Descent: Into the Dark

Al and Steven came over last night for a full four-heroes game of Descent. Al took Byrah the Falconer, Steven took Grey Ker, Andrew took Landrec the Wise, Patrick took Mordrog, and I played the Overlord. They took on the first quest -- Into the Dark -- plowing through the dungeon without much trouble. Andrew's hero (who has very powerful magic attacks, but was short on armor) died once, and Patrick barely survived being surrounded once by beastmen and skeletons. But the group came through just fine -- killing the master giant at the end of the quest without much danger.

The consensus on BoardGameGeek is that the heroes should win most of the quests in the basic set. And that's fine with me, as I view Descent more as a cooperative roleplaying game than a test of wits. I also understand why the rules have the heroes lose all of their weapons and armor between quests. The heroes were so powerful by the end of the quest that they were killing a roomful of five monsters before the monsters knew what hit them.

We hope to continue playing throughout the summer, and Patrick plans to paint the figures once school lets out.