Advancement - how to do it?
Posted: September 3rd, 2022, 5:20 am
The Inn is littered with suggestions for a new “Advancement System” for HeroQuest (many of which are confusingly included in this topic The Inn’s Modular System for House Rules although the posts have the title ‘’Advancement – how to do it?”) but for me, aside from missing spell casting advancement opportunities for the Wizard (and I’ve covered this already in this topic The Wizard Clearing House of House Rules), I am happy with the existing system ‘acquire gold then use it to buy upgrades to your weapons & armour from The Armoury Between Quests’ mechanism, as a concept.
That said the implementation of the advancement mechanism does have a few flaws but rectifying those should be easier than building a whole new mechanism
Problems
1. Not enough ‘steps’ – the Barbarian starts with a Broadsword leaving him only one step up in terms of Weapons upgrades, the Battle Axe in UK/EU system or two steps (Longsword, Battle Axe) in the US system, or 2 and 3 if you include the Crossbow, other Heroes have 3 (Broadsword, Longsword, Battle Axe) or 4 if you include the Crossbow
2. Rate of gold acquisition versus cost of items results in the Heroes maxing out too quickly (made worse by the later introduction of the buyback rule – do NOT introduce this)
3. Giving away free upgrades in the form of weapons & armour in-Quest undermines the advancement mechanism AND takes away player choice (“but no one wants a staff except the Wizard, and he already has one, I would have preferred the gold to choose my own upgrade”) and some of the later Quests give away kit by the cart load – can’t remember which one off the top of my head but I think 2 shortswords and 2 longswords in a single chest – think of the gold value!.
Proposals
*Changed Barbarian Starting Weapon to Shortsword and replaced with Battle Rage ability to give him the combat edge he deserves (this is an improvement also because he retains this attack advantage – but defend disadvantage through his development path, giving him a boosted starting weapon as an advantage disappeared as soon as the other Heroes upgraded) to partially resolve the Barbarian aspect of problem 1
*Added Bow, Axe, Spear to increase the number of steps in the weapon upgrade path to a potential 6 steps (plus the existing 4 for armour gives 10 steps in total) to mitigate problem 1
*Increased the cost of some weapons and armour to partially mitigate problem 2
*Reduce the rate of gold acquisition by restricting treasure searches to once per room (as UK/EU) rather than once per Hero per room (as US) to partially mitigate problem 2
*Removed from Quests the giving out of free advances in the form of equipment in-quest (except Daggers as these are cheap and disposable) and just draw a treasure card or use single-use special treasure like magic arrows, magic throwing daggers/darts, spell scrolls and so on to mitigate problem 3
*Recovery rules for throwing weapons, dagger, and axe to encourage their use and therefore acting as a gold sink to partially mitigate problem 2
*Changed Borin’s Armour to Borin’s Amulet (extra BP for the wearer) to avoid giving away the most expensive upgrade in the game for free early on (this pretty much breaks the advancement mechanism in a single hit) – this one is mitigation for problems 2 and 3
*Give the Heroes another form of advancement through “Blessings” available between Quests at The Temple 500GC for a single-use Fate Point (thanks AHQ), mitigation for problem 2
That said the implementation of the advancement mechanism does have a few flaws but rectifying those should be easier than building a whole new mechanism
Problems
1. Not enough ‘steps’ – the Barbarian starts with a Broadsword leaving him only one step up in terms of Weapons upgrades, the Battle Axe in UK/EU system or two steps (Longsword, Battle Axe) in the US system, or 2 and 3 if you include the Crossbow, other Heroes have 3 (Broadsword, Longsword, Battle Axe) or 4 if you include the Crossbow
2. Rate of gold acquisition versus cost of items results in the Heroes maxing out too quickly (made worse by the later introduction of the buyback rule – do NOT introduce this)
3. Giving away free upgrades in the form of weapons & armour in-Quest undermines the advancement mechanism AND takes away player choice (“but no one wants a staff except the Wizard, and he already has one, I would have preferred the gold to choose my own upgrade”) and some of the later Quests give away kit by the cart load – can’t remember which one off the top of my head but I think 2 shortswords and 2 longswords in a single chest – think of the gold value!.
Proposals
*Changed Barbarian Starting Weapon to Shortsword and replaced with Battle Rage ability to give him the combat edge he deserves (this is an improvement also because he retains this attack advantage – but defend disadvantage through his development path, giving him a boosted starting weapon as an advantage disappeared as soon as the other Heroes upgraded) to partially resolve the Barbarian aspect of problem 1
Battle Rage: As you attack a foe you fall into a berserk rage, sacrificing your own safety to press home frenzied attacks. Whilst in this state your attack dice are increased by one, but your defence dice are reduced by one. This state ends when, at the start of your turn, there are no monsters visible to you.
*Added Bow, Axe, Spear to increase the number of steps in the weapon upgrade path to a potential 6 steps (plus the existing 4 for armour gives 10 steps in total) to mitigate problem 1
Bow
250 Gold Coins
Labels: Weapon, Large, Ranged, Both Hands, 2AD
This long-range weapon gives you the attack strength of 2 combat dice.
Axe
250 Gold Coins
Labels: Weapon, Medium, Throwing, 2AD
The axe allows you to roll two combat dice in attack. You may also throw the axe but if you do so you may lose it.
Spear
250 Gold Coins
Labels: Weapon, Large, Diagonal, 2 AD
The Spear allows you to roll two combat dice in attack. The Spear may be used to attack diagonally.
*Increased the cost of some weapons and armour to partially mitigate problem 2
Staff (50), Dagger(50), Shortsword (150), Axe (250), Spear (250), Bow (250), Broadsword (450), Crossbow (650), Longsword (650), Battle Axe (850), Shield (100), Helmet (200), Chainmail (500), Plate mail (1000)
*Reduce the rate of gold acquisition by restricting treasure searches to once per room (as UK/EU) rather than once per Hero per room (as US) to partially mitigate problem 2
*Removed from Quests the giving out of free advances in the form of equipment in-quest (except Daggers as these are cheap and disposable) and just draw a treasure card or use single-use special treasure like magic arrows, magic throwing daggers/darts, spell scrolls and so on to mitigate problem 3
*Recovery rules for throwing weapons, dagger, and axe to encourage their use and therefore acting as a gold sink to partially mitigate problem 2
A thrown weapon is permanently lost, if the thrown attack misses i.e. no skulls are rolled.
Otherwise, it can be recovered by a Hero picking it up automatically when they move onto the target square or automatically when a room containing the target square is searched.
*Changed Borin’s Armour to Borin’s Amulet (extra BP for the wearer) to avoid giving away the most expensive upgrade in the game for free early on (this pretty much breaks the advancement mechanism in a single hit) – this one is mitigation for problems 2 and 3
Borin’s Amulet
Labels: Amulet, Artefact
This Amulet increases the starting Body Point value of the wearer by one. When it is first put on it adds 1 Body Point to the wearer’s current Body Point total.
*Give the Heroes another form of advancement through “Blessings” available between Quests at The Temple 500GC for a single-use Fate Point (thanks AHQ), mitigation for problem 2
The Temple
Note: The Temple becomes ‘active’ at the end of the Game System with any Hero gaining the champion status getting a free blessing.
Any Hero may donate 500gc in exchange for receiving a Blessing at the end of the first quest book or at any point beyond as part of the “Between Quests”.
A blessing can be used once, and only once, to either allow you a complete dice reroll, you can reroll all your dice used for an action once or to force your foe to do the same to change the effects of something that affects you.