Ye Olde Inn

Hey everyone, I was curious from your experience how hard HeroQuest is when there is only two or three players and one of them is the GM? The quests aren't adjusted for the number of heroes, and the instruction booklet just says "using less than 4 Heroes will make the Quests more difficult", but is it feasible?

Obviously, I'm not asking about the quests for the expansions that are designed for fewer players.

As you've pointed out it does make the game more difficult, but that doesn't mean it can't actually make a game better. An experienced GM will know what sort of a party can handle a specific quest. For example a very powerful experienced Hero could probably easily handle the base game quests solo. We often play quests with smaller groups if I feel it is appropriate. We recently played a couple of the Brazilian translation quest packs with only 3 moderate Heroes as they are not overly challenging.

But if you are talking about one or two new Heroes playing the base game quests, its obviously possible, but there is a high chance of death. In this instance I would let a player take multiple Heroes.

If your question is if 1or2 players can play the basic campaign solo then Id say no (supossing they dont have items or anything since thats the beginning of any quest).
However for the basic campaign 4 players (unexperienced even) are too much, you have to add a couple things to make it interesting. Ideally id suggest 3 players for the base game (or 2 very very experienced) if you wanna play it as is. More players is more fun though, so its really up to you. When I played as a hero there where 3 of us but the GM played by the book, it was challenging but nothing too hard. Now that Im the GM and I have a group of 4 I feel like I do need to add some things to make it more challenging and interesting for players. Also in my group everyone is a new player (1 is very very noob, 1 is very good and 2 are ok-good) so its not like they are a supergroup and I need to add stuff, they are just average players

I am working a lot on the question "is it playable".

You can replace one fighting hero by 4 Helmsmen, if they have 2 Body Points.

That's also more fun, for me at least, because you can kill them without the player complaining as loud as he would if the hero died.

Then, check out the coloured quest book in my sig. It is not beautiful, but it allows to adapt the difficulty in four steps. For another hero less, I propose to play one step easier.

So there you go, two heroes, four mercenaries (one of each kind) and one step easier than normal, done.

Have fun

Thank you so much for your feedback!

It seems to me that this also provides a quick way of modifying difficulty without a whole bunch of house rules; you just change how often "Zargon" gets their turn. Like, to make 4 heroes harder, instead of going after all four heroes, Zargon goes after three or two have gone, then continue with the hero rotation as normal. To make 2 heroes easier, they each get to go twice between Zargon's turns. Almost the equivalent of having more or fewer heroes that way.

You've raised a good question. It's for this reason that I've been stockpiling some of the single-hero quests for times when I'd like to run a game of HeroQuest but only have one person who's able to make it. That way if you do get another person who's able to join you can modify a simpler quest instead of trying to make a more difficult quest easier.

I recommend trying both though and posting what your plays show. I don't think there's a wrong approach - this is where the creativity of the system comes into play which is why it's a living game still to this day

hightechartist wrote:Thank you so much for your feedback!

It seems to me that this also provides a quick way of modifying difficulty without a whole bunch of house rules; you just change how often "Zargon" gets their turn. Like, to make 4 heroes harder, instead of going after all four heroes, Zargon goes after three or two have gone, then continue with the hero rotation as normal. To make 2 heroes easier, they each get to go twice between Zargon's turns. Almost the equivalent of having more or fewer heroes that way.

I like the way you think! For a few extra considerations, check out this post.

I've played some rather difficult solo quests where the Hero was given Mercs to make it more fair (here I'm thinking of Q3 of BQP and Q1 of EQP).

Some quests that work really well with solo are the early quests in the Japanese game system (which were intended for beginners, in that version of the game your magic goes from beginning to intermediate to advanced over the course of the first four quests).

If it's a matter of having fewer players but not overwhelming them with things they need to control (which having mercs does, it's like having one person controlling multiple heroes even if they are weaker heroes).

You can buff out the players if you want, by giving them random draws of potions, equipment and/or spell scrolls at the start. I've also seen some give them an amount of gold at the start to buy gear. That's if you want to make it easier for a smaller amount of heroes. You could let them draw more Combat cards, too.

If the quests were developed for a certain number of heroes, I tend to think you should try to play them that way, acknowledging any less than the recommended number will be more difficult and so don't be surprised if the Heroes lose.