System

Those interested can download a PDF copy of the basic HQ system here. However, again, I’ll do my best to cover it in this review as well.

Basic Task Resolution

All abilities have a rating of 1-20. The system uses a roll-under, lower-is-better mechanic. A 1 is a Critical and a 20 is a Fumble. Every action requires an opposed roll; i.e., if a character tries to lift a heavy boulder, he’ll be pitting his Strength score against the boulder’s Weight score.

Now, generally speaking, I prefer roll-and-add systems to roll-under systems due to scaling issues, and I really don’t like flat critical success/critical failure points. The HeroQuest system addresses both of these issues simultaneously, and with one of the most brilliant game mechanics I’ve ever seen: masteries.

Masteries

Remember me saying that all abilities have a rating of 1-20? That’s true in a way, but it’s not a hard cap. After 20 comes 1w1 – effectively 21, with that “w” actually the “w”-like rune meaning “mastery.” Every additional 20 points of skill results in another level of mastery; i.e., the equivalent of 41 is 1w2. Each level of mastery, in turn, bumps up the outcome by one level: with one level of mastery, for example, a Fumble becomes a Failure, a Failure becomes a Success, and a Success becomes a Critical. Hence, all else being equal, at (x)w1, you can’t Fumble, at (x)w2, you can’t Fail, and at (x)w3, you can’t get anything less than a Critical.

Ah, but masteries cancel each other out. 10w1 vs. 5w2 becomes 10 vs. 5w1. What’s more, “extra” masteries left over after cancellations serve as a kind of “anti-mastery” to the opponent’s roll, knocking down his success levels.

This may well be the finest scaling mechanic I’ve encountered. It may be a fantasy game, but it could handle both mundane humans and Superman-level superhumans with ease, and without heavy number crunching. Superman would overwhelm the typical human with his likely Strength score of 10w20 (or something equally ridiculous)… but if he’s wrestling the Martian Manhunter, with a Strength of, say, 9w20, then we’re back to a simple roll of 10 vs. 9.

Augmentations

So that’s two of my personal rules bugaboos down. But speaking of Strength, here’s yet another pet peeve of mine: the game makes no distinction between “attributes” and “skills.” They’re all just “abilities.” And generally speaking, I hate games that deny any link between natural and trained ability.

HQ answers this concern, and then some. Any ability can boost the use of any other ability, so long as their use makes sense.

What does that mean from a practical standpoint?

Well, let’s say you’re on guard duty for your camp one night, and the place is attacked by trolls.

If you’re attacking with your sword, you’d use your Sword ability, of course… but you could boost it with your Strong ability, and your Quick ability. And does your PC hate trolls with a passion? Why, then you could boost your attack with your Hate Trolls ability, too. And does the attack put your beloved wife in danger? Throw in a bonus for Love Wife as well. Then, of course, there are any bonuses you might get from your weapons, your armor, whatever magic you have to pump you up, and so on.

In other words, you aren’t talking about a simple Attribute + Skill roll, here. You’re talking about an ability roll boosted by any and all relevant supporting abilities – everything from physical prowess to emotional fervor. I can’t think of a better way to simulate the influences of passions as well as powers on epic heroes.

These boosts, called augmentations, may be either fixed numbers equal to 1/10th of the ability, or they may be variable augments, requiring a roll that could result in either a higher-than-normal augment on a good roll or a penalty on a bad roll (representing overtaxing one’s strength, for example). This system represents a distinct improvement over Hero Wars, in which every augment was variable, resulting in both way too much die rolling for every action and a ridiculous number of pulled tendons.

Simple & Extended Contests

The game offers two forms of conflict resolution, making no distinction whatsoever between combat and non-combat. The more basic one takes the form of a simple opposed roll, winner take all – in essence, the entire encounter resolves itself in that one roll after every possible modifier’s been applied. This could work for anything from a difficult river crossing to an extended battle, if the GM’s goal is to keep things moving.

The more detailed version simulates the ebb and flow of conflict with Action Points. Opponents start out with Action Points equal to the value of the trait they use at the outset of the conflict and take turns initiating opposed rolls, with the side whose turn it is making an AP bid. (Yes, this does mean that it’s best to start out using your highest applicable ability, since switching to it later won’t increase your current AP total.) Depending upon the degree of success, the aggressor may cause the opponent to lose the bid amount of APs (or some percentage thereof), may actually transfer those APs from the opponent to the aggressor… or, on a failure, may have the reverse done to him. In essence, then, an aggressor who’s sure of his superiority may “go for broke” with a big bid, while a less confident aggressor may play it safe with smaller bids.

It’s worth noting that in combat, a side inflicting AP loss may instead choose to wound an opponent, resulting in penalties to future rolls.

And on a related note, this system makes it really, really difficult to die in combat – as difficult, in fact, as it is easy to lose limbs in Glorantha’s RuneQuest incarnation. An opponent drained of APs is “defeated,” not “dead,” possibly suffering a penalty to the relevant ability based upon the character’s negative AP total. Only a huge negative AP score will result in a dying character, and deliberately killing a foe takes a conscious decision on the part of the attacker. In Hero Wars, this resulted in what I liked to call the “Minefield of Fallen Foes,” given the fact that attempting to finish off an AP-drained opponent would function as a contested roll that would give the opponent a chance to regain APs and resume the fight. As far as I can tell, HeroQuest has wisely abandoned this idea, instead focusing on social and psychological damage the GM may choose to inflict on the murderous PC.

On the other hand, the default system has taken one step backwards, in my view. Because all advantages in a conflict work as augments, there’s no difference between a nimble fighter and a strong fighter, for example, or even between one warrior with a dagger and plate mail and another with a big sword and leather armor – it’s just a matter of which of them, overall, is more likely to win the fight.

That in and of itself isn’t so bad, so long as you don’t mind the abstraction, but it also means that the “Ninjasaurus Effect” is in full swing: anything that dishes out huge amounts of damage when it connects is also more likely to connect in the first place, at least in purely mechanical terms. To mitigate that, the rulebook has tucked away an option to go back to the system of Edges and Hindrances from Hero Wars, treating such things as weapons as automatic bonuses to the AP bid on a successful attempt rather than as a bonus to the attempt itself. (In other words, rather than the Massive Troll Maul giving a +8 augment to an attack roll, it could give +8 to whatever AP “damage” the attack inflicts.) I’m very glad that the game left this option open and only wish that it weren’t so hard to find in the book. Of course, that only helps in extended contests, since APs don’t factor into the quick resolution mechanic.

Overall, the conflict resolution definitely serves to streamline challenges of all sorts and to instill drama in what other games might treat as boring one-roll affairs – debates, for example. On the other hand, it’s the polar opposite of RuneQuest when it comes to grittiness and relies heavily on description, rather than game stats, to make up the dramatic difference. A dwarf-built automatic crossbow might have cool game effects in RuneQuest terms, but in HeroQuest, it’s just another augment calling for a colorful description.

Ingenious as they may be, the augments represent the biggest complication to an otherwise streamlined rules set. And nowhere is that more the case than it is regarding magic.

Magic

The various schools of magic differentiate themselves largely in the way in which they can be used as augmentations and/or active abilities. In terms of active abilities, the game gives magic abilities a serious boost versus anything mundane, with a fixed score of 14 opposing any magic power; i.e., if you have a magic power called “Jump Over the Mountain,” it doesn’t matter how high the mountain is – it will still resist your jump with 14. If the mountain is magical, however, it will resist with its full power. The problem here is that if a power isn’t used actively against a mundane force – i.e., if it’s used as an augment – then it’s really no better than a mundane ability.

On a related note, there is no such thing as a “powerful spell” in HeroQuest – everything depends upon the ability level of the caster. A spell called “Totally Obliterate Foe” will do less damage than a spell called “Hurt Him” at a higher level of ability.

And trying to put all this together in order to figure out the relative strengths and weaknesses of magic proved a daunting task for me, as there’s no real side-by-side comparison. Thankfully, those more familiar with the system were able to help me out with that.

Animism starts out with the most bang for your buck, given the shaman’s ability to turn loose spirits to fight at their side, but this may only be done a few times per adventure; beyond that, most Animism powers aren’t active. Wizardry, the magic of monotheism, has the strongest community-based magic and is the only magic that can use one spell to boost another. Theism, the magic of the polytheistic gods, occupies a middle ground, providing powerful spells that are limited to the circle of influence of the god in question.

Common magic – the magic of the material world, including special supernatural abilities that the characters can “just do” – is an odd case. Any sort of magic can be “concentrated,” making spells easier to acquire at the expense of abiding by the specific magic schools’ strictures. Common Magic can only be used as an augment unless it’s concentrated, meaning that non-concentrated Common Magic loses the benefit of magic abilities over mundane abilities. However, Concentrating Animism, Theism, and Wizardry allows the character to keep specific types of Common Magic and concentrate them, whereas concentrating Common Magic alone means the character must abandon any Animism, Theism, or Wizardry magic. Since the various types of Common Magic differ only in their sources rather than in what they can do, it makes little sense to concentrate Common Magic alone from a purely mechanical standpoint.

In fact, every magical ability consists of no more than a name. There are no spell lists in HeroQuest. Just look at the name of the ability and decide what it can do.

Character Creation

Characters are comprised of keywords and abilities. Keywords cover a broad range of abilities, and characters have keywords for their homeland (or race, in the case of nonhuman PCs), occupation, and magic. These start at 17. All other abilities start at 13.

The game offers three methods of character creation. The first, ideal for more literary-minded players already somewhat familiar with the setting, calls for the player to write a 100-word narrative about the character, pulling keywords and other abilities out of the completed work.

The second involves a more straightforward listing of keywords and abilities similar to that found in other RPGs. This, too, calls for some setting knowledge, although a summary by the GM seems more likely to serve that purpose than when using the narrative option above.

The last and most innovative method, ostensibly for those most unfamiliar with both system and setting, calls for the player to create the character during the course of the adventure, starting with just a single keyword and a single ability and spending character creation points as they decide what fits best. That’s the method I set out to use for the neophytes in my review playtest game, but we found that the knowledge required for even a homeland keyword tended to snowball into questions that lead to other keywords and abilities anyway. By the time we were done, everyone had already used the listing method.

In all three methods, players get 20 points to spread around to increase abilities, whether keyword-related or not (but not keywords themselves, and with no more than +10 going to any ability), or to increase the character’s level of membership in a specialized religion, if applicable. So, characters can easily start the game with one level of mastery in selected abilities.

It’s a great set of options. I think the only real problem lies with the fact that the complex setting needs such a simple system just to keep character creation from bogging down while still offering a wide array of options. Translated into a more familiar setting, it could be lightning-fast – on par with Over the Edge, for example, while offering better-defined abilities and more open scaling.