I have a question about a stategy that would potentially be unstoppable and break the game.

My friend is playing the Titan, but it really could be done with any Avatar. What's to stop him from purchasing LTs every week until he has them all, rushing to Tamilir and stacking them all there and razing the city?

Stacking multiple LTs in a city would allow him to place multiple sieges on that city each week, correct?

He could potentially win the game in about 3-5 weeks like this. While my heros are still in copper age and have no chance of defeating any LTs in battle. I can forsee an endless loop of trying to fight them off and dieing, to end right back up in Tamilir.

How valid is this? Am I missing a rule that prevents this? If not, whats the startgey for the heros? Theres no way I could beat his LT's with store bought weapons and a bag of holding....

Short answer: Its completely valid and works.

Long answer: Its completely valid and works, and only used by OL's who are complete (insert uncomplimentary name here).

Second part of that is completely my opinion. I understand its a competitive game and that as time goes on the OL has less chance at winning, but I gotta have my standards

I expected that it was valid. i guess the real question is how do the heros even have a chance to stop this? Is there any way?

You can fight the Lts to see if you can get them to flee. Its risky, but even if you die you'e going to be in Tamilir anywways. If you win, he flees. Its not easy.

I wish the old forum was still accessable, as there was a great discussion about the Tamilir Rush on there.

I would agree it is valid but I would disagre that it works. There is risk to it and if the heroes know how to fight LT's the OL can basically lose the game in the 5th week.

If your heroes don't know what they are doing or forget that this is a competitive game and that not all strategies are created equal and just showing up doesn't mean you are going to win, well then they will lose. Then they will promptly complain that the game isn't "fair" and they they are taking thier ball and going home.

Heroes that know what they are doing will kill your LTs and promtly walk all over you.

@granor: thats what I expect, but is it feasible to be able to fight LT's in the first 3 weeks and win? This means fighting them without any treasures and just basic equipment? Your telling me that heros "who know what they are doing" can beat 3-4 LT's without any treasure/upgardes/etc...?

Why would you have no treasures? You should be able to get through 3 dungeons by the end of 3 weeks, so that's a range of like 0-36 possible Treasures from chests in those dungeons. Even if you got 1-2 Treasures per dungeon, that's still 3-6 Treasures which greatly increases your chances. Plus anytime one of the Heroes dies during the week (and someone wil) you can have them spend an extra turn in Tamilir at the Market and pull 2 cards there for an additional 6 possible Treasure items.

There are 4 dungeons within 1 trail of Tamilir that you can get to. At the end of the dungeon, teleport back to Tamilir and if you think you are ready take on the Lt.

IMO there's not much treasure in the entire copper level of treasures that can beat the default Ironskin, Unstoppable, Regeneration 5 Lt. He's immune to everything the players can hope to get from a treasure. Not very many many (possibly none, I'm not sure) copper level weapons even have damage dice larger than the ones the town sells, and cheaper damage/surge effects only add a tiny boost. For a Lt with decent armor that's killer for a party of heroes, especially once you take into account his attack dice and the fact players can't come back from death.

Am I wrong? I'm about the have to deal with this situation and it seems impossible. All I can think is to hope we all roll lucky with a few power potions, but even that won't help enough.

Indeed. The fastest possible Tamalir rush is dropping Alric on it with a Transport Gem on Turn one. It will still take a lot of turns before the city is ready to burn; it also takes time before other LTs arrive. The Heroes have to beef up until then; with them being able to buy wall upgrades, the city holds up long enough for them to do some looting. Of course, they want to lift the first siege before Alric gets Razorwings to silver.

Just because something works doesn't mean it is broken.

a bag of holding doesnt help kill Lt's. hehe....

Honestly though, we have been extremely unlucky with treasure only getting 2 weapons out of the 12 or so treasures we got. one was the rune with stun ability and one was falcons claws, which really isnt that bad. The rest has been useless trash.

I think my question has been answered though. so thanks. I never said it was broken...the question mark implies a question as to wether it would be considered broken or not.

Bravo McWilley said:

Power potions are your friend if you have less than 4 fatigue. At 4 I think fatigue potions and power potions both have benefits at certain times. If you have 5 fatigue you should never buy a power potion. In a side note battle also is a good friend.

If your party can not kill a Lt in two turns of attacks you are doing something wrong. Not saying you will get the 2 turns but it should be possible to deal enough damage in theory. Of course the practical aspects of getting those attacks in will vary depending on how good your OL and heroes are.

Finally the LT look really good on paper and I don't want to suggest the fights are easy, but they are not as tough as they look.

I think the hardest time to fight Lts is at the beginning of the Silver Age. The stat bonus on Alric is pretty good on the silver leap, and the OL should have enough treachery to keep the heroes at bay, even if he just cashes it all in the get a wall of beastmen or razorwings in play.

Big Remy said:

The Overlord will get stronger during that time, though. When you come back after doing 3-4 dungeons you'll be facing either Silver level monsters or some treachery cards. It's still doable, but you have to be careful. It's not as if the heroes only get stronger during Copper level - many of the Copper weapons are equal to or inferior to the town store weapons.

SkittlesAreYum said:

True but to help the LT battle the OL would have to upgrade beasts and that will make the dungeons easier for you guys... Not saying this is a slam dunk for the heroes just showing that the OL is taking a risk.

If the OL buys treachery and loses the LT batle they will never recover the game.

Huh? Buying monster and treachery upgrades is the best way to beat down the heroes...

And really, the best part about Lt battles is the fact that the second it looks like they are about to get hit, they can bail, granting the heroes only some cash. Don't attack with your Lt unless you have a rage or charge card and can get in, get two attacks, and back to the safety of the edge of the board.

Even if you fail the seige and the heroes drive you off, they've wasted time coming back to Tamalir and another Lt can be off trouncing some other city, plus you probably can kill one or two of them at your weakest/their strongest in copper, which means 4-8 CT for you, and a couple hundred in cash for them and a bunch of wasted time.

Keeping the heroes distracted on the overworld by continously seiging Tamalir while you raze other cities and bail on the Tamalir front is a great strategy. The faster the other cities fall the quicker the silver and copper ages come and go, meaning little time to upgrade for the heroes. Right now my heroes are sitting on something like 60 unspent xp each because I've gained 7 CT a turn for the last 3 or 4 weeks and they are so busy trying to finish up things and get to Shika's Hut/Gold Legendary/back to Tamalir to beat down my Lts/etc that they haven't had time to train. The avatar battle might actually be fair. If it weren't for the legendary silver dungeon giving them the skills I'd already swiped from them, they wouldn't stand a chance. They are going to miss upgrading health/fatigue in this phase as well (they also missed it in the silver) - just not enough time with all my Lts razing cities and Alric camping Tamalir.

@pinkymadigan

Buying treachery and monster upgrades in GENERAL are your best weapons. Buying Treachery first instead of a monster upgrade is a risk. If this doesn't pay off (read OL wins the LT fight) the heroes have killed a LT AND have copper critters for more dungeon levels. This is a possition so difficult to recover from I would say unless the heroes do somehting stupid the OL will not recover the game.

The plan you lay out is clearly NOT winning by razing Tamalir with all your LTs during the copper level of the game, the plan that is being discussed right now.

Your plan looks like you are trying to get to gold quickly. Does this help you win? The OL seems at a disadvantage as the game progresses into gold, with the final battle being the weakest game position for the OL. The conquests totals will factor into this but I am trying to get some idea of your strategy here. Are you simply trying to get through gold as fast as possible? This would suggest that razing Tamalir is never actually your goal but instead a threat to cause the heroes to lose time. If the OL is going into razing Tamalir with the plan that he will most likely run when the heroes attack the LT, I would say this plan has far less risk in it than the one being discussed. Actually this plan seems fairly robust and flexible. I like the way it attacks the heroes conquest resource two ways. Prevent them from getting it buy wasting time and prevent them from spending what they are able to get.

Your specific example seems unhelpfull. Any game where the OL has 6 razed cities should be a win, shouldn't it? Doesn't the ascension plot only require 3 cities? I know you may not be using this plot. I an just daying the designers seem to indicate, through this plots existence, that 3 cities is a fair number the OL should be able to raze during the game.

I'm playing Obsidian Shackles currently, and there is nothing wrong with getting to and through Gold quickly if the OL is the one getting all the CT (or better, the only one spending any CT). This means the Heroes will be disgustingly weak and underprepared for the final dungeon (which BTW will have all four of my Lts reinforcing it), with only a few pieces of gold treasure to their name and at most a few silver dice each, max three skills. I razed the board so fast it wasn't even funny with seige engines + Thaad and Traitors Abound.

I've had enough time to spend nearly all of my 348 CT while the heroes are struggling to even get their current XP below 50 (meaning they've spent about 120 so far). The goal is to keep them running from place to place in the copper phase, losing cities and skills that they need. In the meantime I now need only a few more game weeks before we're forced to a showdown and they get to spend one week training (which will probably be the only training they see during gold, as they are heading towards the gold legendary dungeon, and then probably to shika's, but I get the feeling I'll close the deal with my 7 CT a turn before then, so they won't even make it there).

Just because the general concensus says that the OL gets weaker and weaker doesn't mean he does. It just means the OL in those situations forgot to keep the pedal down, and let a few nearly dead heroes escape back to tthe temple.

I'm playing for the final battle because I think the final battle is more fun, win or lose. We're competitive, but not to the point where the win is more important than the journey. Besides, if I can get enough CT from having 7 power cards in play throughout the final dungeon, my Titan will be huge. The heroes are guaranteed an extra 16 health or so, so that stinks, but it'll still be fun (and probably close).

The_Immortal tested this scenario repeatedly (10 times I think) and found that the OL has about a 50% success ratio with this tactic, so it's not an unbalanced move, in theory.

Thundercles said:

Those are good odds for the OL considering it helps him do the things he wants to do anyway, and can most definitely bail on the battle if it starts to look bleak.

granor said:

The odd power pot is still useful at higher fatigue levels - that way you can drink a ppot and add your to a critical (aimed?) roll in the same turn - you can pretty easily get up to 4 gold dice that way even in bronze. That brings your heavy hitters up to nearly 20 damage possible with standard bronze weapons.

Alric is still **** tough though.

Corbon said:

Why can't you just use the movement point you used to drink the power potion to drink a fatigue potion instead? Given the fact that you are limited to one potion per turn I do not understand your point as to why the power potion is better. Are you suggesting you drink the power potion the turn before? That seems to really telegraph to the OL what you are doing.

Given the fact that you are dropping an attack (battle) for an aim I would suggest you are better off taking the fatigue potion.

Yeah but in RtL a Power Potion is essentially 5 fatigue that can only be spent on dice upgrades. So doing a Ready: Aim action and then attacking after drinking a Power Potion usually leads to some heavy damage to the target. I've seen Alric get his HP dropped in half before with one shot after an Aimed power potion attack.

yeah, it makes more sense to drink a power potion, aim, and then make an attack with power potion and fatigue.

Thundercles said:

OK so you are saying

drink power potion (1 move), Aim (1 action), Attack spend fatigue

is better than

attack (spend fatigue), drink fatigue potion (1 move get 5 fatigue), attack (spend fatigue)

Given the fact that once you drink the power potion you are pretty commited to the action and the fact that you are giving up one attack, I fail to see why you are saying it is better. Please explain this in detail for me, I am just not getting it.

Please remember I am only saying this for heroes that have at least 5 fatigue.

For me at least it comes down to this:

Even though the chance is 1/6, seeing your Power Potion enchanced attack, rolling say like a Red, Green and 3 Silver and 2 Black and seeing it MISS because of that Red die....sucks to no end.

That's why I always try to aim my Power Potion attack, on the off chance that the main dice misses and for the ability to reroll any blanks that show up on those power dice. Plus nothing says you can't use a Power Potion to get 5 upgrades, and then use any other Fatigue you have to get further upgrades.