Boardgame Review: Descent - Journeys in the Dark

 

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This game is a cross between and RPG and a boardgame about dungeon delving. One player takes the GM role and the others are the party adventuring into the dungeon. The GM attempts to thwart the players with his cards and his action tokens and the players attempt to stay coordinated, stay alive, pulverize monsters, and achieve a dungeon-specific scenario (in the one I played, it was kill the giant at the end of the dungeon).

This sort of game would be familiar to anyone who has played dungeon-crawl board games or RPGs. Someone opens a door, someone goes through the door, monsters are seen, fights ensue, treasure is looted from the room, traps go off, more monsters are fought, etc.

There seems to be a variety of monster quality levels and special abilities and that makes for some interesting decisions. The Ogre, for instance, possesses formidable knockback as well as good damage dealing. The hell-hounds had area-effect conic firebreath.

Combat is by means of customized dice. You roll dice, which differ in face values by their colour. On the dice, you can get hearts (wound points), numbers (range for effects), lightning bolts (special power activators), nothing (blank!), and probably some other icons I forget. A typical roll for a character with a sword might be three dice of differing colours and might generate 6 damage points, 1 range, and 1 power activator. The power activators can be used to trigger powers on items your character is carrying (such as +1 damage or the like).

Of course, being a dungeon delve, it comes with gear you buy at the start and magical and loot you find along the way (plus money). These items take the form of armour, weapons (ranged or melee) with bonuses to damage, magic items which increase magical attacks, and other special ability items. One example of the later was a magic item that let me spend a fatigue to heal two life for another player.

Characters have some skills which let their characters do extra things or have bonuss. In our run through, one character could spend fatigue points to charge and do more damage. My character had bonuses to defense from parrying and from willpower.

Each character also has variable statistics for fatigue, life points, natural armour/defense, and for what dice they use in melee, ranged combat, or magical combat. They also have special powers - my character was sort of a whirling dervish who could trade fatigue for wounds or wounds for fatigue on my turn.

The characters try not to get killed, try to efficiently kill the monsters and limit the DMs respawn locations by keeping line-of-sight to as much of the explored area as possible. The DM in turn tries to find out of the way spots to spawn in monsters and throws traps to slow down and attrit the party.

The players have control of their tactics, their character's gear distribution, and where they want to go at junctions in the dungeon. The GM has control over which of his cards he plays or discards and whether he spends his action tokens piecemeal to bleed the party along the way or saves up for crushing waves at more distributed intervals.

The game also has a campaign system and this apparently lets you run an entire campaign with the same (barring dying) characters. Even more like an RPG, but on the light side and with very sort of simple dice mechanics and a focus on "open door, whack monster, get loot".

Not sure if the game would sustain my interest over the long haul - different monsters, powers, items would help (and there are a lot of expansions). But it isn't a full fledged RPG and its rather one dimensional play (dungeon crawl, shoot-n-loot) would probably get tiring after a time. Still, as a one off or short campaign, it might make for some excellent fun.

Fun: 3 of 5
Strategy: 2 of 5 (there are tactics, not much strategy)
Speed of Play: 4 of 5 (for games of its ilk)

Session Report:: [Olostin's Hold] Bugbears and Body Bags

 

The party stood before the stone door to the bugbear lair. The mage was tired and a bit mentally fuzzy; Being up all night takes a toll.

The warriors Dhallon, Hagis and Reagan put their shoulders into the surprisingly well-crafted stone door, but to no avail despite their best efforts. This led to a discussion and a search for other entrances, while Hagis and Dhallon went back to the building with the tools to acquire some pick-axes.

Just as the two warriors arrived back, distracting everyone, a Bugbear opened the door and stuck its head out. Hagis raced up to jam the door with Dhallon right with him. Jastra and Reagan moved up behind but could do nothing with the Bugbear in the way.

The Bugbear tried to flee, and Jastra chased him down and skewered him, striking deep into the major artery in his leg and finishing him off as he tried to get through a door to a room full of his cohorts.

The fight was on! Three Bugbears hurled Javelins, swung morningstars, and grappled with Hagis, Dhallon and Jastra, with Murklane adding fire support. Reagan watched the party's rear with Sturv, only to find himself being overrun by another four Bugbears!

Sturv and Reagan fought a holding action against the four Bugbears, while Dhallon, Hagis and Jastra finished off those in the sitting room. Hagis joined the fight in the hallway, wrestling with the last of the Bugbears until it was put down by a bolt from Reagan's crossbow.

Exploring further, the party found various small bits of treasure including a nice table with a map of the Calling Horns area upon it as well as some small amounts of loot found on the individual foes.

Pushing on, the party discovered a cloak room with a few odds and ends and another passage, leading to a room with a Hill Giant!

Hagis talked his way past the Hill Giant, convincing him to let Hagis pass through to the secret door. When Dhallon went to follow, the Giant started to wind up for a swing and Jastra leapt upon him, blades flashing and slashing. The Giant howled and the fight was on.

A brutal battle was joined in the small space, with Reagan sinking multiple bolts into the angry Giant, and Hagis, Dhallon, and Jastra all swinging and dodging, trying to avoid the wrath of the lumbering creature. Soon, the giant was bloodied, but he would not go down quietly!

With one big swing, he connected solidly with Dhallon. Moments later, the backswing smashed Dhallon's ribs, cracking obsidian armour plate and knocking the warrior into the far wall of the room, lifeless - slain by the massive blunt trauma!

Hagis, in a fit of rage, hacked down the badly wounded Giant to avenge his comrade.

The party looked to aid their comrade, but quickly realized Dhallon was beyond any aid, slain outright. The party endured a period of shock and grief, then sought out a way to transport Dhallon's body for a twilight burial outside under the auspices of Lathander as soon as this was feasible. A wheelbarrow was fetched to help bear the body.

A somber group contemplated their next step - leave the current locale with the intent of burying Dhallon and returning or press on and finish cleaning out this den of brigands and monsters. The feeling was that Dhallon would have wanted the group to press on, to carry the fight to the foe, and to win a victory in his name.

Pushing on one room further, a huge store of high-quality spoils were found, although little of the collection easily portable - statues, saddles, armoires, carpets, and such like. A suit of magical full plate was discovered, complete with a skeleton. Magical everburning torches were discovered, handy if they don't start fires! And another door to a side passage was discovered...

Down the side passage, two more doors were found, one replete with sound of Bugbears chatting animatedly, the other as silent as death. The Hagis, Jastra and Murlane, healed by Sturv, prepare to take the Bugbears unaware, with Regan in support and Sturv holding the rear.

Jastra spent the moments following the tragedy by beginning working on an epic poem about the life and death of Dhallon Thores. Dhallon had been a good and true companion, if with a somewhat flexible idea of equitable division of spoils. Jastra had enjoyed Dhallon's pragmatic sensibilities and lovely knitted goods as well. Dhallon would be missed....