by Sadgit
In the last couple of weeks we have received several requests to preview the new coop mode that will be included in the upcoming community expansion Sands of the Past. Here it is now.
Road to Peril provides a cooperative mode of play for Descent: Journeys in the Dark Second Edition and its expansions. In Road to Peril 1 to 4 players must work together to overcome the challenges presented to them by a card-driven artificial intelligence. No electronic device is needed when playing Road to Peril. This mode has been developed by Erik (Painkeeper) and myself and includes many ideas present in RAMV, which can be regarded as its spiritual predecessor.
Road to Peril uses the general rule-set of Road to Legend as given in the “Road to Legend - Rules of Play” book. Notably, both play modes feature:
Alternating hero turns and monster activations
Identical monster activation lists
Identical penalties when attacking multiple monsters
Identical morale counter
Additional goals that we set when designing Road to Peril:
1. Scale-able difficulty (4 levels: easy, normal, heroic, legendary) with the highest levels being still challenging for experienced players with optimized heroes
2. Clear, intuitive rules that do not leave any room to cheese things.
3. Immersive texts and descriptions.
4. Coop components for the standard "Heirs of Blood" campaign and the new community mini-campaign "Sands of the Past" included in the expansion.
5. High-quality design and layout of all components.
6. Thorough play-testing before release.
Here are the links to Preview #1 and Preview #2 just in case you missed those.
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What Lurks in the Dark ...
Although the overlord himself is not present, he left detailed instructions and imbued his minions with unnatural powers.
At the core of Road to Peril two types of cards instruct players how to activate monsters and approach decisions that are usually made by a human overlord.
Agenda cards provide encounter-specific information on Peril deck assembly (see below), monster placement and behavior, reinforcements and special quest rules. There is one Agenda card for every individual encounter. The Command section on the back of many Agenda cards can provide encounter-specific action lists for certain monster groups that need to complete special tasks during the encounter.
Monster Activation cards show players how to activate all monsters that do not have special tasks to fulfill. Monster Activation cards include activation boxes on front and back that display instructions identical to those used by the Road to Legend app. A monster activation box consists of a special effect and an action list. Each time a monster group activates, players roll a standard six-sided die (D6) to determine which monster activation box is used. Then the special effect is resolved and each monster performs 2 actions from the action list. In addition, Monster Activation cards show information on surge usage, special monster abilities, etc.
[hr]Perils and Traps
To make life even harder, two decks of cards provide deadly surprises for the heroes.
Peril cards display effects the represent the lingering influence of the overlord and special powers of his minions that will take effect every second round. Depending on the difficulty level chosen at the start of the campaign, the Peril deck for the encounter may contain color-coded Minor, Major, Deadly and Quest Perils. At the same time, the Peril deck acts as a timer for the heroes to encourage them to hurry up - when a Deadly Peril is revealed the quest is lost.
The heroes must be careful when exploring uncharted territory. Trap cards describe carefully laid-out traps of the overlord. Whenever a hero performs a search action to reveal a search token or opens a door, he must test for traps. A trap test is an attribute test against a trap value between 1 and 6, that depends on the success of the heroes during the campaign: Each time the heroes win a quest, the trap value is decreased by 1; each time the overlord wins a quest the trap value is increased by 1. Only if the hero passes the Trap test he or she can successfully dismantle the trap and avoid its effects.
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And, as always... stay tuned!