Descent: Road to Legend is named after a seminal expansion to the first edition of Descent that first introduced the concept of a campaign in the land of Terrinoth. Now this companion app makes the campaign setting even more approachable for players.
One of the main changes the app brings is fully cooperative play. The application itself controls operations of what would be the overlord player. This includes spawning new monsters, deciding what they will do with their turns, what special peril cards to activate, and advancing the story. For groups that didn’t like the adversarial nature of Descent this is a great boon that lets everyone work together try to win the game.
With the app controlling all of the overlord functions of the game is also adds more mystery to what is going to happen next. When playing the base game you generally can see the entire map at the start of the quest but now, as it should be in a true dungeon delve, players don’t actually get to see what is behind a door until it opens.
Another change to the gameplay is an adoption of the order players take their turns. Normally all heros act and then all monsters act; going back and forth between those two groups. Now turn order flips between single heroes and monster groups letting players and monsters react to the actions of each other in a more natural way.
The way the app controls what monsters and adventures take place is an inventive system of using any of the monsters the owner has told it are available. The game can function with just the base set of descent but if you own some of the expansions you can let it know and it will occasionally use some of monsters and characters from that set to attack you!
Lastly Road to Legend provides some nice features to make playing the game feel more thematic and require less record keeping. As you acquire gold and experience the app keeps track and then shows what class advancements and gear are available to purchase. In order to make the experience thematic all of the interactions throughout the quests have narrative elements and if the sound is turned on it has some background music to help create an immersive environment.
Descent: Road to Legend is available on most platforms including android, IOs, and even steam! Best of all the app is free and most of the campaigns are free as well. There is an eternal dungeon mode they have now added that is available for a relatively low price.
May the cooperative adventures through Terrinoth begin!