Ye Olde Inn

I'm coming to the Inn for some more advice, especially from those who know your Dark Elves from your other pointy eared species.

I've always been a big fan of Dark Elves and have managed to get them into a couple of Quest packs as the main adversaries for our Heroes.
They are skilled with all manner of weapons but especially with ranged attacks. Up til now I've been content to give the Dark Elf crossbowmen the same stats as the Elf archers from Mage in the Mirror as I already had monster card for them and it just seemed to make sense at the time.
Things have now changed. For a start, I found some really cool wood elves in a hobby store and got them really cheap (50p each!). Now that I have decent proxies for the elves in the official HQ expansion, I want my Dark Elvrs to stand out and be different from these official elves. This is were repeater crossbows come in...

In Warhamner Fantasy Battle repeater crossbows are fiendish Dark Elf weapons that allow crossbow bolts to be fired at a greater rate than from a regular crossbow. However, accuracy is traded off for greater rate of fire. In the Warhammer rules the player has the option to fire one round per turn at a ballistic skill of 3, or two rounds per turn at the ballistic skill of 2.

How to do this in HQ? I could have a Dark elf crossbowmen fire one bolt using 3 combat dice, or two bolts using 2 combat dice each. Or I could retain the four combat dice ability of the official HQ Elves when firing one bolt, then make them roll
Either 2 dice each or 3 dice each when attempting to fire off two rounds per turn. 4 then 3 might make them a bit overpowered. Additionally, I'm not sure whether to let them fire at two different opponents per turn or force them to fire two bolts at the same target. I think in Warhammer they had to fire at the same target.

Hmmm. Decisions, decisions.
I want to get this right as I think it would add a cool and unique monster to the Heroquest Dungeon. Any thoughts?

I did a QP with Dark Elves. What we found worked well for the repeater was the following:

Usual range for a ranged weapon.
2 attacks with 2 CD on same target.
No messing around with "3 for one attack", just simple 2 attacks, 2 CD.
For us this was the perfect balance, there were a few in each quest positioned strategically. If you prefer to only have a very few of them and make the monster more dangerous then try 2 with 3 to see how your group holds up.

How about.

Repeater Crossbow
4Ad6
Can split attack dice in to multiple shots
and different targets

That keeps it nice and simple but keeps the ability of multiple weaker attacks. More suited for a hero weapon than a monster.

'2 attacks with 2 CD on same target' sounds like a good idea but how does this stack up statistically over a 3Ad6 in 1 attack? We're basically increasing the Heroes defensive rolls, making it a very weak attack.

I have Quick Quiver for Bowman, 2 attacks in 1 turn.

Thanks guys.

I am definitely erring towards the side of "dangerous monsters" here. I want my Dark Elves to be an elite force, as they only appear towards the end of my Quest pack chronology. I want my Heroes to feel a sense of dread when they enter a room with Dark Elves. Even advanced Heroes.

Mitchie, good point about increasing the Heroes number of defensive rolls against weak attacks. 2 attacks with 2 CD on same target is the same as being attacked by two Goblins, which is not very scary. Even 1 attack with 3 CD, is like being attacked by a single Orc crossbowman. Again, not very scary.

I take the suggestions from both of you about keeping it simple. At this point I think I'm going to give them an attack of 4 CD, which can be split in to multiple shots and different targets. This would keep them in line with the offensive power of the official Elven archers but give them more tactical choices. Thematically, the Dark elf crossbowman is unloading against his single opponent with multiple bolts at 4 CD, or trying to pepper a group of Heroes with multiple split attacks.

When combined with Dark Elf spearmen (diagonal attacks and a decent defence), Witch Elves (poisoned attacks), and Executioners (ferocious attack), this gives the Evil Wizard player with a band of Dark Elves a lot of tactical options. And a real headache for the Heroes .

Pancho, all this talk about Dark Elves sounds really cool. Is there a Quest Pack you're using all these for, and if so, which one?

Spookyhappyfun wrote:Pancho, all this talk about Dark Elves sounds really cool. Is there a Quest Pack you're using all these for, and if so, which one?

Hi Spooky,
Good question. I can answer that but it won't make me too popular around these parts LOL as I know many folks here don't like it when the official quest packs get messed with!!!!! And boy have I messed with them....

I've got two quest packs that feature the Dark Elves.
1) The Dark Company.
2) Mage in the Mirror

I've never actually played the Dark company but to me it always looked like a bit of a slog with very few new and exciting features to really tempt me to play it. Plus I never had the models to represent the Dark company warriors anyway. And I felt that the story was too similar to the Sir Ragnar tale; i.e the Emperors best Knight turns evil. Yawn. So I had a brain wave, why not make Hinsgrim to actually be Ragnar? And then give Ragnar a bunch of elite warriors that he's paid to protect him. Enter the Dark Elves. I already had lots of these models lying around. The Dark Company crossbowman becomes a Dark Elf crossbowman, the halberdier becomes a Dark Elf spearman, the scout becomes a Dark Elf scout and the Swordsman becomes a Dark Elf swordsman.The only real challenge was to give these guys unique and interesting stats/abilities but at the same time make all four of similar value; this was because in the Dark Company the Evil wizard player gets to choose which Dark Company warrior he placed on the board each time the generic Dark Company icon appears in an activated room. If one of the four was better than the others, it would get chosen each and every time, and I wanted to avoid that.

The Mage in the Mirror has also been converted to a Dark Elf quest pack. Again, I didn't have the original models so decided to change things up a bit. It's not stated outright that the Mage in theMirror is set in the wood Elf kingdom, although it's generally accepted to be the case I didn't think it was too much of a departure to place it in the High Elf kingdom, which is at war with the Dark Elves. Our Elf Hero becomes a High Elf. Sinestra becomes a Dark Elf sorceress. I added witch Elves and executioners to the monsters already listed. One idea I really liked was that Sinestra knows that the Heroes are coming for her and has therefore despatched 5 assassins whose sole purpose is to kill the Heroes. They appear when wandering monster traps are triggered during the second half of the quest pack, and add a bit of tension.
It actually all works really well in my opinion.

Heroquest sacrilege I know, but good fun nonetheless.

The fun's the main thing--good choices.

From Mining Mordheim

Bareheaded Warrior wrote:
Add a restriction to the Crossbow so that you cannot move and shoot on the same turn.

Repeater Crossbow
600 Gold Coins
Weapon, Large, Missile, Both Hands, 2AD
This missile weapon allows you to roll two combat dice in attack and enables you to shoot twice as a single action against the same or different targets.

Quantity = 1 (I would restrict this to only a single Equipment card as it is supposed to be very rare)

Need magical laser sights...