Daniel (@dungeondive) continues the City of Kings let’s-play into Story One, Chapter Two: The Orc Hunt, opening with corrections crowdsourced from the comments — those “miscoloured” markers were actually trackers, and luck genuinely starts at zero, so the luck die stays benched until upgraded. The chapter tasks his heroes with discovering three creature tiles and clearing every visible monster, and it’s here the game’s teeth come out. He meets nastier enemies — Jumba that reflect two damage back on every hit, a Broke Tooth Legion with eight health — and grapples with abilities drawn from the bag: tracking creatures that stalk the nearest hero, grab that yanks a target across the map, and a brutal knock-back paired with position cards that fling heroes through fire and poison. He leans on a Stone Curse skill to stop enemies self-healing and learns the hard way not to split the party when heroes move only one tile per action. It’s engaged, thinking-aloud play, but the cracks are showing: rules double-checks, a flubbed activation order, the sense of a system with more moving parts than a casual solo session comfortably holds. Another chapter marked, in hindsight, “ABORTED.”
City of Kings’ random-ability enemies keep every fight fresh but detach it from the lore. Do you prefer enemies that surprise you each encounter, or ones whose powers always match who they’re meant to be?