Descent Assault – an adaptation of Star Wars Imperial Assault

rules for Descent 2nd edition

1. Introduction.

This set of rules tries to adapt those changes made to the ruleset that appeared in Star
Wars: Imperial Assault. I have tried to modify them so that they may work in Descent, so
they are not just taken from SW:IA, more inspired by. Some of the rules below were
previously included in my “defeat matters” rule set.

2. Turn order.

At the start of the turn the hero players activate one of their hero, when that hero finishes
their two actions the overlord exhausts one of their monster/lieutenant cards to activate
that group. After all the figures in that group ended their two actions the hero players
activate their next hero, in this manner the players continue until all the heroes and
monsters have been activated.

So the turn order looks like this:

1. First hero's activation

2. Start of turn reinforcements and/or First monster group's activation.
3. Second hero's activation
2. Second monster group's activation
4. Third hero's activation
5. Third monster group's activation
6. Fourth hero's activation
7. Remaining monster groups' activations
8. Status phase

If there is a smaller number of monster groups, simply proceed to the next hero activation
and after they are finished to the status phase.

3. If the number of heroes is lower than 4

Always use the number of monsters, lieutenants' attributes and treasure tokens (and
anything else referring to the number of heroes) as if there were four heroes in the game.

If there are only two heroes they can be activated twice per each round (use hero tokens
or other markers to help remember how many activations are left), but the same hero
cannot be activated twice in a row. Also each hero gets +10 to their health.

If there are three heroes one of them gets two activations per turn, use a token to mark
this, at the end of the round (in the status phase) pass this token to the hero player sitting
on your right. Also each hero gets +5 to their health.

When the hero starts their additional activation they should first refresh all their skills and
items.
If you have trouble remembering additional health points, treat damage tokens as health
tokens i.e. give to each hero the number of token equal to their health and take tokens
away when their suffer damage.

4. Reinforcements

If the quest book tells you that the reinforcements arrive at the end of the turn place them
in the status phase.

If the reinforcements arrive at the beginning of the turn, place them at the start of the first
(not later!) overlord's activation. If the reinforcements are a new monster group, that group
can be chosen to be activated first.

When placing the reinforcements to a group, minion monsters have to be placed before
master monsters, unless the overlord chooses to spend one threat token.

5. Status phase

Status phase occurs after each hero has activated and each monster card has been
exhausted.

At the start of the status phase heroes refresh all their cards, then the overlord player
removes all the cards from the table that had 1 turn's duration, takes new overlord cards
and can play any overlord cards that say they have to/can be played at the start of a turn,
these cards are in effect until the next status phase.

During status phase all the “end of turn” reinforcements are placed.

6. Defeated heroes.

When a hero is defeated, their card has to be flipped (if it hasn't been already), so by
being defeated that hero loses their heroic feat.

After the hero stands up or is healed the player removes that hero's token from the
board and places it on that hero's sheet.

First the token is placed on the  symbol, next time the hero is knocked out it is
placed on the  symbol, the next one on the  symbol. (so we move upwards
through the values but in a circular manner so after  coming back to ).

Each hero token reduces stamina, health or speed by one (this cannot be healed
or rested in any way).

If the player is defeated so many times that they run out of hero tokens, that hero
cannot come back on the board.

If you want a more challenging game, remove the hero from play on their fourth
knock-out.

When playing a quest consisting of two encounters, the tokes placed on  and 
are removed from the character sheet at the start of the second encounter, but the ones on
 stay until the end of the quest.

When defeating a hero the overlord player BOTH takes a threat token and an overlord
card.

6.1 Conditions

When a hero is defeated do not automatically remove conditions affecting this hero. If the
condition requires an attribute test to be removed (e.g. Diseased, Poisoned) do a test
before putting the figure back on the board (so if the test fails the hero does not suffer 
or  that turn). If the condition requires an action to be removed, remove it.

6.2 Optional rules

1. If you find that your heroes get into the loop of being knocked-out, standing up and
knock-out again, restore 50% of hero's health (rounded down) before any stand-up action.
So a hero with 15 health would get 7 health plus what they roll on two red dice.

When using this variant remove the hero from play after their X knock-out (I recommend
second, but choose a number 1-4 that fits the level of challenge you want).

2. When spending fatigue for movement limit this to max 2 fatigue per activation (this
follows Imperial Assault rule, I'm putting this as optional, as you may want to stay with a
more heroic feat approach as per default rules).