On 12/13/2011 at 6:32 AM, Gyug said:

Which raises a rules question - can a player move less that the number rolled if they want?

Yeah, obviously ambiguous from the rules-- the Barbarian "must" move 1 square after defeating a monster, but the knight seemingly can move "up to 2", which, strictly speaking, would include moving 0 squares. And of course you've got the rule about moving "forward" when landing on another hero, despite the fact that "forward" might put you through a locked door OR might force you "backwards".

Similarly, suppose the following scenario:

  1     2     3     4     5
+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+
|     |Lockd|     |     |     |
|Druid|Door | Bat |     |     |
|     |     |     |     |     |
+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+

If the Druid rolls a Shield, he has the opportunity to move through the locked door, rather than moving "up to 4" in another direction. But he can't land on square #3, because there's a monster there. So... does he land on square #4 instead (I would think so)? But then he must immediately fight the monster-- so, supposing he loses the ensuing combat, does he "retreat" to square #5, or is he forced backwards through the locked door?

Or, say, the following situation:

  1     2     3     4     5
+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+
|     |Lockd|     |Lockd|     |
|Druid|Door |Thief|Door |     |
|w/key|     |     |     |     |
+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+

If the Druid rolls a 1, he can use his key and go through the first locked door. But he can't land on the Thief-- so... does he automatically go through the second locked door and land on square #5? What if he *didn't* have a key, but instead had rolled a Shield?

My own take is that the rules are intentionally vague so that kids can read them quickly and start playing right away without having to worry about funky exceptions like this. Also, given the intended flexibility of the rules, my guess is that there ISN'T an official take on what the rules are in any of those situations.

Personally, we played it such that you could move any number (including 0) up to whatever you rolled. And although that allows you to "camp" outside of a door, thus blocking other players from doing the same, I would probably rule that any player adjacent to a second player that's adjacent to a door has the same opportunity to roll a Shield and pass through the door.

Not sure if rules like that make a big difference in terms of how the AI's would work in a best-case scenario. But they certainly might. I had been more-or-less assuming that the best strategy was simply to charge ahead as quickly as possible, but it's possible that depending on your character class, health level, and other factors, that perhaps it's best to hang back and try to encourage your opponents to do the dirty work of fighting monsters and unlocking doors.

DaveE

  On 12/13/2011 at 3:35 PM, davee123 said:

If the Druid rolls a Shield, he has the opportunity to move through the locked door, rather than moving "up to 4" in another direction.

DaveE

I thought I'd looked for the rules on this but can't find where a heroica roll would allow a hero to pass through a door without a key?

Unless he is a monster in Battle Heroica, where he is unable to pick up items anyway.

A sensible change to the rules seems to be that if you land on another hero, they move back a space. Like in ludo or other dice board games. This also brings about a slightly more strategic movement of heroes.

Another issue Ive discovered is that when a hero is defeated and is knocked back one square if that square is occupied by another hero....wierdness ensues. In some cases the entire party is lined up and the defeated hero is "crowd surfed" to the back of the line.

Usually I don't like ambiguous rules, but Lego games encourage you to make your own rules, so I'm OK with it. But that's why this folder is here.

  On 1/11/2012 at 5:16 PM, Jareth said:

Another issue Ive discovered is that when a hero is defeated and is knocked back one square if that square is occupied by another hero....wierdness ensues. In some cases the entire party is lined up and the defeated hero is "crowd surfed" to the back of the line.

Usually I don't like ambiguous rules, but Lego games encourage you to make your own rules, so I'm OK with it. But that's why this folder is here.

We always just remove a knocked out hero and put it next to plate he was defeated. And if anyone is standing there when he recovers- they both stands there (just put it on his head :P)

Some ideas for items:

Map (in Castle set)- Move up to 2 titles and throw a dice (for move) again. Activates as normal weapon- when you roll "Heroica". When you engeded a battle- you loose the rest of your move of course.

Dagger of swiftness(From ninjago game)- Move 1 and kill monster up to 2 titles. Also activates as normal weapon- when you roll "Heroica".

Edited January 11, 201213 yr by Lordofdragonss

  On 1/11/2012 at 4:13 PM, andhe said:

I thought I'd looked for the rules on this but can't find where a heroica roll would allow a hero to pass through a door without a key?

It says:

  Quote

If you are in a space adjacent to a Locked Door and roll "Shield" at the start of your turn, you may pass through the Door to the first available space on the other side, instead of moving. The Door remains locked.

If that rule applied only to people who had keys, it could make it impossible for other players to win who didn't have keys.

DaveE

  On 1/12/2012 at 2:23 AM, davee123 said:

It says:

If that rule applied only to people who had keys, it could make it impossible for other players to win who didn't have keys.

DaveE

Ah, just realised I was reading the rules for Nathuz, so obviously wouldn't mention doors... as it doesn't have any :P. That sounds like a good rule (and one we failed to observe, but thought about 'adding in'). It does beg the question though, that you've got to hope there's a key on the other side! (I guess this only applies to the dungeon room, being a dead-end).

Has anyone put any ideas down about the monsters being 'passable' once defeated (not destroyed, Ie not a heroica roll), rather than being blockades that require removing from the board before continuing? The current issue I see is that if you were to 'defeat' a monster and jump over it, you would then be on an adjacent square and required to battle the same monster, just from the other angle.

edit: spelling mistake.

Edited January 16, 201213 yr by andhe

  On 1/12/2012 at 10:12 AM, andhe said:

It does beg the question though, that you've got to hope there's a key on the other side! (I guess this only applies to the dungeon room, being a dead-end).

The setups that they show always seem to have 2 or more keys available to the players from the starting square, without going through any locked doors-- although there's nothing from stopping (say) 2 players from taking the 2 available keys, and then progressing through the doors when rolling a "Shield", leaving any remaining players out in the cold!

  On 1/12/2012 at 10:12 AM, andhe said:

Has anyone put any ideas down about the monsters being 'passable' once defeated (not detroyed, Ie not a heroica roll), rather than being blockades that require removing from the board before continuing? The current issue I see is that if you were to 'defeat' a monster and jump over it, you would then be on an adjacent square and required to battle the same monster, just from the other angle.

I believe any time you defeat a monster, they're removed from the board and placed on your Hero Pack, regardless of how you defeat them. So, you can't battle the same monster twice, unless they defeated you the first time.... OR if someone resurrects a monster using the Scepter of Summoning, I guess.

DaveE

  On 1/12/2012 at 6:40 PM, davee123 said:

I believe any time you defeat a monster, they're removed from the board and placed on your Hero Pack, regardless of how you defeat them. So, you can't battle the same monster twice, unless they defeated you the first time.... OR if someone resurrects a monster using the Scepter of Summoning, I guess.

DaveE

Yeah I was meaning in custom rules? I read earlier on in the thread about the monsters taking 'hits' to the value of their.strength, but guess this still involves a hero standing in front of them and keeps on rolling until either the monster is defeated (by losing its 'lives') or until the hero loses a life.

I was trying to devise a rule where monsters take 'hits' but a hero is allowed to pass once the monster is 'stunned' from a hit. Otherwise the hero at the front tends to do all the fighting for not much reward (similar to opening doors and letting everyone else just walk through!). I was imagining that a hero could receive one gold everytime they hit a monster, as the gold placement was pretty thin, and with 4 players I think we ended the game with just one gold each!

This still leaves the problem of a hero 'stunning' a monster and passing him, only to be stood on the other side of the same monster, unless you moved 2 spaces.

  On 1/12/2012 at 11:02 PM, andhe said:

I was trying to devise a rule where monsters take 'hits' but a hero is allowed to pass once the monster is 'stunned' from a hit.

Well, just a thought, but how about this:

When you defeat a monster by rolling a "Shield", remove it from the board. If you defeat a monster by rolling a "Sword", the monster is stunned. Place a 1x1 round plate on its head (or under it) to signify that it is currently stunned. Your turn ends normally when the monster has been stunned.

If a monster is stunned, your hero may pass by it without engaging in combat if you wish. Treat it as though it were another hero occupying the space.

If a player wishes to engage a stunned monster on their turn, they may do so by stopping at an adjacent square. Combat proceeds as follows:

- If a Shield is rolled, the monster is defeated and removed from the board, and the hero may use a Melee ability if available.

- If a Sword is rolled, the monster is defeated and removed from the board.

- If a Skull is rolled, the monster wakes up! Remove the 1x1 round plate from its head, and immediately begin a NORMAL combat round.

- If a Sword/Skull is rolled, there is no change-- the monster remains stunned, and the hero remains in his place.

Missile abilities may still be used on stunned monsters as normal, in order to defeat them from a distance, in which case they are removed from the board.

After all the players have moved, every stunned monster attempts to wake up! For each stunned monster on the board, roll the die:

- If a Shield or a Sword is rolled, the monster remains stunned.

- If a Skull or Sword/Skull is rolled, the monster wakes up, and the 1x1 round plate is removed.

DaveE

That's maybe a bit more complicated than I was hoping for :P ! My original idea was just to keep monsters in play a bit longer rather than just bashing them and moving on. But I guess in normal play there is no reason to be doubling back on yourself, so you wouldn't come across the same monsters anyway. I might look at working on this idea though for Fortaan, where there is more opportunity to be exploring and running into the same monsters again depending on how you set the map up.

A rule I did play was that monsters had life points to the value of their strength, represented by gold on their head. So a level 2 monster would have one gold, the first 'hit' taking the gold, the 2nd 'hit' killing him. This resulted in more exciting battles, especially against level 2 and 3 monsters.

It also brought more gold into the game, and meant we could actually buy weapons and potions which hadn't happened, or been necessary in shorter games.

Another rule I'm toying with is to put all keys/potions into chests. As currently opening a 'chest' is pointless and time-consuming for the sake of 1 or 2 gold. It would work the same as a normal 'chest' roll, but if you got a 3 or shield you would choose an actual lego treasure chest that may contain a key, potion or relic (eg helmet of protection) that would help you defeat the 'boss' (especially as he now has 3 lives and can do 3 damage). This would bring more of an exploring and collecting element to the game.

I finally got round to trying out my set of added rules (the basics of play and character abilities remain the same) so apologies for dragging this thread up from a few pages back...

The map we were playing on was a combination of 2 sets of Nathuz with a starting area in a standard Draida Bay 9other than the addition of giant crabs.

My added rules were as follows.

Enemies had gold studs to the value of their strength on their heads. These also acted as lives, so a hit from a hero would would receive 1 gold, and the enemies strength would also decrease. Once defeated, the hero put the monster on their hero pack as normal, which could be traded in for 1 gold at the end of a level (in this case only between Draida and Nathuz).

Bats and Crabs had strength of 0, so basically acted as roadblocks. Meaning on a roll of 1 or two, you still moved back one space, but didn't lose a life.

Gold remained on the board but I removed all potions. Poitions could be found by exploring chests. Normal rolling applied but on a 3 you chose an actual lego chest, which may contain a potion, gold or both. This added more of an exploration element.

Hero's were also looking for a brown path piece to complete the bridge to the middle island, which held the Sceptre of summoning. (Unfortunately my friend found it on his second chest).

The game ended when one hero reached the exit (mainly because people were getting slightly bored, they weren't real lego enthusiasts...), the winner was the hero with the most points (gold collected plus one point for every dead monster. The sceptre was worth 10).

THINGS I WOULD CHANGE:

Heroes could buy weapons at any point (for 5 gold), but this was mainly pointless as they didn't feel like much opportunity to actually use them. Would suggest adding another shield to the dice. Or giving each hero their own dice, which could be altered as they bought extra weapons etc.

My friend ended the game with 30points and we all had about 20 gold. Would suggest removing gold from general play, and only to be found in chests, and received when fighting monsters.

I had added a Boss at the end (the Rock raiders cave monster) but I reached the exit (via the extra bridge, bypassing the monster, as I'd found the other bridge tile) so this didn't really get to be played out.

Edited January 8, 201312 yr by andhe

Using real Lego chests as prizes from chest its pretty nice idea! I must try this! And very nice map too!

There are some glorious rules made by 4-cha...one site : http://1d4chan.org/wiki/Advanced_Heroica, can't wait to play it like this!

Edited February 8, 201213 yr by Lordofdragonss

  On 2/8/2012 at 9:42 AM, Lordofdragonss said:

Using real Lego chests as prizes from chest its pretty nice idea! I must try this! And very nice map too!

There are some glorious rules made by 4-cha...one site : http://1d4chan.org/wiki/Advanced_Heroica, can't wait to play it like this!

Yeah similar to what I was trying to do. Forgot to mention a few rules that are similar to the link mentioned above.

If a hero bought his own weapon (eg Barbarian bought an axe), on a shield roll he would deal 2 damage rather than 1. (But as previously mentioned, shield rolls were fairly infrequent. I would suggest maybe that hero could add an extra shield to his dice when purchasing his own weapon, as would also increase the chance to use his power). In my rules, due to the greater chance of gold, weapons cost 5, poitions remained at 4.

We also played that you could pass monsters (not pass over/jump them) if there was space, but landing next to them meant you had to fight (or if they were blocking your route).

Question: Should Heroes with 'Ranged powers (Wizard and Ranger) be allowed to use their power when rolling a shield in a face to face fight(when they posses their own weapon as it would give them a hit strength of 2)?. Seems odd that they wouldn't, but obviously would put the Melee heroes at a disadvantage as they have no ranged ability.

Edited February 8, 201213 yr by andhe

One aspect of Heroica I found disappointing, despite all the fun of fighting monsters and grabbing gold, was the fact that your skill has little to no effect on the outcome of the game. While your decisions do have some influence on the course of the game, they're mostly limited to choosing what branch to take, and when to use a potion if you have one. I made the following changes that I thought made the game a little more fun when playing with friends, especially when multiple sets were put together (I only have two right now but it could work for more or less). All the dice rolling felt a little more fair when you could make small decisions to affect the outcome-

Each class gets Skills that a player can use on their turn. Each skill costs at least 1 Strength (hereby called SP) worth of slain monsters. You can only spend one monster per turn, so monsters with a Strength of 2 will give you more bang for your buck per turn.

Barbarian: Move 1 space for each SP spent.

Druid: Heal 1 HP for each SP spent.

Knight: Push an adjacent player back 1 space for each SP spent.

Ranger: Damage an adjacent player for 1 HP per SP spent.

Thief: Take 1 gold piece for each SP spent.

Wizard: Use telekinesis to grab something(e.g., gold, potion, key) 3 squares away per SP spent.

For longer games, you could do a very simple leveling system, where spending a certain number of SP unlocks a second, more exotic Skill for your character to use (For instance, letting the Thief sneak sneak past monsters). The skills I listed were just the one's we've used, but I've thought of a whole bunch of other skills, and it'd be fun to try to think of new one's every time you play and see how they effect gameplay.

  On 2/9/2012 at 4:29 AM, Deaddude said:

One aspect of Heroica I found disappointing, despite all the fun of fighting monsters and grabbing gold, was the fact that your skill has little to no effect on the outcome of the game. While your decisions do have some influence on the course of the game, they're mostly limited to choosing what branch to take, and when to use a potion if you have one. I made the following changes that I thought made the game a little more fun when playing with friends, especially when multiple sets were put together (I only have two right now but it could work for more or less). All the dice rolling felt a little more fair when you could make small decisions to affect the outcome-

Each class gets Skills that a player can use on their turn. Each skill costs at least 1 Strength (hereby called SP) worth of slain monsters. You can only spend one monster per turn, so monsters with a Strength of 2 will give you more bang for your buck per turn.

Barbarian: Move 1 space for each SP spent.

Druid: Heal 1 HP for each SP spent.

Knight: Push an adjacent player back 1 space for each SP spent.

Ranger: Damage an adjacent player for 1 HP per SP spent.

Thief: Take 1 gold piece for each SP spent.

Wizard: Use telekinesis to grab something(e.g., gold, potion, key) 3 squares away per SP spent.

This is an interesting option to increase use of powers. I also found that they are rarely used, and wonder about adding another shield to the dice.

Alternatively you could use a SP system similar to the health system rather than trading monsters 9as this would clash with the sceptre of summoning power, or my rule where monsters are traded for gold at the end of the level).

If each hero had 4 SP on their hero pack they could either use one, or regain one per go. This would give the option of adding potions that allow you to use more SP or regain more SP.

  On 2/10/2012 at 4:59 PM, andhe said:

This is an interesting option to increase use of powers. I also found that they are rarely used, and wonder about adding another shield to the dice.

Alternatively you could use a SP system similar to the health system rather than trading monsters 9as this would clash with the sceptre of summoning power, or my rule where monsters are traded for gold at the end of the level).

If each hero had 4 SP on their hero pack they could either use one, or regain one per go. This would give the option of adding potions that allow you to use more SP or regain more SP.

So I finally got round to trying out my rules variant. Which in a nutshell involves having a 'magic bar' or 4 gold cones, the same as the standard health bar. Magic is used when you roll a shield (ranged or melee) and you can use up to 4 magic points (if you have them) to inflict the same amount of damage to a monster (monsters have health to the value of their strength).

Magic can be restored when rolling a shield in a movement go. Restore magic points up (up to 4) and use the remaining points to move your hero (eg restore 2 magic and move 2 spaces = 4).

Now, my problems with the game. Let me know if you have found the same, and if so how you solved them.

1. It's a race to the end. Meaning it's not really worth stopping for chests, wasting a go and potential losing a life for little reward. I attempted to solve this by putting ALL potions in chests (and in the case of my map, also a piece of the bridge so you need to find it to cross over).

2. Not much gold. If gold is the only way to buy weapons/potions it's easy to finish the game without having accumulated enough gold to buy anything. I attempted to solve this by monsters giving out gold to the value of their strength when hit/killed (this obviously weakens the rogue's power, he still gets +1 on a shield roll though).

3. No point in buying extra weapons. If on a shield roll any hero can kill a monster in battle the 'melee' weapons offer little advantage. Having a ranged weapon seems to involve killing the monsters from a distance so the heroes behind you can pass by freely.

4.You can't choose when to use your power. eg I got stuck behind a rock (in Nathuz) for a number of bad dice rolls, whilst my friends (who had gone a different route) got to the prize. It would be nice to be able to 'activate' your power, but perhaps meaning that you risked having less power later on.

Is this just me or am I missing something? Is this just the nature of 'roll and move' game scenarios?

- andhe

  On 3/12/2012 at 2:38 PM, andhe said:

3. No point in buying extra weapons. If on a shield roll any hero can kill a monster in battle the 'melee' weapons offer little advantage. Having a ranged weapon seems to involve killing the monsters from a distance so the heroes behind you can pass by freely.

This is what used to thinking. But now, after playing Heroica a lot I know that thruth is that with more weapons, you have bigger chance to kill monsters.

  On 3/12/2012 at 2:38 PM, andhe said:

4.You can't choose when to use your power. eg I got stuck behind a rock (in Nathuz) for a number of bad dice rolls, whilst my friends (who had gone a different route) got to the prize. It would be nice to be able to 'activate' your power, but perhaps meaning that you risked having less power later on.

Is this just me or am I missing something? Is this just the nature of 'roll and move' game scenarios?

Yes, this is the race game with a lot of randomness. That's why we make new rules! I really like the mana idea and I am trying to make up some abilities. I like to use "When you roll heroica you get 1 power point, you can spend it to use the power in your turn."

  On 3/12/2012 at 3:02 PM, Lordofdragonss said:

This is what used to thinking. But now, after playing Heroica a lot I know that thruth is that with more weapons, you have bigger chance to kill monsters.

Yes, this is the race game with a lot of randomness. That's why we make new rules! I really like the mana idea and I am trying to make up some abilities. I like to use "When you roll heroica you get 1 power point, you can spend it to use the power in your turn."

I can see how more weapons give you more options to kill monsters (from further away etc) but I can't see how it benefits your hero, rather than just killing them when you are next to them? And even then another hero can jump over you, after you have done all the hard work fighting :D

I am also trying to develop a rule that allows you to use magic even when not rolling a shield. Would be interested to see what you suggest.

- andhe

I know I can't expect everyone to have multiple of one set, but the possibility arises that, if one were to have, say, 2 Waldurk Forests, one person could control the monsters on one board by watching the other, but the hero can't see the treasure, potions, monsters, or even possibly the boss room. Again, I know not a lot of people have 2 of a single set, but it's something to think about and toy around with.

  On 1/3/2013 at 7:07 AM, acidrunner1 said:

I know I can't expect everyone to have multiple of one set, but the possibility arises that, if one were to have, say, 2 Waldurk Forests, one person could control the monsters on one board by watching the other, but the hero can't see the treasure, potions, monsters, or even possibly the boss room. Again, I know not a lot of people have 2 of a single set, but it's something to think about and toy around with.

I think what you are trying to say is that having two copies of each set would help you to play heroica in a way similar to other role playing games. One set is "public" and the players can see only the terrrain and what is in view of the characters. The other copy is hidden behind a screen and only the dungeon master can see everything.

Hmm, I like it. Beyond just liking it, you could also take it a step further and have MOST of the terrain hidden as well. The characters have to move to look around a corner before they can see what is actually there.

Strangelly enough, I do have two copies of most of the heroica games, and I think that most fans do as well, just for extra parts. So I think your idea has more merrit than you give it credit for.

  On 1/3/2013 at 8:28 PM, Jareth said:

you could also take it a step further and have MOST of the terrain hidden as well. The characters have to move to look around a corner before they can see what is actually there.

Thanks for the advice, and I'll be sure to test it out. I look forward to seeing if it improves the game, or just changes it.

On a larger scale, I've decided to embark on a quest, which is to test as many different aspects of the game and determine the most enjoyable rule changes. Although it would be impossible to test every special ability a hero could have and such, I will try to make the most sensible choices on the new rules. I will try to make the game more challenging without overcomplicating everything, and I'll report my findings as soon as I can. Hopefully this will aid in the battle against Heroica's over-simplicity and lack of skill without removing the innovation and video-game feel. Wish me luck!

Maybe once I determine the best ruleset I'll get my brother to program a computer version so I can play by myself.

>See "Quest" 2 posts up

Here is a list of all the major aspects I came up with:

>Map >Size

>Exploring

>Obstacles

>Dice >Plate Variety

>Attack vs. Movement

>Items >Weapons >HeroPower Relationship

>Strength

>Potions >Location Bonus (e.g. Speed Potion = 5 spaces on the Brown/Tan Sand Tiles)

>New Potions

>Gold >Collection >Invisible

>Guarded

>Use >Value

>Shop Items (Potions, Dice Plates, etc.)

>Characters >Heroes >Stats >Strength

>Health

>Speed

>Abilities(Item Powers) >Collection

>Character Specific Items

>Specials(Combat Powers) >Range

>Melee

>Improvements >Enhanced Abilities

>Stat Upgrades

>New Specials

>Same-Character Variation >Powers-Path Choice

>Stat Training

>Monsters >Powers >Damage Affects

>Transportation

>Stats >Strength

>Health

>Hero Strengths

>Hero Weaknesses

I know that's a lot, and that's because Heroica has lots of components, so if I missed anything important, please let me know!

Any of you who are still reading this forum, do you know Jason Glover's Advanced Heroica Rules? If so, (when) does the Venom Attack ware off? Also, what does becoming a werewolf do to you?

Just thought I'd spread the word, there's a new wiki, http://heroica.upgrade.wikia.com/wiki/Heroica_Upgrade_Wiki that is working to compile a series of community-made rulebooks for Heroica, and I thought you might like to contribute your ideas there, since this thread appears to be long gone.