by Jacobgarr
eriktheguy wrote:
We learned a lesson about humility in Chap 2 when we got owned about the moment we entered the crystal cavern place where Lilly is.
The initiatives rolled put Nez first with Lilly next followed by all the monsters. The first action of the encounter was Nez getting captured by a search card. Since Lilly was the top of the initiative, it became impossible to prevent attacks from going on her and she died on turn 2. You can free her with the fork, but we didn't have the fork because the book said you don't need it with Nez in the party.
Unblockable attacks from the centipede essentially insta-killed her, although she was able to ignore one round's worth with the free cowering card.
We tried just killing the minions but didn't roll any hits. I had planned to throw a dodging scamp at the centipede, or just a suicide scamp, but since the centipede goes first and Lilly topped the initiative, getting the centipede to attack anyone but her was impossible.
We learned that aggro is important and initiative can make protecting a character impossible (though admittedly Lilly being at the top of initiative and Nez being instantly removed by search cards is about the worst possible scenario).
I do think the encounter design was a bit weak, you lose almost instantly from one or two bad rolls if the initiative is ugly. We had cruised through every part of every chapter up until then without a surge, had beaten chapter 1 with only 2-3 surges and the end marker pushed all the way back to 9, and then suddenly it was over in two rounds with what seemed like very little decision making.
But I guess that's dice. I think an obvious observation is that we could have minimized our risk by using a search action to bring Nez back close to the mousetrap ASAP. Although it would probably result in poorer combat results on average, it greatly increases the chances of returning Lilly to the party before she is KOd.
Also, in missions where it's obvious that protecting a single target is important we should probably take Colin with the ability to swap initiatives.
The initiatives rolled put Nez first with Lilly next followed by all the monsters. The first action of the encounter was Nez getting captured by a search card. Since Lilly was the top of the initiative, it became impossible to prevent attacks from going on her and she died on turn 2. You can free her with the fork, but we didn't have the fork because the book said you don't need it with Nez in the party.
Unblockable attacks from the centipede essentially insta-killed her, although she was able to ignore one round's worth with the free cowering card.
We tried just killing the minions but didn't roll any hits. I had planned to throw a dodging scamp at the centipede, or just a suicide scamp, but since the centipede goes first and Lilly topped the initiative, getting the centipede to attack anyone but her was impossible.
We learned that aggro is important and initiative can make protecting a character impossible (though admittedly Lilly being at the top of initiative and Nez being instantly removed by search cards is about the worst possible scenario).
I do think the encounter design was a bit weak, you lose almost instantly from one or two bad rolls if the initiative is ugly. We had cruised through every part of every chapter up until then without a surge, had beaten chapter 1 with only 2-3 surges and the end marker pushed all the way back to 9, and then suddenly it was over in two rounds with what seemed like very little decision making.
But I guess that's dice. I think an obvious observation is that we could have minimized our risk by using a search action to bring Nez back close to the mousetrap ASAP. Although it would probably result in poorer combat results on average, it greatly increases the chances of returning Lilly to the party before she is KOd.
Also, in missions where it's obvious that protecting a single target is important we should probably take Colin with the ability to swap initiatives.
How did you get the end chapter marker back to chaper 9 :surprise: There is only one spot that moves it back 1 space.....