Evil Wizard Deck

[Bareheaded Warrior]

I've been revisiting this thread on occassion over the years with interest and am thinking about finally implementing something along these lines but...

Aside from what is on the actual cards themselves I wanted to take a step back and work out the scope, function and handling of this new feature

The Function

(1) To make the Evil Wizard's involvement in the game more active than passive. Bearing in mind that the Quest creator and the Evil Wizard player don't have to be the same person, the Evil Wizard player has a limited role aside from being an administrator, particualrly on turns where there are no monsters on the board. This deck will make the role more active, less passive.

(2) There is no time penalty in HQ, no incentive for players/heroes to keep moving and not spend endless turns waiting, hiding, retreating and poking into every noke and cranny. This deck will introduce a gentle push to keep them moving, which they can resist but will just get worse for them.

The Scope

Do we and how do we make/keep a clear distinction between the EWP cards and negative treasure cards?

By which I mean negative treasure cards like Wandering Monster and Traps have their own draw mechanism (search for treasure), their own frequency (how often you search and the number in the deck) and they are played immediately. If we have EWP cards that replicate Wandering Monster then there is a risk to game balance, hero searches and gets WM card, Chaos Warrior, EWP drops 3 WM cards, so 4 Chaos Warriors suddenly in play...this could make or break a Quest...

Equally we have a number of traps built into the Quest Map, plus a few extras in the form of the Treasure Cards, do we really want the EWP deck to add even more...a trap heavy dungeon with maybe 6 traps combined with an unlucky run on the treasure cards adding another 3-4 plus the EWP throwing a few more at you seems excessive!

Are these EWP cards intended to be exclusively bad for the players (even if only a minor annoyance) / good for the WP or could/should they include things that benefit the players, like random events that could be positive, negative or neutral?

The Handling

What triggers a card to be drawn and how is this linked to "time" as in (2) above

How are the cards played?

Are the cards played immediately when drawn or held in reserve for the opportune moment to unleash them (this may be a case of some of one type and some of the other)?

If held in reserve then some form of limit may be required to prevent them all from being saved up and unleashed as a bundle at the optimum time (from the EWPs point of view) but stacking in such a way that they make the difficulty of the quest essentially random!

Can the EWP only play one per turn, one per player turn, on per game turn? (and again this may vary based on the specific card)

[The Admiral]

I link the rate at which cards are drawn to the size of the party. At the start of each EW turn, the EW draws 1 token for each Hero on the board. If the EW then has 16+ tokens, 16 Are discarded and a card drawn. The EW may keep in hand as many cards as there are Heroes. I call this the Spawn Level. Monsters/traps may not be spawned in a room above the spawn level e.g. with 4 Heroes, a room with 2 monsters and a trap could have 1 monster or trap spawned in it.

Henchmen count as a Hero as follows: 1-2 = 0, 3-6 = 1, 7-10 = 2, 11-14 = 3 etc.

I have many more rules to stop the use of the cards becoming monotonous, along with a luck token per quest for the Heroes to negate 1 played card.

Now if the Heroes want to shuffle around the room to stop the treasure searcher being attacked by a WM they will pay for it, although I house rule anyway that the WM will attack the nearest target if it can't get to the searching Hero.

[Bareheaded Warrior]

That sounds a little complicated to read but that is only because you have expanded it out to cover Mercenaries and Extra Heroes so in practice it feels easy to implement.

I'm still a little concerned that your Spawn Level cap is too high, again back to my Chaos Warrior as WM example, could you spawn 4 of those in a single room (that had no monsters or traps) or 3 with a existing WM from a treasure search...perhaps a limit of one card per turn (round) could be played...

I'm wondering (and I don't even like the sound of this myself as I type it) whether introducing an EWP deck should involve removing the negative treasure cards, feels like we have two mechanisms stepping on each other toes, the positive treasure deck and the negative EWP deck (from the heroes POV of course)

The idea of being able to hold one card per hero sounds good, simple and scalable

It is good that you don't seem to have fallen into the trap of some of the earlier posts of tying your card drawing mechanism to turns with no monsters on the board, I get that part of the function of this mechanism is to give something to the EWP to do when he has no monsters, but surely that should be covered by his playing of the EWP cards and has nothing to do with the rate of acquisition which should be turn-based as you have suggested

My thoughts were simpler than yours, EWP rolls a combat die at the end of his turn, if then he draws a card, similar odds to yours for 4 heroes (yours in 1 in 4 and mine 1 in 6 but same ball park!)

EDIT: And apologies I have now realised that your reply was a repost that I had missed!

[The Admiral]

That sounds a little complicated to read but that is only because you have expanded it out to cover Mercenaries and Extra Heroes so in practice it feels easy to implement.

I'm still a little concerned that your Spawn Level cap is too high, again back to my Chaos Warrior as WM example, could you spawn 4 of those in a single room (that had no monsters or traps) or 3 with a existing WM from a treasure search...perhaps a limit of one card per turn (round) could be played...

I'm wondering (and I don't even like the sound of this myself as I type it) whether introducing an EWP deck should involve removing the negative treasure cards, feels like we have two mechanisms stepping on each other toes, the positive treasure deck and the negative EWP deck (from the heroes POV of course)

The idea of being able to hold one card per hero sounds good, simple and scalable

It is good that you don't seem to have fallen into the trap of some of the earlier posts of tying your card drawing mechanism to turns with no monsters on the board, I get that part of the function of this mechanism is to give something to the EWP to do when he has no monsters, but surely that should be covered by his playing of the EWP cards and has nothing to do with the rate of acquisition which should be turn-based as you have suggested

My thoughts were simpler than yours, EWP rolls a combat die at the end of his turn, if then he draws a card, similar odds to yours for 4 heroes (yours in 1 in 4 and mine 1 in 6 but same ball park!)

EDIT: And apologies I have now realised that your reply was a repost that I had missed!

Yeah, with a basic 4 Heroes it's 1 card every 4 turns. The EW could hold a hand of 4 cards and would have to discard if a fifth card is drawn.

There is 1 of each monster in my deck so the worst 4 would be a Gargoyle, CW, Fimir and Mummy, and that would be in an otherwise empty room, and you would have to have those exact cards in hand which would be unlikely, and that would then denude your hand.

No spawning in addition to a WM, only in a room when the door is opened.

[Bareheaded Warrior]

Do you have a link to a file where I can view your deck?

I'm sure I'm stating the obvious here but one source of EWP cards would be to copy the Treasure Potion Cards as in the base game Monsters never get to use potions, that would give you a few cards with minimal effort - Potion of Healing, Speed, Strength, Heroic Brew (might need to change the name on that one Berserkers' brew or Battle Brew), Resilience/Defence and so on.

[Bareheaded Warrior]

I’ve thought long and hard about this topic but haven’t really come up with anything definitive so I thought I’d share my rambling and see if the wisdom of the crowd could produce something more useful.

I definitely think that HQ could benefit from some form of mechanism that punishes dawdling and introduces a time pressure, but one of the appeals of HeroQuest is the exploration so I don’t think that we want a “hard” time pressure that forces players to rush through a quest, just a gentle push, an inclination not to waste time and to keep moving forward, but soft enough that you don’t panic about the time taken.

The treasure deck, some would argue contains such a timing mechanism as it grows less rewarding and more dangerous each time you draw a card, however this is easily avoided by simply not searching for treasure after a certain point in the deck’s deterioration, and this is both a shame as searching for and finding treasure is a big draw (and a useful source of necessary selfishness*) and setting players up to ditch this action later in the game, just detracts from the experience and the fun.

So, we need a gentle, gradual bonus to the EWP / penalty to the heroes, which grows in a way that is not based or at least not solely based on actions that players can avoid. And when I say gradual, or gradually building, cumulative effects I mean that each card cannot be too powerful cannot be a game changer, that would mean that success or failure of the quest is determined by whether the EWP gets to draw and play the massive ancient, enraged Ogre card or not.

In HQ we are, or should be, presented with a quest that has pre-determined, carefully thought out and balanced, quest with the right amount of the right monsters, discovered at the right time, in the right combination, backed up by a few chests and traps that generate that sense of risk, difficulty and challenge, and overcoming which rewards our players, getting almost killed by the monsters in a room, only to discover a Healing Potion and a load of gold in a chest, whoop, whoop.

The number of random things that turn up in the quest is deliberately limited to avoid the game balance being spoilt, treasure cards with traps or wandering monsters (whilst these are technically unlimited, player choice can eliminate them)

The other aspect about the quest design is a strong theme, I dislike the random monster effect in some similar games like AHQ/WQ, room 1 has a group of Skaven, room 2 a minotaur, room 3 a bunch of orcs, room 4 some zombies – seriously were these guys getting along or trapped in their respective rooms for an eternity before the heroes decided to turn up!

So a dungeon or EW card deck cannot I think force a monster type, you are exploring an Orc Warlord’s lair and deep within in, you get ambushed by a wandering group of mummies, without a thematic way of writing those into the quest, like you fall through the floor of an abandoned side room that the orcs never enter, into an catacomb a level below the base, or discover a secret door that the occupants have never found and discover a long hidden tomb…but these are twists for the quest designer to build in or not, not for a random deck.

What do you do as an EWP when the first 3 cards you draw all give bonuses to orcs and goblins when you are playing RotWL?

So, what mechanism to draw the cards that is not linked to actions that players can avoid, that is not too strong and not to weak, goldilocks!

The mechanism
Perhaps, EWP rolls a combat die on their turn, if a then draw a card. Perhaps a cap equal to the number of heroes, if a cap is indeed required, to prevent using cards in bulk.

The cards
What to put on the cards that is not so weak as to be inconsequential, so strong as to break the quest?

1. Traps is an oft cited “class” of cards in the EWPs arsenal but the game already includes as many traps as the designer feels necessary, plus a few more random ones thrown in related to the searching for treasure action, so is more traps going to fall into the category of being so weak to be inconsequential or too strong or too frequent as to spoil the game, a trap heavy design inspired by Indianna Jones might be great but adding a load more random traps may be oversalting the broth (and you can’t rally include rolling boulder and falling block due to their potential to wreck the quest by sealing off heroes and areas). So, whilst I wouldn’t rule out traps entirely, I’m not convinced they should form too high a proportion of any EW deck, maybe one or two chest or door traps might be ok)

2. Wandering Monsters – certainly a possibility, the mechanism already exists (although tied exclusively to an optional action) but to prevent either seriously repetitive monster appearance, what a surprise yet another Orc, or unbalancing the game, some quest have Chaos Warriors and similar as Wandering Monsters, too many of them and the quest is broken, so we would have to make a change to Wandering Monsters and keep them low power but throw in a little variability – in HQ Gold for example each quest has a wandering monster value of something like 1-2 = Goblin, 3 = Orc, 4-5 = 2 Goblins, 6 = Goblin Scout/Archer and this balance changes based on difficulty and theme, 1-2 = Skeleton, 3-4 = Zombie, 5 = 2 Zombies, 6 = Mummy for example. Using something like this in combination with Wandering Monster cards in the EWP deck may be a viable addition, although it does clash a little with the WMs in the Treasure deck, so perhaps replace those (and possibly the traps/hazards with “you find nothing but the time wasted searching only makes your enemies more prepared” – EW gets to draw an extra EW card - or something similar

3. Specific Monsters – no for me, due to the risk of either breaking the theme, complicating the rules (having to remove or substitute cards based on the dungeon population) or introducing cards that cannot be played at all.

So, what does that leave, a small number of trap cards and a larger number of WM cards, not exactly inspired. However, what about that give the EW the opportunity to give existing monsters a minor or at least short-lived boost, this mechanism already exists in the game through potions for the heroes, but monsters despite having potions in their lair, never use them. So, our EW deck could contain potions, equivalent to those for the heroes that the EW player could play to give a temporary boost to monsters

Potion of Speed, Potion of Strength, Potion of Healing, Potion of Resilience/Defence, Heroic Brew (perhaps renamed as Potion of Rage or Frenzy or Berserkers’ Brew).

The precedent exists, monsters do occasionally get to have and use potions already in the game although it is rare, so why not chuck some of these into the EW deck in similar proportions to the Treasure Deck for heroes.

This now gives us 5/6 WM cards from the treasure deck, (and these could be differentiated by when they can be played, in ambush when no other monsters are on the board and heroes reveal a new area, or reinforcements that can be played when heroes are already engaged with existing monsters, 2/3 hazard or trap cards, potentially a couple specifically linked to doors or chests, plus specific ones, and a copy of each of the potions from the treasure deck.

So, assuming 2E treasure deck (NA has different proportions) that gives us:
• 3 trap cards, which could be restricted to floor, chest, or door
• 5 wandering monster card (using the variable but themed WMs for each quest) and again these could be further sub-divided into “ambush” and “reinforcement” cards
• 6 Potion cards: 2x Potion of Healing, 1x Potion of Resilience, 1x Berserker Brew, 1 x Potion of Speed, 1x Potion of Strength

14 cards in total, not enough but a good start!

[dragon5145]

I know this is not perfect and contrary to the way most post about how EWP decks should be played, but if you're worried about the EWP unloading several powerful cards at once and unbalancing the game you could just have the EWP play by the same rules the heroes, ie one card per turn. This is how the sugested rules for the combat cards "house rules" expansion was worded, and note NA rules monsters given spells were limited to one per turn for that monster other monsters could still cast their one card if they have the ability. If that seems too little you could allow for additional EWP cards based on the number of monster on the board, say one extra card play for every 1 to group's choice number for every monster, preferably only counting those without their own spells or abilities that play like a spell.

[crystlshake]

I've been revisiting this thread on occassion over the years with interest and am thinking about finally implementing something along these lines but...

Aside from what is on the actual cards themselves I wanted to take a step back and work out the scope, function and handling of this new feature

The Function

(1) To make the Evil Wizard's involvement in the game more active than passive. Bearing in mind that the Quest creator and the Evil Wizard player don't have to be the same person, the Evil Wizard player has a limited role aside from being an administrator, particualrly on turns where there are no monsters on the board. This deck will make the role more active, less passive.

(2) There is no time penalty in HQ, no incentive for players/heroes to keep moving and not spend endless turns waiting, hiding, retreating and poking into every noke and cranny. This deck will introduce a gentle push to keep them moving, which they can resist but will just get worse for them.

The Scope

Do we and how do we make/keep a clear distinction between the EWP cards and negative treasure cards?

By which I mean negative treasure cards like Wandering Monster and Traps have their own draw mechanism (search for treasure), their own frequency (how often you search and the number in the deck) and they are played immediately. If we have EWP cards that replicate Wandering Monster then there is a risk to game balance, hero searches and gets WM card, Chaos Warrior, EWP drops 3 WM cards, so 4 Chaos Warriors suddenly in play...this could make or break a Quest...

Equally we have a number of traps built into the Quest Map, plus a few extras in the form of the Treasure Cards, do we really want the EWP deck to add even more...a trap heavy dungeon with maybe 6 traps combined with an unlucky run on the treasure cards adding another 3-4 plus the EWP throwing a few more at you seems excessive!

Are these EWP cards intended to be exclusively bad for the players (even if only a minor annoyance) / good for the WP or could/should they include things that benefit the players, like random events that could be positive, negative or neutral?

The Handling

What triggers a card to be drawn and how is this linked to "time" as in (2) above

How are the cards played?

Are the cards played immediately when drawn or held in reserve for the opportune moment to unleash them (this may be a case of some of one type and some of the other)?

If held in reserve then some form of limit may be required to prevent them all from being saved up and unleashed as a bundle at the optimum time (from the EWPs point of view) but stacking in such a way that they make the difficulty of the quest essentially random!

Can the EWP only play one per turn, one per player turn, on per game turn? (and again this may vary based on the specific card)

I think you hit a lot of the important considerations for making an addition to the base game. I also particularly like how chaoticprime's cards at the first post demonstrate a range of play conditions, effects and flavor.

Function:
I think filling otherwise empty turns and creating some kind of time pressure has value. This was one of the core design elements I used for The Blackcrest Horror (found here https://crystlshake.itch.io/ )to create urgency and dread of a building problem. Time pressure also ties into potential mechanics like light sources and changes to the environment or situation so lends itself to wider range effects (good or bad). Keeping a game moving at a steady pace is important for spells and effects that increase movement to feel more impactful and makes better use of constrained time to play. I recently had to play a quest closer to the book despite more than 4 heroes playing due to an impending departure and for player experience (2 new players) where normally I would make a few on the fly adjustments to the current game state to help keep all players doing something engaging.

Scope:
I think trying to keep the feeling of the events separate in flavor to not impede or ruin quest flavor or content or feel like an extended treasure deck is fairly important. I also think having some kind of balance to things like the treasure deck may be useful. In my mind random events should go hand in hand to some degree with the evil intent of some effects to make the dungeon feel more like an antagonist itself or at least more of an active thing than just responsive. The wandering monster trap in some expansions leans into making the experience more unpredictable. I also see these as chances to add more flavor to the experience, hence my appreciation for the flavor text. This is most important for areas with limited interaction such as hallways, and rooms that are empty of combat and stretches between combat.

Handling:
Having time pressure (empty turns) as the draw trigger works well on several levels. It is a visible representation of building danger (this was the main reason I used skull tokens building up in a pile for my quest). It quickly and cleanly informs the players that time is important and that perfect is the enemy of good enough. This should push them to be a little less cautious and keep gameplay from stagnating too much. Perhaps the trigger should be on completely empty turns (ie no interactions with monsters or traps) to account for quests designed with low monster counts. I am also a fan of having a variety of play conditions as that further makes the events unpredictable compared to treasure searching.

Flavor:
I think the thing that I like the most about a deck like this is that it serves to 'interupt' the expected story. This is particularly useful for replaying a quest and making it feel different on the fly with little extra preparation. Good or ill fortune of the events aside, it breathes a bit more life into the experience. I think there is some good potential to further increase engagement and suspense by crossing over some flavor between cards either with similar or the same signposting and mild deception. For example you here a noise echoing in the distance- could be on cards that do something, cards that don't or cards that roll a die to decide (in the last case, I would consider having die rolling on otherwise effectless cards to give the impression that something of significance happened. Some cards describing the environment or conditions- maybe choose one of 3 descriptions with generic or more focused options- to give some options depending on the specific environment such as underground (most cases) or in a cave, mine or fortress. Example: in general the card is about dampness, it could have options for glistening or dripping stone (natural or shaped) or rot/mildew/moss or shallow puddles. As far as introduction of the mechanic goes I would probably do a short excerpt thing about Zargon becoming aware of the heroes after the GS. This idea could be expanded on by increased awareness introducing more or stronger evil effects. The environmental ones could be introduced at anytime or when region appropriate (like if you wanted to have some more jungle or ice themed ones for those expansions.

Ballance:
I'm a fan of using existing game components or keeping to a simpler implementation where possible. Part of this is due to my playgroup leaning much more to the boardgame vs rpg side of things. I would consider having the hand size and maybe draw amount set by the number of players (I typically have more than 4 heroes) to tie into awareness/noise of a larger group. Further I would consider giving ranks to stronger effects where it checks player count or requires discarding/playing 'good' effect cards to cast. I would keep it simple to not bog things down or become too much it's own thing, but for effects on the players that destroy equipment or create longer more lasting problems beyond a short time like a turn having to use some resource to kind of reduce the danger should be slowed down to be less frequent by some kind of associated cost or stricter condition. One consideration would be to have the hand size influenced by the number of hero character and underlings/familiars, but start out with 0 or 1 card. Having a condition for the number of cards in hand or having a 'full hand' as a condition before they are played could keep them from taking away from the start of a quest and thematicly tie into the awareness the forces of Dread have of the heroes. Design wise this also gives another method for triggering or restricting play of cards. Maybe playing them (or most) at all is restricted until max hand size is met. Alternatively, the evil wizard ones require hand size to be met while more flavorful or environmental things that effect monsters and heroes equally are not restricted. Maybe an either or condition such as hand >2 OR Hero 3+ ?

I think effects that could prevent healing have to be carefully considered for timing and play style. For example something that disables a potion or healing spell could have a lot of friction with players expecting them as 'extra lives' or extended healthbars. While those are easy enough to scale by knocking back their efficiency (such as healing half or 1 BP) other spells or potions may be harder to hamper rather than just negate. Maybe some wording can be done for effecting dice rolls or their results more globally. Stuff that disables core character features such as abilities should be considered carefully as well. I would lean toward temporary suppression vs outright negation. This is particularly important for characters like the monk or wizard who have a lot of dependence on abilities/spells to be functional. In a greater scope using a spell or special ability of a monster to do that (probably a boss of some sort) would be more fine but needs finer control than a random deck and maybe some sign posting if its a longer term effect like an anti magic area.

Implementation:
I'm partial to cards for implementing this vs rolling on tables. Part of that is the visible build up of danger as they accumulate and visible threat, though this could be done with skull tokens or something easily. Presentation is part of it, as many game elements are handled by cards. Rolling on a table can be done with supplemental dice, but the game standard 2d6 offers some limitations. Cards present only the relevant information in a condensed format. Overall table space could go either way depending on your set up and number of events. I also prefer cards as it is in some ways easier to modify the deck than a list to work properly. The list will work great for testing though or as an alternative. The deck modifications I am most interested in are for tailoring the deck to a given location/region or environment. I think setting a size limit to the deck would be useful, as well as a configuration guideline. I think I would start from the base treasure deck ratio of bad to good and tweak from there. That also sets a good baseline for deck size depending on if you have anything cycle back in like the treasure deck does with bad stuff. I think having other cards outside the deck as other options that could be swapped in or out will help keep the effects more varied and unpredictable. Maybe some kind of indicator or symbols for certain types of things for sorting such as environment (ex. jungles or ice), expansion (if they are component or rule related like if you need long pits available), good, neutral or bad to make deck construction easier.

A special consideration could be for if you had a card that enters rotation after a given event like defeating a certain boss or completing a certain quest. This could be useful for things like increased or decreased monster activity of a certain type or similar things triggered by story, like a possible bounty hunter encounter or extending expansion type content into other areas or quests- like the afore mentioned long pits.

Example conditional card- after completing Kellar's Keep, if the wandering monster for a quest is Goblin or Orc, add an additional monster of its type within line of sight (may need some attack or placement restriction)
Probably have that as an effect for the rest of the quest (unless overwritten), for an event type thing like this maybe you could have an option to carry it over to the next quest as a continued effect? Though you would probably want some kind of end condition or trade off to that- maybe it occupies one of the hand slots so you have less options while in play. If there is a mechanism for the players to reduce the hand size it could also maybe be removed that way. Reduction of hand size or removal of cards could also be worked into the 'good' effect cards. Maybe global events outside the dungeon could be represented this way, such as the kings army winning a battle removing modifiers like the example and/or forcing discard of 'evil' EW cards as Zargons attention is drawn elsewhere. It would give the impression that the world outside the dungeon is living and active and can impact play.

For an environmental example- 'You hear distant rumbling' Storms have flooded the area and the rising water table has made movement more difficult. All figures have movement reduced by 1 from the ankle high water. (id maybe add something about increased difficulty detecting pit traps or making them more dangerous too) The flooding could potentialy cycle back in or trigger other cards to have a related effect like rising waters reducing movement more or receeding- maybe worked as a dice roll and markers for tracking the strength effect?