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The Heroquest Remastered Project: A Brief History

In the commentary above, I mentioned the Heroquest Remastered Project. This is a brief history on that project.

It started back in the late nineties when the internet was new and shiny and, frankly, a far friendlier place, long before AI posed an existential threat to the nature of creativity. These were golden days when the future was more egalitarian, new indie bands got radio airplay, the net ran on enthusiasm and old men didn’t yell at clouds or tilt at windmills. Heroquest had come and gone, but multiple websites devoted to it had been created by the fans. The pre-eminent site of the day was aginsinn. It was run by Dwayne Agin[1]. Not only did it boast the most material, but it used forum technology. Aficionados soon congregated on the forums to discuss their favourite game. It was the antecedent to yeoldeinn, itself the predecessor to the popular Facebook group.

Through such discourse, it soon became apparent that the international versions of Heroquest were not uniform; the UK and Europe received two expansions that never saw the light of day in the US and vice versa. Japan received a completely different base set entirely. Extra material was only available in particular markets: Two scenarios from White Dwarf were published in the UK, a Marvel Christmas special was only available in certain regions, across the Atlantic a new scenario was published in Adventures Unlimited #5, Brazil had its own share of semi-official fan-made material in Dragão magazine…

Upon learning this, a somewhat younger (and certainly dafter) version of myself jumped into the new material and was surprised to discover that in America the name for the principal villain had been inexplicably changed from Morcar to Zargon. Of course, it would have been easy to hand-wave this away, but to my mind this was an excellent plot hook. Now the heroes could actually face off against their nemesis, giving them a sense of accomplishment, and a new one could rise to take their place. I wrote a quest called The Tears of Times Passed to act as a bridge between the European and US versions of the game. It was quite popular and inadvertently gave rise to the nickname The Gathering Storm for the base set quest pack.

Skip forwards about twenty years. Despite being unavailable in the shops, Heroquest enjoyed a steady fan-base who continued to create their own quests, rules and material online. Tales would circulate around internet forums concerning ways in which scenarios might be improved. Players described narrative flourishes they added to their quests to make them more dramatic. Advice was offered when campaigns were derailed because the heroes broke the expectations of the original authors. Then, after multiple attempts to revive the franchise and the game seemingly residing in development hell, Hasbro finally republished Heroquest. Rather than using this treasure trove of wisdom, Hasbro republished the game largely as was. To be fair to them, if they had made too many changes they would have received negative feedback from the fan-base, but it did ignore a wide body of material…

.…which is where this project comes in. The aim of this project is to gather all the official and best unofficial Heroquest material out there and merge it into one continuous campaign, expanding upon the story and lore of the Heroquest universe to provide the most satisfying narrative for heroes and evil wizard players alike.

The Remastered campaign was inspired by the excellent Tomes Trilogy by Nicodemus. It has been written with a stronger narrative perspective. Side characters are developed and fleshed out. This is, arguably, fanfic, and, like all fanfic, your mileage may vary, as is your prerogative. (In fact, there’s an essay on why the script isn’t sacrosanct in the first pack of the campaign.) Regardless, I’ve tried to include some of the most interesting quests I’ve found online and accredited the authors as best as I can. The Heroquest Jam has always been an excellent source of innovative material. So, to anyone who has ever entered a quest in this fine competition, I say to you Chapeau! Thank you and keep submitting excellent material for all the Heroquest fans out there.

You can find the Remastered Heroquest series in the Files section of  the  yeOldeInn Facebook group.

[1] To honour his contribution to the fan community, I gave Dwayne a shout-out in my reworking of The Dark Company.

Thanks, Craig, that seemed to do the trick. A screenshot for anyone else that runs into this problem:

Screenshot #3:

Screenshot #2

Screenshot #1:

Not entirely sure what I'm doing wrong here but the pdf isn't showing on the submissions to download...

My page is https://jacob-busby.itch.io/the-brittleburg but the pdf is resolutely refusing to enable the pdf for download. itch io seems to think I want money for this (I dont!) and/or seems to think I want to tell them my financial details (I won't!) Anybody got any clues what's going wrong here?

Other entrants, ignoring your own entry (if you entered the contest), what quests caught your eye? Here, in no especial order, are ones I liked:

• Kaestis Diagorum - Gauntlet of the Witch Hands 
• Persephones Tavern 
• Brother my Brother 
• Tower of the Argent Moon 
• Frozen Death 
• Save the Goblin Queen 
• The Tomb of Endless  Whispers 
• Power Struggle 
• The Forgotten Fortress 
• The Siege of Kaba Karn

Thank you

About ten minutes. My guess is that behind the scenes this site uses cloud servers and need to synchronise from time to time.

EXPERIENCED HEROES ONLY: The quest title warns that this is for veteran heroes only. That's no idle threat! After a few encounters to soften the party up and, more importantly, set up a crucial plot point, the party reaches the finale: three mini-bosses and a spellcasting undead army, all of which must be fought using hand-to-hand combat and under the penalties imposed by the quest itself.

THE AURA OF HONESTY: As the Evil Wizard player, you should interpret the efficacy of the Aura of Honesty based on your audience. This gives you a lot of latitude. Young players should be given more leeway ("You didn't roll enough for movement, but you followed through with the intent to the best of your abilities"), whereas old hands might find themselves in trouble if they say "I'll move up and kill the orc" and then either fail to roll enough to reach the orc or fail to kill it. Of course, this could lead to players making legalistic statements like "I'll move toward the orc and, if I roll enough to reach it, I will attempt to slay it." That's deliberate: it reinforces the whole "courthouse" feel of the quest and really pushes on the fourth wall.

STRATEGY NOTES: The Judge is almost unkillable, but the heroes (hopefully) have two Fire spells, Genie and Tempest, in addition to the four extra random spells they found in the scrolls at the start of the quest. They should either take the Judge down fast or whittle out both of the Jury's healing spells. The Battle Axes were added to the quest to give the heroes a 1/16 chance of inflicting a point of damage, if they lack any other options. These odds can be improved with Courage, Future Sight and Potions of Strength.

WHERE CAN I GET MORE CONTENT LIKE THIS?: A slightly different version of The Halls of Honesty will appear in my Remastered Version of The Frozen Horror. (~55% complete at the time being) If you enjoyed this quest (or just want to steal some of the ideas from it), please check out the other Remastered Versions of quest packs I’ve written. There's eight so far, covering all of the European quest packs plus the Mage in the Mirror and Rise of the Dread Moon! You can find them in the Files section of the YeOldeInn Facebook group. Each Remastered pack not only reworks the original quests, but adds in many new ones as well, using some of the best fan-made quests from the last 35 years.

Looks like it's just a timing issue. Quest has appeared there now.

EXPERIENCED HEROES ONLY: The quest title warns that this is for veteran heroes only. That's no idle threat! After a few encounters to soften the party up and, more importantly, set up a crucial plot point, the party reaches the finale: three mini-bosses and a spellcasting undead army, all of which must be fought using hand-to-hand combat and under the penalties imposed by the quest itself.

THE AURA OF HONESTY: As the Evil Wizard player, you should interpret the efficacy of the Aura of Honesty based on your audience. This gives you a lot of latitude. Young players should be given more leeway ("You didn't roll enough for movement, but you followed through with the intent to the best of your abilities"), whereas old hands might find themselves in trouble if they say "I'll move up and kill the orc" and then either fail to roll enough to reach the orc or fail to kill it. Of course, this could lead to players making legalistic statements like "I'll move toward the orc and, if I roll enough to reach it, I will attempt to slay it." That's deliberate: it reinforces the whole "courthouse" feel of the quest and really pushes on the fourth wall.

STRATEGY NOTES: The Judge is almost unkillable, but the heroes (hopefully) have two Fire spells, Genie and Tempest, in addition to the four extra random spells they found in the scrolls at the start of the quest. They should either take the Judge down fast or whittle out both of the Jury's healing spells. The Battle Axes were added to the quest to give the heroes a 1/16 chance of inflicting a point of damage, if they lack any other options. These odds can be improved with Courage, Future Sight and Potions of Strength.

WHERE CAN I GET MORE CONTENT LIKE THIS?: A slightly different version of The Halls of Honesty will appear in my Remastered Version of The Frozen Horror. (~55% complete at the time being) If you enjoyed this quest (or just want to steal some of the ideas from it), please check out the other Remastered Versions of quest packs I’ve written. There's eight so far, covering all of the European quest packs plus the Mage in the Mirror and Rise of the Dread Moon! You can find them in the Files section of the YeOldeInn Facebook group. Each Remastered pack not only reworks the original quests, but adds in many new ones as well, using some of the best fan-made quests from the last 35 years.

I've uploaded a quest, but it doesn't seem to be showing in the submissions. (The Halls of Honesty by Jacob Busby) Any advice on how to get it to submit, as if I'm having this difficulty, others might too?

That's where the Barghests appear. They appear whenever a hero rolls odd doubles and will appear on the corresponding odd number.

Great tool, but can you add cut and paste to the text for the online version. I often want to use Read Aloud in Microsoft Word to avoid typos, then paste the completed text into the image

You could always post the quest on another site like yeoldeinn or the facebook page. It's a bit of a shame for all your efforts not to be appreciated.

These notes explain some of the thought processes behind this quest, as there are a number of subtle nuances which might not be readily apparent at first.

 It should be clear from the title but this quest sits between the online quest Knightfall and the first quest in the Rise of the Dread Moon pack. The background helps establish Ragnar a little more and gives the heroes a solid reason for travelling/returning to Elethorn.

 Hawthorn is traditionally associated with the fae and is involved in a number of legends and superstitions.

 Natghga Goblins are a call back to Rogar's Hall, whereas the mention of Ælfgār provides a credible link to the popular Sundayquest series.

 Barghest are fae hounds - they felt like an appropriate enemy for an unseelie mound - and the wolf tokens from Mage in the Mirror were too good a resource to waste. The chances of generating a Barghest are 1 in 12 - so one should be spawned once every three hero rounds or so. This should be enough to keep the pressure on so the players can’t optimise every move without overwhelming the party.

 Section B gives the heroes a chance to see the central conceit of the quest - how to reach and repair the Mirror gate without being killed by the brambles. I gave the orc a scroll of Pass Through Rock in case the heroes didn't have that spell in their load-out and got trapped in the central room.

 The three stooges in Room D teach the heroes everything they need to know about the Zombies in this quest without explaining the rules. If they still charge in, chop the Zombies up and get infected, that's their shout.

 The Elven Altar in Room G follows the rules for elven altars, but it also establishes the conceit that the elves worship the moon, helping cement some of the cultural background, long before the heroes raid the Temple in Rise of the Dread Moon.

 The ashes in Room J show that Ragnar was trying to cover his tracks - it very nearly worked too - if nothing else it demonstrates that their foe is very shrewd and they will need their wits about them to bring him to justice.

 There's a very subtle trick in this quest that may go unnoticed at first. With the exception of Room I, searching for Secret Doors actively harms the party as it gives the Barghest access to the sub-quadrants. This subverts the expectations of experienced players who have probably gotten into the habit of checking every room for traps and secret doors! A cunning Zargon might have several Barghests congregate near 3, then burst through the rubble when one of the secret doors to the inner corridor is found!

 I hope you enjoy my quest. I certainly enjoyed writing it.