Expanding HeroQuest: My Homebrew Heroes

Here's a bunch of custom heroes I've designed for HeroQuest, based on the minis I have. As you can see, I love simplicity, and I hate to have extra cards.

I'd love some feedback especially regarding balance when compared to the four basic heroes.

All the minis, with the basic game heroes for size comparison

Archer [bowgirl from the Legend of Drizzt board game]

Move 2

AD 2

DD 2

BP 6

MP 4

Starting gear: short sword, bow (2 AD)

Special rules: monsters and heroes don't block line of sight. Cannot use shields.

Armory: I've added to the armory a 4AD long bow she can buy (500 coins).

Cleric [from the 2001 D&D adventure board game]

Move 2

AD 2

DD 3

BP 6

MP 4

Starting gear: mace (2 AD), shield

Special rules: +1 AD vs undead. Once per game, at any time make all heroes recover 1 lost BP. Can only use blunt weapons.

Armory: I've added to the armory a 3AD warhammer he can buy (250 coins).

Druid [elf wizard girl (?) from the 2001 D&D adventure board game]

Move 2

AD 1

DD 2

BP 5

MP 3

Starting gear: staff

Special rule: At the beginning of each quest, choose one animal companion to accompany her. Cannot use helmet, heavy body armor such as chain or plate.

Animal Companion: shares the same statistics as the druid (gear included), and plays immediately before or after the druid.

• Wolf: +1 AD [from the Castle Ravenloft board game]
• Bear: +1 maximum BP [from the Wrath of Ashardalon board game]
• Panther: +1 movement die [from the Legend of Drizzt board game]

The bonus applies to both the beast and the druid.

Duelist [various guys from the Wrath of Ashardalon board game]

Move 2

AD 3

DD 2

BP 7

MP 3

Starting gear: broadsword

Special rule: +1 AD vs monsters without adjacent heroes.

Knave (my simplified version of the Rogue) [two-daggers guy from the Castle Ravenloft board game]

Move 2

AD 1

DD 2

BP 6

MP 4

Starting gear: dagger

Special rules: +1 AD vs monsters who are adjacent to other heroes. +1 AD when using dagger or short sword. Cannot use shield, helmet, heavy body armor such as chain or plate.

Warrior [fighter (?) from the 2001 D&D adventure board game]

Move 2

AD 2

DD 3

BP 7

MP 3

Starting gear: short sword, shield

Special rules: His movement is never hindered by any type of heavy armor.

Scout [thief girl (?) from the 2001 D&D adventure board game]

Move 2

AD 2

DD 2

BP 6

MP 4

Starting gear: short sword, bow (2 AD), tool kit

Special rules: Once per turn, when in front of a closed door, he may roll a combat die. Skull: the content of the room behind the door is placed on the board but the door stays closed. White shield: nothing happens. Black shield: the door is immediately opened. This skill doesn't count as an action. Cannot use shields.

Halfling [from  the Legend of Drizzt board game]

Move 2

AD 1

DD 2

BP 6

MP 4

Starting gear: dagger, sling (1 AD)

Special rules: opponents attack him with -1 AD (minimum 1). Can move through enemies and heroes. When searches, draws 2 cards and picks 1. No shield, no two-handed weapons.

The druid and the halfling are the two that I feel might be unbalanced: the druid might be too strong (it's like you're playing 2 heroes, and the gear you buy for one works for the other too), the halfling too weak.

Thanks in advance to anyone who'll want to chime in with some feedback!

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Into HeroQuest? Check out my other HeroQuest posts!

New Year New Game Sale 2023: My OSR Recommendations

   The New Year New Game sale is on at DTRPG, and here's the offers I recommend.

Whether you've never played OSR games, or you're a veteran looking for something cool, here we go.

This year, despite the sale name, a lot of OSR adventures and supplements are included in the sale!

OSR GAMES

Old-School Essentials - Classic Fantasy Rules Tome - The best retroclone around, a faithful reproduction of the B/X D&D rules, with an exceptional work done on the text to make it clear and user-friendly, with an egregious layout. Recommended if you're new to the OSR and want the distilled, simple experience of the original B/X rules. Everything you need to play in one book. Also, my favorite OSR game.

Dungeon Crawl Classics RPG Core Book - A glorious OSR game that is not a retroclone but captures the feel of old school games, with unique mechanics that build on a solid d20 system, generally compatible with other OSR stuff. Recommended if you want a more modern cut, while true to the spirit of OSR... and you like crits and fumble tables. And then there's 100+ DCC adventures and supplements that are also on sale.

Worlds Without Number - Kevin Crawford's masterpiece, and one of the most successful games on the whole DrivethruRPG platform. A great game in itself, and a book with tons of tools to generate everything, from world building to adventures, whatever game system you prefer.

Solar Blades & Cosmic Spells, and Sharp Swords & Sinister Spells - Both of Diogo Nogueira's original games are a blend of OSR and modern sensitivity, with streamlined rules and inspired tables.

Maze Rats - a modern classic among non-retroclone OSR games, by Ben Milton.

ZWEIHANDER RPG: Revised Core Rulebook - the Warhammer Fantasy Role Play retroclone... 'nuff said!

AND OSR ADVENTURES & SUPPLEMENTS

Despite the promotion is supposed to be about new games, this year quite a few supplements and adventures made it through the mysterious DrivethruRPG automatic selection and are on offer:

OSE official adventures Hole in the Oak and Incandescent Grottoes. Highly recommended!

And 50+ more third-party OSE-compatible titles are on sale.

The Gardens on Ynn - A point-crawl adventure set in an ever-shifting extradimensional garden, with a system to generate content while you play.

The Stygian Library - Gardens of Ynn's twin, this time a dungeon set in an infinite, extradimensional library.

Luke Gearing's Fever Swamp - a hex-crawl sandbox adventure compatible with BX d&d and its clones.

Pauli Kidd's big huge Wolf's Head Tor, a 233-page mini setting, with a megadungeon included, developed from the author's original 70s campaign! Can you imagine something more old school?

Brad Kerr's latest adventure anthology book, Wyvern Songs. Probably THE OSR BOOK OF THE YEAR 2022. It's so good. I've reviewed it here.

Peril in Olden Wood - An acclaimed, big huge regional adventure for OSE, level 3-5.

Puzzle Dungeon: The Seers Sanctum - A challenging 10 room dungeon for smart players to figure out. Reviewed it here.

Chris Kutalik's Slumbering Ursine Dunes - A widely and wildly acclaimed setting, point-crawl, and sourcebook, compatible with BX d&d and its retroclones.

Ben Milton's The Waking of Willowby Hall - A lovely adventure scenario for Knave.

WHAT ABOUT MY STUFF?!?!?

For reasons I can't fathom, my OSR stuff was not selected for the current sale. No worries though, the Falkrest Abbey adventure for OSE is still up for just $1, and my OSE e-zines are out there as Pay What You Want.

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Into OSR? Check my other OSR posts!

HeroQuest: The Arena Quest Set-Up

  Here's another of the improvised HeroQuest games I played with my 7yo son was particularly interesting so I thought why not share it on the blog? You can see it in the picture.

 

The board: I used the arena from the Immersive Battle Maps book.

The set-up: The hero started at centre of the board. I placed one of each type of the green and white monsters at sides of the arena. I should have placed the grey ones too from the beginning, at another side, but I didn't, so I added them at a second time.

The objective: Defeat as many monsters as possible before succumbing. When a hero reaches zero Body Points, the challenge is over and they are taken out of the arena and healed of all wounds. For each defeated monster, the hero receives a reward of 10 gold coins.

I didn't think of a special prize in case all monsters were defeated, but now I think it could be a great addition.

Special Rules: At every Zargon's turn, 1 monster enters the arena. Zargon decides which one enters.

Setting your own Arena quest

Ideally, this set-up works best with a large areas. If you only have the standard HeroQuest components, I suggest putting all the open doors on the board, carefully placing them (and the wall blocker markers) to create a maze-y environment. You probably want to exclude the 1-square corridors, because those will create boring fights. Then, I would put the heroes in the central room, with four open doors, and the monsters grouped in the furthest rooms.
 This might actually be more fun than a single, large, open area.

Scaling with Players

I went with 1 monster per monster type, and had 1 monster enter the arena at every Zargon's turn. With more players, I guess it should work with 1 monster per player entering the arena at every turn.

What Story?

The arena set-up can fit well as an alternative to the trite "you've been captured and wake up inside a cell" scenario. This time, you've been captured and the diabolical Big Bad Guy wants you to entertain him.

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Into HeroQuest? Check out my other HeroQuest Posts!