by Kurgan » April 15th, 2024, 9:30 am
I don't have a problem in general with the new heroes because even if you don't like them, their use isn't required for any official quest (we all know that Zargon can tweak the game to his liking anyway, but still, this is a major point).
However, ever since the Knight was first introduced, the fact that he's a "combat" type and has 7 body points, some have said he's "superior" to the Dwarf and removes any desire to use that one in favor of the Knight. I am here going to push back at the notion that somehow the existence of the Knight makes the Dwarf redundant, irrelevant or somehow gives him some unfair competition.
1) Nothing says that the Knight has to replace the Dwarf in the four heroes. Yes, the App suggests always using a group of 4 heroes (except for the 7 solo quests) and swapping any one out for any other. But you could just as easily have a Dwarf and Knight side by side. Besides, the Companion App, though official, is not the end all be all of rule clarifications (it gets quite a few things "wrong" or has odd ways of interpreting the official rules, due to limitations in the program and also apparently out of a desire by the developers to allow to a variety of rule interpretations and play styles though their primary goal was to allow the casual player who didn't want to play as Zargon or wanted to try the game out solo, could jump in without too much difficulty).
2) Yes, the Rogue pack suggests only using one copy of each character type at a time in a party (and the app doesn't allow it), but nothing actually stops you from using two knights in a group (we did this with some of the "solo" quests as bodyguards for the main hero). If you missed out on the Hero Collection and just have the Rise of the Dread Moon version (which would probably be most players) you only have the one Knight anyhow, but chances are you won't be using him until after the original 14 quests (not everyone of course, some will start right on one of the expansions or bring the special new hero back to the classic 14) which means he'll be "behind" compared to the other kitted out heroes (though the answer to this is you could always use your excess gold or spare gear to power him up without much effort).
3) Skills. This is the larger point... what perks does the Knight have? Two of his abilities require a Shield (which he starts with being worth 150 gold, meaning he has stronger defense for free). Shield block is single use and is used to protect another hero. Knight's Challenge doesn't require a shield but only applies to himself, one time, to let him come back from death with 1 BP, which is no different than if he had a 1 BP healing potion (like "warmth"). So a Dwarf with a potion of healing and a shield has the same perks here as the Dwarf, other than the shield block which doesn't help him but only an adjacent ally.
4) Perks. Here is where someone will really complain and say that the Knight is "better overall" than the Dwarf. Why? Because the Knight can wear plate armor with no movement penalty! But here's the thing, technically Borin's Armor does the same thing. To me this is where you imagine that the Knight is a secondary character from the main four and the Dwarf gets Borin's Armor, while the Knight can spend 850 gold coins to get plate and as nobody else will want it he can have it. Later on there's Elven Chainmail (originally intended for the Elf and so again in the 2023 remake although the 1992 version was for anyone but the Wizard). What does the Dwarf have? He can disarm traps without a toolkit, better than any hero with a toolkit. That's right to disarm he has a 1 in 6 chance of failing, while a tool-kitted hero (have to spend 250 gold) has 50% chance of failure.
5) Heroes are not actually in direct competition to one another. When it comes to HeroQuest, it's a group thing... a team sport. Many times when we were kids we each controlled more than one hero (not having exactly 5 people to play at the table every session). In the EU edition competition was possible (but ultimately to be discouraged in all but the first quest, since victory came easier through cooperation) but not so in the NA/Remake. So whether you're controlling the Knight AND some other hero(es) or if he's simply on your side, why worry if he killed more monsters or survived bigger hits than you did? In the end, he's probably going to share his gold with you (and you with him) to optimize the party anyway.
So I would say that the Knight may seem powerful but the usual complaints people have about heroes... that in competition with one another, one seems better than another, is just not all that. Eventually the classic heroes (minus the wizard) will be fully equipped with armor, weapons, artifacts, potions, and will start to feel much more similar to one another except how often they will have to heal or their odds at beating the rare Chaos/Dread Spell.
Now what about the Barbarian? Here again people complain and say why would I ever want to pick the Barbarian if the Knight is available? Well first of all he might not be available, someone else might have chosen the Knight from under you. Second, one might be available and the other not depending upon how Zargon set up the hero offerings at the start. Next what does the Barbarian have?
1) Starts with Broadsword (250 gold). Having 3 dice to attack instead of only 2 is a big deal. There are two early strategies in HQ to increase your survivability... one is to upgrade armor first, but we always upgraded weapons first. Kill the monsters quickly before they can start attacking. You have four heroes and its going to be awhile before you start facing enough monsters that this strategy will be less useful. So while the knight can defend himself better at first, the barbarian can take down monsters more quickly on average. Having one more body point and one less mind point isn't that big a deal, but then that was always the case of the Barbarian next to the Dwarf.
2) Barbarian has no skills or special perks. How boring! Well this is actually the attraction for a lot of players (especially beginners to HeroQuest) to the Barbarian. They LIKE the fact that he's "simple" to manage (at first), that he is simply good at what he does (surviving attacks and dishing out damage). He has the most to gain from healing and while he's the weakest against enemy magic, you don't face a lot of sorcerers in HQ in general (and not for awhile if you're starting from the beginning).
So I would say if you are afraid of using the Knight in your games, don't be. Every new hero raises eyebrows among players, usually saying they are "too powerful" and so the nerfs begin to be added, but then they are also said to be "too boring" over time, so they start adding buffs. But to me these addon heroes can still add value to the game (occasionally Zargon will have to compensate for the fact that a group quest may have assumed a certain classic hero was there instead of the new one), but they can also be used as NPCs, mercenaries, monsters, as a "fifth hero" or left out entirely if they aren't wanted. One place where the new heroes really shine I think is when a player is joining your table for a one-off event. There's no worry that ten quests down the line they are going to "feel boring" or something (you could make the same criticism of the other "combat" heroes as after awhile they all have the same equipment in theory).
As for the Knight being "better" than the Wizard I don't think anyone makes that argument, nor does anyone compare him unfavorably to the Elf. Both characters have much more variety in terms of how they pick their spells (after all, nothing says that the Elf HAS to have Earth, or even that he has to have Earth or Water). And thus the Elf and Wizard have more variety in terms of how they begin vs. most of the new heroes who have fixed abilities (Knight, Rogue with their skills; Warlock, Bard, and Druid with their spells). The Wizard has great limitations on his equipment but he also gets special artifacts nobody else can use.
Another point I didn't spend much time on (because the Dwarf and Wizard quest packs were never officially completed and released... yet) is that every one of the four heroes was going to get an artifact that boosted their BP maximum by 2 and their MP maximum by 1. The Elf and Barbarian were the only ones that officially got these. I suppose here people would start to wonder if maybe the new heroes would get the same bonus as well, so they all end up back where they started. But for now the Barbarian and the Elf have an "advantage" over the others in terms of their boosting, assuming they survive all those extra hard quests to get these bonuses!
Ultimately, would you mind too much if your party had a body point total of 24, 26, or 27 instead of 25? So the only complaint I have against the Knight is that he was an exclusive, that quickly was going for ridiculously inflated prices after he sold out in the first day (with only one small restock before he was sold out "forever"). I waited nearly six months to get mine, but I'm thankful that now anybody can get this character (albeit in cosmetically altered form) within another retail expansion (and he's been available in the App for a long time now, which got extended to December 2026 by the way).
