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Revival
Back in the early 90s HeroQuest had a few new expansions come out that were exclusive depending on whichever side of the pond you lived on. One of the two to come out in the UK was the Against The Ogre Horde. When HeroQuest was revived by Avalon Hill they based it on the North American version of the game, which contained several differences to the UK, most notably being much more difficult for the players. This also meant that the expansions being released were either those American ones or some brand new content. Now though, they’ve finally released one of the European exclusive ones, updated to match the difficult ruleset. Time to take on the Horde!
Meet The Ogres
Back in the day the original box was a flimsy thin cardboard box, a rarity to find these days in good condition because of this. Starting off by picking up the new box it shows us the beginning of the modernisation process. A thick sturdy box, updated art and sized to fit nicely on a shelf (or in a Kallax cube) with the other boxes. Looking inside there’s a couple of punch sheets we need to get through. It comes with the usual expansion bits in some extra tokens from the base game, then additionally you’ll get the extra cardboard sections from the original expansion, some new rooms and tiles, plus finally some extra parts that are brand new that we’ll get a look at soon.
Among the rest of the contents there's a small selection of cards, a quest book, then finally all the chunky plastic pieces we've come to expect from the new versions. As well as having a few standard enemies there's also, unsurprisingly, several ogres included. But while the regular versions are large enough in their own, towering over the incarnations of the Barbarian, the special ogres are massive, the pieces taking up two squares on the board alone and the rest of the figure sized up to match! Along with this are several more doors, some new double wide doors and even a double wide throne for the Ogre Chieftain. The large doors even have the middle part removeable so you can physically open and close them! This box already has several upgrades over the original expansion, not to mention the new hero character and more.
Learning To Fight
Being an expansion to the base game, all the regular rules of HeroQuest still apply. However, as well as the new quests and story line, it introduces several new rules to improve the game, along with more rules related to the newly added mechanics and pieces of course. The main feature here is the one advertised on the back of the box, which is the brand new Arena Mode! A new game mode which features heavily in the opening quests, the arena uses the large punch out board included instead of the main board, and pits two teams of fighters against each other. This will generally be the heroes against the monsters, but with the included rules could be done as a one off between differently matched groups of monsters.
Some other new introductions in the box to really make the game jump out:
Ranged Enemies – These guys were in the original expansion as a special mention in the rooms they appeared, but now they get their own cards and miniatures so they can appear in the same places, whilst also allowing them to be used elsewhere in place of standard enemies to mix things up.
Stone Doors – Heavy new doors required strength to be opened, giving another challenge for the heroes to overcome. Meaning parties consisting heavily of magic users might struggle, which could be the case if you decide to use the new Druid hero included in the box. One gripe about this part though is the rule text was copied almost directly from the previous rules, so they specifically reference only the Wizard for rolling one attack dice, but not the included Druid hero, even though he has the same exact one attack dice.
Average Move – When there are no enemies present you can treat any movement dice as if they rolled a 4, a fantastic addition which could have been adapted from the original Advanced Heroquest exploration rules, finally you don’t have to worry about one player taking a few bad movement rolls and lagging behind.
Multiphase Enemies – Some bosses have multiple stages, like they drop down then stagger back up as they get a second wind. Think about classic video game bosses who just don’t stay down, giving you a second or even third form which could be more rage filled or more desperate, and this gives a fresh surprise for the players who are used to boss enemies dropping to the ground and that’s it.
Time To Quest
The Quest book has been bumped up in this new edition, now featuring an extra three quests over its predecessor and bringing it in line with other expansion boxes. These quests see you being introduced to the arena and the Ogres, although the option to skip it is also presented to heroes who may want to get straight into it, whether you don’t fancy trying it or perhaps you’ve played before and just want to run it through again as originally intended. The early introduction to the Ogres also allows the players to charm one enough to be hired as a mercenary between the quests, a massive bonus to help even out the odds for the players. As well as this mercenary being able to bolster up the party, the Quest Pack also includes a wolf animal ally who can do the same thing, but the cost is waived and you can use it for free if it's replacing a missing party member.
Once you set out on the main block of quests you’ll discover these to be similar to what came before, the heroes will face the same level of enemies but now at an even greater strength to match the updated statistics, better get those extra party members while you can! A couple of rooms have been rearranged and some extra chests left around, but otherwise the layout remains the same so all the deadly new traps will be in the same locations. This also means you’ll still encounter a few enemy magic users along the way. Thirty years back the spells were introduced on some cardboard tokens but now they come included in the deck of cards, it’s just a shame that they’ve kept with the expansion’s individual style, so each spell comes with 5 copies of the card, and they don’t match up to the spells included in the base box set. The rules also deal with heroes running out of Mind Points now the spells have been brought back into the game, again almost lifting the text straight from the original rule book. Something in the back of my mind feels like there was a previous mention of running out of mind points would have killed the heroes in times past, but now it just leaves them unable to do more than the bare minimum but still participating in the quest.
Returning Home
Finishing off the Quest Book enables you to freely play with the Arena Mode if you don’t have any further expansions to play through. While this introduced something new and exciting, after repeated plays you might find the fights tend to end the same way, the two sides duking it out to the death in the middle. There are a few chests and bonuses to be picked up around the outside, but they probably won’t last too long. But it does let you try out different monster groups against each other, why fight the Ogres yourself when you can see how they’ll fair against a couple of Gargoyles or a legion of Dread Warriors.
The addition of the Ogre-for-hire and the Animal Ally go hand in hand with the official app, allowing groups to play with less than the full compliment of players and still get the full experience without having to make many modifications to the rules, or take the effort to play multiple characters at once.
So, I guess the main question would be is the Against The Ogre Horde expansion needed? Most likely my short answer would be it depends. There are several expansions available on the market, so what you need to consider is which ones you’ve already purchased and completed. One downside of the box compared to others available is it doesn’t include any extra dice that a couple of them contain, and due to the translation across versions it’s very high on the difficulty curve, so if you dive into it too early then the party might struggle to stay alive. But otherwise, the additions are definitely worth it, some of the rules can be translated across but will definitely improve the game, and the new hero gives some further options to play with, especially if you don’t have any other quest or hero packs. This along with the wolf and ogre means you can also take several different set ups when you play, plus while the arena mode can be a bit predictable at the ending, it does provide an alternative option for some shorter games when you can’t fit in a full quest but still want to get some time in questing.
