Witch Lord nova'd, again

[Jalapenotrellis]

So...
I set up the final room for quest 10. I gave the witch lord 2 extra body points (6 instead of 4). I always set up the rooms as they show on the map. Well, before they found the center room, the aligned themselves in their turn order outside the door, then proceed to magical throwing dagger one at a time, the third heroic brew and magical throwing dagger X2, the wizard genie then saw it fizzle and ball of flame (no saves rolled).

So they got rid of 6 hp using all their resources. They have no magical throwing daggers left. Didn't get one turn on the witch Lord, no spells cast. Didn't feel like it is honest to keep saying "oh but he has one more hp!" When he already had more hp than anything they fought up till now.

I feel like it is pretty poor planning for them to set up the room like that. He has plenty of hp if it isn't set up that way and you can use the monsters as meat shields. But I didn't expect them to eat through 6 hp in one round no save allowed, and when using magical throwing daggers, it should matter. Same with heroic brews.

Sigh. Maybe in Against the Ogre Horde it will be different. Maybe those spellcasters won't suck.

[Davane]

This is a flaw in what is a 30+ year old game. Veteran players know the tactics that work, and as such, it can be really hard to shift them from their comfort zone. It's really up to you, as the EW, to shake things up for them, which can be quite difficult to do with existing official quest packs.

The real problem is that HQ has a lot of Quests where there's only one single worthwhile encounter, so Heroes tend to save everything up and unleash it all in those encounters as necessary. Players also know that if they don't Search for Treasure except where there's chests, then they won't run the risk of getting wandering monsters to drain resources, and therefore there really isn't much that the EW can do in such circumstances.

Thus, the only real answer is to start modifying your game to surprise the players a bit, but use this wisely, as some players will call BS if they like the game as it is, and suspect that the EW is purposely making things difficult for them.

One thing you could do is stop letting the Heroes have time to prepare a strategy to unleash everything in one round. An easy way to do this is to activate Monsters BEFORE the Heroes open the door. That way, Monsters can cast spells, flank the Heroes, or rush out to interrupt their plans. The game favours the attacker, so you really need to attack first, however you can get away with that.

The other thing you could consider is pre scripting opening moves for named characters when the Heroes enter their lair. For example, maybe have each spellcaster able to cast one spell as the door is opened, that takes effect immediately. Thus, the Heroes will have to face off against at least one spell. If you vary this spell, you can have the party preparing for all sorts of different scenarios, like what happens if the Barbarian charges in first, only to fall to a spell like Command? Are they in a room where Fireburst to damage the whole party? What about a Tempest to stall the first hero?

Finally, if the party is fond of the "unleash everything at the final encounter" tactic, simply give them more final encounters. Put a sub-boss in a room on the way to the boss, so that the party can be duped into unleashing everything on them instead? Or have the boss take the party on early before running away "Escape, anyone?" and attacking again in a later room.

Of course, if the intent is to play these quests straight, then just grin and bear it, and remember everything they do, so you can come up with ways to shake them out of complacency later on...

[Pancho]

Use the Room cards (Evil Wizard deck)?

Also, the UK game doesn’t have magical throwing daggers. I know the UK game has other issues, but still worth bearing in mind maybe.

[Jalapenotrellis]

This is a flaw in what is a 30+ year old game. Veteran players know the tactics that work, and as such, it can be really hard to shift them from their comfort zone. It's really up to you, as the EW, to shake things up for them, which can be quite difficult to do with existing official quest packs.

The real problem is that HQ has a lot of Quests where there's only one single worthwhile encounter, so Heroes tend to save everything up and unleash it all in those encounters as necessary. Players also know that if they don't Search for Treasure except where there's chests, then they won't run the risk of getting wandering monsters to drain resources, and therefore there really isn't much that the EW can do in such circumstances.

Thus, the only real answer is to start modifying your game to surprise the players a bit, but use this wisely, as some players will call BS if they like the game as it is, and suspect that the EW is purposely making things difficult for them.

One thing you could do is stop letting the Heroes have time to prepare a strategy to unleash everything in one round. An easy way to do this is to activate Monsters BEFORE the Heroes open the door. That way, Monsters can cast spells, flank the Heroes, or rush out to interrupt their plans. The game favours the attacker, so you really need to attack first, however you can get away with that.

The other thing you could consider is pre scripting opening moves for named characters when the Heroes enter their lair. For example, maybe have each spellcaster able to cast one spell as the door is opened, that takes effect immediately. Thus, the Heroes will have to face off against at least one spell. If you vary this spell, you can have the party preparing for all sorts of different scenarios, like what happens if the Barbarian charges in first, only to fall to a spell like Command? Are they in a room where Fireburst to damage the whole party? What about a Tempest to stall the first hero?

Finally, if the party is fond of the "unleash everything at the final encounter" tactic, simply give them more final encounters. Put a sub-boss in a room on the way to the boss, so that the party can be duped into unleashing everything on them instead? Or have the boss take the party on early before running away "Escape, anyone?" and attacking again in a later room.

Of course, if the intent is to play these quests straight, then just grin and bear it, and remember everything they do, so you can come up with ways to shake them out of complacency later on...

Good advice. I'm thinking the main change is to just allow the witch lord to walk back to his throne and have a few monsters block him when the door opens. Or just start with the room arranged differently. He has plenty of HP if he doesn't start with his pants down.

[Daedalus]

So...
I set up the final room for quest 10. I gave the witch lord 2 extra body points (6 instead of 4). I always set up the rooms as they show on the map. Well, before they found the center room, the aligned themselves in their turn order outside the door, then proceed to magical throwing dagger one at a time, the third heroic brew and magical throwing dagger X2, the wizard genie then saw it fizzle and ball of flame (no saves rolled).

So they got rid of 6 hp using all their resources. They have no magical throwing daggers left. Didn't get one turn on the witch Lord, no spells cast. Didn't feel like it is honest to keep saying "oh but he has one more hp!" When he already had more hp than anything they fought up till now.

I feel like it is pretty poor planning for them to set up the room like that. He has plenty of hp if it isn't set up that way and you can use the monsters as meat shields. But I didn't expect them to eat through 6 hp in one round no save allowed, and when using magical throwing daggers, it should matter. Same with heroic brews.

Sigh. Maybe in Against the Ogre Horde it will be different. Maybe those spellcasters won't suck.

I'm not sure I understand how they could pull off all of those attacks with the movement allowed by the map. The problem is with the lead Hero at the door. First, he must open the door; it is important to remember that this is part of movement. To be positioned to throw a magical dagger, he must either move in one square and be stopped by the Witch Lord at the square marked "C" or stay outside the doorway. He may NOT throw the dagger and then retreat behind the other Heroes--that's a move (open door)--attack--move. So to throw his magical dagger, he must block Line of Sight to at least two other Heroes from his position at the doorway.

The best tactic I can see the Heroes pull off is for the lead Hero to open the door and move to the back of the line. Then the other three Heroes attack and simarly fall back. That would have netted 5 Body Points of.damage against the Witch Lord.

[Kurgan]

Normally I'd say if they were smart & tenacious enough to make it this far and do all that, perhaps they earned it (especially since you already beefed him up and they still got 'im).

But the Evil Wizard deck usually affords an opportunity to save the boss character from a cheap single round kill like that. I even have a card (if I'm lucky enough to draw it on the non-monster turns as Zargon) that lets me toss one of the lesser monsters in the way, to take the hit intended for the main villain in the room. There's another that lets him defend with blue dice (defend like a Hero essentially) but that wouldn't help against Magical Throwing Daggers which are unblockable hits.

You wanted a dramatic knock-down, drag-out fight and you didn't get it. But, sometimes those are the breaks! If the Heroes were already down to their last BP each, I might even feel good for them pulling off a stunt like that.

[lestodante]

the wizard genie then saw it fizzle and ball of flame (no saves rolled).

But can Genie damage the Witch Lord too? I remember only the Spirit Blade and fire spells do.

[Kurgan]

The Witch Lord can only be harmed by 4 things at this time:
The Spirit Blade, the Fire of Wrath spell, the Ball of Flame spell and
the Magical Throwing Dagger.

I interpreted the statement to mean that the Wizard, armed with the Wand of Magic (two spells per turn) attempted Genie, but the spell was wasted ("fizzled" out), then used Ball of Flame (2 BP).

Prior to that, the other three heroes had each used Magical Throwing Daggers: 1, 1, 2 (with Heroic Brew, meaning he had to have 2 Magical Throwing Daggers) for a total of 6 damage in one round (he modified the bad guy specifically to have 2 more BP than normal). If the Heroes were lined up at the door, then the first person could have attacked and moved out of the way, the next person attacked and then moved out of the way and then the next and finally the last could have moved up to attack (each would only require rolling a 4 to move "out of the way" in order to attack).

If using the default quest setup, there's a long hallway and the WL himself is lined up perfectly with the door, so LOS once the door opens and the Magical Throwing Daggers and spells are all ranged abilities. Magical Throwing Daggers are an artifact that isn't available in the EU editions (the "fire magic" text doesn't specify if that includes Courage), but then again the WL only has 1 BP there, so he'd be smoked either way (substituting Wand of Recall for Wand of Magic which does the same thing).

So it sounds perfectly plausible to me, albeit unlucky for Zargon.


(Interesting that neither quest map explains what happens to any remaining enemies if they're still alive after their boss dies, but it seems you win just by taking out the leader. I don't recall if we assumed you had to clear out the room or if we just naturally destroyed all the minions first).

[lestodante]

Oh.. ok, I didn't understand that "fizzle".
Also I was not sure about the magic daggers, but went to check and yes, the notes specify he can be damaged with a magical throwing dagger too but I would prefer no to avoid situations like the one above.
He was stronger in the previous quests.

[Kurgan]

Yeah, he starts out immortal but weak, then strong, then stronger, then weaker but still strong. Did the Heroes know in advance? Apparently not everything. But to get to him, remember, they had to overcome those 9 rather challenging quests, minimum (more likely, another 14 before that, giving them clues, but not proof, as to how to proceed). I found that the magic throwing daggers are usually used nearly as soon as they are found, we didn't save them up hoping to eliminate the boss at the very end of the pack.