Sebastian D.
Germany
Berlin
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Previously: Session 1, Session 2, Session 3, Session 4, Session 5, Session 6, Session 7, Session 8
Back again for our Campaign #1, formatting will still be the same. So (+X) indicates Conquest Tokens CT for the heroes, [+X] indicates CT for the overlord. Red highlighted text will be used for possible rule problems we had and blue highlighted text will mark personal comments. We're playing with Altar of Despair only.
Since I spend a lot of time without my computer these days, details are shady at best. Usually lots of the action sticks to the back of my eye and mind but this session is already fading.
So anyway, here we go, we left off with the heroes in the legendary silver dungeon, desperately trying to finish it without switching to the gold campaign.
At beginning of session:
CONQUEST TOKENS: Heroes: 132, OL: 82/249; Total: 381
Player 1 (Kirga): {Rapid Fire}, {Master Archer}; +2 Fat.; Bow of Bone, Chain Mail, Archer's Charm, Ring of Prot., (Falcon's Claw, Mirror Shield); XP: 80
Player 2 (Tahlia): {Tiger Tattoo}, {Unmovable}; +2 Fat.; Grinding Axe, Plate Mail, Ring of Freedom, (Mace of Aver, Dragon Odem); XP: 80
Player 3 (Jaes): {Spiritwalker}, {Inner Fire}; +4 Health.; Ice Storm, Chain Mail, Mana Weave, (Staff of the Grave, Staff of Punishment); XP: 80
Player 4 (Landrec): {Bless}, {Marksman}; Drain Life, Robe of Kellos, (Pacify, Bottle Imp); XP: 100
Heroes have ca. 7500 Gold, Guide, Enchanted Boat, Staff of the Wild, Kerak's Map and upgraded Great Bazaar at Tamalir.
OL Avatar: Spider Queen, XP: 82/249
Plot: Ascension (Temple of Fire at Forge)
OL Upgrades: Sir Alric F. (at Blackwing Swamp), Siege Engines, Gold Beasts, Lord Merrick Farrow (at Greyhaven), Slaggorath (at Tamalir, 2 Siege Token), 2 Trap, 1 Monster, 1 Event Treachery
WEEK 18 continued
We gave me the five CT I forgot to add after razing Dawnsmoor but I had also misremembered deck cycling wrong so three CT were subtracted resulting in a total of [+2]. The count stands at 383 CT for the campaign (OL: 84/251). They figure there will be one more glyph and the leader reward leaving them with 9 CT to spare if they want to stay in silver for the crucial fight against Slaggorath and Sir Alric F.
The heroes have cleared the first area and prepare to enter the second. I spawn Hellhounds to hit them one more time through their armor before the escape through the stairs. It works, Kirga is killed [+3] (total: 386 CT) and Jaes is heavily wounded. In addition I can maneuver the Hellhound into the path to the stairs so they can't just outrun them. Of course they manage to kill them but it delays them so only Landrec can move through the stairs, facing the Blind Giant alone but smartly staying out of reach. Nine encounter tokens seem like a lot to them, meaning they will need to spend some time in this area. But with Tahlia they actually are pretty fast as she activates two tokens per turn, moving from one to the other during her guard action. Was that right? Ending movement is independent from your own turn, I think. I thought that was pretty good play and another proof that Tahlia is a really good hero. They activate only one of the glyphs (+3, at the intersection) (total: 389 CT) and place a hero at the intersection (Landrec the Slow as he doesn't help getting those encounter tokens fast, but he also does the most damage to the giant with his pierce rune) to keep spawn opportunities at a minimum. After killing the giant three times (+4 for the first kill) (total: 393 CT) and suffering each time after his return (Landrec dead [+2]) (total: 395 CT) I tell them to kill him with guards as that buys them more time Well, they did figure it out themselves, but also needed reassurance from me  . When they finally remove all tokens the giant dies permanently and Kirga runs down the stairs and opens the chest (+1, no treasure) (total: 396).
This point put the gold campaign finally into reach for me. For a couple of turns I was saving threat and spawn cards to get one more shot at the heroes. Now I only need to kill one, either Thalia or Jaes. Thalia is at full health and tough to kill with just one group of spawned monsters (if they even manage to all reach her), Jaes on the other hand is still wounded from my earlier spawn of Hellhound and he participated in the token removal. So he didn't get to heal. Kirga has the third area covered, coming through the first area is too far, that leaves only the second area. Thalia guards near Jaes, Jaes guards one space adjacent to the stairs and they both cover quite a large area of spawn possibilities. Landrec in a weird move descends to the third area and stays on the stairs to help cover Jaes. I spawn Razorwings, fast-moving, hard-hitting birds of death. The group knows it, they're done. And they are right. One space is not covered by Landrec and while Jaes and Thalia kill the first Razorwing together, the second one gets an attack in and Jaes is dead [+4] (total: 400)!
Oh, my heroes are so disappointed, shoulders are sagging and they exchange empty looks. Lieutenants are particularly strong at the beginning of a campaign stage and now at gold Slaggo and Alric look almost undefeatable as they have to attack them on their next turn (they can delay the die roll two more turns with training actions, buying dice upgrades and available items and also building the wall upgrades each time but they don’t feel that that will help as I get to upgrade stuff, too).
So they just rush to the quiet lake and grab their reward: Tahlia gets Acrobat (to reach Slaggo through all his spiders), Kirga gets ???, Jaes gets Quick Casting (because Landrec fears to be dead too fast to use it effectively) and Landrec gets Leadership.
LEVEL SUMMARY: 17 turns; Heroes: +8 (140), ca. 1600 gold, OL: +34 (93/260); Total: +42 (400)
DUNGEON SUMMARY: 44 hero turns, 41 OL turns; Heroes: +28, ca. 4700 gold, OL: +75
Phew, that’s over 100 CT in one dungeon! Silver went by in a breeze, with not much to do for the heroes other than dungeons, no training, no shopping (besides out of the dungeons).
WEEK 19
[+4] (97/264), Greyhaven +1 Siege Token (now at 1) I stay here with Merrick to get a fourth city razed in case the heroes lift the siege at Tamalir. I want to have a backup option with a plot win., Tamalir +1 Siege Token (now at 3). Sir Alric F. moves to Tamalir, lending his strength to the defense of the siege. I buy not diamond beasts but a second Event Treachery [-20] (77/264) for Ambush, which I think is stronger than the diamond beasts. And it will work perfectly…
Heroes attack Slaggo.
Slaggorath @ Cursed Forest
Armor of all figures is reduced by one. That location *again*. Not much variety in our draws… but the heroes try to grab every opportunity: ‘This is where we killed Eliza! Let’s do the same to Slaggi!’Treachery chosen is Exploding Rune(for threat), Crushing Block and 2 Pit Traps as traps, Razorwings and Blood Apes as spawns and Ambush as event.
The heroes act cautiously and all move into trees with guards ready, Kirga is hit with the Crushing Block (discarding the Exploding rune and the Blood Ape Spawn) and has only 3 wound left. I don’t do them the favor of running into their guards and also stay back with everything, only reinforcing Razorwings at Slaggis exit. Thalia moves closer during her guard action and then gets to Slaggi on her turn. Jaes with the silver pierce rune attacks through her and uses Quick Casting. With those attacks they take 32 wounds off Slaggorath. I get a little scared. But Landrec misses twice with Blast attacks. On my turn I move in with my spiders and razorwings, web Jaes and kill Landrec [+2], Kirga miraculously survives 4 attacks! The group gets their hopes up a little but on their turn I play ambush. A razorwing finally kills Kirga [+3], Slaggo runs to the other end of the map, safely out of reach of anyone. Player 4 (Landrec) complains about the low threat cost of ambush, and not even me pointing to the two treachery cost can waver his opinion of ‘too strong and too cheap’. The heroes now are without hope again, Thalia flees and Jaes is killed on his way out [+4].
ENCOUNTER SUMMARY: 3 turns; Heroes: +0 (140), OL: +9 (86/273); Total: +9 (413)
WEEK 20
[+4] (90/277), Tamalir stands! Greyhaven +1 Siege Token (now at 2), I upgrade Beasts to Diamond.
Heroes give up and the campaign ends with a win for the Overlord!
Comments:
So this is it. Five months of playing and the Overlord wins because the heroes give up. A little anti-climatic but deserved nonetheless  . In the end the change to gold came down to be on the spot. And because we gave out CT wrong or missed giving them out right this might have turned out differently if we had played 100% correctly. But mistakes happen, I’m not complaining, they jokingly will  . I mean, look at the last fight and their damage. Slaggo with silver stats might’ve really been in trouble.
Anyway, random thoughts:
Did they have a chance against the two lieutenants at the end? Should they have tried one more time (encounters don’t play as long as dungeons, so time should not be a valid point )?
The legendary dungeon with its four levels was a major loss for the heroes. Trial by Fire as the first level and 17 rounds on the legendary level really let the kill count rise. The reward is great but it didn’t help them enough at that moment in our campaign. Changing into gold was just the last worst thing to happen to them. Even if they had lifted the siege I was swimming in CT and could’ve bought all avatar upgrades for the final fight. Of course I don’t know how that would have gone.
Slaggorath is a major force for the spider queen, posing a frightening threat on the map board from the moment he is bought. Even losing Eliza, which I whined about so much, was quickly forgotten.
Items are important but upgrading dice is important as well (I said this before). They were struggling to overcome the fear of the gold dragon and even when spending fatigue for those surges the damage was not good enough. They end the game without any dice upgrade and three skills each, the last one only just obtained through the silver reward. To me that screams ’not enough’.
In the beginning it seemed to me that they were trying to prevent lieutenants from razing cities more than pursuing their own development. And while they were moderately successful, it hindered them in the long run as they were only reacting to imminent threats rather than going for long-term goals. It’s easy to say that, I know, because I can see their reasoning. Razed cities give me more CT and if that happens early, say on week 5 or so, it will add up, not to mention two razed cities without any interference from the heroes as they are cruising the map for upgrades. So what’s the golden middle path here?
They weren’t blitzing in the beginning and I had silver beasts after one dungeon and that put them behind. But as beasts don’t really live in the dungeons, the levels should have been easier than they were most of the time. After glancing over the other reports I gained more CT than them in almost every dungeon. Almost all dungeons were explored and finished through all three levels. They were a little unlucky with treasure draws, only once they found more than one in a chest, more often than not the chest was empty.
I think the group was mainly of the opinon that they never had a fighting chance. City razing was too fast, items were not coming in steadily enough, lieutenants and treachery as a combo is too powerful. And while they had fun playing they were always a little frustrated throughout the game.
Granted, it’s our first campaign and we’re still learning but I thought it would be harder to convince them to play another campaign right away. Our Sorcerer King campaign is nearly at a stand-still because one player is rarely available. So we started another one, this time with AoD and ToI. And all of the experience they gained during this campaign. Player 3 (Jaes) thinks he will start to lose interest in the game if we focus too much on optimal strategy rather than pure monster-bashing fun (He’s the one who always votes against fleeing and urges everyone to keep going through the levels. I tried corbon’s thematic explanation of ‘defeating a big bad overlord not clearing the countryside of every last little skeleton’ but he didn’t buy it. Too bad as I thought he would consider a thematic argument. Let’s see how it goes.)
Thanks for reading you guys and thanks for every comment you left on each of my reports. Sharing like this about a game I really like with people I don’t know is… fun and exhilarating!
Why don’t you tell me if you would like to hear about our next campaign, too? I give you the group set-up as a teaser :
Varikas the Dead with Able Warrior, Ronan of the Wild with Shadow Soul, Andira Runehand with Quick Casting and Landrec with Vampiric Blood against the Demon Prince with Obsidian Shackles.
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Bryce K. Nielsen
United States
Elk Ridge
Utah
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The Copper Legendary Dungeon is really only worth hitting if the OL hasn't upgraded a monster yet. I wonder if the silver dungeon is the same (i.e. before the OL upgrades a set to Gold)?
-shnar
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Sebastian D.
Germany
Berlin
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Do you mean any monster category or the 'corresponding' category for that dungeon? Because the copper legendary has a Dragon leader and
Spoiler (mouseover to reveal): mostly beast monsters accompanying him while the silver legendary has a Giant leader and Spoiler (mouseover to reveal): also mostly beasts accompanying him (at least in the first area, manticores and nagas, the second area is empty except for the giant) With gold beasts this first area was definitely tough on the heroes. .
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Seth Stewart
United States
Endicott
New York
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Nice session report.
With such a big discrepancy on CP, I was wondering what your input is on this thread: http://boardgamegeek.com/thread/554813/do-you-ban-any-cards-...
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Bryce K. Nielsen
United States
Elk Ridge
Utah
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BastiRand wrote: Do you mean any monster category or the 'corresponding' category for that dungeon? Because the copper legendary has a Dragon leader and Spoiler (mouseover to reveal): mostly beast monsters accompanying him while the silver legendary has a Giant leader and Spoiler (mouseover to reveal): also mostly beasts accompanying him (at least in the first area, manticores and nagas, the second area is empty except for the giant) With gold beasts this first area was definitely tough on the heroes. .
Doesn't matter really. Whether the OL upgraded the main monsters for the legendary dungeon or not is not important. If the OL has upgraded *any* monster group, then the 3 levels to get down to the legendary level will be much more difficult, and probably not worth the CT going down.
-shnar
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Joe Barrett
United States
Virginia
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BastiRand wrote: Why don’t you tell me if you would like to hear about our next campaign, too?
Please, I have enjoyed reading your reports. My group is pretty new, soaking up some vicarious experience is win.
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I've loved your session reports so am very much in favour of you continuing with them.
I have to say after reading this account of Slaggaroth's power (and Corbin's threads on the subject) I'm pretty apprehensive about the thought of my overlord buying him. Any tips for facing that lieutenant?
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Alain Gottcheiner
Belgium
Brussels
Unspecified
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Finding the Ring of Free Action.
Using a hammer to allow webbed heroes to move.
Finding some way to hit many spiders in one round (Precision and an explosion weapon will do)
Finding some way to go after the lieutenant before the spiders (one character with Acrobat and one with Spiritwalker would be useful)
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Corbon Loughnan
Singapore
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Merrimac wrote: Finding the Ring of Free Action.
Using a hammer to allow webbed heroes to move.
Finding some way to hit many spiders in one round (Precision and an explosion weapon will do)
Finding some way to go after the lieutenant before the spiders (one character with Acrobat and one with Spiritwalker would be useful)
Maximise wounds, rather than fatigue (you have to survive a lot of space traps that each do +3 damage).
Conserve Fly Feats (we completed that campaign before ToI was released).
Acrobat.
If you draw a map with a lot of trees, especially corridors with trees, then killing off the spiders really fast isn't particularly feasible. You can't get lots of them with AoE weapons (shadowcloak, not being adjacent to more than one)) and you have to get right to them to attack, ruling out many multi-attack skills.
The best bet is to go after Slaggoroth himself, which means an Acrobat/Fly hero to get through the blocking spiders and get next to Slaggoroth (probably standing in the rearmost tree).
Leadership (a Guard attack) and a knockback weapon will help a little (or a feat to give him an attack even on a run action). Spiritwalker is also good, though it won't be easy to also get your mage within 5 spaces of the 'runner' and still have attacks left.
Webbed heroes aren't really a major problem, it's surviving the first turn and getting at Slaggoroth - melee heroes pretty much shrug off webs and your mage will hopefully have spiritwalker.
The gold/silver knockback weapons that allow extra spaces of knockback are your best bet, on a hero with acrobat or fly.
Of course, a smart OL will have targeted those weapons with CB as priority...
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Sebastian D.
Germany
Berlin
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Glamdryn, the big CT gap only started to appear when the heroes where already desperately fighting against all odds. Before that it was pretty even, even when the heroes already felt they should be behind much more.
And with only one/two campaigns on my back, I really can't contribute much to your thread. I saw it, though.
corbon wrote: The best bet is to go after Slaggoroth himself, which means an Acrobat/Fly hero to get through the blocking spiders and get next to Slaggoroth (probably standing in the rearmost tree). That's what I would think, too. And it worked pretty well for the heroes in this game. (Not that they killed him or anything but as a strategy it seemed the way to go.) But doesn't this work as general advice against all lieutenants? Battles I've had never lasted longer than three turns so that's the time you have to kill him/her.
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Brian Thomas
United States
Herndon
Virginia
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I've enjoyed reading your session reports a lot, and hope you keep posting them for the next campaign.
I think the single best thing you could do to make the next campaign better is to send links to these session reports to your players and let them read them. They'd probably whine less, for one, but more importantly, they would see how you think, and what you consider important. You have a lot of good insights on their play as well that they could learn from.
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Jerry Rhodes
United States
Elgin
South Carolina
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Always enjoy reading the session reports. If you enjoy writing them know you will have an audience of at least me.
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Posted Thu Aug 19, 2010 3:26 pm
