Ye Olde Inn

by **wallydubbs** » March 4th, 2023, 1:38 pm

For Prince Magnus' Gold a Wizard's replacement was drawn from the hero pool, joining in was the Male Rogue.
Barbra had a helmet and Drew still has a staff, saving up her money for the eventual bracers.

This quest didn't start off so smoothly for the Druid. Casting Shapeshift on her very first turn, and her initial attack on the goblin in the adjacent room failed. The Goblin got in a hit in, thus wasting Drew's Shapeshift ability. Weilding a staff doubled the Druid's attack spaces and I noticed a major difference in her attacks in regards to position and cautious approaches: often using her partners as cover and protection. In like manner, Rogue utilized his opportunistic striker skill, targeting monsters specifically adjacent to other heroes. His skills came in handy to make up for the shortcomings of single-point dagger attacks.
Upon reading the Rogue's card it's said he's very useful with his Bandolier, however under starting equipment he's only given a Dagger. Since the Bandolier has a price on it, I must assume that he'll need to eventually buy this and doesn't start off with it. So his first attempt at throwing the dagger I had to redo once I realized the error.

However the missing Dwarf left the heroes vulnerable to traps. Barbra triggered 3 out of 7 traps in this quest. But having the body points and 3 attack dice from a broad sword shows off her value to the team. Upon playing a campaign with these other heroes, playing a few quests without a Wizard or Dwarf has emphasized the Barbarian's importance to the group. Although the Wizard adds some useful and tide-changing spells, and the Dwarf could remove traps, but the majority of the game features around dice rolling combat and the Barbarian's Body Points and 3 attack dice broadsword are instrumental in a starting campaign. While the Elf, Wizard and Dwarf have their uses, they COULD be interchangeable with new characters, but for a starting group, a Barbarian is key!

Barbra and Drew have collected a number of healing potions through previous quests and gave a few to the Rogue as, due to his high rolls, generally put him at the front of the line.

In this quest the heroes found quite a bit of gold. There are 10 rooms in this quest and out of all the treasure searches 6 yielded gold or gems, etc; 1 Heroic Brew was found by the Rogue, who didn't really need it; and three Wandering Monsters were drawn. The Druid and Rogue were impressive, I've seen them both take down an Abomination, despite only having weapons with 1 attack dice. So this quest was fairly straightforward. Overall it was a pretty fun quest. It seems like this'll be the group that goes through the rest of the campaign. They're gonna need to invest in tool kits.

I made it up through the Fire Mage with Barbra, Drew, Galadreil and Elron (Rogue) and I gotta admit, I'm missing the Wizard. The Druid is kinda boring. The Barbarian is still racking up the kills as opposed to the other heroes. The Druid just seems to be tagging along, getting a couple kills here and there. Upon upgrading to a Short Sword her Shapeshifting attacks are more powerful. She did well in Legacy of the Orc Warlord, but during the Lost Wizard she's the one that drank the Potion of Mystery, so wasn't accompanying the other heroes when they needed healing. So the Chaos (Dread) Warriors beat all the potions out of the other heroes (except the Druid).
I could increase her strength by buying new weapons and eventually buy bracers to increase defense, but I'm not finding anything overly exciting about this hero.

After Legacy of the Orc Warlord I wasn't sure if the Druid could wear the Wizard's Cloak. If anyone among the 4 playing heroes could wear it I think the Druid might. But if I remember correctly only the Wizard and Warlock could wear the Wizard's Cloak.

In The Fire Mage all 3 potions of healing showed up in the Treasure Deck, along with 2 Wandering Monsters, a hazard, 2 gold, a gem and Potion of Strength. Barbra finished off the Fire Mage with a Potion of Strength as soon as he ran into the center room. So the Fire Mage only cast 2 spells (Tempest and Escape) in first room with the skeletons.

These are only my personal thoughts on the campaign in regards to the Druid. But the only question I have at this point is if the Druid is allowed to wear the Wizard's Cloak?

by **wallydubbs** » July 19th, 2023, 1:53 pm

by **wallydubbs** » July 19th, 2023, 4:15 pm

So the group has essentially survived the Game System, Keller's Keep, Prophecy of Telor and Return of the Witch Lord: An Elf (Link) and Warlock (Annabelle) died in the initial Trial. A female Wizard and Elf took their place, the Wizard died in Lair of the Orc Warlord due to a double attack Wandering Monster, the male Rogue took her place and lasted with the group up until Keller's Keep where he was replaced by Penny the wandering female Dwarf. Throughout all this It's been Barbra and Drew (The Female Barbarian and Druid) that have been in the group since the beginning.

Being that the Barbarian, Dwarf, Wizard and Elf are the four originals, not much needs to be said about them as they are remarkably balanced, but having gone this far with the Druid I now feel I can lay down a fair assessment.
The factors of mortality generally come down to a heroes armor, weapons potions and positions:
A successful offense will keep the enemies numbers down, a dead orc won't attack;
The more armor you have, the better your chances of Defense;
If you're not a heavy hitter don't get in the middle of a battle where multiple monsters can gang up on you;
Always keep healing potions handy.

I'm gonna backtrack for a bit, the success of the Trial was due to a combination of things: the Barbarian's Broadsword was a well needed heavy attack, the Druid and Elf providing healing spells, and a big one was the Warlock's range attack, especially under demonform. If I remember correctly Annabelle was the one to kill Verag, who was chasing her and the Druid, she took him out with her ranged attacks by keeping a safe distance. Sadly she didn't survive the rest of the quest due to a low movement roll and getting cornered by a beefed up Mummy. She didn't survive long enough for me to see how helpful she'd be in the long run. However the Druid's healing spells have also been noted.

Since playing the rest of the quest pack and KK, PoT, and RotWL I've since noted that thanks to Druid's healing spells and carrying the Spell Ring (usually enchanted with Life Force) the heroes have been able to stack up on healing potions found during the quests.
I've played through Hero Quest with a beefed up treasure deck, which makes healing potions all the more rare, but playing through with a standard 26 Treasure Card deck, the healing potions come up more frequently. Due to the Druid's Spell Ring the heroes didn't need to use their potions as much.

The Barbarian and Elf have been able to max out on armor and weapons, so at this point they only take chip damage from the likes of Skeletons and Zombies.
The Rogue and the Druid didn't have such luxury as their defense was limited. The Druid, however, could pack a punch with Shapeshift and a Longsword, but the Rogue had limitations to attack, which is unfortunate considering his inherit Combat Mobility, which gives him a constant Veil of Mist power, gives him the ability to sneak in the middle of battle, which should balance out with Opportunistic Striker and Ambidextrous skills. However I've noticed his limited armor is a massive hindrance, he went through healing potions quickly and the Druid even used the Elixir of Life to bring him back once, but it wasn't enough to keep him alive through Keller's Keep, that's where the Dwarf took over.
The Dwarf has since bought Plate Mail and tends to buy Potions of Speed and Dexterity to keep up with the party.
I feel I also need to add that the Prophecy of Telor yields a lot of gold and healing potions as if the heroes weren't maxed out already.
So with a maxed Barbarian, Dwarf and Elf only the Druid lacks the best defense, but makes due with her Shapeshift ability. The attacking factor doesn't necessarily come in hand as her weapon of choice is the Crossbow.

But the Druid has only been this successful due to his teammates. Barbra and Drew started the group, losing and adding friends along the way. Druid, in essence is taking the place of the Wizard (whose stay in the group was short-lived) so I can only attest to how well she plays with a Barbarian, Elf and Rogue or Dwarf. Building up to this team I noticed that the Barbarian is essentially the key to success, a heavy-hitter/tank is mandatory for any good group. The Wizard usually stays back and just adds creative support through spells, but in this case it's the Druid that keeps a distance but instead of having a huge arsenal of spells, relies on the crossbow. She's the only one on the team who bought a Tool Kit, which in hindsight might not have been the best choice. I would say the Druid helped build the team with her healing, allowing the other heroes to build up healing potions, but asides from that the creative assistance of the Wizard is missing.conventional wisdom might suggest trading her for the Elf instead, but I'm thinking 3 well armored heroes is a better choice for a team, and until the Guardian Knight joins the hero pool, only the Barbarian, Elf and Dwarf can wear it. We'll see how well this carries over once they get to Frozen Horror.

by **wallydubbs** » September 26th, 2023, 1:53 pm

Frozen Horror was a bit of a nightmare and obviously can't be played as is, by Quest 8 the group had depleted all their healing potions and had no chance to get through Quests 9 & 10. They managed to make it through though thanks to the Genie spell. They knew full well it was futile to go through 9, so upon finding the door to the Frozen Horror the Elf bypassed the Crystal Key and used Genie to open the door.

After the fact I was surprised I got the Druid to go this far! Upon rereading the Druid's hero card, cross-referenced with the Bard's hero card and Helmet, Chainmail and Shield equipment cards, I now realize the shield is NOT a restriction for the Druid, only the helmet and Chainmail is. I could've had her wield a shield and Longsword, upping her to 5 defense dice with the Shapeshift and Bracers.

by **The Admiral** » October 2nd, 2023, 4:24 am

I see the Druid as quite a decent character. Once she has the longsword, bracers and shield she is a 3 diagonal attack with 4 defence, rising to 4/5 with shape shift. She also has 6BP's worth of healing. 5 defence gives the EW player a dilemma.Try and take the shapshifter off against 5 defence and possibly do nothing or go for an easier target?