Game is grueling

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If you guys want a hard game to play, eventually with friends once coop is working... I think this will do the trick.

[Gloomhaven_Community]

Hi Orcluck,

Thanks for the kind words! Have you played the board game before, or is it your first time with Gloomhaven?

Take care,
Gloomhaven Team

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First time with it.

[Olebrommm]

im so glad i tried it hear,,, saved me alot of money... how this game is so popular i dont know.. it might be me doing something wrong.. cant even do the first one on easy,,, running out of cards and dieing, everytime.. how do you get the cards back without loosing cards,, i rly dident like the way the top bottom combo works sometimes its just not what you like to do,, thisgame is not for me i gess

[Shake Appeal]

The two most common mistakes beginners make are:

1. Not rationing their lost cards. Your deck is also your stamina, and if you blow a bunch of powerful attacks (which have a little X in the corner), you will exhaust before the scenario is out. You want to use discard attacks (which can be reclaimed by resting) and pace yourself. A huge part of Gloomhaven strategy is using your discard and lost cards efficiently.

2. You don't have to play the top or bottom action specified on the card. You can opt to do a basic Attack 2 or basic Move 2 from the top or bottom of *any* card, and this always counts as a discard, even if playing that half would ordinarily be lost.

[Perkus]

I dunno, folks, not trying to claim I'm brilliant or anything, but I'm playing on Insane (which is a laughable misnomer, given that it's just the normal difficulty level of the board game), Brute just hit level 6, and I've never lost a scenario. Even the one time I made a really stupidly planned entry into the first boss' room, I somehow pulled it out. Yesterday I had an annoying bug repeat which cost me about 3 turns in the very first room. Contemplated restarting to replay around it, but kept going. I ended up wiping the last room (4 mobs, 1 was elite) taking exactly 0 damage, needing no heals, and finishing at full health! A few nights ago I had the most unlucky run, hit 6 or 7 crit misses, failed to kill a guy at least 5 times that should have been dead, and still won that comfortably.

I'm about to go after the 2nd boss, which might well be my first loss since it's supposed to be tough. We'll see. I have 7 healing items between 2 guys, so I have a lot of room for error I think.

All that said, I'm playing Brute/CH, probably the easiest combo, with a ton of hit points. if I screw up with the UI, misclick, or hit a nasty bug, I don't hesitate to restart that turn. I don't use it to optimize results, though. And I've mostly taken green paths, just a couple of yellows. I am actively playing the board game, too, but less than 10 scenarios in. We've lost once. I played 2 practice rooms on my own first to learn the rules, where I did get my butt kicked... Having the right tactics is one thing, but you really, really have to understand all the nitty gritty little rules, particularly for AI, and there are tons of them. Much of the skill is in avoiding getting attacked in the first place through careful timing & positioning. If you're serious about playing well, start by googling "gloomhaven flipbook", and learn that entire online boardgame rulebook & added (long) FAQ. I guess you can ignore all the stuff not in the digital game yet, which is at least half the rules. Refer to it whenever you're not sure how something works.

This game really rewards knowledge & skill. You can't play it very casually and get by. But experienced boardgame veterans wind up raising the monster level regularly to maintain some degree of challenge, because the campaign game at normal difficulty is actually considered too easy once you know how to play well.

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It would help if the mechanics were clearly explained, and for example, the concepts of rationing cards would be explained.

[Dr. August]

Once the progression system is fully implemented I'm sure the difficulty will balance out. The perks are needed badly

[flagyl2]

Originally posted by Orcluck:

It would help if the mechanics were clearly explained, and for example, the concepts of rationing cards would be explained.

Have you looked at the guide in the game?

Under the tab of 'Guides' in the Community Hub, you can also find help.

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=1809310239

[J]

Plays game on insane with strongest 2 man comp....honestly try 4 mans comps on insane or switch to scoundrel / spellweaver duo if you think it's "too easy" with good game knowledge. Much harder than CH / Brute boss fights on 4 man comp hard+ are actually a pretty steep difficulty jump. CH / Brute comp even on insane is still an easy mode lol.

Take the time to understand game mechanics and what seems impossible with quickly become possible. There are a lot of bad decisions you can make in GloomHaven really take the time to consider your options and consequences before acting in GH.

[Thumb]

I played normal with the easy loadout, I just think its hard to be card efficient at first. I'll give the game another go when its further along and I can play with others. I just can't have fun with it at the moment by myself because its pretty crunchy and I'm a casual.

My D&D games aren't even half as challenging, which is great for this game because it focuses on the combat, and if it was too easy it'd be boring...but its too hard for me to succeed with it as is.

[tormania1]

I am using the 4 character party on the "middle" difficulty setting and just beat the 1st boss last night, within one more round of available cards left for 3 of my characters. My characters were all Level 6/7. I tried it the previous night and got just utterly slaughtered as I made some silly mistakes and the heavily shielded Elite Bandit Guards stalled my assault and then massive archer attacks with ridiculous range toasted my SW too early.

I'm still learning the best way to play the SW as I have had her get exhausted several times, well before everyone else, even when using her card to get back all lost cards. I started with the Tinkerer IRL so the change from 12 cards to 8 for a character is a big adjustment.

[saluk]

Originally posted by Orcluck:

I played normal with the easy loadout, I just think its hard to be card efficient at first. I'll give the game another go when its further along and I can play with others. I just can't have fun with it at the moment by myself because its pretty crunchy and I'm a casual.

My D&D games aren't even half as challenging, which is great for this game because it focuses on the combat, and if it was too easy it'd be boring...but its too hard for me to succeed with it as is.

Honestly... it's not as hard as it seems at first. The interface is pretty confusing. When you play the board game you have to learn the rules, so you really know how everything works together better. Even then it can be challenging.

A general rule is to not burn any cards for a character before their first rest. Since resting burns a card anyway, burning cards early significantly shortens your timer. You usually can survive the first room and a half without having to burn cards.

Three areas that are really obscured in this version of the game and will hurt new players:

Modifier cards are really important - but they fly by on the screen so fast you don't even know what modifier you drew for the attack. They really need to fix the interface for that to make it clear. But you can at least look at the modifier distribution to see if you have a high chance of getting +1's or -1's. (You always have a pretty equal 1/20 chance to have a positive/negative crit)

The elements are pretty much impossible to pick up on if you don't already know how they work. Though they don't impact the game much at early levels.

The other is the importance of initiative. It took me a game or two to realize that I could click on the initiative number on my cards to choose which initiative value to use. But at least knowing the board game I knew that the initiative isn't dependent on which card you want to activate first. So you usually get the choice to move fast or slow.

If the enemies are far away, you don't need to move fast. You can try to move slower so they move in range of you and THEN you walk up casually and hit them.

The game seriously needs an undo for when you misclick or make a mistake! (Which is something a casual group can EASILY do in the board game)