Zachareth's fine... but I just find him so boooooring. His deck is indeed very powerful, and I agree you should pick this one in a vacuum if you´re just after the best choice possible at general level. However it is just not my style of play. Everything in this deck is made to interact almost robotically with other mechanisms, like OL cards, search cards etc. There is no "if" or "roll to check". There is no "I will do this so I can use this plot card", or "I will make the heroes do this so I can play this card". There is never that sense of danger from the heroes side because everything is so inevitable and predictable. You draw the treasure chest, BAM! pick another card. No attribute test, no dice roll, just raw inevitability. It's almost like the heroes have to suck it up intially and give up the effect of the cards you purchase and incorporate it in their strategy. As opposed to other types of decks where everybody sees what effect you can play but they never know when you want to trigger it because there is no given any longer. Sometimes an effect being situational is a bigger threat psychologically. People can give up on the fact you run 13 OL cards in your deck instead of 15. There is nothing they can do about it. But this Mirklace card Shifting Earth for instance is something they have to live with for the reminder of the campaign and need to keep thinking of, putting further strain on their planning/focus. If you are like me you want some other type of juice. I can't quite give a full ranking of all LT plot decks because I´ve only used a few of them. As a general thumb rule, I avoid every "themed" plot deck resolving around a monster type. It's just the fact that I think it restricts your choice of monster so much, or makes you give fortune away to make monsters become of the chosen type. I think that's the weakest plot deck mechanism by far. Then sure, if we have access to 20 monsters for each type in 3 years time then fine, but that's not the case today. 0-cost threat cards is what makes me happy. Tristayne my friend. Rylan is going to be my next friend. Some people will probably disagree, but the threat->fortune spent to trigger Sir Alric Farrow's defense cards just negates the whole point. Who cares if my monsters are harder to kill if I give as many extra actions and dice rolls to the heroes to kill them. Bol Goreth is probably the best choice you can make if you intend on investing in the Infector class. Some say Zachareth is good too, but you can also invest in Plan Ahead cards and Refresh if all you want is hitting your best card all over again.

The narrative side is the only problem I have with the game. The familiar tone (shortened words meant to illustrate characters speaking some kind of raw dialect or something) is hard to read to an assembly of people who don't have english as a native language, combined with the rather complex terminology in some paragraphs which I suppose is quite common for fantasy immersion. We normally skip it because it's not worth the effort. However I do mention at times why this lieutenant is there, what is the purpose of the quest etc. but it tends to be streamlined compared to the initial narration.

I second the choice about Mirklace, there aren't many good cards in his plot deck but the ones that are good are freaking awesome. That includes the agent, because Mirklace is a hell of a creature. Gameplay aside, the look on the face of my players the first time I pulled out the mini was priceless. I had played Bol Goreth before but Mirklace took the cake in terms of wow factor. The best part is, it lived up to its expectations as heroes broke down on him like waves crash on to the shore. One of my best memories in this game, really. The quest objective suddenly became the issue of how to kill him. But wait, there is more. I am currently playing with the Tristayne Olliven deck and I am totally a-m-a-z-e-d. It revolutioned my (initially negative) view of plot cards. You can play these 0-cost cards and make your monster hit very hard, especially when you can combine attacks with OL cards to get extra damage or surges. I do this EVERY turn. There is zero reason not to, and that to me gives a purpose to plot cards that I wasn't able to see before. Because everything was sooo situational, gave them fortune tokens etc. I never really wanted to go all-in with those unless they made me win on the spot, because of the price of playing these cards. I don't like punishing mechanisms so I considered plot cards as being more risky tha n useful in general. Maybe I´m lucky to face a party of heroes with low willpower, but the card earning you one threat for each willpower test failed (paired with basic II for best use!) ensures a constant stream of threat coming your way. Of course like everything else in this particular deck, it can backfire big time on you, but I´ve found these situations quite marginal as you tend to play these plot cards when you know you won't suffer said side effects. I also really enjoy the exploding fall card damaging everything within 2 squares of the dying monsters. I love global damage because it forces the players to consider group healing, which is difficult to achieve unless the group is clustered and the healer has enough stamina to run his thing. He needs to rest, well great, just play the basic II card punishing him for it. What a great moment when you can chain these cards together. I also like the plot card giving Ravage to a monster group when played at the beginning of encounter 2 of a quest with half-damaged heroes. It's awesome to give this to Rat Swarms to finish off the heroes for the lulz. I rarely seek for alphastriking a hero because there is barely any point in doing so, but when you get that much firepower in your hands it is quite an experience to play the "heroes way" and see them fall down one by one.

I have to say that the more I play this game, the more I find it balanced. Furthermore, I find that more and more cards are interesting in different situations. There were cards I had completely overlooked before, that I start to play again because I have changed my view on their useability. I still stand firm on the fact Dash feels way above any other card in terms of power, but overall I am having a blast playing Basic II with situational yet powerful effects. There seems to be a viable strategy against any kind of heroes setting and I am really glad that my initial sceptism has been proven wrong. Like many others here I am playing the Overlord exclusively, but I am having a kick out of finding weaknesses in the hero party and trying to capitalize on that. I am for instance facing Leoric of the Book as a Runemaster, who has worn a Rune Plate since the first quest due to a lucky shot at the best card in the search deck. While not a purchase per say, thus not a waste of money nor a wrong choice by any means, I´m somehow happy he´s the hero wearing it and not one of the other dudes. Rolling gray + black dice is quite a thing in act I, but it's a nothing compared to Syndrael/Knight million defense dices and upgrades because of the shield. I find that stunning the mage or splitting him from the group (since he always tends to want to shoot at something) has revealed being a better choice to make as the overlord. I have found that he is still killable if I wanted to go all-in for it, but in the end it feels always better to have him as far as possible from the group to avoid his stupid boost to his 3-spaces away pals. That's how I handle him normally. In terms of what I would consider as being overpowered, I even changed my mind about the Immobilized condition. I use that a lot against my heroes and yet they still find a way to come over it. Similarly, I accept the fact there are abilities played against me that are going to straight kill or incapacitate 2-3 monsters each round if the heroes want that. On the other hand that's as many actions spent to not go for the quest objective, precisely like when they focus on killing the poor Mimic. A monster is a big flashy target but it's above all an action/fatigue sink. Like I said sometime earlier, every monster has an unprinted "number of actions required to kill" figure, and that's all I´m reading (plus abilities of course).

I can't disagree more ... I don't mind that a co-op version exists, but I absolutely don't want it to take away or eliminate the expansions for the main game. Having the option to play a co-op every once in a while is nice, but it absolutely is not why I got into this game in the first place. In fact, it really can't be the reason anyone got into the game in the first place, as that option didn't exist to begin with. I share your situation as well. Edited my previous post to explain my view a bit better. And yes, I thought "how boring" when they released information about the co-op expansion. Now don't get me wrong, I'm sure I would enjoy playing a co-op game of Descent, I'm sure it is interesting and well-made, I have no doubts about that. I am happy FFG released it when I see how many people were asking for something of that kind. I just felt this way because I thought ah well, back to traditional dungeon crawl. I also like random maps and full co-op but I feel like there are a lot of other good games at it, and would rather keep Descent 2E as my little niche game with these awesome twists no other games have. Plus the minis can always be ported to any other game system I suppose.

Well, it clearly points to the past, that's for sure A vast majority of adventure games sees a party of heroes fighting against a semi-automated monster control system. So yeah, they're all co-op, apart from the Wizwar ones where you also get to bash at each other, but they probably belong to another category.Is co-op better because there is no Overlord? Or do you mean the map should be random? Feel free to think any of this, but Descent 2E is not that game you wish it was. This said, I'm really glad the co-op expansion allows for meeting players' demands, like yours, but again, please respect the people who like D2E as it is and do not make these players believe Descent is done as a game, as if there would only be one possible direction for the game: the co-op direction. It's not. There IS a future for normal Descent 2E and assuming a vast majority of people would want the co-op direction to take over the game is a gross exageration. I'm really happy Forgotten Souls is having so much success and I hope it will promote D2E as a whole and not only the co-op elements of the game. Gameplay-wise, D2E i far, far more modern than any Hero Quest, Warhammer Quest, even Myth or Arcadia Quest (which are in fact more recent) and the likes. The co-op expansion brings something more traditional to Descent. It doesn't mean the mechanisms are archaic or something, I'm sure it has its own modernity, but it's just a purely traditional way to play dungeon-crawls at its core. Therefore I strongly encourage people I know to try out D2E, because it's nothing like I´ve played before. It would be a shame if this game had to fall into darkness because people assume the only way to play dungeon crawls is to do it the traditional way. I have no problems with people who think D2E is unsatisfying and wait for D3E or the co-op releases to take off, but I have a big problem with people who want to force their overly negative feeling about D2E upon the people who enjoy it. That's lame. It's great we can discuss and criticize, but the "D2E is dead/should be IA" people should keep their rant constructive and bear in mind the fact people come to these forums because the game is ALIVE. We're not here to convince players that they should stop having faith in D2E because "IA is soooo much better" or "co-op: the ONLY possible future for that wreck of a game". Seriously guys, shut up. At least here on the D2E forums. If they announce something drastic like the 3rd edition or a 100% co-op direction for Descent then sure, let's talk about it. But for now people just assume things and I haven't got any indication that FFG would bury "classic D2E" for one or another reason. I understand that you mean that co-op expansions should be promoted in the future, and I agree with that, but I strongly disagree that it should be done at the expense of the regular product line for Descent. Likewise, I'm happy if Imperial Assault is doing well if it can promote Descent in form of getting positive influence out of other good mechanisms out there. This said I like the fact D2E is unique in its genra so blending it with other products or borrowing some gameplay elements might imply that the game loses a bit of her soul. I am no purist, in fact I would like this game to evolve as much as possible, but I would want it to keep its spirit. So yeah, you got it, what I cannot stand is the automatical dismissal/denial of D2E just because somebody think some other things might be cooler. It's fine to prefer other games over Descent, but you don't have to spit in other people's soup.

Not interested, but I respect the fact other people are. I think it would be awesome for you guys, but I also hope that the original product line will carry on releasing new content at the same frequency, without the need to wait for the co-op line to release its own expansion before the next "normal" release pops in.

Nah. I really hope not. Maybe they will, but I don't see the benefits aside from allowing hero players to accumulate piles and piles of skills and equipment while the Overlord sits with act IV monster cards with +2 health on them and an extra +1 damage on surge. Seems to me like a way to make the hero build-up masturbation from the heroes side last way longer for no real reason, bar the satisfaction of covering the table with cards to make it feel like a true RPG, which this game is not. I don't think it would bring anything to the game experience. Problems I see with this apart from the above, which I think is already boring enough as it takes the game spirit out of its context: - Too long. Not only the fact you have two more acts, but all of these skills and equipments and additional rules has got to slow down the game drastically. The game needs to flow. - Too many cards on the table means problems with clarity and availability of the information. Everybody has got to have a clear view of everybody's skills and equipment. As an overlord I have problems with that already when we reach the middle of Act II. - Why not taking advantage of the variety in this game? Why would you add 15 hours to a campaign with the same heroes instead of picking a new team and get to try something else during the same time? That would multiply your experience of the game by 2. Nothing prevents you from picking the same hero and class if that's what you want? If we had only 4 heroes and 4 classes then sure, I can understand why you would want to make your campaigns last longer, but with the unmatched variety in this game I really struggle to see how people that are passionate about the game are willing to use the same bullets over and over again instead of trying out the different strategies and options there are. - Thematically, act IV zombies and goblins? Hitting harder than an act I dragon or something? I mean I don't care, but it makes no sense. - With no major overhaul of the Overlord mechanisms I don't think supporting act III and IV is even remotely manageable. It is strongly in favor of the heroes. Yet you seem to want to release EVEN MORE skills and abilities and equipments and ways and ways and ways to bury the overlord under card advantage. - The campaign needs to feel like there is a slow yet unstoppable rise of the forces of darkness until the epilogue takes place. I'm not sure I would feel it the same way if the campaign took me 4 months to end instead of 1.5. It's just too long and FFG would have to introduce a lot of game changing elements to provide that type of experience. I don't only think it is unlikely they can do it, I would even go ahead and say that it would probably destroy the game as we know it. - The XP system would need to be changed completely, as would the threat system. Sure you can do this change, but then all of the quest books are wrong etc. FFG is not Games Workshop, they don't release revisions of their books every two months because the business model forces them to release the same product for purchase at that frequency. Please don't suggest that FFG should opt for a strategy like this and force everybody to purchase new monster cards, quests books and so on in order to play your so-called awesome campaign system.

Thanks for explaining your view. I also think some of the gameplay would have been much better (especially less prone to inbalance) had it been done a different way. I too have ideas about how this game could have been made better, and I would be really happy if some of these ideas were put to trial and represented in the next edition, but as for now I am globally happy with the game. It is currently keeping 9 persons (from different groups) on their toes, and they are asking for more. I agree about the fairness issue of winning the campaign off the Finale alone. My view though is that even though it puts a bad taste in the mouth of both winner and loser, if you look retrospectively at the campaign as a whole and look for the epic moments you've had, I think there is still some satifaction to get out of the game. I like to win obviously, but I sleep better after a fierce fight I lost than a cheap win I got off Dash or a mistake from my opponents.

Ok, let me clarify this. I know there are a lot of things that need clarification, many interactions that are not obvious from the rules, unintuitive situations occur from time to time etc. I'm not blind to the fact FFG should at some point release a big errata/corrected cards for these situations to facilitate our future games, or at least centralize the information somewhere in a big handy document you can print out. This being said, these "issues" have never put me in a situation where I sat and considered stopping playing this game because it was too much for me to handle. I don't know, there is a lot of support to be found on the internet. Once you find the information, you're set. I get that some of these situations can be annoying, like these one-sided quests for instance, but when you do the research, you almost always find that these quests can be done by both sides assuming the correct combination of abilities/heroes/monster choices is met. I know it's not comforting, but every quest cannot be made 50/50 sided I guess, but that's a good thing because it forces one side to go all-in. Since each game has its own setting, there will inevitably be quests of that kind, I guess. I mean, I don't think the game can be perfect considering all of these factors. I guess there are also different levels of "bugs", but most of them I consider to be the result of the amazing number of abilities, equipments, quest settings and other combinations of things that is currently occupying 6 boxes on my shelf. I'm not saying some of these flaws are not obvious sometimes and shouldn't have been caught during the quality assurance process, but people need to realize that playing a game with many powers and infinite combinations of them is always going to lead to situations where players need to sit down and make a decision for lack of better guidance. My point being that if you bar the very very few number of crazy situations (which you can house rule away if they're that bad), it comes down to your attitude towards the game. You can nit pick everything and demand a 3rd edition, or you can enjoy the game as it is and be prepared to make decisions during these tough calls. So yeah, I'm all ears to these "issues" but I don't need to bury my head into the sand if I am just prepared to meet these situations. Don´'t know if this clarified my view Still, I really would like to know what's that "unbearable" with D2E for the people who think so.

I'm confused. What bugs are you talking about? Will FFG plan for a 3rd edition at some point? Eventually, yes. Is this the answer you wanted to get? Not sure what your point is. I really wonder why people think D2E is done. Right now the people demanding D3E are the people who openly criticize D2E's design (LoS, overlord, fixed map, which are all strong design choices, not bugs..), which are legion on these forums. But to me this point is applicable to any game you don't like whether it's had a short life or a long one. I don't understand why people feel the urge to press FFG for a third edition for a game that is completely fine. Like I said, if you don't like D2E then it's in your right to gather your points and put them forth to the community, but what I really dislike is the way it is put which forces the D2E players who like the game to rally to the idea that a 3rd edition is on its way while it's not. Don't force these people to think D2E is done. It might not be your intention but that´s how it looks like, combined with the rest of these other IA threads. A non-debate in my opinion, at least until you can explain what you think are the inherent flaws of D2E or bugs that "require" a new edition so we can get rid of them (yeah, as if a new edition would magically sort everything out anyways...). I don't think everybody shares that idea of the game.

No, we don't play with the Salary Cap variant. Like you said, it allows for some ridiculous wins, and we don't like that. Humans benefit a lot from enchanted balls. You commit a blitzer, tackle a player, execute a pass, get the ball, and execute a third skill? That is amaaaaaazing I don't find humans as lacking any particular strength, I think they are very strong in all departments. They're not stellar in any department, if that's what you mean, but they lack nothing and are competitive enough on all these points to meet virtually any other team. Your mileage may vary obviously, but they just have the perfect base roster and anybody can pilot them to victory. If we have new players crashing for a game, I always suggest Humans as being one of the teams to try out. In the hands of a strategist, they really shine.

Not quite true in my opinion. In my circles most players play conservatively/defensively because they are overly careful and want to keep their choices open rather than shutting doors early in the game. The Chaos team requires the manager to do the exact opposite. Dwarves can be played conservatively, so to me it makes the team available to a broader public. They are much harder to pilot than say Humans, but playstyle wise they are not much different. About Vampires, I´m not sure what their playstyle is because I honestly don't know what makes them work. If I had seen one single success with them then I´d be able to say which playstyle or approach seems to be the most appropriate, but I haven't. Suicidal playstyle, agressive playstyle, build-up kind of playstyle, we´ve tried all that with no success. Orks is also a very accessible team in my opinion. To me the teams that are truly requiring the manager to run them using a non-conservative playstyle are Chaos, Dark Elves and Goblins. Nurgle maybe but I don' have many games with them to back my statement. Vampires on top of that with the above in mind. It's one man's opinion obviously.

OK so I read your first paragraph - which I agree with as it confirms what I had said previously - , but then you suddenly jump off to the conclusion that the best matchups for the Dark Elves are against the teams with statistically the most tacklers available to take down the Dark Elves players with downed skills? I mean, that's a hell of a simplification Besides, the final result of this analysis is exactly what I find as being the worst matchups ever for this team (which is quite funny). Because yeah, like I said earlier, we both agree that you need to capitalize on these downed skills, but in my mind it's not only about the action of getting tackled but also the fact that it forces your opponents to make a choice, and to me an opponent deciding not to tackle one of your players by fear of executing the downed skills has equal if not more importance in the win factor for this team. You still need standing players like any other team, otherwise you cannot win matchups, however my point was that you can play this type of "cold war" game bearing in mind you don't have as much to lose as your opponent. Or more accurately maybe, your position may be strengthened in the matchup because of the tackle. Or maybe not, that's what the opponent needs to evaluate. But again, I´m 100% in a multiplayer setting thus I might be trolling this thread since the OP clearly stated that this was not his own context, but I would gladly commit players to a game against Humans (best team imho) rather than Vampires (worst team imho) for the reasons I exposed previously. What you do not want to do is being involved in a highlight against a team which you know will want to canalize all focus on one single matchup if the odds point this to the one you´re in. Dark Elves is a juicy target for this type of commitment to a matchup. To each his own experience, I´m not saying somebody's inherently wrong here, but in my experience, teams that are across all boards (because they can, which Dark Elves cannot) will easily be a bit loosy on their focus on each individual matchups and often go for teams equally powerful in order to strip them off a few rewards. You are not a major threat to them is what I´m trying to say, which is how I build my strategy with this Dark Elves team. But with regards with your point system, while I see what you mean and yeah statistically these teams you mentioned have the most chance to down your players, but that's barring a TON of other factors that actually (in my opinion) make the conclusion completely opposite to yours.

I can understand why somebody would rate Orks as being better than Chaos. I would personally rate them as having a more or less equal ranking. Playing the Chaos team requires a very specific playstyle that not all the players are able to take on. They just don't work at all if the player is overly defensive and conservative about his plays. Also, a team relying on cheating tokens to win games means you are exposed to the luck factor in a less controlled way compared to most other teams. They´re either hit or miss. Chaos is nowhere near Humans You had me lose my breath for a second, lol. Their team roster and upgrades are far, far behind Human's base capacities. I don't mean Chaos cannot defeat Humans ever, but to me the Humans team is just vastly superior in almost every aspect. Putting them in pair with Wood Elves is less shocking to me, especially since I tend to rank Wood Elves as a second tier team (maybe the top 1 second tier, though) but that's entirely based on results, I cannot fathom comparing the teams from a theoritical perspective as they are just day and night.

How is this remotely a problem? As the OL and the rulesmaster, I am always involved during my heroes' turn. I cannot help them making decisions, but I am required to confirm what can be done or not, and provide information about my monsters, the range between two figures, we calculate things together etc.

Oh dear.. Yeah you are 100% correct and apologies from me for forgetting to state the CORE assumption in my analysis, which is that I base that on a multiplayer setting. We play 4-5 players games and I have exactly zero 1-vs-1 games in my bag backing the things I've said. I guess some of these things would still valid from the duel perspective, but the part about deciding which teams to go against falls completely flat in that sense. I don't think I would change my tactics if I were to play this team in a 3-players game, for a duel I would just try to rely on luck alone Well not quite, but I mean the part about going all-in for the star players/team upgrades is really vital here. Then it highly depends on your opposition. Since you are playing duels, you may already have a matchup reference for the Dark Elves, e.g. which teams they have most favorable odds to win against and -likewise- which team they have unfavorable chances to win against.

I don't think Sprint loses any usefulness as time goes by. You can always discard the card you just drew if it isn't better than any of the cards you already have in hand. It can also be used as a way of getting rid of cards in your draw pile that you do not want to draw as your starting hand for the next round. If there is only a few cards left in your draw pile, then you can often figure out which cards they are (obviously you don't know in which order though) and decide if you want them in your starting hand or start sprinting to flush them away. At best, the draw pile is emptied and you get better chance to draft your best cards again in the next round. I use that strategy a lot with the Skavens in order to maximize my chances of getting the few star players I drafted back into my hand round after round. I don't think there can be "too much sprint". I have found that what you want in this game is the ability to make choices. I would commit players in a matchup with a sprint enchanted ball before any other type of effect even if I already play sprint-heavy teams like Skavens and Wood Elves. Seen from the perspective of the teams which are REALLY lacking a way to get their card draw going, sprint is a must-have ability that has relevance at every stage of the game. There is also the fact that your opponents will inevitably make calculations and guesses as for what you have left in your hand through the course of the game, based on what you have already played or discarded so far. The final turns are quite representative of that fact. If you draw a new card due to Sprint, then it makes that kind calculation much harder for them.

One of my player plays her with the Wildlander class, so she can shoot from any range through friendly figures... He had me a couple of times with this.

Wow. I guess the wall/obstacle situation has never presented itself yet, so my interpretation was indeed that the hero was forced to spend movement points to cover the extra 3 spaces from the Grease Trap, otherwise he/she would be suffering 1 damage/fatigue per space he cannot move to (due to lack of move points). I can definitely understand your version, though. I can see myself doing it your way in the future. My interpretation seemed legitimate at the time but yours made it overcomplicated and less likely to be true.

Ok so I have to ask for a clarification as for how Grease Trap works in a particular situation. "Play this card when a hero enters an empty space from an adjacent space. He tests Awareness. If he passes, he suffers 1 Fatigue . If he fails, move the hero 3 spaces in a straight line in the same direction he last moved. For each space he cannot move, he suffers 1 Heart or 1 Fatigue (your choice). Mage: If he fails, the hero is also Stunned." Now if the hero decides to use fatigue to move to contact in order to attack twice. I should be able to trap the hero during the forced move with Grease Trap, which is where I would think I could inflict him 3 damage since he has 0 move points at this point and can therefore not move the 3 extra spaces. But my heroes argue that the hero has two actions left and could use a move action to get these move points back into the pool and therefore would not suffer any damage. What do you think?

Well like I said before, I am always happy to draft this team and it might even be that it's my favorite one as well. This being said, I do not win every game I play with the Dark Elves, but they are always a good contender for the pole position on the fan track. But yeah, there is no auto-pilot function with the Dark Elves like there would be with other teams like Humans, Undead etc. You cannot sit with 2-3 highlights and a tournament thinking that you have a decent shot at winning all of them just by using the players in your hand. With the Dark Elves, you really need to go all-in for the rewards you truly need. Obviously there will always be cases when committing one single lineman to an empty spot will earn you an easy reward, but most of the time I tend to pack my Dark Elves together and thus try not to be everywhere at the same time (bearing in mind we have 5 highlights and a tournament in our games). I think the Dark Elves have unexpectedly decent odds against the top-tier teams. Mid/low-tier teams need to go all-in in order to compete at all, so psychological warfare doesn't really apply against them as they need to go for the easiest target, which you often are due to your overall low star power. Against top-tier teams however, the Dark Elves are in a very particular position. As opposed to mid/low tier teams, top-tier teams always have a choice to make in order to make the most powerful play they can achieve in the situation. This is where your players are seldom the prime target (unless you're winning already) because using a 4-5 star power player to tackle your star power 2 player and get a backfire in response is not necessarily “the best play out there”. I digress a bit, but I think top-tier teams seek each other out in this game, leaving some room for other teams to try and compete. If I play Humans and a buddy of mine has the Undead then I would try to limit his capabilities as much as possible instead on focusing on a team that has a lot less chance to fare as well as ourselves. So yeah, I would try to commit players to match ups against these teams early in the game and try to avoid Chaos, Goblins, even Orcs and Vampires as much as possible in the early stage. Wood Elves are a good target because they are good to tackle (this said they are not top-tier in my meta). Then regarding play style. I think Dark Elves need to be played very aggressively. By this I don't mean that you’re going to tackle anything at any range, but that you want every skill to count and force your opponents to make bad decisions by using the downed skills or the team upgrades to your advantage. I actually think that a passive opposition is almost worse for the Dark Elves because they cannot compete based on star power alone, so you won't win match ups if all you do is pile up players in front of an opponent doing the same thing. You need to tackle players, and be tackled in response. You need to trap their attention. How to use the players in the roster is key to that. A few thoughts about the things you mentioned, is that you WANT the runners to be tackled. I really think the 2 star power is great because it incitates your opposition to bring them down. And if they do, dump off the ball and cycle a card. You need that sprint skill. The way I use Assassins is that I commit them to match ups with an interesting enchanted ball so that if I miss the tackle then I can grab the ball and execute another skill. I nearly always go for the cheating token when I commit Witches or Blitzers, unless I don't think I can lose the match-up I commit them in. About the downed skills, I agree that you don't have full control of those since they rely so much on your opposition choosing to tackle the player with these skills. But I truly believe it's more powerful than you think because there aren't many coaches out there that want you to strip them off the ball, get a potential +3 power cheating token or cycle another card. So yeah, they tend to leave these players alone unless they are star players with great influence in the match up they're in. I think some coaches are overly defensive in games like BBTM and try to be consistent from the beginning to the end. I don't think this type of strategy pays off very well with the Dark Elves. I would really not be too afraid of tackling stronger players, and committing players to match-ups against top-tier teams. I would grab a cheating token for my split skills players, and so on. About upgrades and how to make choices for the match ups you need to commit players to. The star players deck for the DSS provides plenty of resources for the Dark Elves so that's what I tend to go for first. The star Vampires are really good for the Dark Elves. As always, I tend to get rid of my linemen as I draft non-freebooter players. Now the thing is that drafting big fat players automatically makes you more of a threat to everybody especially in tournaments. Which is why I tend to time/delay these star players the best I can (unless said player is the only sprint player in a hand full of linemen) to allow the core of my team to operate in the dark (like I said, good players choose flashy and juicy targets) until I can slam them into play and win on the spot. Now this is where I'm not 100% sure what the best approach is in terms of payouts bar star players which you're going to need anyway. The “safest” approach brings your team in pair with the other ones quicker, at the price of competitiveness for the things that make Dark Elves so tricky to play against. You would typically go for staff upgrades and try to get a set of coaches and a few scoreboard phase abilities that allow your fan track to stay high. That's not how I play though. I usually go for the team upgrades and no staff upgrade at all. I mean, a staff upgrade is always a good thing, but I always strive after getting all my team upgrades. The team upgrades for this team takes the things I just described and help you making these as relevant/succesful as possible. Death lace in particular is a game changer ability. Dark Sorceress strips the ball off players who can't drop it by normal means etc. Dice re-rolls, double tackles etc. I don't know, I always find a use for these abilities. I would gladly trade one of the weaker ones for a sprinting coach, but that's not exactly how it works heh. Anyway, that's how I set my mind when I play this team. From there **** can hit the fan anytime, especially under the Foul Play rules

OK, my bad about point 1, I was totally wrong. Our playgroup had a house rule for that and I somewhat assumed it was part of the core rules. I realized the rulesbook had a section at the end of it with the clarification you mentioned. Apologies! About the disease token. I assume you are talking about the team upgrade called "Grossly Infectious: matchup action: exhaust this card to move 1 disease token that is currently at midfield to midfiels at any other matchup". You know that can play team/staff upgrades triggering as matchup action only after you have commited a player and resolve all of his skills/abilities. So yeah. your player will inevitably suck up the existing disease token at midfield first, then generate a new token at midfield if he has the spread disease ability, plus the rest of his skills/abilities would be executed before you can cast Grossly Infectious. You can then play the upgrade to move the new token to another matchup. As for how useful this particular team upgrade is, I guess it's going to be highly situational in most cases, like most cards for this team if you ask me. I don't think it's as bad as you think it is, though. If you are leading at a matchup (tournament in particular) and therefore do not intend to commit any more players to it unless you are forced to, then there is something to gain from sending a disease token to that matchup. It incitates managers not to commit players to the matchup. You can also send the token to a matchup to help a manager against another one. It's a race for who has the most fans in the end, so sometimes helping out against the leader can be a strategy.

I think otherwise but you know that already However I do have some follow-up questions out of interest which might prove being relevant for what you seek: 1- How do they fare compared to Wood Elves and Skavens in your group? 2- Does the team feel hermetic or complex to the player, in such way that they eventually find hard to play it compared to other teams? 3- How conservative/defensive are your players with regards to taking risks? 4- Can you say that most of the time your players make the correct decisions as for what upgrades to go for with a particular team? I can probably point out a few things based on your answers, but one thing I do have noticed with this game is that some players (even experienced) sometimes get completely paralyzed over the course of the game as they have problems figuring out how to get their team up to speed.

1- With only two managers going for the tournament, the second place automatically gives the "runner-up" reward. Nobody gets the "lose" reward in this case. You have two types of rewards for the losers of the tournament, the runner-up reward for the second place, and the "lose" for the rest of the teams. No ability triggering upon you winning a matchup would apply unless you came first place at the tournament. 2- The rulesbook says that you IMMEDIATELY assign the disease tokens at midfield to the player being commited at the same matchup. The player you just commited would get the token.