by Our legendary member Kurgan, performed time ago an great live interview with William Mort, better known as "Avalon Bill" in social media, performed during GenCon 2023 event in Indianapolis. At the time of interview, William was the Public Relations Leader of HeroQuest remake's products.
The interview with William Mort can be found in Kurgan's YouTube channel XSC3-HeroQuestFans here, however, he gave me permission to transcript it on this post for eternity. Nevertheless, of course I encourage you to watch the full video if you are interested in listening to William.
On behalf of all members of Ye Olde Inn, Thanks a lot to Kurgan for generating this great valuable piece of history!
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INTERVIEW WITH WILLIAM MORT "AVALON BILL" by our Ye Olde Inn member Kurgan, performed the 5th of August 2023 for his YouTube channel, @HeroQuestFans
- Kurgan from HeroQuestFans (K): All right, so we're sitting down here... this is Day Three of GenCon over in the Avalon Hill booth, so HeroQuest Fans and we're talking now to Avalon Bill. Hey, how's it going?
William Mort "Avalon Bill" (AB): Hi everyone. I am "Avalon Bill". I've been with the Avalon Hill team for about two years, now a little over and I handle all the social media. I'm on the consumer and commercial and franchise marketing team.
K: Very cool, so you're no stranger to fans, kind of like confronting you and yelling at you about stuff...
AB: Absolutely, I've been doing social media for about a decade. Now I've had a number of very contentious roles and so honestly coming to Avalon Hill and dealing with the fans we have. It's been one of the best experiences for me personally. Hero Quest fans, and fans of our other games, have been so gracious, so great. When there's been negativity, it's never been out of malice, but out of people who are passionate and love our games and just want to see the best thing out there.
K: I'm so relieved to hear you say that because I know that the internet can be kind of a hostile place sometimes, people can kind of get carried away but out of all the social media, so you guys are on Discord, Twitter, Facebook...
AB: We are primarily focused on our own Discord server and then we have Instagram at Avalon Hill Games, and then on Twitter. We're both at Avalon Hill and at Hero Quest, which for those of you who haven't seen it yet, our Hero Quest Twitter account was taken over by Zargon a couple of years ago, and he has not given back control yet, so he just kind of gets to tweet whatever he wants, how he's feeling for the day...
K: Can you confirm that the secret identity of that Zargon is actually Doug Hopkins?
AB: That is not true...
K: Ah, debunked.
AB: I won't give away who Zargon is, but I will let you know that they are very crotchety and very much embrace the ideals of Zargon.
K: I should have planned ahead and done process of elimination, like in clue, so it's like "okay, now we got all the answers, so the one person who didn't say anything tada no kidding". I know your whole team isn't here, so that actually wouldn't work, so I'm just gonna lay this out there and you've probably heard this before that there's a lot of people that have criticized the marketing strategy, and I already had a great talk with Patrick [O'Rourke] and Chris [Nadeau] about the strategy for marketing, both the Haslab campaign and then the retail version of Hero Quest, and I really appreciate the wave kind of reached out and welcomed people in honestly. When the Discord started I was a little annoyed because I thought "oh my gosh, oh I'm gonna lose all my people and they're gonna go over to yours", but actually I had nothing to worry about because I feel like when you guys started the Avalon Hill Discord you had a huge influx of people for Heroscape, but you also had Diplomacy and Betrayal and the Hero Quest people just went to both and if you guys got an exclusive you were like "hey, go ahead and share this" and so we would port it over to our Discord because honestly, as someone who runs his own Discord, and I just am fairly new to it, I don't have time to like check everywhere, but people come to me and they bring it to me, and I'm nobody special, I'm just a guy, so I really like that, but going back I think a lot of people were upset because they felt like they didn't have enough time to get engaged in the Haslab campaign, they only got like two emails in two years or something, so what has changed from what 2020 to now, and what are you doing to further reach out to the community and make sure people are in the know?
AB: Yeah, that's a great question. I came aboard a little bit after the Haslab ended, and so one of my goals as a social media guy was making sure that we had some dedicated platforms where we're putting out new, so the fans know exactly where to go. Another big thing is our partnership with the Hasbro Pulse team has been getting better and better over the years, so we're working with them to figure out how we can make an email newsletter thread, or some way to better notify our fans of everything that's coming. I know there was a lot of criticism around the release of the Commander of the Guardian Knights because all the fans that backed us and supported us for the Haslab, not all of them found out about that character until it was too late, and hope I can definitely say that we've not always done the best thing possible, but we are trying to figure this out as we go along and correct our mistakes of the past, and make sure that our fans are connected and know what's going on.
K: And I just want to say I don't want to sound like too much of a fanboy here,because I feel like I'm still like a guerrilla reporter of some sort. When I saw that apology letter for the Guardian Knight, I was like "what is this like? corporations don't apologize for stuff", so I wasn't really sure how to react to it, but I guess I said something along the lines of "well, if they make it right, I'm willing to let that go and I mean I got three copies, so I had nothing to worry about", but I felt bad on behalf of the people that saw the new thing and they couldn't get it, and now that you can buy Rise of the Dread Moon and it's in there, and personally I think it's a cooler sculpt, yeah the collectors are happy and then the people who just wanted the new mechanic are happy, so I consider that a positive, and I'm glad that happened, and I hope that moving forward these other things, these other disappointments get corrected, and I think that just builds more goodwill, so am I right to.
AB: Yeah, that's absolutely something we're working on is figuring out how we can make sure that fans of the game can get the content that maybe at the time was either limited, or hard to get, so whether that's like you said reproducing the Guardian Knight. It's not the same exact sculpt, but it is mechanically the same exact character, so that you're not missing out, as a fan you can pick up Rise of the Dread Moon and you have that content that was in the Commander of the Guardian Knights. I know there have been leaks online that I can't comment on, but hopefully fans have seen that there are some other things coming down the pipeline that were kind of hard to get at first, or maybe they missed out on, and those will be available for the fans who missed out.
K: So you might start hearing like conspiracy music in your head, like the theme from the X-Files, but there's some people out there. I won't say who believe that actually, you guys accidentally on purpose leaks stuff, so that we'll start speculating about it is that true.
AB: No comment on that. What I can say is that the Hero Quest fans are so passionate that the second any even like iota of information hits the Internet, it's everywhere, it's on Reddit, it's on Board Game Geek, it's on our Discord, like we sometimes find out about leaks from you guys so...
K: That's so great and it's so true, I mean... like I said I'm not all over social media, I don't have an Instagram account, I barely spend time on Facebook, the most I spent there in years was just to figure out this Gen Con thing because a friend of mine talked me into coming, I'm so glad I did, but yeah, it's like we have people looking at like SKU numbers and like going to like Italian web pages, and like Australian web pages looking for any clue, after I got a hint that maybe there were some stores that knew about some possible rumored expansions, and I was asking him, "so what can you say about this?" and they were like "well, everything's subject to change and we don't really know much but we think that this Path of the Wandering Monk is coming up in January or sometime", and sure enough here I am, and the first thing I see is The Path of the Wandering Monk, so that makes me think our sources were probably reliable. I know you can't say can't comment, but...
AB: Yeah and hopefully you saw The Path of the Wandering Monk in the case, we have that great Arena set up there that if hopefully people see the pictures online, but sort of the fun with that is also the Easter eggs in that, that kind of hint at what's coming next and maybe has been teased online a little bit, not by us but or leaked, I should say, so that you can see like the path that we're heading down.
K: I'm gonna replay that sentence in slow motion to see if you accidentally said something... I'm kidding, I'm kidding, yeah, so they have this really cool like... is it resin, or is it foam?
AB: Mostly foam.
K: Okay, it looks awesome. Yeah they built this big like amphitheater... it reminds me of the cover of Return the Witch Lord, but it's not exactly the same, it's different and all the figures that you guys have released, all the character figures, thus far are in there, and they're all kind of arranged differently. Chris had to point that out, he loves to mess with me I just know this.
AB: Oh yeah, Chris Nadeau... he's fantastic to work with and he loves trying to find every single way he can to kind of give fans little Easter eggs, and little hints about what this world is, especially as we build it out and get deeper into that Hero Quest world. You'll see one of the things that comes in The Path of the Wandering Monk expansion is a little scroll and I won't give away everything, but if you read that scroll it gives you some hints, and then on the back of that is one of the first ever pieces of map for the Hero Quest world.
K: Yeahc, I was noticing the geography, so I'm one of those silly people who tries to find out more official backstory, even though like many fans, I have my own head canon of what's happening in Hero Quest, and I don't mind that other people's canon is different, but I had the the Warhammer world and I was erasing the names and replacing them with the new names you guys had put in there, so no offense to them but it was just like "okay, well, it's not Karak Varn, but Kaba Khan is kind of in the same spot, but now that kind of goes up in the air because we have this new geography", so is this the same hemisphere as the rest of the Quests, or what can you say?
AB: Honestly that I am not 100% sure about. That's definitely a Chris Nadeau question.
K: Oh and I just got through grilling him, he probably needs a break from me. I've been after him like the whole time, well I'm really excited about that because on the one hand you can make up whatever you want, but it is nice to see what you guys had in mind, and what you're trying to inspire us to build off because you have those Quests and it kind of it doesn't even matter where it's set, but a lot of people wonder about that, they want to know well where is Elethorn really.
AB: Yeah, and that's one of the beautiful things about Hero Quest, that I think anyone who's a fan knows, is that we can release all this unquote official information, but Hero Quest is really a game for the fans by the fans, that's why we want to make sure to retain the blank Quests in the back, and for a while we ran out of them, but we had the blank Quest pads here to give away to people because I know when I was a kid I loved making new Quests. I love creating my own characters, creating my own spells, and we want to make sure that it's still a big part of Hero Quest, is that fans have control over what the game is for them.
K: The Adventure Design Kit, right?
AB: It's the Adventure Design Kit that's right.
K: Yeah, I think the first one a lot of people were saying "well, this is cool, but it's a joke because the icons are the wrong size", so was the point of that, just to say "well, here's what a table looks like, so you can draw it yourself".
AB: Yeah, yeah. The original intent was that like "oh, this is what the little Goblin symbol looks like, so you can draw that in not necessarily like, cut it up and paste things where they arek but I mean we've heard that from a lot of fans, that's a great suggestion, so we'll see what sorts of changes we can make in the future.
K: I never owned it because I grew up in the United States instead of the UK, but the original Adventure Design Kit actually had like adhesive stickers for all of the components and so there were multiple gargoyles or whatever, and you'd stick it on there and but other than that, I mean they had bigger character sheets and they had a little guide giving you suggestions, but usually it was like don't put in too many monsters because that will make the Quest too long, or don't put dead ends, make sure that you know if the Dwarf dies, can you still complete the Quest? little tips like that, it was like "oh, that's great, I know that you've probably seen the fan squidge monster, he has a website called HQ builder.com and I suppose you guys don't see that as any threat to your product, right? the free Quest maker...
AB: Yeah, I mean I don't have a problem with it. I love seeing fans make new content. I don't know if I can give an official Hasbro statement on whether that should exist or not, but that's a bear that I'm just not gonna poke. I'm gonna let it exist and have let the fans have fun.
K: Well, I do appreciate, I mean I guess I've heard rumors that some people have gotten cease and desist notices when they're making like bulk products, and calling it Hero Quest. Okay that's probably different than someone just making like a fan created, like this is for me and my family and...
AB: Exactly, yeah. I mean obviously you cannot make Hero Quest products, call it Hero Quest and try to sell it. That is IP infringement, don't do that, but if you're just making Quests for fun and playing with your friends, sharing it with your friends, go ahead.
K: Yeah, I'll admit I've tried to keep my Discord fairly drama free, I mean I'm the type of person that'll argue with someone and then afterwards I'll be like I was that kind of a jerk I can back off on that, but I feel like it's very positive and we have those passionate discussions, but I know that and I know Avalon Hill is not the same as Wizards of the Coast, but I know Wizards of the Coast had their big deal with the ogl and all these questions were very much in the public of "okay, we know that the IP is owned by the company", and it's like how much Freedom are they willing to allow the community to have, so I think some of us were fearful that however this ends up, this is going to affect Hero Quest, but so far it hasn't.
AB: Yeah, the Wizards team there... they're definitely part of the Hasbro family, but there's different staff, so those issues I can't really comment on, I'm not involved in that in any way. I know my personal goal is to make sure that the fans can make Quests and still do what they can do to improve the game for themselves, and again like as long as you're not selling anything, I'm not going to have a problem with it.
K: That's awesome, that's awesome. Well, because there's now with things like 3D printing, it's like people can make their own miniatures. I mean, yes like a big company, like has broken back something that's even better than what we can make, but I've heard that and I have not grilled the Games Workshop people about this, but I've heard a lot of talk about, well they're gonna have to start 3D printing because they won't be able to compete with that market, I don't know if that's really true though because I've heard that those plastic sprues that they put out, so many that it's like pennies on the dollar to create those, and I'm not a business guy so I don't know how accurate that is, but is there ever a fear that well we're gonna have to go out of business because or stop making Hero Quest because everyone's just gonna print everything themselves.
AB: That's a great question, who knows what the future holds honestly, and everything changes, and it's just how we can adapt to that, and obviously we are people who are passionate about this game, and we want to see it exist for as long as we can, so when those challenges come up we'll try to find the best solution possible for us and for the fans. To us the fans are our North Star, our guiding light. If we can do right by them, then we've succeeded and we might not always be on the onset, make the right choices, but we will always look at what we've done and see how we can do it better.
K: I'll just confess to you I do have a 3D printed custom Sir Ragnar figure, so and well and I have the Mythic one, but that at least for me, there is a market for that, so to speak, so but at the same time if you guys made one, I'd buy it, that's me.
AB: The biggest piece of criticism with Rise of the Dread Moon... we're so happy to see that response to the pack has been very positive, people seem to love the Quests, but a lot of people are wondering where is that Sir Ragnar miniature, and so that is definitely a learning moment for us. I don't know if there was ever a plan for one or not from the production team, but definitely in the future that's something we'll have to consider. If we ever bring back a popular character, do we make a miniature for that character?
K: Well, and after talking with Chris about this and Patrick, it's like I get why it didn't happen, and for me, as an old school Hero Quest player, I'm used to substituting one figure for another, you just use your imagination, not every named character has to have a plastic sculpt, but because we had the Haslab campaign, it was like "well, here's one version of Sir Ragnar and dot dot dot", like that put that idea out there, so there still is kind of a dream that people have, and if they get that, I mean that's even more smiles in your corner so to speak.
AB: The one of the pieces of feedback that I've seen, that I really love the idea of, is an idea of a Premium Pack featuring miniatures for all of the different like villains that you've faced throughout Hero Quest. I think that would be something really cool to do if we ever have the opportunity to.
K: I'm glad you said that because that was one of the questions I forgot to ask in the other interviews, that's great and of course, then I can hear someone saying, but it's going to be an exclusive and someone's going to scalp that? I mean I'd rather see it come out than not like this is how crazy I am, I would rather see like you got you and Games Workshop get together and come out with like Warhammer Quest anniversary edition, parentheses Advanced Heroquest, and it would be like a totally modern? the chances of that happening are probably very small and if it did, it would probably be in small quantities but I'd buy it.
AB: Who knows what the future holds. We had a very great relationship with Games Workshop working on Hero Quest, and so I'm a big Games Workshop fan, I played Warhammer back when I was in college, and then recently fell to the lure of the Leviathan box set, so getting back into it, their work is great, they loved what we did with Hero Quest, so hopefully there's something there in the future.
K: I'll admit it as much as I throw around the stuff that I unbox. I'm kind of a budget gamer, so I waited until after Christmas, and I saw they had Fire Team, not Kill Team, but Fire Team 50% off at Barnes & Noble, and I bought three copies, so that I could start painting each of the three like, well three of the Space Marine factions, so the red, the blue, the yellow Imperial Fists, Blood Angels and Ultramarines. I'm still learning, but I have a copy of Space Crusade that I got from a really cool guy in the UK, from Board Game Geek, but I'm so crazy, I'm looking for like Star Quests like the German version because it has variant lower, and oh, I didn't say this to Chris... you guys already know this, but so I guess the problem with Space Crusade is it's so tied to the 40K lore, and you'd have to have more long meetings with Games Workshop to see if they'd be willing to, but on the other hand if they wanted to make it without your approval, there's probably something tied in from the Milton Bradley.
AB: Yeah, that gets into like IP issues and stuff that I have no idea about, but yeah, like that's Space Hulk and Space Crusade, and all those games are so cool, but you're right, they're so tied to the Games Workshop lore that as a fan, I would want to see it in that world, so who knows if that would ever happen.
K: Properly we've been joking quite a bit online about like the king of space has summoned, the cosmic army to go like fight the space pirates, and it would be the same game mechanics, but the lore would be totally different.
AB: It would be Dread Star Captains or something like that. [Laughs]
K: Yeah, it would be fun and everybody would be kind of winking at each other, but yeah, if you're just like "oh, I want the 40K version of Hero Quest, where is it?" this is an it'd be disappointing.
AB: Yep, absolutely. One of my favorite games is... I don't know if you know Forbidden Stars, it was a great game published by Fantasy Flight Games gosh I want to say like seven to ten years ago and then when their partnership with Games Workshop sort of fell through, it was really disappointing because it's a game primed for expansions, and fans of the 40K Universe know that there's so many different armies, and things you could add into that game so finding out that there weren't going to be any more expansions, was a real bummer so my only hope would be is, if we were ever able to do something like that, we could forge a relationship where we keep coming out with expansions, just like Hero Quest? where the more content you get like? it's fun and exciting to explore that stuff.
K: Yeah, I also have the Eldar Attack expansion and there's no way, I'm never going to be able to afford the Mission Dreadnought, so yeah and I never wanted to buy Space Hulk because I thought, well, between the two games, you get so much more lore there... sorry I'm going on this up.
AB: No worries, we're ending the Yawning Portal Tournament, but thanks so much for down with me, I really appreciate this.
K: I forgot about the tournament, I'm sorry. Thank you so much.
AB: Yeah, have a good one.
K: My pleasure.
End of interview.
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Links to many other relevant interviews about HeroQuest are compiled in thread.
