HeroQuest rules questions

[uncle phil]

Given that GW are british I would expect the UK version to be earlier. The american rule book longer and clarifies certain sections and explains them better. In the rulebook under line of site and spells it says a magic user can see everywhere in a room, but in a corridor a line of sight needs to be drawn between caster and target (for spells that need LOS).

The rules on the "Imperial Academy" site are also worth looking at. Furniture such as chests and tables do not affect Line of Sight but tall things such as fireplaces, cupboards and other characters or monsters do, which makes sense. Nice thing about HQ is that it does not need to be tournament rules so such house rules are very much up to you

[Sjeng]

uncle phil wrote

Given that GW are british I would expect the UK version to be earlier. The american rule book longer and clarifies certain sections and explains them better

Yes, that was my first thought as well... Seems strange that the initial translation would leave that detail on those spells out...

And another quest completed, more questions arose lol:

When monsters defend, they need to roll black shields. But what if a spell card says that a monster may roll X combat dice to defend against that spell (such as the sleeping spell and the fireball), and for each shield rolled, it negates 1 damage or cancels the spell. Does that mean ANY shield, or only black shields? It doesn't say anything about defending against spells in the rulebook, as that just says "see spell card for explanation", and the spell card doesn't clarify whether it's only black shields or any shield. I suspect the same rules apply as with regular combat damage, but what do you guys normally do?

[MortiS-the-Lost]

Yes the American version is a lot more clearly written - but I still can't stand the use of 'Zargon' in place of 'Morcar' when I read the rulebook

Sjeng wrote

When monsters defend, they need to roll black shields. But what if a spell card says that a monster may roll X combat dice to defend against that spell (such as the sleeping spell and the fireball), and for each shield rolled, it negates 1 damage or cancels the spell. Does that mean ANY shield, or only black shields? It doesn't say anything about defending against spells in the rulebook, as that just says "see spell card for explanation", and the spell card doesn't clarify whether it's only black shields or any shield. I suspect the same rules apply as with regular combat damage, but what do you guys normally do?

When I've come across this kind of wording I normally assume that the word 'Shield' on it's own refers the white shields, while the 'monster' or 'black shield' will be referred to as such directly

[uncle phil]

I can see that names sometimes need to be changed due to undesirable meanings in other languages, but why the American HQ has to be Zargon and the UK Morcar is a bit of a mystery? Any ideas? We see this in a few other places too -the film "The Assassin" (a US remake of Nikita) is called "Point of No Return" in the US? Lynx deodourant is Axe (insert you own joke here about the smell of pussy and choppers).

The whole "white shield for heroes, black for villians" always seemed a bit unnecssary to me and was obviously intended to make things easy for the heroes. When I was contributing ideas to the Netherhells game I was an advocate of dice that had two skulls, two shields, a pentagram and an "!". Rolling a certain number of ! would be a fumble, letting the attacked model strike back if I recall. Pentagram was a neutral magic symbol, but there would be a character advancement/skill that let a fighter count Pentagrams as Skulls.

[MortiS-the-Lost]

uncle phil wrote

When I was contributing ideas to the Netherhells game I was an advocate of dice that had two skulls, two shields, a pentagram and an "!". Rolling a certain number of ! would be a fumble, letting the attacked model strike back if I recall. Pentagram was a neutral magic symbol, but there would be a character advancement/skill that let a fighter count Pentagrams as Skulls.

The one of initial house rules that brought about the now (in)famous MortiS Quest system my group plays, works on the same principle. We use the HeroQuest Combat Dice all models (Hero or Enemy) all defend on the White Shields (and of course attack on Skulls) the Black Shield we call the Special and it ties into a model's special rules and abilities. Elves for instance have the 'Sure Shot' rule which allows them to re-roll Specials when shooting with a bow, Black Power guns misfire when they roll a Special, the 'Damage Resistance' rule means Skeletons and other undead count Specials as Shields when Defending and so on.