Yupsate said:

I don't blame the Overlord for the tactics, I blame the game for allowing him to do it.  Either way, the problem exists.

Yupsate said:

I use blocking tactics as the OL, and it hasn't created a massive imbalance at the table. Why? Because the counter-strategies available to the heroes are just as basic. The reason some of us don't see a problem is because in our experience this is surmountable with the tools available.

If you are in a situation where you have to take it easy on your opponents to make it even, my advice is: don't. They will learn how to play the game properly if you kick them around a little. And if they don't, then this just isn't their kind of game. No harm there - not everyone is good at turn-based tactics games, or enjoys them enough to become good at it.

The easiest solutin to the problem is haveing the dasterdly overlord and the most confident hero player switch roles.

I am sure that the "new" hero will teach the old heroes a thing or to on how to get around the problem.

An overlord that has thought long and hard on how to work the system has put enough time into identifying ways to get around his own stratagy.  Making him a player will force him to reveal to the others how to do so.  Unless he is a truley dastardly player and sand bags the heroes on purpose just to avoid giving away his secrets…

Our experience has been similar to the OP's.  The problem is more pronounced in some quests compared to others, but yes - it seems like there is little "real" interaction or employment of any tactics until towards the end of the quest when one side or the other has nearly won anyway.

We were thinking of house-ruling the following:

Monsters cannot double-move (in the same way they cannot double-attack).

Then some combination of the following (not necessarily all):

Figures cannot move diagonally past (or between) blocked spaces.

Centre-to-centre LoS, but figures instead provide a "cover" (range) penalty rather than blocking LoS altogether.

Large monster movement: Same as the original rules, except that the square the monster shrinks to must match the same square on its base as when it expands again.  The monster can also rotate 90-degrees around this square for 1MP.

Heroes can use 1 action to remove *half* of their current fatigue, or 2 actions to remove *all* of their current fatigue.

Heroes only regain their stamina at the start of their next turn, providing they did not take any wounds (reverting to the 1E method).

A hero must have performed a Move action during their turn in order to use stamina to move.

Overlord takes first turn of each encounter.

Yupsate said:

I don't see how this would work without completely breaking some scenarios and making life really boring for at least one hero.  It seems to suggest that one of the best tactics would just be to leave one hero by the entrance to prevent the OL from spawning anything.

My group mutinied against Descent 2.

We made it almost to the end of a campaign with me winning every encounter as the Overlord (aside from the Intro). Halfway through the second half of Dawnblade my group quit out of boredom and we started playing D&D4E "Descent style" instead.

As for background, I've been playing Descent 1 since it first came out and every expansion since. I was familiar with the FAQ and had it printed out to take with me wherever I was playing. I pored over the rules and was active on the forums to make sure I had everything right. Whichever side of the table I was on, Overlord or Heroes, that side won… with one exception. I lost as the Overlord one time (it was the Tomb of Ice dungeon with all the bane spiders. I hate bane spiders.)

But the thing is, nobody ever mentioned being bored or switching games. Everybody I played with liked bashing monsters (or heroes) and using their abilities. It was a blast, like Landrec with Sunburst.

Not so with Descent 2. For us, the spirit of the game is lacking. The objective of each side is some abstract event that each side pursues almost to the exclusion of the other side. What I mean is that there's no real incentive for the Overlord to even attack a hero. I roll attacks as an afterthought if the monster can't do anything else with that action. And it's the same for the heroes. Rolling an attack on a creature that isn't blocking a hallway is one action that isn't going towards achieving the goal (I'm slightly exaggerating).

To make matters worse, for the Overlord there's no reason to do anything else besides blocking a hallway with ettins or shadow dragons then have every other monster going after the goal.

We feel like the rules are not balanced well at all. I've seen some people say that the Overlord of D2 is more like a DM that should pull punches. I mentioned this to my players and they made it clear they would not play with me if I did - it kills the spirit of the game (competition). We don't enjoy eurogames. My wife's review of D2 was that it plays like an early teens board game you'd find at Toys'R'Us, not Descent. They removed all the crunch in the name of streamlining. I guess we liked the crunch of D1.

But all that aside, even if the rules are balanced and there are ways to overcome the hallway blocking tactic, the game itself isn't worth it. There's just not enough fighting for us.

By the way, it's worth mentioning that after the second dungeon we played we instated a house rule that monsters cannot use both of their actions to move. I still won without even trying. With Descent 1 I at least had to work for it.

As i can see for the quest "A Fat Goblin" the heroes can get at mid before the overlord can decently block anything.

first do ranged single move + stamina move and attack blockers if really needed at the big room.

Close combat or if there is a gasp do double move + some stamina = center room on first turn.

 I just got D2E the other day and played my first game tonight with a friend (2 player First Blood).  I was the OL and right from the beginning it seemed everything was stacked in my favor.  He had really crappy rolls and I had really good ones at the right time for most of the game, but it just seemed like if I didn't bother to stop to attack after my first 3 goblins made it out at the end of turn 3, then I would have easily won the game in about 5 rounds tops.  I only stopped running and started attacking because I wanted to give him a chance to have some fun, which by that point her certainly wasn't.  He ended up winning the game eventually due me holding back from double running and also not playing some cards when I could have, but it shouldn't have to be that way.  I just didn't want him to be so frustrated that he won't ever play again.

Two player "First Blood" (and First Blood in general) favors the Heros, IMO. Dropping a single Ettin with four attacks per round is cake. Getting all five goblins off, not so much. Even if you get all three off by round two, you can only spawn one in on your next turn which means your ranged can just pick them off while your partner whittles down the Ettin. Without any way to heal your monsters the only real chance the OL has is if he can knockout one of the two and squeeze a goblin past on crappy hero roles.  I'm not saying the OL can't win First Blood, but it definitely takes a lot more luck than skill, especially with two players.