Searching for treasure house rule

[mcapone888]

So my heroes have uncovered a workaround which minimizes their chance of being hurt by a wandering monster when searching for treasure. Basically, there are four heroes in play in my game. After clearing a room they all stay in the same room and put the first hero in the play order in a corner, then the other three heroes occupy all the available spaces around the first hero. The first hero searches for treasure, and if they pull a wandering monster the monster cannot attack because there are no available spaces around the hero who is searching. The monster does nothing, and by the time it is the monster's turn to move the other three heroes have already killed him. They then rotate and do this for all four heroes. This causes the monster never to be able to attack on the hero's turn when a wandering monster card is pulled.

So I have a few problems with this. First, it takes away 'most' of the dangers or searching for treasure. It also slows down the game tremendously. It also makes the heroes overpowered too quickly.

I am thinking of putting in a house rule that says if you want to search for treasure you must have at least one available space adjacent to the hero searching (allowing the monster to always be able to attack the hero searching for treasure).

I mean, in real life it makes sense to do this. It is like having your friends watch your back when you search so nothing creeps up on you, but in the game it just (I feel) ruins game play and balance.

Have you guys experienced this? Do you have any house rules around searching for treasure and wandering monsters?

[Kurgan]

I feel your pain as one who loves playing as the evil Wizard Zargon, but at the same time, like the door blocking strategy, I feel it is one of those situations where I would rather give credit to the heroes for their cleverness than punish them for it by changing the rules. Now adding another rule that generally raises the threat level is something else entirely...

There is still danger in treasure searching, since Hazards have no defense (unless you're using my house rules for the torch!) or the ultra rare "Treasure Without Doom" artifact found only in the Elf Quest Pack. But...

There are plenty of other ways that Zargon can make the heroes' journey a living nightmare (or at least take their cockiness down a notch)... such as the 'Evil Wizard Deck.' Check it out! (scroll down a bit)

[mcapone888]

Thanks Kurgan. I agree with not punishing the heroes for their cleverness. When I was 12 and playing Zargon I always thought that I had to win the game at all costs. As an adult I realize now it is about creating a fun experience for my players. And I really like those Evil Wizard cards. I am going to pick up the correct card stock today to begin printing them out. Actually, some of those other decks are interesting, too. I am going to have to go through all these. Thanks!

[j_dean80]

Somewhere it says place Wandering Monster as close to searcher as possible if cannot place adjacent. To go along with reality: the Monster would attack someone else from the party if cannot get to the searcher.

[Kurgan]

A good point, although the rules don't allow this, that would be an easy solution... the Heroes still would take a hit one way or another. The Knight Hero gets a skill card that let's him distract the wandering monster so it attacks him rather than the searcher, but that's an expansion and of course is applying to the normal circumstance.

A lot depends upon your player group. If they are the type of players who are used to getting their way, and exploiting the rules to make things as easy as possible, will they keep playing when things get tougher? Will they be invested? Because if you were to say, start out a long campaign where you play the later quest packs (not just Against the Ogre Horde and Wizards of Morcar, or the Dark Company but the REALLY hard ones like Elf and Barbarian quest packs) they will need every trick in the book to survive, and there will be no more "easy times" for them.

But if these are the type of players where they will give up if they can't cheat, maybe try to shake things up a bit, without seeming capricious or petty. Let one of them be Zargon for a change, but keep in mind, he will learn from your example.

[Daedalus]

I too like their clever gamesmanship, but I wouldn't allow it for more than you could restrict it to one Hero per room. Like you said, it slows gameplay.

One thing to point out in case it matters, there are diminishing returns as your Heroes rotate their treasure-search strategy because the player turn order (say ) remains fixed. That means just after the last player's ( ) search the Wandering Monster can attack and move before any player can try to attack it.

Another option is to play with an Evil Wizard Deck, like Kugan said. My own houserule to keep it moving is to use the Monster Cards to draw for a Wandering Monster patrol. No special deck needed.

[SirRick]

We always played where the monster attacks someone else if it can't fit in an adjacent space.

The rules technically don't say this, but my group sort of thought it was a common sense assumption, and that the perhaps the writer thought that as well. I still believe the intent was for the monster to attack the next closest person.

Since the instructions don't say the monster attacks someone else, you can't really argue against it.

Consider this though, how many people have actually played a game of heroquest without changing at least one rule, or accidentally doing something wrong? So I say do what you want as long as people agree and think it's fair.

[The Admiral]

Yes, that is a ridiculous situation. In my games, if a WM can't attack the searcher, it will attack the next nearest Hero.