Breaking in the Underdark

While a long-time Heroscape fan I hadn't had a chance to try out the new Underdark master set until today but my first impression was a good one.

I played a complete Heroscape novice, so I naturally took the weaker side, but even though I went down to eventual defeat it was an interesting fight.

We played the first scenario, which sees the heroic human fighter Tandros Kreel and his elven magic-user companion Ana Karithon racing to rescue the Elf mage Erevan Sunshadow from drowning in a cage guarded by a fearsome feral troll.

This alone was an interesting twist from the usual Heroscape scenario, which often tend to degenerate into mere smashing matches.

Tandros and Ana charged forward and were met halfway by the troll, who concentrated on the weaker Ana first. Here we made an error in play because I didn't realize that Tandros had a special ability that required him to be attacked first if he was adjacent to an enemy. The novice player also missed the special ability.

In any case Tandros bravely abandoned Ana to face the troll alone while he continued on to free Erevan. The troll dispatched Ana and followed.

Tandros was able to spring the cage on the first try, and the blubbering Erevan crawled out of the water and right into the rending arms of the troll. Having no order markers on him because he was just freed Erevan wasn't able to use his Fey power to escape and the second hero joined the first in the dead pile.

So it was just Tandros against the troll. Tandros abandoned the archery he had using up to this point for a close-range broadsword attack that quickly slew the troll, and claiming a rather Pyrrhic victory. It appears to me that the hero party needs to use Tandros to deal with the troll while Ana tries to save Erevan. I'll report how that turns out.

The battle went quickly. It probably took more time to build the set than it took to play. Next time I'll try to get more than one fight off the same map.