Welcome to Four Short of a Strategy, our new video series where the Battle Systems team takes on the Dungeons of Enveron campaign from their game Maladum.
Excitingly, over the past year Battle Systems has been growing in number. With everyone at different levels of gaming experience, we thought it would be a good idea to get everyone to play through a campaign of Maladum together.
It’s a chance to learn the game together, share different playstyles, create some team bonding, and show the kind of choices players make, both good and bad ones. But then it also occurred to us, people picking the game up for the first time, or thinking of picking the game up will also be going through the same dilemmas of character and class selection, tactics within the dungeon, what best to yell at a lamentor when it rolls a crit… so why not film us playing as well.
To kick things off, everyone was given 100 Guilders to build their first adventurer. Which has immediately exposed the different mindsets heading into the campaign. Across this series, we’ll document how everyone chooses to level up, the tactics the party relies on, and how those decisions work out in practice.
We hope that Four Short of a Strategy will serve as both a guide and a cautionary tale. You’ll pick up ideas on what to do, and more than likely several lessons on what not to do.
In this article, we’re going to spend a little bit of time meeting the players and their adventurers before stepping into the first dungeon.
Meet the Players
Tom – Marketing
New to tabletop gaming. Before joining Battle Systems the most complex game he’d played was a board game called Heat. But since starting at Battle Systems he has been diving into a few more complex games and even started painting miniatures at the end of 2024.
James – Operations
Handles data, accounts, and spreadsheets behind the scenes. Relatively new to tabletop and board gaming in general, so this is expected to be a steep learning curve.
John – Trade Sales Manager
An experienced board gamer, with a background in heavier Euros and a past fondness for Core Space First Born. And not a stranger to playing larger scale games like Warhammer 40K.
Dan – Game Developer
The veteran. Years (we’re under strict instructions not to disclose how many) of gaming experience across board games, card games, and war games. Prefers competitive play and by his own admission is not known for his teamwork.
Character Builds
Tom – Grogmar
Chosen for his tankier build and ‘Grogmar Smash’ demeanour. Grogmar is set to be the adventurer up front taking the brunt of the adversaries in the earlier dungeons.
With the Barbarian class his unarmed combat ability increases to a three dice attack roll, meaning that even if he loses his weapon, Grogmar has the potential to stand toe to toe with most adversaries and come out on top.
As a size 2 character Grogmar is also able to carry size 1 Characters and smaller unsecured terrain pieces without penalty to movement. Tom seems to be putting all his eggs into the unarmed basket taking one level in Brutal Assault. This skill makes it so that Grogmar can add an additional dice to an unarmed attack, bringing the total to four dice in one attack. If you then combine that with the strength spell, Grogmar has the potential to roll five dice in a single attack. However, with only one magic peg and one skill peg that attack is very much one and done until Grogmar can take a rest.
Whilst Grogmar comes with a higher count in health pegs, without any natural immunities Grogmar is still open to suffering from status counters like Terrified or Poison. So taking one level in Impervious gives him a get out of jail free card for game changing negative effects, providing he’s not already spent his skill peg.
With his left over Guilders, Grogmar was also able to procure some Leather Armour and a Halberd. Meaning he goes into the first dungeon with +1 Armour and +1 Reach.
James – Nerinda
Nerinda brings a sneaky edge to the party. Picked for her mobility and potential to get out of trouble when things go wrong, she offers a different playstyle to the more straightforward bruisers.
James went with the Assassin class in the hope of this giving Nerinda an initial extra square of movement. Which he realised, after picking, was not the case.
Even if the choice wasn’t exactly what he first intended, the extra flexibility at later levels turned out to be a pleasant surprise, and he is now taking a longer term view at her potential.
Nerinda’s character, similiar to Grogmar, is able to attack unarmed, but, with only one dice this will only really work against Lamentors and should be a last resort. Level 1 Acrobatics grants the passive ability to stand up using an effortless action, should James take this to Level 2 he will also gain the movement he original desired for Nerinda. Quick Recovery giving her the option to swap a skill peg for a health peg. And a level in Reflexes giving her the option to move out of combat without suffering an attack of opportunity when engaged.
Nerinda cost 80 Guilders, with 13 spent on the Assassin class. That left just enough for a Short Sword at 6 Guilders, leaving 1 Guilder that can go into the pot.
John – Brahm
With plenty of health and the potential to gain a third action later in the campaign, he’s designed to grow into a real powerhouse. The Character and Class selection already shows Johns tendency to plan six moves ahead.
John paired Brahm with the Scavenger class, which adds useful passive abilities and makes him quicker on his feet. Moving five squares instead of four with each action means Brahm can outpace enemies, reach objectives faster, or beat the rest of the party to any crates and chests.
Brahm’s character is immune to being Terrified, which will be invaluable against more powerful adversaries. With his chosen skills Level 1 Acrobatics grants the passive ability to stand up using an effortless action. Combat Arts makes it so that all weapon attacks gain Quickstrike, and weapons that already have Quickstrike grants him the ability to dash and then attack as one action.
The total cost came to 99 Guilders, 90 for Bram and 9 for the Scavenger class, but that left no spare Guilders for weapons or armour. That means John is going in bare-handed, hoping to grab equipment from loot chests and weapon racks once the dungeon begins.
It’s a bold strategy readers, lets see if it pays off for him.
Dan – Moranna
Moranna is a mage built for maximum magical firepower. With a high pool of magic pegs and the ability to gain an extra action later in the campaign, she has the tools to become one of the most dangerous adventurers in the party… and we’ve left Dan in charge of her…
Dan has selected the Prymorist class, ensuring access to the classic Fireball spell, his favourite option for both damage and chaos. Moranna also comes with Impervious, protecting her from status counters like poison and giving her a layer of resilience most magic users traditionally lack.
Maladaars can fall into the trap of ignoring skills and putting all of their XP into learning new spells. But with Moranna’s character already having 1 Level in Malacyte Mastery this stacks with any points put into the same skill under the class Prymorist, giving Moranna access to higher levels of Malacyte Mastery at lower levels. This choice has given Dan access to all Level 1 spells and the ability to re-roll Magic Die after seeing the result of it and then choose the results.
The choice was as much about style as it was power: Dan feeling that Moranna has one of the more striking sculpts in the set, making her his ideal centrepiece for a magic-heavy approach.
Campaign Goals
The goal of any game is ultimately to have as much fun as possible. But we also asked the players if they had any specific goals around what they wanted to get out of the campaign. Tom and James seemed fairly similar in that they both want to gain a deeper understanding of the rules away from your standard move and attack. Tom admits whilst he has played Maladum several times, he doesn’t tend to delve deep into the skills available to him, a habit he carries into other games as well not just Maladum. With Grogmar having quite limited skill pegs at later levels he wants to develop being able to use these at the right time for the betterment of the quest.
James also shares a common goal with John in that they both want to level up their character as much as possible to unlock some abilities that they have looked ahead and have picked their skill specifically for. They both also are very eager to loot as much as possible and try out all the exciting gear you can find in the dungeons. Although it does sound like James is going to take a more cautious approach compared to John who does like to push his luck.
Dan has one simple plan, to cast fireball, as often as possible.
Alliances & Predictions
To keep things entertaining we encouraged everyone not to openly discuss their character with the other party members. So before entering the first dungeon we also asked everyone if they thought they might have a particularly strong alliance with anyone at the table and what their general predictions were for how others will play.
That’s the setup for the campaign. Episode 1: Of Coin & Glory is now live on our YouTube Channel, so all that’s left is for you to watch what happens in the dungeon!
Until next time, Happy Gaming!
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