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- $aaa|1-Review of
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- |1-WARHAMMER QUEST
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-
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- $faf New Board Game by Games Workshop
-
- $fff By Matthew Buxton (Bucko)
-
- $faf Warhammer Quest is the latest addition to the "Quest" board games
- that Games Workshop have produced. It follows on from the Heroquest
- series of games which where very popular, at least around my
- neighbourhood.
-
- $faf The first thing you notice about this game is the sheer weight of
- $fbfthe box when you pick it up. As well as the many board sections,
- $fcfcounters, dice and books, Warhammer Quest contains no less than 43
- $fdfCitadel miniatures and that's excluding the 12 giant bats, rats, spiders
- $fefand snotling models made especially for this game. It took me a whole
- $fffafternoon to remove all the models from their spruces, and they are up
- $fefto the usual standards of Games Workshop. The Orcs, Skaven and Gobbos
- $fdfare the standard Warhammer miniatures. The four Heroes (Barbarian, Elf,
- $fcfDwarf and Wizard) however, represent some of the best plastic models I
- $fbfhave ever seen and are far superior to the heroes in Heroquest and
- $fafAdvanced Heroquest.
-
- The quality of the board sections is also good, they are printed in
- vivid colours and stand out well, there is no furniture with Warhammer
- Quest, but there are some superbly drawn tiles, there are also three
- decks of cards that are printed in full colour and three books, (Rules,
- Adventure and Roleplay.)
-
- The rulebook that is included with the game is about 16 pages long
- and tells how to play the simple game. The much bigger (about 120
- pages) Roleplay book has all the rules for keeping warriors and building
- them up into true heroes. Note that this is NOT easy as in Advanced
- Heroquest, where the players could become Super-hard by the end of their
- first few adventures. Training in Warhammer Quest is much more
- expensive and the book contains full details of just about every
- bad-thing in the Warhammer world. There is always a monster capable of
- killing the brave heroes within the DM's reach (all Warhammer models
- excluding artillery and war machines are compatible). The game plays
- well in simple mode but really shines when played in its Roleplay
- version.
-
- I must also tell you about the great new system of random generated
- dungeons. Anyone who has played Advanced Heroquest will know that it's
- "roll a dice and look it up on the table" system works reasonably well,
- but can lead to huge dungeons (which someone must map) and inevitably, a
- shortage of board pieces. Warhammer Quest gets around this problem by a
- new system where the dungeon is generated according to the draw of a
- card. Before starting a random dungeon, the cards are shuffled and the
- rooms and corridors are placed out according to the cards, which are
- drawn each time a warrior enters a new section of the dungeon. If he
- enters a room an event card is drawn which shows what monsters are
- lurking in the room (or sometimes an encounter may happen). After the
- monsters are slain, the party receives a treasure card. There is no
- need to map and no endless waits for the objective rooms.
-
- I could go on and tell you about magic, travelling between dungeons,
- living in settlements and warriors' developments but I will leave you to
- discover more when you buy the game. The only fault I found with this
- product is that it is not very backward-compatible. That is, you cannot
- use Advanced Heroquest board sections with Warhammer Quest. Of course,
- there is nothing to stop you using Advanced/Heroquest tiles or
- furniture, so it's only a minor gripe.
-
- The last thing I will tell you is that there are already many
- expansions for the game. New Hero packs, such as the Pitfighter, the
- Noble and even a Chaos Warrior (DM's take note, this character is MEAN)
- are readily available. There are also more treasure cards to buy, new
- adventure packs and new rules and board sections printed in each issue
- of White Dwarf magazine. If you liked Heroquest of Advanced Heroquest
- then you will love Warhammer Quest. The game is good VFM if you
- consider how much the models are worth if bought separately (I got my
- copy of the game for £35 from Argos). In short, if you like Warhammer
- or DND, buy this because it's great fun and good value for money.
- (Especially for Warhammer players)
-
- Look out for future issues of THE WORD where I will be submitting
- the most successful dungeons that myself and my friends come up with.
-
- $fffEnd
-