First thought: I have been playing the RotR game with one extra friend since I started this game and have noticed something. Do you guys find the setup time to be really slow? We usually take the decks or part of the deck, shuffle, and deal out the cards. Any ideas on how to make it faster?
Second thought: Has anyone found the wrong way to play the game? I usually find the way and I have been at gaming for quite a while. I figured it would be good to max out certain characters stats while playing, but in some instances I see that people diversify. I'm just wondering if most people have a reason or just trying out different ideas. I know that in traditional game play you would want to max out certain stats. For example, I see that most people hit up Dex and Cha with Lem. I see the Cha for the casting stat, but you are also relying on his weapon for some damage as well. I had a simple thought....why not use the ally darts on top of the class ability? I just see others use him as a damage dealer.
FYI, I'm really digging the forum. I usually spend my time reading what other people say than usual posting.
This is the fastest setup way I can think of:
1. Set out adventure path, adventure, and scenario cards.
2. Set out location cards.
3. Each player takes 1 type of card, shuffles, and deals out the appropriate number to each location. Then takes another type of card and repeats.
4. Add in villains and henchmen.
5. Shuffle each location deck.
6. Begin to play.
I made a little card size chart to count the number of each type of card needed in each scenario based on the number of players you have. It is in my set of PACG accessories. It is based on this other one. That way you can just make a pile of each card type and then build the locations.
Second thought: Has anyone found the wrong way to play the game? I usually find the way and I have been at gaming for quite a while. I figured it would be good to max out certain characters stats while playing, but in some instances I see that people diversify. I'm just wondering if most people have a reason or just trying out different ideas. I know that in traditional game play you would want to max out certain stats. For example, I see that most people hit up Dex and Cha with Lem. I see the Cha for the casting stat, but you are also relying on his weapon for some damage as well. I had a simple thought....why not use the ally darts on top of the class ability? I just see others use him as a damage dealer.FYI, I'm really digging the forum. I usually spend my time reading what other people say than usual posting.
Some of it depends on your characters and your party size. I played Seoni with Sajan and Seelah. At first I put a couple of points in Charisma but then put some in Dex and Intelligence because we had some gaps there. I thought about Constitution as I saw some of the later banes and checks to close. I think with larger parties you can focus on one or two skills but with smaller numbers you gotta spread out more.
Second thought: Has anyone found the wrong way to play the game? I usually find the way and I have been at gaming for quite a while. I figured it would be good to max out certain characters stats while playing, but in some instances I see that people diversify. I'm just wondering if most people have a reason or just trying out different ideas. I know that in traditional game play you would want to max out certain stats. For example, I see that most people hit up Dex and Cha with Lem. I see the Cha for the casting stat, but you are also relying on his weapon for some damage as well. I had a simple thought....why not use the ally darts on top of the class ability? I just see others use him as a damage dealer.
From what I understand, diversification is important in Skulls and Shackles due to the increased difficulty (which involves increased amounts of and difficulty of non-combat checks). In RotR, however, it is simple to take a few cards (like Masterwork/Thieves' Tools and Blessing of Abadar) to trivialize barrier encounters and then focus all of your might on explore power and combat strength. Doing this gives the best results in RotR, and is the primary reason why you'll see the vast majority of characters built all for combat in RotR.
Now Lem (and Lini, if you can tell from my avatar) was one of my two favorite characters from RotR, and I successfully built him for both combat and support. Would he ever be as powerful as Seoni, Amiri, or a properly built Lini in combat? Well, no, but he could get the job done (in RotR at least). He can choose his favorite card type to ensure he always gets dealt his weapon and can hold onto it as long as he doesn't take enough damage to be forced to discard it. A light Crossbow or better will give him 2d8 for combat before any bonuses, and he can support himself from there. When he gets his role card and chooses Virtuoso, he'll gain the ability to add d4+x's to his own checks, and I find that Aid, or clouds/storms like Incendiary Cloud or Blizzard work well with him. You can make it so that he supports others AND himself in combat. Spending cards to make your own checks better won't leave as much room for exploring as other characters, but you can do some and also help out your buddies along the way. To date, my favorite combo/team I've had was Lem and Seoni. Seoni was built as much as possible to explore and destroy in combat, and Lem provided support, healing her, letting her draw more cards with Restoration, adding to her checks where needed to break through barriers or close locations, or just provide enough of a boost that any damage spell would kill the opponent (you get a ton of work out of Cloud spells if you're exploring 6 times in a turn). We would play 8 locations with our two characters and rarely use more than half of the blessings deck. BUT, despite being so supportive, Lem would do a few explores on his own turn, and he was still built so that he could handle any combat he came accross.
|
Hawkmoon's suggestion is how we set up our group. The real difference comes in having everyone help. If you're playing solo, you have to shuffle every type of card before dealing. When you have six, then each player can be shuffling a type of boon (weapons, spells, armor, items, allies blessings), you deal it, and then it's done. It's very quick.