I have just ordered Descent and the expansion "Well Of Darkness" it should arrive with me sometime this week.

I was hoping (maybe rather optimistically) to have the rules sussed out for our first game in a few days time.

Am I better to try and learn the Vanilla Descent or should I combine it with the Well Of Darkness.

I have heard that the game leans heavily toward the heroes without the expansions and as I will be playing as the Overlord I want it to be a good game (one where I crush the heroes as cruelly as possible).

Any advice would be gratefully appreciated

Cheers!

You could do either really. I think the first time I played as OL I went with just the base set, and that was still fun. The first Quest is pretty easy on the Heroes.

My recommendation is actual to go and download the pdf of the rules and the FAQ from the Descent page and just read it several time, and have you players read it as well prior to playing.

Thanks - I'll go and have a look at the rules pdf now. I suppose I could email it to the victims...I mean heroes...give them something to read over their lunch break.

Definitely start with Quest 1 from JitD. From my experience, vanilla descent is too hard for 2 heroes, about right for 3 heroes and a bit too easy for 4 heroes.

However, you have bought WoD, which gives you treachery. This addition to the game makes it harder for the heroes, so I would start with Quest 1 and if you have 4 heroes, use the treachery rules to take out some "not very good cards" from the OL deck and add in some "very good" cards.

Be aware that Quest 2 from JitD is a bit of an odd one, and IMO it shouldnt be quest 2. It is there to teach the players how to overcome certain situations - They are facing a really tough monster with only town equipment who comes back to life if they kill him. It is a level where the heroes will probably lose first time and then they need to think very tactically about how they can actually beat this level.

I've not played any WoD quests, but apparently they are virtually impossible. Try them only when you are comfortable with the game, and you may let the players have more choice of initial heroes and skills to rebalance things.

Oh, and most definitely, print out and get your heroes to read the "Advice for Heroes" on the FFG support page. Vital information for all new players.

I echo the notion of starting with Quest 1 from JitD. Consider this a learning experience for everyone. I'm not sure I would start with Treachery. Try getting the hang of what comes standard in the OL deck before changing it (although definitely put in the new cards that are added to the deck).

Some general advice:

1. Keep all the pieces organized, it really helps things go faster.

2. The heroes need to keep moving in Descent. Many RPG's I've played want to go slow and be cautious. This doesn't work in Descent.

3. Remind the heroes to cover lines of sight to keep the OL from spawning.

4. When you are the OL, wait to play your cards (like traps) when it will be most disruptive to the heroes. Patience, planning, and foreknowledge of the dungeon are the OL's biggest assets.

For the first few games I recommend that everyone (heroes and OL) work together to learn the game. No one will want to play if they don't have fun the first few times.

Thanks for all of the help guys.

My first game will be with three heroes and myself playing as the OL..

I think its a good idea that we all play through learning the game together - I had a bit of a nightmare with this sort of thing before, I got 'Arkham Horror' last Xmas and tried playing through it with my family that evening...not a fun experience trying to figure out the rules as you go along.

I've bought the base game recently. I've played Quest 1 twice:

With 4 heroes - Everything went well for them. There were a few really dangerous moments, but they had managed to pull it off.

With 2 heroes - Slaughtered right off the bat. And it was so easy I thought that maybe I was not playing correctly.

So I think it's safe to assume that a party of 4 (probably even 3) would have a fun time learning the game while playing it's first adventure. But if you start playing with 2, it will probably ruin their experience and they'll never want to play it again, because they'll see it as "too hard and unforgiving".

You should probably never play with two heroes except specifically to handicap the hero team.

That said, experienced players could probably beat the first quest with only 2 heroes without much difficulty. The first quest is rather easy, but there are enough "rookie mistakes" the heroes can make in Descent that it's still definitely possible for new players to lose on it.

Sadly I'm still waiting for my game to arrive - it's been almost two weeks since I first ordered it and I am beginning to lose my patience.

I sent a copy of the rules to all of my players last week so everyone is getting quite excited about our first play.

I'll let you all know how I get on (I have been assured that the game will arrive with me this week).

I have read that there is quite a sliding scale of difficulty - the heroes start dominating after they get lots of quality items.

Is there any way that a good OL can combat some seriously tooled-up heroes or is it simply a matter of attrition until they meet the boss characters?

You will probably get destroyed the first Quest since its pretty easy. If you decide to put WoD in right away, Treachery will help. There is no Treachery listed in the Quest Guide for JitD, but there are values to use in the book for WoD.

Your best chance for winning is to be ruthless early, because once they get Silver treasures you life will get harder, and once they get Gold treasures you are going to be fighting a rear guard battle. Remember trap cards are your friend.

I'll give one fun option that can intimidate new Heroes and make them step ligthly:

If you get in your hand at the same time these cards:

Crushing Block

Any Pit Trap

Play the Crushing Block first, and then when you move the Hero to an adjacent space play the Pit Trap. Even better is if you have a monster nearby with Knockback, have it attack, move the Hero 3 spaces and when the Hero lands on that empty 3rd space do the CB followed by the Pit.

Its fun.

It might also be helpful to print out some of the reference files you can find at BGG (boardgamegeek) if you have not done so already. Those can really save you from having to dig through the rulebooks whenever a question comes up.

As for difficulty, I've heard the base game favors the players (if you have 4 players) but the WoD expansion tilts the balance closer to the OL. I'd definitely play the game with all the errata because those address some serious balance issues. I would also go ahead and use the treachery rules with JITD - WoD's rules tell you how to use Treachery in the base game and it gives the OL some extra firepower

Monsters are probably more useful in the early game before the heroes have found a lot of treasures. After the heroes have found more items, you may find your monsters last about as long as butter would in the fires of Mt Doom. At this point, you may be better off with traps, which can bypass armor and cannot (obviously) be killed.

And remember, have fun! If your gaming group dislikes losing, you may even want to go easy the first time just so they'll come back! There'll be ample opportunities to trounce them all later!

in the first 2 or 3 quests from the main game the heroes really have great advantages.

I think that is to make everyone learn the basics and after that the OL can really crush the heroes badly if they make any mistakes.

In WoD the heroes never survived in any Quest , they really are a bit too hard. Most of the tme the heroes didn't even reach half way through and i think i lost 1 or 2 people to play with cause of that.. we alsp player 1on1 where 4 heroes wheere played by one person but even with that he never survived to the end.

So for the first games it defintely has to be the main game if you don't want to loose all interest

I'm a rookie overlord too, with the added fun of maintaining the interest of pre-teens who don't like losing but need to learn how to, gracefully. I've been playing the overlord cards as an open hand, so for training purposes they can see what might happen, it helps to point out the rookie mistakes. You might also consider allowing a dead hero to be revived in town with an additional skill, or to allow them to initially draw 1 extra (total) skill card from the types they have and discard the least useful skill card.

In my first game the heroes seemed to want to skedaddle to town a lot. I'm of the opinion that if they're all out of the dungeon at the same time, the overlord wins.

No, the heroes all being out of the dungeon at the same time is a perfectly reasonable and valid tactic--it's sometimes tactically necessary, and it even sometimes occurs involuntarily (e.g. if all the heroes die at once). In fact, I believe in Road to Legend, the heroes can choose to flee a dungeon by all going to town and then declaring they are fleeing, which definitely implies that they're supposed to be able to all go to town and not flee.

But it carries the cost that the heroes have no LoS coverage, so the overlord can spawn monsters wherever he wants. Also remember that time is against the heroes--every turn they delay gives the overlord extra cards and threat, and gets him closer to cycling the deck (which costs the heroes 3 conquest tokens each time), so the heroes are heavily incentivized to not drag things out.

Also, remember that the heroes can't teleport to and from town on the same turn, so they can't pop into the dungeon, attack the monsters, and pop back out before the monsters can react.

Antistone where do the rules state that Heroes cant move out and in town in one turn?

thats not a rule from the main game is it ?

Kycoo said:

pg17 of the JitD rulebook:

A hero may only use a glyph once per turn—he may not use a glyph to go to town and then return, or vice versa. Glyphs are not items and cannot be picked up or moved.

So no sneak attack and then back to town, no glyph hopping.

Kycoo said:

Also, the RtL rules, top of page 18:

However, to move through an activated glyph, a hero must begin his turn on or adjacent to it. Then, rather than being placed on the town marker (which is not used at all in the Advanced Campaign), the hero returns to Tamalir. A hero returning in this way is placed in the building of his choice, and may immediately claim the benefits of “restocking” there. See “Cities and Buildings” and “Using Buildings” on page 21 for more information. On the hero’s following turn, he may either return to any activated glyph of transport for one movement point (as normal), or restock in Tamalir again, in the same building or another one.

The two hightlighted phrases above pretty much rule out the Tamalir back and forth on the same turn.

RTL is not available in Germay so far.

but thanks, that part of the rules went out of my mind.

Hi all,

I have a question. If I would like to attack a hero with a ogre, then I can use only the special ability (Knockback) or can I attack the Hero normaly?

Thanks your help.

Knockback always occurs, but the way its written in the book is that you may move the target up to three spaces away after dealing damage (that's before armor, so before it takes wounds).

So in a technical sense the ability is optional, but you don't need to delcare that you are making a Knockback attack. The only thing like that really is Bash I think.

Thank you the help now it is clear.