HeroQuest Gold

[Shark]

Re Loot

I have gone with you only search;-
- the room once for general treasure from the deck.
- a item of furniture (including chest) can be searched once by rolling 2d6 on a table for that furniture item, and yes you have to move next to it, so possibly moving on a trap.
- a killed monster can be searched once (they sometime have gold) and roll 1 combat dice with shields indicating they sometimes have useable equipment. Again you move to where it was killed.

This to a degree allows for replaying of a basic quest, with different random treasure up for grabs each time.

The idea was taken from this.
https://boardgamegeek.com/filepage/1718 ... m-rulesdoc

[Bareheaded Warrior]

Thanks for the feedback Shark

My HeroQuest Gold Edition is currently in a state of flux, it was originally developed from the NA edition rules, but I recently had something of an epiphany, when I realised that many of the complications that I was trying to iron out were only present in the NA Edition, so I'm now in the process of converting my house rules to use the Second Edition as my starting point.

The subject covered by the "Loot Update" is a great example of that, under SE rules, opening chests is a distinct activity from searching for treasure, see this topic for details How Treasure chests work in the EU rules (LONG) and the Quests were originally written for the Second Edition so no problem. When the NA Edition came out they changed the search for treasure rules so that chests were included, but didn't update all the Quest maps to reflect this change, hence the problem.

Once I have finished converting my rules to use the SE as their base, this problem will no longer exist in the Gold Edition.

In terms of carrying and worn item limits, I’ve posted the full details on this discussion thread, so feel free to continue the discussion there:
Limit to number of items in same "slot"?

[Bareheaded Warrior]

20210530 “The Search Update”

Search – The Binding Topic
Traps on the other side of the door

For me, the issue with the “Traps on the other side of the door” logic isn’t that it feels unfair (although that is true), it is more that it feels unintended. I don’t get the feeling that the designers of the game set out with the intention of creating this situation, they simply wrote the searching for traps rules, and this surfaced through play as an unintended consequence that they highlighted in the rulebook so that players would have some guidance on how to handle the situation when they inevitably uncovered it.

I see this particular unintended consequence as negative and for me it indicates yet another flaw in the searching for, and general handling of, traps rules so I propose a re-write to eliminate this issue and hopefully various other issues with trap searching, some examples listed below, I would be interested to hear if there are other issues that I haven’t included with searching for traps and whether they have been resolved by my proposed change.

1. ‘Traps in a row’ flaw - You can search in a single square width corridor and find (without having to handle) numerous traps, even though it would logically be impossible to get to the subsequent trap squares without having dealt with the first one in some way – this could be resolved by stating that your search ends with the nearest trap found within your search area, this logic is used in certain Quest notes but perhaps should be a standard rule rather than an exception

2. ‘Poorly defined inconsistent search area’ flaw - Search area isn’t really defined (aside from the searching for traps in a room bit, i.e. you have to be in a room to search for and locate a trap in a room), it isn’t clear whether you can be in a room – in the doorway for example – and perform a trap search and locate a trap on the (adjacent to you) first square in a corridor which is inconsistent but not prohibited expressly as far as I can tell and the search area in a corridor isn’t well defined but I assume it is a single ‘straight stretch of any length’ but there is no information around standing on a corner or other intersection between two corridors and searching both simultaneously – this could be fixed by defining the search area but see below

3. ‘Assumed movement ignore movement limits’ - The assumed movement inherent in a trap search can be up to 25/26 squares long despite your maximum movement being 12, outside of potions, spells etc this is made even worst by the fact that you could, for example at a junction, presumably use your action ‘search for traps with assumed movement covering 26 squares in one direction and then roll and move up to 12 squares in another direction, your figure covering a total of 38 squares of movement (assumed and actual or more 42 I think if you consider the area of larger rooms) – this could be fixed by limiting assumed movement to a maximum of 12 squares (or a lower figure such as 6 squares but see below

4. ‘Unrevealed Monster’ flaw - The assumed movement could cover a T-junction that has unrevealed monsters along the other arm of the T, you can discover traps through your assumed movement passed the junction but would fail to reveal the monsters that would be revealed if the movement was not assumed – limiting assumed movement would reduce the likelihood of this occurring but it would still be possible, paradox warning - you would need to search (and move – assumed not actual) that would result in the monsters being revealed and having revealed the monsters you would be unable to perform a search due to the presence of the monsters uncovered during your search

5. ‘Inconsistent search conditions’ flaw - there are discrepancies between the descriptions of the conditions in which you can perform the three different searches in the original which make no sense. Search for treasure can be done when there are no monsters in the room, whereas searching for traps and searching for secret doors can only be done if there are no monsters visible to you, so if you are in a room with no monsters in that room but one stood in the doorway outside the room in the corridor then you would be able to search for treasure in that room but would not be able to search for secret doors or search for traps. In addition, only the “Search for Treasure” has the potential to spawn a Wandering monster outcome but not the other two search actions which again is inconsistent

6. ‘Traps behind the door’ flaw - If the official rules, there is a strange situation that occurs when a trap has been placed on the first square of a room on the Quest Map. As, under the official rules, you cannot search for a trap in a room without being in the room, and stepping into the room, will activate the trap, these become undetectable

7. ‘Volume of searches’ flaw - In the US rules a room can be searched for treasure once by every Hero (although in the original UK/EU rules it was search once per room (not once per Hero). This results in a volume of treasure found that leads the Heroes to max out on equipment in a brief period, causing advancement to stagnate. It also offers to a considerable number of potential searches during the game, four treasure searches per room, plus a secret door search and a trap search – 6 search actions per room plus two additional searches for every corridor – starts to feel like the game should have been named “Hero Search”.

8. ‘Handling Chests’ flaw - In some official quests the layout of traps and chests implies that a Hero needs to be adjacent to a chest to open it. Chests are a purely decorative indicator that it might be worth searching in this room- Separating chests out of the main search rules and putting them into a separate action resolves this issue

Attempts that I have seen so far to resolve these issues, by trying to limit the search area, feel inelegant and complex. Applying quick fixes to mitigate the worst of the issues, like ‘search only finds the nearest trap’ and the ‘search behind the door from the doorway,’ do work, but feel like patching up the holes in a leaking roof when a new roof is what is really needed

The ‘search for traps’ for me feels very artificial, both logically checking for traps in your path (or on a chest that you are about to loot) makes sense but you would think for Heroes with any experience and likely to survive for any length of time the check would be automatic (NOT automatically successful, that would render traps pointless, but the check would be automatic) but also in terms of the rules as written with the awkward ‘declaration’ mechanism and the Zargon indicates a dodgy square but no marker is placed, nothing similar is used anywhere else.

After all, why would you search an entire room (or for that matter the other side of a two-square wide corridor) for traps if you aren’t moving through those squares (moving through those squares solely for the purposes of uncovering a trap sounds daft – “the trap in the corner of the room got me”, “what were you doing in the corner of the room”, “searching for traps”!!?? “Searching for treasure” makes a far more understandable response.

You search the path that you are travelling, room or corridor, and if you are searching a room (for example for treasure) then again you would ‘pre-search’ the path (of assumed movement) that you are taking as you search for treasure (and that path wouldn’t necessarily cover every single square in a large room, I would imagine that you are likely to focus your treasure search around features, furniture, fallen monsters and the room edges (walls) rather than the empty expanse in the middle)

*Scrap the Search for Traps and Secret Doors actions

*Modified the Disarm traps activity to be a Detect & Disarm activity that is applicable to found unsprung traps only (and not hazards that result from traps like pits and falling blocks), but to avoid complications from the way this is change is implemented in the US edition, the Detect and Disarm activity both finds and disarms (or sets off unsprung traps) so that they don’t have to persist in a found but unsprung state, the activity is all resolved one way or the other through a single roll.

*Expand this Detect and Disarm option so instead of being limited to only the Dwarf (or a Hero with the Toolkit), it becomes an option for ALL Heroes, but the Dwarf (or a Hero with the Toolkit) is better at it. This gives non-Dwarf Heroes something else to do, increases the reasons for buying the Tool Kit – and makes it useful for the Dwarf too

*Added mention of Traps and discovering Secret Doors through movement to Book of Exploration

*Added mention of Traps and Secret Doors as part of Book of Searching

*Once a pit trap is sprung Monsters treat the resulting hazard ‘the pit’ the same as Heroes

*Added the Jumping Attack rule to better resolve jump/attack combo if the square on the other side of a pit trap is occupied by a foe

[Bareheaded Warrior]

20220102 “The Monster Update”

Optional Monster Abilities

To complete mitigation of the door blocking issues covered in a previous update and to add some flavour to the basic monsters and tactical options for Zargon I have upgraded some monsters to use reach and ranged weapons and some other special thematic abilities

*Goblins equipped with spear as standard allowing diagonal attacks
*Skeleton scythe allows diagonal attacks
*Introduce new Goblin Scout armed with Bow
*Introduce new variant of Skeleton armed with Bow
*Troll gains Regenerate ability
*Zombie gains Reanimate special ability
*Mummy gains Fire Vulnerability special ability

Applied ‘dewarhammerisation’ used in HQ2021 to ease transition of any players familiar with that version to HQ Gold
*Chaos -> Dread, Fimir -> Troll, Empire -> Realm and so on

[Bareheaded Warrior]

20220108 “The Wizard Advancement Update”

The Wizard Clearing House of House Rules

The Wizard is pretty much excluded from the advancement through upgrading weapons and armour mechanism due to their inability to use anything but the basic weapons. The Wizard has almost nothing to spend his gold on, so is effectively excluded from the advancement mechanism.

*Introduced a mechanism for the Wizard to advance through purchase of new spells – spells have a cost
Mind Point to Maximum Spell Principle – make explicit instead of implicit – Maximum Number of Spells is one set of three for each (starting) Mind Point over three i.e., Elf MP4 = 1 set of 3 spells, Wizard MP6 = 3 sets of 3 spells = 9 spells

*Allow Wizard to use Shortsword (giving him another upgrade option, and access to a few weapon artefacts like Orc’s Bane and gives other Heroes someone to hand kit down to)

Short sword (Huh. Good God.) What is it good for?

*An alternative version of the Wizard has 5 Body Points & 5 Mind Points. These changes still thematically mean the Wizard has highest mind and lowest body, the extra BP means he doesn’t have to wait until death to get full value from basic 4 BP healing spell/potion, gives him a little higher survivability, keeps the BP and MP total of 10 principle

*His 5 mind points give him a starting number of spells of 6 spells (2 elements) and when his starting Mind Points increase (for example due to an artefact like the Talisman of Lore) he has the option to purchase new spells (prices for spells are included next to the relevant spells in the appendix)
Only has 6 starting spells – Wiz chooses 1 set, Elf chooses 2nd set, Wiz chooses 3rd set. This is in line with the normal principle of every Mind point over 3 gives you access to one set of 3 spells

Each Mind point for the Wizard over and above his starting 5 gives him the opportunity to learn 3 more spells, a single set. These can be purchased with Gold between quests, individually or collectively as a set, but a complete set needs to be purchased before you can move onto buying from another set, the gold purchase representing the time and material needed to learn and master the spells.

[Bareheaded Warrior]

20220112 “The Death Update”

Problems:

The effect of being reduced to zero Mind Points isn’t not clear, no rule exists in the official rulebook, but slightly different rules are presented in various expansions

The rules around passing items in general, and specifically healing potions in this context are not clear, no rule exists in the official rulebook, but slightly different rules are presented in various expansions

The rule around using a healing potion to save yourself from death (due to being reduced to zero body points), but if we assume being reduced to zero Mind points also kills you then, there needs to be a corresponding entry

The rule/special exception about a spell-caster saving himself by casting a healing spell is vaguely worded and it isn’t clear whether a situation could even occur in which this rule could be invoked. For this rule to be invoked a spell caster would have to lose BP resulting in death on their turn before they had taken their action. As the only way that BP could be lost on the spellcasters turn is through movement onto a trap and activating a trap ends the spellcasters turn

Potions: how do they work?

*Scrap the cast a healing spell to save yourself rule

*Potion of Healing (restores D6 lost BP) and Potion of Restoration (restores all your lost BP) can be used under the “Saving Yourself From Death” rule but in that situation used on a Hero with zero BP they only restore that Hero to 1 BP

[Bareheaded Warrior]

20220211 “The Poison Update”

Poison?

Problem(s): The rules for handling poisons are introduced in expansions long after poisonous traps are introduced

*Introduced the mechanism for handling poisonous attacks
*Reviewed and added in some traps and furniture traps, which utilise poison from various sources
*Reviewed the use of poisons in official Quests, removed those that are too early in the sequence
*Reviewed the anti-poison potions in official quests and adapted for these house rules

[Bareheaded Warrior]

20220411 “The Crossbow Update”

Crossbow Argument
Crossbow--2 handed or can use a shield?

Problem(s):

Crossbow has unlimited range, unlimited ammo and is therefore overpowered
Missile weapons may not be used on adjacent targets but what about diagonals (especially if the monster in that diagonal has a spear)
Crossbow, both hands, with shield?

*Missile weapons may not be used if there is a foe in any of the squares surrounding you.
*Crossbow labelled as ‘both hands’

[Bareheaded Warrior]

20220507 “The Courage Update”

Courage Spell

Problem: Courage spell is poorly written and open to different interpretations and potentially overpowered

*Compared the different versions of the courage spell through different editions and the history of changes and rewrote to clarify
*Added the point that Courage and Fear cancel each other out
*Modified the Fear spell to reduce your Attack Dice by one rather than to one

[Bareheaded Warrior]

20220124 “The Looking, Revealing and Line of Sight Update”

Is "see" the same thing as "line of sight?"
Line of Sight

Problems:

The first, is that the text of "A Good Rule of Thumb" isn't reflected in the accompanying diagram. The dodgy line of sight crosses the Wizards square halfway along the top edge of the square. I would consider that LOS to be blocked. The diagram, which I assume was added to provide clarity, doesn’t!

The second is that the general text within the book seems to use the term “see” to sometimes refer to things that can be seen but at other points to use the term “see” to refer to “line of sight” - things that can be targeted by a missile weapon

The third is that there is no mention of the effects of furniture on seeing and/or line of sight

The fourth is that the ‘reveal’ rules for laying out furniture in a room when the Hero opens a door. But before he enters the room contradict the ‘seeing’ rules in that you have to lay out contents that cannot be seen by the Hero

*Missile weapons, and some spells, including thrown weapons, dagger and hand axe need a clear line of sight to the target

*In every other instance, that I can think of, the rules around seeing i.e., whether something is visible NOT line of sight. For example, you can only search if no monsters can be seen, stuff is laid out on the board when you can see it (the “reveal” rule)

*Blocked square spaces and tall furniture – bookshelves and cupboards block line of sight i.e., the squares that they are in are occupied the same as if they were occupied by a figure, any other furniture doesn’t block line of sight.
*Clarified ‘what can be seen’ i.e., your field of view.

• A Hero in a room or corridor can see (and can be seen by) everything in that same room or corridor (corridors are always straight so corner squares belong to two corridors and T-junction squares belong to three corridor)
• A Hero standing on a square adjacent to rooms or corridors can see (and can be seen by) everything in the rooms or corridors that he is adjacent to
• A Hero can see anything that he has a line of sight to

*Clarified Line of Sight - You have a line of sight in the following conditions.

Draw an invisible straight line between the centre of the square that the Hero or monster is on and the centre of the square the target is on. If the line crosses a wall, closed door, cupboard, bookshelf, blocked square, or another Hero or monster, then the line of sight is considered blocked, otherwise the line of sight is considered clear, even if the line just touches a corner or wall edge.

For the purposes of missile attacks (and corresponding spells) you must have a clear line of sight to the target. You have a clear line of sight in the following conditions

Draw an invisible straight line between the centre of the square that the Hero or monster is on and the centre of the square the target is on. If the line crosses a wall, closed door, cupboard, bookshelf, blocked square, or another figure, then the line of sight is considered blocked, otherwise the line of sight is considered clear, even if the line just touches a corner or wall edge.