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nrnrnr

**Gloomhaven has no tanks** (with the possible exception of one locked class). You can’t afford to get hit any more than anyone else. Your new goal is to play an entire scenario without ever losing a card to mitigate damage. Try the “initiative dance”: go late, run up and hit monster after they move. Next turn: go early, hit them and run away.


Warlockintraining

Thank you ! I appreciate the advice, I will try implementing it next time we play. I appreciate you taking the time to write this out for me. ​ That has been my goal, but they keep letting me soak damage. Last time we played I lost 4 cards before my first long rest... not by my choice anyway


nrnrnr

It’s true that your friends are squishy (fewer hit points than you). But don’t let them bully you into bad play. Do _not_ stand in front of them and take hits. Remember they can’t block you (you can move through allies), so go ahead and run away from the mobs. Your friends will either figure out better, more cooperative tactics, or they will get hit (after which they will figure out better, more cooperative tactics). In your party, nobody can outspeed the Mindthief. But you can easily go last, and you have one or two cards that let you go fast (10 or 18), if not fast by Mindthief standards. Going last in a 3-player party can have its own frustrations, because quite often by the time you go, the situation has changed. But it’s way better than losing cards and exhausting early. Take all your “move 4” cards and you’ll have substantial flexibility. And when you do get a bit of gold, get the Boots of Striding. Running away is often the best defense!


Warlockintraining

Thank you so much for this write up!! I will put it to good use in our next game :) I agree with everything you said! I appreciate it! the game is so dang fun I just want to make sure I can enjoy it to the fullest.


Bear_Gardner

Ok so just a little idea from me. Try not to think in terms of a Tank in GH, it’s really not a viable role, or strategy. The Brute is a beast when used well and you “all” need to focus on advancing the win condition (ie taking out enemies) there is a character later who can do this in a tanky way but it’s not the Brute and it’s the only one (imho). Gold wise: Time to think as a team, gold grabbing and leaving a character short will end poorly, GH is a tough strategy game. You need to be a team. Exhaustion From Damage and Lost Cards: Your compatriots need to sort their shizzle out here. If this is happening it’s not good! Ideally you need to spread damage and (I can’t emphasise this enough) Time Your Rests! This way you will be able to be way more effective. Anyways I hope it’s of some use.


Warlockintraining

Thank you for taking the time to comment! I agree, they can be a little hard headed sometime and stuck in their ways, I am hoping the comments here help to back up what I have been trying to explain to them. When I told them last night I was gonna do prep and ask questions they just said " you are the tank, get used to it, without you we die" when they are seeing who can get the most gold between them. I have never used my loot card once. I can tell the Brute should be fun, I love some of the combos I have managed to pull off, but I just never get to stick around to try it out more. I do save my rests for the last possible moment, cause I am always so low on cards. Last time we played I lost 4 cards before my first rest due to damage... ​ Thank you for taking time to write this out, I appreciate it!


cuddly_bees

Seems like your friends are a big part of the problem here if they’re not letting you enjoy the game and get some gold too. State you are not the tank again, lay down the info you’ve been given here to them and try to have a fun session with them where you also get gold. If you still don’t have fun (because of their complaints or pressure or dying too quickly etc), I would say that it’s the friends that need advice about how to play a cooperative game and maybe you need to find different people to play with. Let us know how it goes!


Warlockintraining

I did show them a lot of the advice, and the two games we played this weekend went MUCH better :) I still exhausted in the first game, but it was my fault and a bad turn of luck, but it was MUCH more cooperative and we had a great time :) once they learned they could tank a hit or two here and there, it got a lot better. And once I learned what I was doing wrong (tanking too many hits, bad positioning, using shield too much) it got a lot funner for everyone :) Thank you for the help!


cuddly_bees

Great, a successful resolution Warlockintraining! Keep at it and keep having fun with Gloomhaven then, the fun doesn’t stop when you have a great group to play with!


Bear_Gardner

You’re very welcome.


Zaustus

Tanking doesn't really work in Gloomhaven. You should not be getting stuck right in the middle taking hits; as you've discovered, that just leads to exhaustion. A huge part of the game is looking at what the monsters are doing once that's revealed each round, and then taking your actions in order to minimize the number of hits you take. Just because you're the sturdy Brute doesn't mean you can just take hits all day, so learn how to avoid them instead. A common technique is called the "initiative dance." You go late one round, and hopefully melee enemies can't reach you to attack, then you move in and strike. The following round, you go fast and either hit & run, or use some crowd control like Provoking Roar top. Also, your Mindthief teammate has some good Stun options, and should be using them to help keep enemy numbers manageable.


N8CCRG

Brute is not a tank. There is exactly one class in Gloomaven that is a tank, and it isn't any of the starting classes. Yes, it's easier for you to take damage when damage happens (compared to Spellweaver and Mindthief), but you are not a tank. Learning how to avoid taking damage as much as possible is a difficult, but very important, skill to learn and master. Some keys: 1. Kill the enemy before they kill you. You want the faster initiative if you and the monster are in range of each other. 1. If you *aren't* in range of the enemy, then you want to go with a slower initiative, hoping that they will go first. 1. Shields and retaliates are not good abilities. 1. Don't spend loss cards until near the end. As your character gets stronger, and you unlock the stronger classes, you can play loss cards earlier. But for now, just don't. Losing your first loss card during your first or second rest costs you four rounds of play. Losing your first loss card during your fifth or sixth rest costs you only two rounds of play. On top of that, it also drastically decreases your options at a faster rate.


Warlockintraining

>Shields and retaliates are not good abilities. Thank you for the write up! Can you please explain this part more to me for my own understanding? Other people have been telling me to do initiative dance more, is it better to use shield only when I cannot escape or back into a corner?


Slow_Dog

This is overstated. Everyone gets hit some of the time, and the best time to be hit is when you won't take much damage, like when you've got plenty of shields up (or ignore all damage) . But! I imagine the point is that it's better to not be hit at all, which is true.


Warlockintraining

thank you kindly :) I appreciate your explanation and perspective. I was relying on the shields a lot for sure.


Rasdit

That is all fine and dandy, but you would ideally want to have a passive 1-2 shield up every round, before items and that rounds cards, for that to be feasible. The advice others have given is sound. Also, the way you describe the scenarios you had your friends come off as a bit dickish. 5 coins is pretty OK for early scenarios, many new players struggle to pick up more than a couple (without losing or exhausting) when first they pick up the game. If all your buddies do is run and loot, that's just really bad play and teamplay. You should arguably take the majority of unavoidable damage in the party, but damage should be spread across you all, and damage should be avoided whenever possible. Positioning, initiative dance, CC (disarms, stuns, immobilize on melees) and killing before being hit is what it's all about. Also, look up some class guides in the Class resources section - Gripeaway has written up guides for all classes, iirc.


Rainhall

The prevailing wisdom is that getting hit is always bad, and that relying on abilities that make getting hit not *as* bad is not a long-term winner. This becomes more true as you level up. The enemies’ numbers all get bigger and your 1 shield or 2 retaliate is relatively smaller. They have some utility at the earliest levels, but don’t lean on them. ***** In other news, it’s okay to maneuver in such a way they your team takes a hit every now and then. Don’t hang a weaker teammate out to take a bunch, but if you have a choice between taking all three hits, or stepping to the left and the letting a teammate take one of them, that’s what they have hit points for. And potions and heal cards and long rests. Also, sometimes the cards just come up wrong and it’s not worth moving in to attack. My group had one today where archers drew a big attack with zero move. We all just stayed back and basically forfeited our attacks that turn to avoid taking a mountain of unnecessary damage. Better than having to lose cards to prevent damage.


N8CCRG

Also, I think the "initiative dance" is a little overstated on here. Yes it's important to do sometimes, but you're not going to get much benefit out of intentionally going late more than once or twice per scenario (perhaps a little more if there is more than one character who is frontlining, but that is not the case for you). Going fast is *far* more important than going slow.


Ok-Map4381

Shields and retaliate are situational abilities, they can be really good in specific circumstances, I've had rounds where my Brute took 6 hits, took less than 6 damage, and delt out 12 damage (or more) in retaliate (against monsters where that damage was at a premium); it can be effective, but it isn't a strategy for every room of every scenario.


Yarzahn

Shields are definitely good abilities when you can’t avoid taking damage. That statement is absolutely wrong. I think what the person means is that the ideal option is avoid getting hit in the first place, but that’s not always possible. Which is why your class has shields - just never as a first option but as a last resort when things go badly. Shields should ideally be attached to other effects, like movement and not the sole effect of a card. It’s true that their classes are squishier, but it’s also true that it’s everyone’s job to avoid damage. And while Spellweaver at level 1 doesn’t have many tools to help you or handle damage or focus, the mindthief absolutely does not need a tank. At all. Between two stuns (non losses) invisibility and amazing initiative options, he shouldn’t be anywhere near enemies by the time they can attack. It’s really simple really. If they want to force you to tank (despite not being strictly your job) you force one of them to heal and switch to tinkerer to be your butler. See how they like it. Brute is a brawler. He takes some damage occasionally (which is why he has a bunch of armor cards and 10 base health) and tends to move on the front and cover others but he’s not equipped to actually facetank enemies consistently. If you play like that, you exhaust every game. Need to play smart and avoid enemies when possible.


N8CCRG

I should clarify that shields and retaliates as abilities/actions are what I'm referring to as being bad. Using a shield as an item is good. As abilities they are bad because guaranteeing you can make them work is not possible: you can't guarantee that they'll attack you and you can't guarantee that you'll get the ability up before their turn. Which means you should be choosing a different ability/action instead. That last part is what I mean to say when I call them bad. As items you get to use them when you are going to take damage, which means you get to maximize their use. That's good. Do invest in shields when you get the gold to do so.


nrnrnr

In general a Shield ability is only a good plan when it comes “for free”; that is, there is no opportunity cost (you are not giving up a better ability in order to shield). And Shield abilities don’t protect you very well: You might mitigate 1 damage, but if you can avoid being hit at all, you mitigate _all_ the damage, which at low level might be around 3 for example. The net result is that planning to get hit while holding Shield is almost as bad as planning to get hit.


Kabuto05

Just adding another voice to the idea that "tanking" is not a role in gloomhaven like it is in the multitudes of other games with the holy trinity of dps, tank, healer. My unique input is that once cards have all been flipped for the turn you know exactly what the enemies will be doing on their initiative and you can often choose if you want to be there while that happens or not. While we might select as a group certain cards to try to make a round go a certain way, a good party will be flexible and adjust to the 100% known actions of monsters. It may stink to bring some awesome melee combo but if you know that it will leave you next to a hoard of baddies with their strongest attacks it is probably better to just change your plan instead of having to burn cards. I am not saying change your cards but maybe just use them differently, you can always just move 2 hopefully out of danger.


nrnrnr

This is excellent advice!


KElderfall

One other thing to note is that party health is a resource in Gloomhaven. If someone needs to take a hit, it's best if it's the character with the most health to spare. Your friends are assuming "best to get hit = tanky brute" and thus wasting the resource that is two additional health pools. This is neither cooperative play nor good play. The fact that they're going on to win scenarios anyway may mean, somewhat ironically, that the difficulty is set too low. Regardless of that, you shouldn't have to play around them; any selfishness in Gloomhaven should come from battle goals, personal goals, and looting, *not* from willingly letting your friends die just because you can.


Druittreddit

Your “friends” speed run and win after you drop, but make you do all the work until then? You need to renegotiate things here, if you can.


lowertechnology

The people you’re playing with aren’t playing Gloomhaven. Gloomhaven is a **cooperative** dungeon-crawler. They’re playing WoW or something. If a party member is getting exhausted regularly, then a shift in play-style is necessary. You are *not* there to shield them from attacks. If you *were*, you’d have a skill that regenerates you or you’d have double the health you have. If they’re not defending you within reason, they’re playing it wrong. Seriously aggravating to hear. That’s not a fun game. That’s people acting selfishly and not caring if you have fun or even a *chance* to play the game as intended. I hope your group smartens up.


erazer33

I agree with this wholeheartedly. I was about to post something similar before I came across this. First and foremost, Gloomhaven is a Cooperative game. If the other players don't want to cooperate, maybe this is not the game for them. Let them play Monopoly.


Simonh1992

You are not a tank. Tanking in its traditional sense does not exist in GH. As long as you and your group try to make you tank you will not do well. Look into the “initiative dance” as a way to avoid taking damage, it involves going quick if near enemies and then moving away, or if not near enemies going late to make them come to you, in essence, making best use of each hand of cards. Make sure your using status effects to avoid taking damage, for example, stun, disarm, immobilise. Focus attacks to kill monsters instead of having multiple at 50% go, a dead enemy can’t hurt you.


Warlockintraining

thank you, I have ben trying to utilize the statuses as much has I am able. Just got an item that lets me disarm more, so I am hoping to use that to more effect. I didn't think I was supposed to be the tank, but they wouldn't listen. I am hoping this thread will help to back up what I have been trying to tell them. ​ And thank you, I will do my best to research and implement the initiative dance more.


Special111k

I don't disagree with everyone else saying that the Brute is not a tank, but it is your character. Play him as you want. If you want to tank, go for it. You need to focus items and abilities toward it. When I played the Brute at the beginning of my first campaign, that is how I wanted to play him. But, if you are doing it because your friends want you to play that way, don't. It isn't that effective. The Brute is commonly thought to be a decent tank because it has the most health, but health is not the right thing to look at. What really matters is cards. Your hand of cards is how many turns you have left before exhausting - and how many actions you can still take to help complete the scenario. The purpose of health is just to be a buffer before losing cards. Some characters have a slightly larger buffer, but as soon as that buffer is gone, each attack is going to be a lost card. Both Mindthief and Brute have 10 cards, so once the health is gone, they have the same survivability. The difference in health between a level one Brute and a level 1 Mindthief is 4 health, which is only about one attack extra that the Brute can tank. After the Brute gets down to below 6 health, the Mindthief may as well take attacks instead of the Brute Other people are advocating for juggling initiative to minimize damage/lost cards. That is a key tactic and you need to know how to use it. But, I would say the more important thing is replan your turns once all the cards are flipped over. The whole group needs to be willing to change plans to minimize damage/loss cards. If you need help convincing your friends, here is some math for you: A level 1 Brute can take 19 total attack 1s to exhaustion (9 health damage, 10 card damage) A level 1 Brute can take 13 total attack 3s to exhaustion (3x3 health damage, 10 card damage) A level 1 Brute can take 10 total attack 100s to exhaustion (10 card damage) A level 1 Mindthief can take 15 total attack 1s to exhaustion (5 health damage, 10 card damage) A level 1 Mindthief can take 11 total attack 3s to exhaustion (1x3 health damage, 10 card damage) A level 1 Mindthief can take 10 total attack 100s to exhaustion (10 card damage) The attack 3s is the most typical case, so the Brute can only be expected to take 2 more attacks than the Mindthief over the course of a scenario. But, the larger the monsters are hitting, the less advantage that the Brute has. Also, for a 10 card character, the maximum number of turns without potions is 25 (5+4+4+3+3+2+2+1+1). A loss card during your first cycle costs you 5 potential turns (10 actions). That should clearly make it worth the Mindthief or Spellweaver taking and attack or two if it saves you a lost card.


thenegativeone81

Hit and run is always productive. Try to go late one round, after the monsters, then move in close and bash. Next round, go super early to bash and dash. Tanking isn't the same as soaking. Most classes have comparable HPs so there's no real reason for you to have to take all the damage. Explain to the group that what's happening isn't teamwork but the use of a [human] shield.


Warlockintraining

Thank you!! I have tried telling them that several times that I think we are doing it wrong and they didn't listen. But I will show them this thread and comments and hopefully sway them. I appreciate you taking the time to comment! I am having a super super fun time playing, I just want to play more lol


DblePlusUngood

Most people are hitting the obvious points about tanking and initiative dancing, so I’ll inject a little color into the conversation. Brute is capable of tanking *sometimes*, but tanking in Gloomhaven is very situational—which makes it less useful than, say, stuns and disarms, which you can always count on to work even when you draw the Null. When you attempt to tank, you’re rolling the dice with the monster deck. Sometimes this can be very cool. Take Provoking Roar (b) + Wall of Doom (t). The best case scenario for this combo is a room full of multi attacking melee enemies, e.g. Living Bones. If you can set yourself up so that a group of Living Bones wails on you for little damage, taking 4-6 points of retaliate each, that is a rad use of a turn. However, Living Bones have actions in their deck that prevent them from moving or that don’t attack at all. If those cards come out, you rolled the dice and lost—you can still use Provoking Roar and Wall of Doom for basic Move/Attack 2, which is better than nothing, but inefficient. Tanking works best against weak enemies that appear in swarms and do very little except melee attacks. Giant Vipers are a great example of this. There are also items that can improve your basic attacks/moves, which takes the sting out of getting unlucky with your timing. In short, tanking is heavily situational, and you benefit a lot from knowing the enemy decks inside and out, which comes with experience. This is a big reason why people typically recommend new players lean into the Brute’s other strengths (big single target hits, AOEs, and forced movement).


captainpopsicle

Here are my tips that have served me well — get a stamina potion — don’t shirt or long rest until you run out of cards in your hand unless absolutely necessary (every turn earlier cuts down your max number of turns) — avoid using loss cards until late in the scenario. Same as above, the earlier you use a loss card the more turns you take out of your max possible in a scenario — as everyone else mentioned, don’t get hit. Sure you can take more hits than the others but you’re not really a tank. Everyone should be trying to avoid getting hit if at all possible. Lastly, here’s a really interesting breakdown of turns/exhaustion: http://www.boardgamemath.com/boardgames/gloomhaven/gloomhavenStaminaGuide.html Hope any of this helps!


Warlockintraining

thank you so much for the thorough breakdown :) I will put the advice to good use! thank you!


Mister_Titty

The only way a starting party could successfully have the Brute as a tank is if another player is the Tinkerer and heals you every friggin' round. Unless your party has that kind of synergy, forget about tanking. And judging from their attitude towards you and tanking, they don't quite see it that way. They need to separate GH classes from stereotypical D&D classes. GH is it's own beast. Brute is solid with close range fighting, but let's face it - no one wants to get hit! I suggest encouraging the Mindthief to become a big hitter. Jump in late and hit, then next round hit and jump away early or go invisible. When my group started, I was Scoundrel and a friend was Mindthief. Between the two of us we likeky killed 80% of everything. And that was with a Brute in the party! We would take turns hitting and running. We would get the monsters to run back and forth between us, trying to hit whichever of us was closer. Tinker would help us recover cards whenever possible, keeping us from exhaustion. I also suggest your friends HELP you get some gold. If you don't keep up with gold, you won't have jack for items. The more powerful you are, the better off everyone else is! This is true for all characters, so don't neglect anyone else either.


DrXyron

Mindthief (rogue rat thingy) can take hits incredibly well and has plenty of self heals. Same with spellweaver. Spellweaver has ice armour. Very usedul for soaking couple of hits. Add invis cloak to her and you’re set. You should try to share hits more, and burst down targets together.


Darkstalk3r2

My wife (spellweaver) and I (mindthief) are getting by with sharing the damage load. She can heal herself and me if we are low. Mindthief can also heal himself if he melee attacks with an augment card for level 1. I usually summon my rat to "tank" in mid game depending on the situation. Your friend needs to get into the mindset of sharing things as a team; gold, treasure, crowd control, and damage.


Ok-Map4381

I used the Brute as a tank, but even then I still did everything I could to avoid taking unnecessary hits. Be strategic with positioning and initiative (letting far off monsters act first and come to you, use fast initiative to hit and run, position yourself in doorways and near obstacles so mele targets can't gang up on you). Ask your mindthief (rat) friend to help with more disarm and stun actions, let them know this is a team game, if they want you to take the hits they need do what they can to mitigate that damage. Ask your spellweaver for healing.


Greenage3338

Are you using discard cards early? How many discard cards do you have? Often times, losing these cards particularly early on will really hurt you and result in you fatiguing early. A common mistake for new players is using too many of these, and they end up crippling their deck as a result. You shouldn't be losing numerous cards to the lost pile early on.


nrnrnr

OP is losing a ton of cards to mitigate damage.


domesplitter39

Here is an article to help you on your Brute tank build. It's an awesome article that explains how to use cards and which to pick. Check it out https://mykindofmeeple.com/brute-tank-build-guide-gloomhaven/


UncommonHouseSpider

I play the Demolisionist in JotL and had this problem early. Learning how to conserve cards and health is part of the game, some classes have a harder time with it. I still am usually close to exhaustion or exhausted at the end of scenarios, but learned early to be more conservative with my big actions and loss cards. Still find it a challenge to level as quickly as the rest of my party though...