HeroQuest World

[Goblin-King]

Wasn't it Morkar?

Americans... sigh...

[Blackthorn]

I found this map on gameboardgeek under HeroQuest. I don't know the original source.



It shows the locations of "Mentor's Domain" and several other locations from HeroQuest.

[Big Bene]

That's a pretty heavy argument for it being the one and same world in my opinion.

Indeed it is.
Nobody denies the worlds are very similar and we can find ever more similarities if we want. And of course, this is because at some point, someone intended them to be the same.
The story, as I see it, is the following:
Once upon a time there was a guy named Stephen who had a great idea: a boardgame based on the priciples of rpg. He sold his idea to Milton Bradly UK (some sources say he was an employee at the time, some sources say he was a free author with connections to the company). MB in turn (perhaps even at Stephe's advise) called Games Workshop for help with the figures and the fantasy background, which they had no experience with (I normally call them Greed Workshop, but back in the 80's they were much more customer friendly).
The guys at GW designed really nice miniatures and provided a background, settling HeroQuest their Warhammer world. In their intention of course it was the same world. Probably they hoped to develope the partnership with MB further, having the HeroQuest franchise as the Dungeon-crawling boardgame variant of Warhammer (and get a foot in the doors of the mainstream games market). However, MB maintained all the rights on the Heroquest stuff. For a time, this worked out. The joint venture made the European HQ extensions, as well as Battle Masters, Space Crusade etc.
But at last they parted paths, MB taking with them the HeroQuest rights and publishing the American extensions, which clearly have nothing in common with Warhammer, and GW trying to compensate for their lost brain-child by publisheing Advanced Heroquest, which is clearly set in the Warhammer World and introduces all relevant Warhammer monsters (and taking out Mentor and Morcar), and then Warhammer Quest.
So, at one time some people involved in the developement of Heroquest surely intended the two worlds to be the same, which explains why they are so similar. But even back then, I think, the people really in charge of HeroQuest (i. e. MB) did not see their game as an extension of Warhammer. They agreed to to re-use background material, but felt free to change it where it fitted the board game they wanted to make, simple and playable by children and fantasy newbies. Thus the introduction of a single antagonist and protagonist etc.
So, to my opionion, the two worlds are not the same, but because of their developement history have many similarieties. I take the side of MB as the owners and see the HQ world as independent, open to every idea I want to throw in, as long as it fits with the published HQ material.

Having said this, Warhammer is still a great source of ideas, and looking further for similarities and differences should be an interesting task.

[Big Bene]

This brings me to a whole other idea:

If I'm right, we can use the Warhammer world for HQ, but it's not "canon".

Buuuut....

If the guys at GreedWorkshop, the people responsible of the Warhammer background, intended HQ to be part of the Warhammer world, then is HeroQuest material canon for Warhammer?
Just imagine leading a warhammer battle as gamemaster and introducing loretome... If someone objects, well, it's canon!

[Goblin-King]

It goes both ways - And I don't object!

I'd say we have been shown all the evidence we need, though we are not getting a definitive answer.
The worlds are identical - but are they the same? It's a very tricky question, and until we get an official statement I guess it's up to each of us to decide for ourselves.

After this whole thread I'm landing on the simple "yes, they are one and the same".

[Sjeng]

Once upon a time...

Wow, I never knew the history of HQ, AHQ and WHQ! Very interesting indeed

Well, that aside, I don't really care about the company politics involved. To me it's one and the same world, possibly at a different time.

[Fullork345]

nope it's Morcar

I'm pretty certain the name in the armybook is morkar. Not Morcar, unless the us version of the armybook has it spelled differently. Same with the Sigmar triology when Morkar makes a cameo.

[Blackthorn]

I just found out that the map I posted is from the HeroQuest sticker album. topic is here.

[Daedalus]

That's a pretty heavy argument for it being the one and same world in my opinion.

Indeed it is.
Nobody denies the worlds are very similar and we can find ever more similarities if we want. And of course, this is because at some point, someone intended them to be the same.
The story, as I see it, is the following:
Once upon a time there was a guy named Stephen who had a great idea: a boardgame based on the priciples of rpg. He sold his idea to Milton Bradly UK (some sources say he was an employee at the time, some sources say he was a free author with connections to the company). MB in turn (perhaps even at Stephe's advise) called Games Workshop for help with the figures and the fantasy background, which they had no experience with (I normally call them Greed Workshop, but back in the 80's they were much more customer friendly)....

Stephen Baker was indeed a key figure as creator of the game that intended Hero Quest to have a quasi-GW Old World history. Evidence for this can be found in the HeroQuest-- The Marvel Winter Special published in the UK 1991. Marvel had its writers do the article, but Stephen Baker was the consultant. There GW Old World references found in the Hero descriptions are almost certainly attributed to Stephen Baker, not the Marvel writers:

 "Are there no Elves left in the forests?...They have hidden among the trees in Loren and we have forgotten them....An elf would certainly be a hero, if any would come forward in our time of need." This is a reference to Loren, the forest of the Wood Elves found close to the Empire, in Bretonnia of GW's Old World.  Thus, an Elf Hero can be construed as a Wood Elf.

The Elf Quest Pack builds upon this by placing the objective of the Queen Terrellia's first Quest on the southern border of the Empire. Loren of the Old World lies on the southwest border of the Empire, so Loren could easily be interpreted as Queen Terrellia's kingdom, which would lie just west of the first Quest.

"They [Dwarves] live in vast undergroud cities under the World's Edge Mountains..." These are easily recognized as a GW mountain range, so a Dwarf is a member of a clan dwelling there.

"Even in these days the fame of the barbarians of the borderlands is known everywhere.  There may be less of them now than there were once, before Chaos Plague thinned their ranks, but they are still bold and they fear nothing.  They can be seen stalking the streets...Some say they will make an alliance with Chaos...." Chaos with a capital "C" is a major theme in GW's Old World. Chaos Warriors come from the barbarian tribes of the northlands in the GW Old World, and the intimated alliance above fits this well. Norsca or a northern neighbor of Kislev by the river Lynsk in the Old World could supply unbowed barbarians not yet fully corrupted by Chaos. They are the Northmen.

The Barbarian Quest Pack builds upon this by talking of the Barbarian returning to the land of his youth after exploring the warm lands to the south.  He has been summoned back to aid his people against the Frozen Horror that threatens the Northlands.  That background would make the Barbarian part of a territory named the Northlands, which fits well with the borderlands of the Marvel Winter Edition.

...So, at one time some people involved in the developement of Heroquest surely intended the two worlds to be the same, which explains why they are so similar. But even back then, I think, the people really in charge of HeroQuest (i. e. MB) did not see their game as an extension of Warhammer. They agreed to to re-use background material, but felt free to change it where it fitted the board game they wanted to make, simple and playable by children and fantasy newbies....

Agreed. To add to this, the Elf and Barbarbarian Quest Pack adaptations to earlier Old World-influenced canon show that MB was interested in not overtly contradicting ealier work. Instead, those unknown MB-US authors simply added on to previous background with new, generalized names that matched well enough. Other, specific place-names that didn't need to match ealier groundwork was simply invented from new cloth. Both cases saved further need to approach GW for a new liscense of creative work.

...Having said this, Warhammer is still a great source of ideas, and looking further for similarities and differences should be an interesting task.

I'm with ya there. My vote is for two different worlds that shared material and reused ideas.

One last thing, while Skaven never were HQ canon, they were ready to be adapted into Ratmen for an unrealeased Wizard Quest Pack in North America just before everything fell through. Here's yet another example of GW background being drawn upon, liscense-free. See Toco's blog for the original (yet derivative) artwork and story. Skyknight even possesses the 4-up figure. Release the expansions!

[Goblin-King]

Even though the stuff Toco has dug out for us are unreleased I consider it as much canon as the other expansions.

So (giant?) spiders, minotaurs, sabertooth tigers and skaven are go!