HEROQUEST - COMPANION APP discussion

[manamail]

Thank you very much, HispaZargon.

[Parzival]

User Manamail from Telegram Spanish Fans Community of HeroQuest has passed me the following collection of important bugs he has detected in the Official App of HeroQuest.[SNIP]

3.- In Prophecy of Telor expansion, Quest 6, "The Ruins of Gilgarreth's Temple", is a bit unplayable. Heroes cannot move beyond the starting space. The mission cannot be played directly in any way since it crashes when the first hero steps on the first square and the app freezes.

I had no problems with this one, but the in Quest 10, “Zargon’s Flame”, if the monsters aren’t consumed by the flame (you didn’t roll Zargon’s number), the monsters cease to attack and just become blocks to movement. So you have to keep hitting them until you get lucky. But otherwise, they do nothing, which is boring (and frustrating). The player solution is to lie to the app about the die roll result.

8.- In Quest 9 of Kellar's Keep, when the shapeshifter stops changing, his figure does not retreat and remains paralyzed in the app. If he is facing the door to the room when this happens, the Heroes can become permanently trapped inside.

I killed the first shape before it moved. Kinda disappointed when it froze. But it never got to the door.

9.- In Quests 7 and 9 of Return of the Witch Lord, Skulmar and Kessandria can pass through the Heroes when they are fleeing, so you cannot try to block their path.

I hadn’t noticed this. Is it a bug or a feature?

11.- Feature "Undo" should be added for Mercenary deaths: A much-needed fix was added a few versions ago: if a Hero entered solid rock (using Rock Passage, Elven Cloak of Passage, or Cloak of Shadows), but the player accidentally lifted their finger from the touchscreen (removing the cursor too early), even though they didn't intend to end their move there and had one move left to get to safety, normally that player would die and be eliminated from the board, and the Quest would be forced to restart. However, "Undo" (or "back" or "cancel") was added so that, in these cases, a simple mistake would be fixed and the Quest could continue if, in fact, the Hero didn't intend to kill himself that way. Unfortunately, Mercenaries don't have this ability. A hero could cast Rock Passage on a Mercenary to send him through a wall, and if the player moved their finger from the screen, the Mercenary would die and be lost forever. I think an "Undo" function would be necessary for all types of mercenaries and allies.

[/list]

Undo is a great add— I hadn’t noticed it. Definitely helpful when you accidentally slide over a trap you knew about and intended to avoid or disarm. One can just ignore the trap’s results, unless it’s a cave-in trap. But an undo function is definitely needed for anything controlled by the user— it’s too easy to slip and tap the wrong square by accident.

[manamail]

Any news about the App being updated to include the new Crypt of Eternal Darkness quests?

[HispaZargon]

Any news about the App being updated to include the new Crypt of Eternal Darkness quests?

Some world regions have already have the chace to update it to version 6.0 including CoPD quests, however there are still many regions outside US than cannot update it yet and still have version 5.1.

[manamail]

and any patch notes to know the changes?

[Niro90]

Great discussions and ideas in this thread about the Hero Quest Companion App. Does the app developer read this thread directly, or what is the best way to inform them about bugs and ideas?

I wanted to test the app extensively over the next few weeks and write a report if I find any bugs.
It would be great if the app were compatible with common custom rules. Don't get me wrong, of course the developer should not implement custom rules, but I think most custom rules are outside the scope of the app possible.

For my first steps with the app, the compatibility approach seems to be good.
As example: You control the heroes' attacks outside the app. This allows you to influence what can be attacked and with how many dice. That's great.
With this approach also equipment and count of dices of equipment can be influenced by custom rules without any problems. Also, great.
It's also useful that the app doesn't prevent you from performing multiple actions. This means you can search for traps and secret doors in one turn, when this is one action according to custom rules.
The number of fields a hero can move is also regulated outside the app, which also allows for custom rules regarding the heroes' range. Great!

So, for first try the app concept seems to be good.
But I found some first issues and have some questions.

For hero spells like “Tempest,” the app evaluates the line of sight to the monster. Here I want to check if it's implemented "correctly". Has anyone already done this test, and is it as described in the rule book?
Perhaps it would be good to have an option where, at least for heroes, the player decides which heroes and monsters can be affected by hero spells, without having the app to check it. That way, at least for hero actions, you would never have any issues with custom rules for line of sight and what is blocking (specific) spells.

What do you think about searching for treasure or secret doors in corridors? I think everything is pretty clear in the rules for rooms. But for corridors, especially when you're standing at corners/junctions of several corridors, and especially when you're standing at corners/junctions of the inner floors of the map, understanding of the rules will vary. Do you think the app has implemented this well, which corridors are affected when you're standing at a corner/junction?

I think it would be good to have an option where the app does not influence whether a hero can perform an action. For example, the app seems to use the rule “only possible to search for treasures when no monsters are visible.” There could also be differences in understanding the rules, so it would be best to leave the decision about which actions can be performed optional, preferably outside the app by the players.

I would also prefer it if there were an option to increase or decrease the number of monsters at map start. For example, when playing with fewer heroes, or with more heroes, or by influencing the number of monsters based on the heroes' level. (Needed when you have a frequently changing group of players)
We had some custom rules for this. Here, too, it would be great if no direct custom rules were implemented, but simply an option to increase/decrease the number of monsters by a percentage.

I did a very brief test for monster wizards (bosses). In my opinion, it seems completely random which spell was cast on which hero. I would be interested to hear your opinion on the effectiveness of wizard monsters in the app. In our games in the past, wizard monsters (bosses) were the most exciting encounters, where the most heroes died or at least things got very complicated for heroes. But only because the monster caster used its spells very clever. For example, casting a spell on a room that also hits monsters, only use it, when there are few monsters left in the room and many heroes are inside the room.
Does casting spells happen completely randomly, or is it implemented with somewhat smarter decisions?

Edit: I did a quick test to see if monsters do “hit and run” to make free space for another monster. For example, if a monster starts beside a hero and makes space for another monster after doing the hit. That doesn't seem to work, which is a shame. It would be a real pity if even simple basic rules for halfway clever battles weren't implemented in monster behavior.
Edit: Also order of monster turns are fixed. That also lead to bad decisions. Would be great to see improvement in somewhat-clever usage of monsters. Could be improved with some simple checks and algorithms.

It would be great to hear your opinion and experiences.

[manamail]

First, I apologize for my English because I don't speak English. I'm Spanish.

Regarding the bugs I sent to Hispazargon and this one reported to Hasbro, they've fixed them all, which is great. I've been reviewing all the bugs one by one, and they're all fixed in 6.0.

"For hero spells like “Tempest,” the app evaluates the line of sight to the monster. Here I want to check if it's implemented "correctly". Has anyone already done this test, and is it as described in the rule book?"

Yes, line of sight when casting spells is pretty well implemented. You don't have to worry about that.

" which corridors are affected when you're standing at a corner/junction?"

If you stand at an intersection, I'm pretty sure he'll be looking for secret doors and traps in the two visible corridors.

“only possible to search for treasures when no monsters are visible.”

The app follows the rules. I think it's well implemented.

Does casting spells happen completely randomly, or is it implemented with somewhat smarter decisions?

This is difficult to evaluate. In my experience, wizards cast useful spells, but not the most optimal ones. This is something that should be checked in the app. Sometimes, spellcasters cast spells at random.

" I did a quick test to see if monsters do “hit and run” to make free space for another monster"

Regarding this, I'm writing another post below with the corrections I've sent to Hispazargon, to see if they can send them to Hasbro to include in the next version of the app to improve the monsters' AI in terms of movement and attack.

[manamail]

When you activate advanced goblins, they move, attack, and then move again. So if there are several advanced goblins and other monsters in a room, the logical thing would be for the goblins to attack, leave, and leave the gap for the rest of the monsters to attack. But what the app usually does, if, for example, you're at the door and there's only one gap, is attack any monster (never goblins). Since they have no gap to move, they move randomly and stupidly around the room, unable to do anything.

The problem would be solved if the monsters were activated in the following order (and that's how it should be programmed in the app): The goblins (if they're advanced) should move first, attack the weakest and move to leave a gap. Then the monsters that can do the most damage should move and attack the weakest. Finally, the rest of the monsters with the ability to attack should move, occupying the remaining gaps. If the attack order were scheduled like this, the monsters would work much more intelligently. Furthermore, advanced skeletons should always attack diagonally to leave horizontal or vertical squares free for normal monsters to attack.

- If monsters are chasing characters, either because the quest says so or because characters are moving away from them, they should move toward the characters using the shortest path to reach them.

- If characters are moving toward monsters or standing still, monsters should only move if they can attack. Let me explain. You turn a corner and at the end of the hallway is an orc 9 squares away. In the app, the orc advances toward you, staying 1 square away, and then on your turn, you approach and kill it. Logically, the orc, seeing that it's not coming and is going to stay halfway, would not move and wait for you to get close enough for it to reach you. If your next move is toward the orc, it will move toward you only when it reaches you in combat. If your next move is to move away from the orc, it will enter "chase" mode and go toward the characters.

- If you open the door to a room and stand in the doorway waiting for them to arrive one by one, the monsters shouldn't move until a hero enters the first tile in the room. Therefore (the exception would be rooms with only one monster), if the hero doesn't step on the first tile, the monsters should reposition themselves in the most optimal way possible (usually moving as far away from the door as possible if the hero doesn't enter). The moment a hero remains (just stepping on the tile and leaving again isn't enough) on a tile in that room, the monsters should move to attack that hero or those within their attack range. This way, you'll avoid having to open a door and stand outside waiting for them to come one by one to kill them.

- If heroes open a room with monsters and then retrace their steps to enter an empty room and wait for the monsters, making them go through the door one by one, the monsters should stay in the room they were in (away from the door) and should only move when a hero is in that room as I said above. This would avoid the annoying tactic of opening a room and then going back to attack them 1 on 1. They should have some intelligence as if they were handled by a human Zargon.

I'd love to hear your thoughts and potential improvements to the monster AI. Let's see if we can all report this to Hasbro and make the app a fantastic experience.

Thanks and best regards.

[Kurgan]

Michael on Avalon Hill discord said the fastest way to pass along bug reports and feature requests is to @ him on that discord. I had him pass along some requests while at GenCon:

Put itemized list of changes in each patch version (like a changelog)
Allow to edit the profiles of Mercenaries to change their names (like the heroes)
Allow Mercenaries to "use special" (mainly for the ROTDM elven mercs, but could be all and just use the honor system)

I forgot to mention an "undo" feature for Mercs (for when they pass through rock and you pull your finger back too soon and they die instantly)

[manamail]

Michael on Avalon Hill discord said the fastest way to pass along bug reports and feature requests is to @ him on that discord. I had him pass along some requests while at GenCon:

Put itemized list of changes in each patch version (like a changelog)
Allow to edit the profiles of Mercenaries to change their names (like the heroes)
Allow Mercenaries to "use special" (mainly for the ROTDM elven mercs, but could be all and just use the honor system)

I forgot to mention an "undo" feature for Mercs (for when they pass through rock and you pull your finger back too soon and they die instantly)

Hello. Could you please send them the changes I suggested to the monster AI to see if they can improve it? I don't have Discord, and my English is very poor. I'm actually writing this using Google Translate. Thank you very much.

I'm adding some improvements to the AI for evil spellcasters to see if they can be reported as well:

The evil spellcasters, often cast spells that aren't appropriate at the time. I think evil spellcasters need the following improvements:

- If they have the spells "Summon Undead" or "Summon Orcs," they should be the first spell cast on their first turn.

- "Command" should be cast on the hero with the fewest minds points.

- "Fear" should be cast on the hero with the most attack dice.

- Sometimes the first spell an evil spellcasters casts is "Firestorm," which almost certainly kills all the monsters in the room. This spell should be cast as a last resort when there are few monsters left or the mage feels truly threatened, since if it's cast early (as the APP's AI often does), the spellcasters himself will kill all his minions.

- Often, when casting "Rust," the evil sorcerer casts it on the wizard (if you have the option to have monsters attack weakly), which makes no sense. This spell should always be cast on the hero with the most attack dice or defense dice.