Plate Armour

[Gold Bearer]

And on a related note. Welcome back goldbearer.

I missed that, cheers.

I forgot my coolest armour when I posted that list.
Dragon Scale Armour: 1200GP D4 M6(or roll three dice and ignore the highest) Half damage rounding down against fire, ice and lightning.

I could accept 2D4 movement or
2D6-2 minimum of 1 point of movement or
2D6 Max of 9

Or roll three dice and ignore the highest, or roll rwo dice and ignore the lowest. I'm not sure about adding different dice just for one thing.

Another thing that would make sense is to rule that a hero can't use ranged weapons if they're wearing plate. It would just be the crossbow in the standard armoury but it would make more sense with a bow.

I still don't think this is a problem at all if you actually look at the four standard heroes. A wizard who can't use it, an elf who should be slowed a lot by it, a barbarian who shouldn't like wearing it an a dwarf who should be slow anyway. It would suit a warrior or knight class hero much more and they can have a rule that makes them move faster with it.

[cynthialee]

I have a large pile of dice that includes a number of D 4's
adding in a unique dice roll for a certain situation isn't a problem for me.

[Lemmeron]

My version of Plate armour and my solution to the 1 dice movement issue
Keep in Mind my Characters have the following Body Points...
Barbarian 10
Dwarf 8
Elf 6
and Only Warriors (Barbarian and Dwarf) can use plate armour.

Thus, a Barbarian in plate rolls 2 movement dice and counts any roll over 8 as 8 (max body points: 10 - 2 = 8)
Dwarf counts any roll over 6 as 6 (max body points: 8 - 2 = 6)
And the Boots reduce this penalty by upto 3...
so Barbarian counts rolls of 12 as 11 when wearing Customised Greaves (max body points: 10 - 2 = 8 + 3 = 11)
and dwarf counts rolls above 9 as 9 when wearing Customised Greaves (max body points: 8 - 2 = 6 + 3 = 9)

Armour


Boots

[alyndavies]

Going back to when the game first came out, my friends and I used to have the rule that you could take the armor off at the end of your go so could roll 2 dice to move. Though eventually we realised your still carrying the armor so that doesn't make sense.

Playing the game with my partner and kids these days, I bought several extra artifact (quest treasure) cards so now each of them is able to get a Borins armor, provided they search the room with the quest treasure in. Combined with a helmet and shield they defend with 6, so Plate armor isn't really required. They then use the Spirit Blade and crossbow as weapons.
If I manage to kill any of them after the quest to get the items, they are able to buy a new artifact card in the same way as equipment cards. I have to be careful because I'm playing the game with teenage girls, so I have to maintain their enjoyment and not be too unfair. It's actually not too bad, though have have been walloped a few times if they draw a wandering monster. A wandering monster once killed Sir Ragnar and that didn't go down too well.

[Daedalus]

...As I recall, the original question was whether or not Plate Mail deserves its movement penalty, and if not, what other debuffs should be applied to it instead. Instead of answering this question myself, I will instead answer something Daedalus said three pages ago:

A simple modification is to still allow a Hero wearing Plate Mail to roll 2 red dice for movement, but one must be discarded (the lower one, or just one if they are equal)....

It's only slightly better - I still can't see myself wearing that to be honest.

Now a house rule can't be expected to please everybody, but here's another go at it that is hopefully more tempting:

Plate mail is so heavy that you must roll two red dice for movement twice and use the lower result while wearing it.

You're twice as likely to roll a lower than average result, and half as likely to roll a higher result...right? Overall, it yields a higher average movement than the better of two dice, I think.

The average roll for "roll one red die twice and take the better of the two results" is about 4.5.
The average roll for "roll two red dice twice and take the worse of the two results" is about 5.6.
Thus, Daedalus's suggestion offers a slightly higher movement rate.

Thanks again for precisely confirming what I only generally describe. Your Inn name is Count Mohawk, but perhaps your title should be the Marquis of Math. What would roll 2 dice, and then reroll the higher die yield? Maybe that would be easier than comparing two seperate rolls.

Seriously? A dwarf who can disarm traps just by looking at them.

Wait, this is a thing that can happen? I was always under the impression that in order to disarm a trap, the dwarf (or a Toolkit user) had to move onto the trapped square and announce his intention to disarm it.

Gold Bearer is right when taking the first edition British/EU rules into account. Those rules say a Dwarf or Hero with a Tool Kit can disarm and remove a trap after it has been found. The Dwarf's special ability detailed on his Hero Card says the Dwarf may remove any visible trap in the same room or corridor.

The second edition British/EU rules basically support what Count Mohawk is familiar with. Those rules state that the Dwarf or a Hero with a Tool Kit may remove any (found) trap tile that he is adjacent to, and the Dwarf may may do so automatically (one trap per turn.) Both editions consider any spear trap rendered harmless when found by any Hero.

[Daedalus]

A thought strikes. We've been debating the in-game merits of Plate Mail on its own, rather than side-by-each with its partner in crime Chain Mail. As printed, the differences between the two are: Plate Mail costs 350 extra gold, grants an extra Defend die and reduces its wearer's Move by half. If Heroes could wear Plate with no penalty, every Hero would eventually be sporting a suit once they accumulated enough gold. As far as I can tell, penalty-free plate has four main effects on the game:

• The Heroes Defend better, with 6 dice normally or 5 dice with a Battle Axe.
• Rust has a much costlier effect, as Plate is much more expensive to replace than Chain.
• Borin's Armor becomes merely 'normal' Plate that is also immune to Rust (although the trap in The Cold Halls specifically destroys Borin's armor, but not normal Plate).
• Rather than offer end-game Heroes a choice between defense and speed, they can have both.

Focusing on the merits of chain mail as compared to plate mail and other armor may also be worthwhile.

• helmet*- affected by NA Chaos spell Rust
• shield*- may not be used with a staff or battle axe
• chain mail*- high cost (500 gc)
• plate mail*- very high cost (850 gc), only one movement die
  *WoM spell Rust may affect any equipment

The helmet answers the need for a quick power up in lower-powerd Quests. The shield repeats, but with a negative. Chain mail delivers a bump at the suitable power level, then plate mail repeats, but with added cost and a negative. To smooth out the perceived (sharp?) divide between chain mail and plate mail, it has already been suggested to lessen or strike out the plate mail move-penalty. Another way to go would be to add a penalty to chain mail. With that, either lessen or retain the original plate mail penalty.

My thought is chain mail requires the Hero to reroll the higher of the two movement dice, while plate mail requires the higher of the two movement dice to be discarded. I'm guessing the chain and plate clad Heroes will remain about 1.5 moves within each other, while those without this armor will move about 1.5 moves faster than the chain-clad Heroes. Monsters will get a bit of initiative advantage in rooms, but Morcar/Zargon is usually at a disadvantage anyway.

The main detraction as I see it is the resistance to saddle chain mail with a penalty. For my part as a D&D player, I remember being a bit surprised that chain mail didn't affect movement back when the game [(Hero Quest) -edit] was released.

[Daedalus]

I always felt the movement penalty was too high and found no one ever buys it because of that (as opposed to the cost). I don't disagree with a moment penalty which reflects that the wearer is encumbered (carrying weight, movements are more taxing and movement range is slightly more restrictive), but I'd probably apply a cap of 8 or 9 squares as 12 and 11 don't statistically roll that often so won't be missed so while you can't roll the large numbers, you can still get the average rolls of 5 - 7 squares.

There's an idea I haven't seen before! If you cap a normal set of 2 dice to 8 (or, more generally, you can only roll a maximum of 4 per red die), you end up with an average movement roll of 6, while also avoiding a pluponderance of very low rolls as would happen in the straight subtraction method. I think I'll be changing my armory to reflect this way of thinking.

...In theory this would be an excellent opportunity to bust out some d4s. However, most d4s are shaped like caltrops and have roughly the same amount of aesthetic appeal. If only someone would invent a d4 that actually rolls!

I have toyed with ideas of dice caps for armor restrictions in my personal notes. If you have some old d6s, you could mark out 2 pips on the six side and 1 pip on the five side. They will always end up rolling a four or less. The other solution is to reroll 5s and 6s.

[Daedalus]

• Swap the Broadsword for a Spear - Pro: diagonal attack, Con: rolls one less attack die
• Swap the Broadsword for a Battleaxe - Pro: rolls one additional attack die, Con: cannot also equip the shield and so rolls one less defence die
• Swap the Broadsword for a Crossbow - Pro: may attack any figure they can see*, Con: may not attack an opponent they are adjacent to
• Swap the Chainmail for Plate armour - Pro: rolls one additional defence die, Con: may only roll one die for movement

The spear, staff and 2nd ed. shortsword are all interchangeable as the diagonal option.
The NA system obviously blows this out of the water by adding the Longsword.
*Is this assumed from our knowledge of what a crossbow is? I can't see any reference to it on the EU cards or in the rulebook. NA armory definitely fixed this.

You need to go to p.15 (2nd ed.) to find the relevant rule under Missile Fire:

...
Your opponent must be visible, as with casting a spell. There is no maximum range
for firing the crossbow or throwing a weapon. However, you may not use the
crossbow or throw a weapon if you are adjacent to your opponent.

Page 15 of the 1st ed. carries similar text under Missile Fire.

[Daedalus]

As for on topic:

I have conceded that I can accept a penalty to a dice roll for movement but a complete dice penalty is too severe.

Talking it out with one of my gamers after explaining the movement penalty for the benefit of an extra dice they wouldn't buy the armor. I wouldn't either. No one wants the suit with such a high penalty. Roll a string of 1, 2 and 3 for movement and the armor is almost useless.

I could accept 2D4 movement or
2D6-2 minimum of 1 point of movement or
2D6 Max of 9

But as it stands, I just do not see a person wanting plate, unless the entire party was in plate. Otherwise you are going to often fail to catch up to the battles thus defeating the reason for the armor in the first place. Unless you have players waiting for you to catch up, but in a board game scenario I don't see it happening often. {If I can defeat the monsters and get a free action to loot before you show up any special treasures are mine...}

How about this? Keep the 1-movement-die restriction only when combined with an action. That way combat could be affected with a slower initiative, but just moving could be set at 2 movement dice. That would save game time and keep the tank close to the action (or far from pursuers!)

[Count Mohawk]

What would roll 2 dice, and then reroll the higher die yield? Maybe that would be easier than comparing two separate rolls.

"Roll two dice, then reroll the higher of the two" has an average sum of 6.02, which is slightly higher than the 5.54 produced by "roll three dice and sum the lowest two". The easiest way to affect this roll would be to roll three dice at once, one of which is a different color than the rest, and remember to only disregard one of the color-matched dice, never the odd one out.

On the subject of rolling "slow dice" with nonstandard faces, has anyone ever given thought to using the Sicherman dice? For those not familiar with the concept, one of the Sicherman dice shows 1-2-2-3-3-4, while the other shows 1-3-4-5-6-8. The two dice in the Sicherman pair are unique among oddball six-siders in that, but for the possibility of doubles, the sum of rolling them perfectly matches the sum of rolling a pair of normal six-siders. If you have two or three pairs of Sichermans, you can use the 1-2-2-3-3-4 as a "slow die" and the 1-3-4-5-6-8 as a "fast die". If you don't, you can easily deface a pair of normal d6es by switching the "2" face to an "8" on one, and rubbing out three dots on both the "5" and the "6" to make them a "2" and a "3" on the other.

How about this? Keep the 1-movement-die restriction only when combined with an action. That way combat could be affected with a slower initiative, but just moving could be set at 2 movement dice. That would save game time and keep the tank close to the action (or far from pursuers!)

This is the most creative idea yet! No mental math or rerolling required, just a simple decision: do I roll one die or two this turn? I would probably word this ability as something like:

"While wearing this armor, you roll one fewer red dice to move each turn if you take any other actions during your turn.

Thanks again for precisely confirming what I only generally describe. Your Inn name is Count Mohawk, but perhaps your title should be the Marquis of Math.

Yesss! A title at last!!