really not sure what I'd do differently than the heroes are doing to try and win.

Slinthas said:

I actually agree with much of what you've said here. Heroes should start with either brown defense dice, or actual equipment cards that give them their base defense (i.e. the grey dice they start with is ASSUMED chainmail, meaning they cannot put on another layer of mail). Any new armour should REPLACE what was there before, IMO. And with the significantly lower damage output now, having armour greatly improved could cause a huge issue in games (and it seems it has done, looking at this thread).

Slightly related to this, I wonder why they made all armour dice six sided. Battle of Westeros shows they are prepared to make custom eight sided dice, I wonder why we didn't see an eight sided black defense dice. The armour value might not change, but the chance of rolling a blank is reduced. Just a thought.

How did the OL block Tomble in a hallway? His feat would allow him to bypass the monster where he could run down the goblins.

Zcurator said:

Zcurator said:

I don't think many people have a problem with it here either - they are just lurking and not posting… like I have been. It's a good and viable tactic for the Overlord. MAKE the heroes come and fight. As an OL I have, and will, continue to use that as a strategy! Force the heroes to use their once per encounter feats if they are combat feats etc, force them to use fatigue to get more movement and damage, anything.

You are the Overlord - not a Dungeon Master - you are an evil force set to destroy the heroes and thwart their feeble plans. The heroes need to deal with it and react and adapt to whatever the OL throws at them. SURE the game still needs to be fun… but taking away blocking of heroes would severely unbalance the game IMO.

Quoting on these boards is terrible. This is to Efidm

First off, you are just flat out wrong. The Grey dice has the sides of 0, 1, 1, 1, 2, 3. This is an average of 1.33 shields per roll.

Secondly, armor does not flat out double your defense. Some armor increases by a brown die. The armor you got did, but that increase it to 2.66. A full damage lower on average. Also, why would you ever attck a player over a more squishy target unless you had to? That's just dumb. Also, I don't know how your 'cleric' is adding i grey dice, since cleric is not a class. If it is the spiritspeaker's base ability, it can only be done once a turn. If it is the Disciples Armor of Faith, it only adds brown dice.

First off, most of the player's power increase come from skills they buy, and they are hardly 'lacking'. Secondly let's compare the basic Battleaxe to the Act 1 battleaxe. Same dice? Yup. Inate powers, improved axe has pierce. Surges? Improved damage surge is double that of the base one, and it can increase its pierce even more. I don't see how this is minor at all, that's a regular +2 damage.

Also, you were expecting each goblin to have as much HP (the same 'base stats') as the wizard? Like 8 each? That would be insane and all but impossible for the players to win.

So every level should just be you flinging hundreds of monsters at the players for 3 hours? That did exactly that in 1st ed. It was terrible. Yes, if you use your goblin archers to fire exclusively at the tank in the chainmail with 14 HP and a healer standing up his ass they wont do much. Attack someone else. It isn't that difficult.

Draffut said:

You have managed to entire miss the point of every single thing you replied to.

Secondly, armor does not flat out double your defense. Some armor increases by a brown die. The armor you got did, but that increase it to 2.66. - Yes, SOME doesnt, but we were talking about the one we experienced, and 2.66 is double 1.33.

Also, why would you ever attck a player over a more squishy target unless you had to? That's just dumb. - I agree, sadly there was a Knight in the group so I dont have a freaking choice. They FORCE YOU to attack them. Just one of thier abilities and you can believe if someone is playing the meatshield, they are going to meatshield.

Also, I don't know how your 'cleric' is adding i grey dice, since cleric is not a class. - Cleric is the Archtype, Spiritspeaker is the class….I work on a game called Rift, where Cleric is the Class, and Spiritspeaker would be the soul, its just a terminology difference, means the same crap. Nitpicking that seems a bit rediculous. As for the ability its called: Stoneskin - it reads When you or a hero within 3 spaces is attacked, before dice are rolled, exhaust this card to add 1 additional grey dice to that hero's defense pool. So yeah thats how the Cleric (and it IS STILL A CLERIC just because it subspecialized in Spiritspeaker) adds an extra grey dice.

First off, most of the player's power increase come from skills they buy, and they are hardly 'lacking'. Secondly let's compare the basic Battleaxe to the Act 1 battleaxe. Same dice? Yup. Inate powers, improved axe has pierce. Surges? Improved damage surge is double that of the base one, and it can increase its pierce even more. I don't see how this is minor at all, that's a regular +2 damage. - You miss the point. There is no smooth ramp up in grear/player power. Adding Surge 1 to a weapon is FAR FAR stronger than say adding an extra power dice in D1 was. Small incremental increase in Player Power is a better DESIGN philosophy than, doubling your damage output with your first weapon upgrade, or doubling your armor with your first armor upgrade. Adding pierce 1 to the upgrade for the battleaxe means that, after the FIRST ADVENTURE, the ones that the players have to activly try to lose, if the player win (they will!) the melee damage dealers cut 80% of ALL MONSTERS FOR THE NEXT 4 ADVENTURES, armor from 1.33 to .33 or less. That is a 75% decrease in all monsters' defense except for Dragons and Ettins, oh and Zombies who only have brown so its even more drastic. 1 in 3 rolls you will block 1 shield of damage. You don't think that's a bit drastic for a FIRST UPGRADE? Players already 1 round entire monster groups, why do they need that much help? And I'm not even talking here about surge spending.

Also, you were expecting each goblin to have as much HP (the same 'base stats') as the wizard? Like 8 each? That would be insane and all but impossible for the players to win. - I wasnt expecting anything, I said, Even if they had the same stats as Heros, the heros would roflstomp them in 1 round because of the sever disparity in comparitive power. I.E. - They suck too much to ever use for anything other than double run actions.

So every level should just be you flinging hundreds of monsters at the players for 3 hours? That did exactly that in 1st ed. It was terrible. Yes, if you use your goblin archers to fire exclusively at the tank in the chainmail with 14 HP and a healer standing up his ass they wont do much. Attack someone else. It isn't that difficult. - No, nowhere did I say that I had that expectation. What I said was I am disincentivized to engage in combat with anything besides Ettins or Dragons because nothing else will live 1 TURN so that I can actually attack with them, LET ALONE DO DAMAGE! - And the EXACT set up you describe with a Tank and Healer standing side by side at the forefront is what you deal with when you have a Knight + Spiritspeaker, oh and hey guess what? As already stated THE KNIGHT GETS TO CONTROLL WHERE I ATTACK if I attack any player near her, and when there is a tank like that in the group, you can be assured that the soft ones stay with range of that ability.

Look Im not trying to start a fight or anything but, you are just spouting stuff. I don't expect the OL to be so powerful that the players can't win. I expect my monsters to die easily to the players. I do NOT expect that 80% of my monsters can't have defense after 1 adventure or that NONE of my monsters can HIT a player after 1 adventure. And lets be clear here - It can happen IN the first adventure if you get lucky on a search.

D1 was a balance nightmare, every expansion swung it in a different way, and honestly I expected some of this same stuff in D2. I didn't expect WORSE balance however. There is ALOT to commend in this addition, and we will still play it, but you can't even try to deny that there is an incredible amount of B.S. in it too, and I do include in that that the only viable winning tactic for the OL is to….not fight and block hallways with big high defense monsters. That is both not fun, and not thematically consistent with what I would expect from a crazy evil Overlord.

Slinthas said:

But you also have to recognize that some groups of Heroes (especially if playing with less than the full 4) may not get any useful equipment upgrades for several Quests.

Since shop cards are dealt out randomly at a rate of X+1 where X is the number of Heroes, getting useful gear can be pretty hit or miss.

I think the conclusion that I am drawing here, having heard people arguing passionately that the OL is at advantage, and that the Heroes are at advantage, is that the advantage is this game is very delicate. In Act I, at least (because I have not yet played any Act 2), it seems that a single search, a single Shopping trip, a single miss rolled by either side, can drastically alter the outcome of the game, and even influence future Quests. I am now very, very interested in play at least three Campaigns through to conclusion, and then consider my final reflections on balance in this game.

Slinthas said:

Yes, 2.66 is double 1.33. But you said grey defense dice gave you 1.83 and doubled to 3.66. I was simply pointing out your incorrect numbers.

How many players do you play with? Was the knight adjacent to every single one of them every time? It was the 3 movement hero I assume. (from the 14HP)

Did you pit trap that hero to split them up? Or Dark Charm to make the healer sprint forward by himself. Remember, both fighters have pitiful awareness, use traps on them a lot.

Did you use Ettins to 'throw' the hero's (It isn't an attack and cannot be redirected), effectively splitting them up to pick off?

Did you use Elementals and Merriods and Zombies to immobilize them? Mind you again Elementals target Awareness with their immoblize.

Did you use Shadow Dragons, and Elementals to attack both of them all at once?

How about using Barghest's and Elementals to eat the fatigue so he cannot redirect any attacks?

Just becuase you fail to try and even see a method around it does not mean the game is imbalanced.

That is what I figured about the Spiritspeaker. Just remember that it can only be used once a turn, so as long as you make more than one attack it stops being effective.

Also, I find it funny how you compare the item scaling to first edition, where the only method for the hero's to win was to sprint through the level and opening chests as fast as possible since those copper/silver/gold items were each such rediculous upgrades that they all immediately became untouchable gods.

Really quick, show me how 4 charecters in act 1 are going to regularly put out 40 damage a turn to ROFL stomp 5 8hp goblins.