AGAINST THE OGRE HORDE discussion

[Kurgan]

Puppy Power! You may be right of course. It is probably their attempt to refine the previous ally. How much time has passed since then?

I should also point out that the CGI images posted on Avalon Hill's social media may have a scale problem. For example the Ogre "King" appears to take 2.5 (or even more) squares on the arena, but photos of the actual physical tile and plastic miniature show he is no wider than the other light colored ogres... two square "surfboard" base, not 3.

[SirRick]

Maybe they gave the Wolf a Scooby Snack.

I will be very disappointed if this expansion has no new treasure/artifacts/equipment to find. That is part of why KK was not very appealing, you don’t find anything good!

The large tile looks like you might be able to use it for that arena in the PoT, which would be nice.

[HispaZargon]

The large tile looks like you might be able to use it for that arena in the PoT, which would be nice.

Well, actually you can not use it correctly without changing the position of some elements of the quest map because PoT arena is 8x8 square size, however AtOH tile is 8x9 square size.

[Kurgan]

Maybe line the extra wall with furniture pieces? (to cover up one row of 8 squares)

[Kurgan]

Maybe they gave the Wolf a Scooby Snack.

I will be very disappointed if this expansion has no new treasure/artifacts/equipment to find. That is part of why KK was not very appealing, you don’t find anything good!

The large tile looks like you might be able to use it for that arena in the PoT, which would be nice.

Kellar's Keep had several artifacts (AND an alchemist shop) added to the NA edition though. Granted, mostly consumables, but hardly useless (I prefer the ones in ROTWL, personally). I think at this point that's all we can hope for for now, even barring a digital supplement later. Still, it was better than nothing!

ATOH in its original form had few instances of any special treasures... plenty of gold and jewels yes, but only one healing potion. There was the option for each hero to start with 5 healing potions each that restored their body points to full (no death saves in EU rules, so they had to be used before going to zero bp!). Mind points restored automatically between quests even in this "quests as a series" mode (where you couldn't shop or change the Wizard/Elf spell configurations between adventures). They could easily dress this up if they wished with just a couple of lines of text each quest. But will they? Or do you have to "earn" all your potions in the Arena first? Or maybe those things don't transfer from one map to the next?

Now there's an idea... what if the "Big Healing Potions" have to be fought for and earned in the Arena fights? Pure speculation of course. What does the "Shields" tile represent? Are they like a potion of strength, or maybe an equipment card draw? Or again just a temporary (magical?) armor bonus?

[Kurgan]

Avalon Hill says they revealed everything at Cannes from the box contents, but that doesn't mean necessarily that everything has been photographed and put on the internet in readable fashion... though if French fans are really going home from the convention (which ended yesterday) with copies in hand, it shouldn't be long before fan unboxings clear up the remaining mysteries, even ahead of the official retail release. Anyway...

Would someone please correct my card & tile counts? (totals grabbed from the back of the box image, which by now everyone should agree is 100% accurate and final).

29 game cards:
druid hero cards (male/female) 2 [new]
druid spells 3 [repeat from Mythic set?]
Ogres (Champion, Commander aka Chieftain, King/Lord, Mercenary, Warrior) 5 [new, no physical cards for these in original, were part of booklet]
Wolf card 1 [new]
Dread “mentalist” (?) spells (3 types – 4 of each) 12 [these were originally tokens]
other monsters (Orc archer, skeletal archer, goblin whatever) 4 [new]
I'm missing two...
perhaps there are more dread spell cards (which doesn't quite match up to the 15 that were in the original as tokens)
maybe there's actually two goblin cards instead of one (boomerange and bomb not represented by the same card?)
but still leaves one unless I goofed up somewhere

29 cardboard tiles:
I come up with 23 tiles...
1 outdoor area / pit of dread (2 sided)
1 arena (2 sided) [new]
1 eye mosaic room (2 sided)*
1 carpet room (2 sided) * [eye/carpet were reverse of each other in original]
1 bloody weapons room (2 sided)– this is the bridge with pit tile on reverse
2 potion tiles (2 sided) [new]
2 shield tiles (2 sided) [new]
2 swinging blade traps (2 sided?) [new]
4 pit of darkness tiles (2 sided?)
2 secret door tiles (2 sided?)
6 fallen block trap tiles (2 sided?) ** in the original all these were just black on the reverse side
what might the other six be?
I could imagine 2 more potions and 2 more shields hidden behind something... and/or maybe 2 more secret doors to match the count of the original?


We're thinking that doesn't really leave room for any (unless it's just one or two) Treasure, Equipment, or Artifact Cards. Of course that doesn't mean those things don't exist, as theoretically they could go old school on us and describe items in the quest book with no image (like the Elven Chainmail) or with a card image but no separate physical card (see Mythic tier quest books). They could even "correct" such an oversight with a free online PDF (aka "Into the Northlands"). Of course that's all speculation, they might not do any of this. The original EU packs were a little "sparse" compared to their NA equivalents... see how KK and ROTWL each had a 4 potion (same selection for both packs) Alchemist Shop page... that was before they had cards for each individual potion type (which of course doesn't limit supply under the new rules either) and 10 mini-artifact cards at the end (granted, you were expected to photocopy or cut them out of the back cover of the quest book in the 1991 edition... remake made them stand alone cards to supplement the booklet pictures that were only for reference). The 1990 original of ATOH had no NA equivalent... and the only things you ever find are gold or jewels (with gold values) and one lonely 1d6 healing potion... other than the 5 "big" healing potions per hero you could start the expansion with if you were playing them in order as a campaign (we don't know if those are being retained, or maybe if you have to earn them in those added tournament arena sections?). All that gold and you don't get to visit shops, but maybe you can hire Mercs?

Well, speculation will be endless until we see the inside of that booklet! Even just the first 11 pages and the last 2 would be fine... though I am very curious how the actual "tournament" rules work for, what we presume are the first three (or maybe they are interspersed in the rest of the campaign, or maybe they are optional side adventures? I guess they could be part of the final battle as well!).

Below are images of the classic elements (EU, 1990) for reference (grabbed from Ebay):

[LucaRocks]

The first is Friday and no major US retailer has preorders up right? So either it will get released earlier in Europe or maybe they will just release it without a preorder window. That's super rare but it happens once in awhile. Or maybe the blurb was wrong and preorders will go up on March 1?

[Kurgan]

Even if the Pre-Orders are what's going on March 1st, that still doesn't mean some won't get it early (as the social media post by AH basically admitted).

A complete lack of a US "pre-order" is fine by me. But then again as mentioned, non-US and also smaller time online stores have had "Pre-orders" up for a long time in some cases. At the very least it implies there won't be a Hasbro Pulse (or worse, Premium Member) priority window on getting this earlier, which would be another "negative rumor" busted. I approve!

I can't wait to see the first Fan (non-influencer) unboxing with spoilers... will it be you reading this? If not, I hope you still share it here and everywhere...

[LucaRocks]

What about that one shop that canceled someone's ATOH preorder because they were told it would be exclusive to certain retailers? That could still hold true I think

[Kurgan]

Yeah it was GeekGoneGiddy's pre-order of ATOH from Miniature Market.

They were saying it was NOT coming to retail. So that's already proven false (if they told MM this, and it wasn't a misunderstanding, then Hasbro has reversed themselves, which is ultimately a good thing!):

So what I draw from this is:
Not cancelled.
Retail release (which implies not limited release).
Not Pulse exclusive (not even temporarily).
Coming to multiple online retail stores (no mention of exclusive or waiting period).
On or around March 1st (meaning it could come out early, as all releases have with possible exception of ROTDM).

The next week will show whether Hasbro keeps their promise.