Overview of the Old World

[Davane]

So, I was reading through Battle Masters. It states on the front of the box “From the Makers of HeroQuest”. Well, in the manual it talks about the Empire, Altdorf, Reikwald, River Tengin, Grunburg, and River Reik. These are Warhammer locations, so this further places HeroQuest in the Warhammer World

What ties Battle Masters to HeroQuest?

Being made by the same company that made HeroQuest isn't enough - all this proves is that Battle Masters is set in the Warhammer World. I don't know enough about Battle Masters personally, so I wasn't particularly aware that BM was essentially WFB-lite...

[Kurgan]

Edit: Going by what y'all have said and what I found, I would say they are at least set in the same (or loosely based) world even before someone uncovers any official statement about it.

I am by no means an expert and have never seen the game in the wild, much less actually played it myself! The only exposure to it I had as a kid was a tv commercial, but we already had Hero Quest, so I kind of forgot about it. It's meant for two players (or two teams). Wipe out the enemy, winner take all.

Battlemasters seems meant to be to tabletop fantasy wargamming, what Heroquest was to dungeon crawler board games. Maybe a more hardcore version of Risk too when you think about it...

The artwork on the box looks very "warhammer" -esque to me. Don't think there were ever any expansions, just what you get in the big box.

BM has a huge plastic battle mat you fold out covered in hexes... you put up towers and cannons, and little platforms that have units plugged in. You draw cards and roll dice to defeat the other army. I used to get this confused with a different game "Weapons & Warriors" (the one where you literally fire marbles out of spring-loaded cannons and rubber band balistas to knock over each other's figures).

How are they similar or connected? Made by the same people (and advertised as such "From the Makers of Hero Quest"). Milton Bradley & Gamesworkshop 1992 and targeted at the same demographic (age 10 to adult).

BM has the forces of the Empire fighting the forces of Chaos.

The solid color plastic Citadel miniatures are very similar. The scale and even the color choices are familiar (neither here nor there) although there are now yellow and black units in addition to the familiar dark green, red, dark red, blue, dark blue and gray (no undead, fimirs, elves or dwarves mentioned that I could see) with mainly gray architecture.

Now the figures slot into larger formation/company unit bases (green, black, beige, etc) rather than having individual bases (and stickers to apply to shields and labels to differentiate units), but many similarities exist...

The Imperial side has red soldiers (including crossbowmen and halberdiers) that look very much like the "Men-at-Arms" from Hero Quest (their outfits are identical other than the chest armor being covered with cloth instead of bare metal like in HQ), alongside armored knights. Other members of the Imperial Army strongly resemble the "men at arms" found in Advanced Hero Quest / Mighty Warriors.

The Chaos ("Chaos Army"/"Forces of Chaos") side has a dark blue (or black) "Ogre" that is like a retooled version of one of the Ogres in the ATOH (he's larger and has a different head and a bit of Fimir style belly armor). There are dark green Orcs, though they are wearing a bunch of armor so they look slightly different than the HQ orcs, but the faces look the same, ditto for the goblins. The Chaos forces also feature gray Chaos Warriors (their horned helmets lack the little "ball" between the horns characteristic of Hero Quest). The term "Doomguard" is used to refer to certain Chaos companies. There are also goblins in the same color plastic. The bad guys also have "chaos archers" that are mohawked humans.

Some of the greenskin bad guys ride giant wolves. There are also Beastmen, which were a figure rumored to be part of some of the unreleased quest packs.

I used to think BM was a NA exclusive, but there were European versions released (Dutch, German, French, Spanish) and also Japanese. No idea if there were rule variants, the components seem the same.

The minis are so similar, many fans have modified them for use in HQ... you can find pictures online.

A similar type of skull tile (painting of a skull on a black background, not identical to HQ) is used for damage counting. Terrain and other effects are simulated by cardboard tiles, mostly.

You get 6, six sided (square) plastic dice that are red with white markings, but feature skulls that are reminiscent of Hero Quest (the shields are totally different than either of the shield types on HQ dice).

Is it "Warhammer fantasy" or is it "Hero Quest" ? Or its own thing?

Is it supposed to be "canon" for HQ? I don't know, and it doesn't concern me either way, but its cool to imagine this is you playing out what's happening in the background during quest packs. I didn't see any actual maps of the world but cruise through the terms in the manual to see if you find any matches I guess.

In BM, the Imperial capital is called "Altdorf." There is a mention of a river called "Reik," and some place called "Grunburg" that had "fallen" to Gorefist, commander of the Chaos Hordes. Baron Delbourne (or Delborne) and Duke Blitzen (or Blitzein) are mentioned as leaders whose forces supplement your "Imperial Knights." Apparently the Chaos leader is invading the borderlands of the Empire, in some place called the "Reikwald" a heartland featuring plains. There are a series of five "battles" which progress the story of the invasion campaign. There is a river called Tengin. I didn't read the whole thing to see if there was a way to create your own scenarios or if that is it, the bad guys attacking, the good guys trying to eliminate the invaders before they violently overthrow the Empire.

Chaos companies include names like Grom and Uglub (Goblins); Blackfang and Bogrot (Wolf-riders); Doomguard and Fellmor (Chaos Archers); Gazkull and Zogrod (Orcs), Bale and Flint (Beastmen); Goreband and Finmar (Chaos Warriors); Gorefist (Champions of Chaos) and the Ogre Champion Grimorg.

Imperial companies include names like Melgar (Imperial Crossbowmen); Bogenhaffen and Grunburg (Imperial Archers); Reikwald, Altdorf and Grunburg (Men-At-Arms); and the aforementioned Delborne, Blitzein and Prince Normand with the Imperial Knights and Lord Knights of the Empire. And yes, there is a mighty cannon.

More info from BoardgameGeek

[Kurgan]

Here's the Hasbro scan of the manual...

Interesting stuff all around.

PS: Ice Magic spells do appear in the Barbarian Quest pack (the Frozen Horror) on the Chaos side, but also on the Hero side (in the form of Spell Scroll artifacts).

[j_dean80]

Here's the Hasbro scan of the manual...

I have it listed on pg2 of this thread too.

[j_dean80]

So, I was reading through Battle Masters. It states on the front of the box “From the Makers of HeroQuest”. Well, in the manual it talks about the Empire, Altdorf, Reikwald, River Tengin, Grunburg, and River Reik. These are Warhammer locations, so this further places HeroQuest in the Warhammer World

What ties Battle Masters to HeroQuest?

Being made by the same company that made HeroQuest isn't enough - all this proves is that Battle Masters is set in the Warhammer World. I don't know enough about Battle Masters personally, so I wasn't particularly aware that BM was essentially WFB-lite...

It doesn’t explicitly state it ties to HQ, but as Kurgan pointed out - the high similarity count; plus the way it is advertised using the HeroQuest name. The setting is for sure Warhammer. It seems to be the empire fighting wars against Chaos as the HQ Heroes fight behind the scenes.

I read through the whole manual. It gives 5 battles to play out for 1 campaign and tells you to create your own as well.

I would tie it to the battles taking place in Kellar’s Keep.

[Kurgan]

Here's the Hasbro scan of the manual...

I have it listed on pg2 of this thread too.

My bad, wasn't trying to steal your thunder, just skimming too fast! I also see I was wrong about BM expansions, there were two, but they were just packs of reinforcements (one for Chaos Warband and one for Imperial Lords).

[Davane]

So, I was reading through Battle Masters. It states on the front of the box “From the Makers of HeroQuest”. Well, in the manual it talks about the Empire, Altdorf, Reikwald, River Tengin, Grunburg, and River Reik. These are Warhammer locations, so this further places HeroQuest in the Warhammer World

What ties Battle Masters to HeroQuest?

Being made by the same company that made HeroQuest isn't enough - all this proves is that Battle Masters is set in the Warhammer World. I don't know enough about Battle Masters personally, so I wasn't particularly aware that BM was essentially WFB-lite...

It doesn’t explicitly state it ties to HQ, but as Kurgan pointed out - the high similarity count; plus the way it is advertised using the HeroQuest name. The setting is for sure Warhammer. It seems to be the empire fighting wars against Chaos as the HQ Heroes fight behind the scenes.

I read through the whole manual. It gives 5 battles to play out for 1 campaign and tells you to create your own as well.

I would tie it to the battles taking place in Kellar’s Keep.

I would accept any argument that BM is tied to Warhammer, because the campaign sounds Warhammer, and I know BM was often considered WFB-lite. However, this argument is also what ties HQ and Warhammer, so if it's not valid in that case, it's probably not going to be valid in this case either.

Naturally, anyone can pick and choose what to have as canon in any individual game, but as a rule of thumb, I'd consider BM canon as part of Warhammer as much as HQ is, and visa versa.

The similarity aspect between BM and HQ isn't as perfect as it seems - after all, where is ABM to go alongside AHQ? WFB isn't exactly ABM, because WFB was already in existence at that point.

I would note that in 1991, GW and Citadel Miniatures would formally decide to focus solely on their Warhammer IPs. Prior to this, Citadel Miniatures, whilst owned by GW, produced miniatures for anything, and wasn't strictly tied to Warhammer.

Looking at BM, the copyright says 1992, so this would have been AFTER this big change, and therefore anything using Citadel Miniatures and/or GW could be classed as Warhammer related, and this can be seen by how Warhammer-esque BM is in terms of background. However, HQ copyright says 1989, which put's it BEFORE the big change, so you can't automatically say Citadel Miniatures or GW means Warhammer-related like after 1992.

If GW was working with MB during this period, this would put more credence of something happening that changed the relationship between the two, and would see GW decide to work on their own IP.

I do know that historically, the change in 1991, is when Ian Livingstone and Steve Jackson, the original founders of GW, sold their shares. This is seen as the birth of modern GW, as it becomes much more inwardly looking and self-reliant than it had been previously, when GW was more like a cross between a FLGS and an indie tabletop games publisher.

Personally, I'd put the Battle Masters campaign as the series of Battles in the Borderlands that would eventually drive the Emperor to take refuge in Kellar's Keep. Having the Emperor besieged in Kellar's Keep by Greenskins whilst the Forces of Chaos march on towards Altdorf makes sense, as does the Emperor being rescued and rallying the Imperial forces as they defend their capital makes for a dramatic moment in history.

This may be no connection, but if GW was affected by their dealings with MB, a US company, it would make sense that they would essentially ignore US culture in the Warhammer World. Naggaroth is basically the whole of North America, as one big Dark Elf Controlled frozen tundra and temperate forest/plains full of slave-driven work plantations, with only a single High Elf City just south of where you'd place the original 13 Colonies.

Don't worry, this is mostly a Devil's Advocate Data Dump post, trying to put more context into where Battle Masters comes in terms of the GW/MB history. Pre-1991, the Old World was much more fluid and flexible, and much more generic, that the Warhammer World before GW threw it under a bus...

Saying that though, AoS does have some very interesting lore behind it, and as AoS seems to be converging in to a more 40K playstyle, we might be seeing the convergence of Warhammer Fantasy and Warhammer 40K coming together, since by all indications, AoS seems to be set inside the realms of magic (aka the Warp)... not sure how AoS would apply to HQ, but the Warhammer World (aka Oldhammer World) is still seeing such popularity, that GW may decide to bring back the setting and battlesystem ALONGSIDE AoS.

Certainly, Cubicle 7 seems to not have any problem dealing with THREE different Warhammer IPs - Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay, a Warhammer Age of Sigmar RPG (I forget what it's called), and a Warhammer 40K RPG...

[Pancho]

One thing the lockdowns have shown is that we all have far too much time on our hands
Obviously Battle Masters and Heroquest are set in the Warhammer world. Same locations, same races, same individual units even. Same artwork and iconography, designers and figures too in some cases.

[j_dean80]

Battle Masters was also developed by Stephen Baker. It was a collaboration between MB and GW (just like HQ). The 2 expansions for BM not only came with extra units, but also came with new powerful warriors and some additional rules.

P.S. I don’t have much free time. I just enjoy this, so this is how I spend part of what I do have. (It’s either this or buying too many minis and wife getting mad every time another package arrives.)

[Pancho]

Not a dig at you at all J_Dean, just a nod towards the endless “canon/not canon” walls of text we’ve had on multiple threads. It is interesting stuff up to a point. No worries guys, please carry on and ignore this grumpy old gamer .