When Questing Was Not Just A Hero's Game

Sometimes, there are games that demand a reprint, games that have long faded to memory and to that fabled nostalgia that holds such things in high respect. Games that reach heart-stopping prices on the secondary market. Warhammer Quest should be that game. I am lucky in that I already have a complete set, as the original would both bankrupt me and a rerelease would take an organ I may need in later life.

It’s a good thing it’s not what you remember.

Make no mistake, I’d jump on a re-release in heartbeat, but this is absolutely down to the fact that 1995 was a great year full of great things and the release of Warhammer Quest is part of my brain like a physical shard of memory driven deep. I took my Dwarf (Rognak Grunderssonsonson) through a multitude of adventures until he eventaully took the Slayers Oath (the character pack came out just after a close to Total Party Kill, so it made sense to switch).

Even when my time with Warhammer Fantasy Battle came to an end, Warhammer Quest was played well into the 2000s, with a return in 2009 when the Old Oilhouse recordings* took place. And that seemed to be it until 2016 when my love of Warhammer came back in full flow, and I was lucky enough to get a deal sorted for a nearly complete Warhammer Quest set, with extras (missing the RPG book though, which I still need to find). And returning to the dungeons took place with much gusto.

Rognak made a reappearance and I found that, in the almost-decade between games, I started struggling with the rules that I knew so well. Something had taken place..

…… and that something was other board games.

Warhammer Quest is a stunning release, packed with great minatures, filled with a multitude of replayble quests, fitted with modular boards which are still my favourite way to Dungeon Crawl, and I love it so very much. But it’s so clunky now. So very clunky. I introduced it to younger players and focus vanishes. I introduce to people who have not played it before and interest wanes. Compared to Gloomhaven, Nu-Heroquest** and a horde of Dungeon Crawlers, both real and digital have moved the genre on, simplfying and streamlining the processes.

There are those out there who find the art in Warhammer Quest garish and cartoonish. These people are wrong, as Mark Gibbons and Wayne England cement the 90s style in the same way that Miller and Blanche did in the 80s. Looking at WHQuest against Advanced Heroquest’s more subduded dark style makes for a fascinating evolution of Warhammer. GW was very much running into it’s Way-Over-The-Top phase, with outlandish helmets, duel wielding two handed weapons and putting skulls on skulls on skulls on everything***

The 90s were an amazing time. It may not be the out and out despair and darkness that came before it, or the mud n blood that came after, this era of Warhammer is pure joy loaded with darkness in the lore and backstories. This release was a perfect example of it, a vivid world filled with bizzare creates and heroes and adventures that rivalled the very best DnD ever had to offer. It was also way ahead of it’s time in a surprising number of ways.

The game was totally co-op for a start. Whilst Advanced Heroquest had attempted something akin to this in 1989, WHQ had it straight out of the gate and it was entirely possible to play without a Questmaster. This concept became the “AI” of Blackstone Fortress 20 years later, but at the time, it was absolutely incredible and often unbelievable. Much like the meat-masher mechanics. Whilst the Co-Op game was a great expereince, it often led to moments of TPK early into a dungeon as rampaging Minotaurs would ruin momentum in room three, or even worse, not hitting a single fight in a sesson. Both were entirely feasible and often a Room O’ Death would fill a mouth with bad taste for going forward.

So, for someone as heavy into the Warhammer World as I was, it was perfectly themed. Mad, Dark, Unpredictable. That’s the Old World right there. However, that random element brought with it an equal amount of frustration.

However, when it hits right, exploring is a genuinely good time. rooms are empty until you step inside, where a random encounter card is pulled, bringing with it either monsters or a random event. It’s quick, though dice-heavy and the choice whittle down very quickly once the card is pulled. The game is a string of random encounters and reactive dice rolls, though if you play a linked campaign and gain skills, you gain more to do and more choices open up, which is why I’ll always say the roleplaying book is the correct way to play WHQ. It’s a game to make stories, one where the journey is far more than the destination could ever promise to be. It’s a game of camaraderie and teamwork, not of point scoring. It’s a game where you may decide to try and trip up a friend named Scott so the skaven eat him instead of you and take the Slayers Oath until a familiar looking Templar turns up with a different name and vengeance to unload. It’s a game of friends around a campfire. Its a game of “do you remember when?”.

It’s a game where all your party falls and you are alone in the dark, as the undead shuffle towards you. And you pick up the dice….

This is not a game about winning. This is a game about adventure. Often brutal but never boring.

This is the dungeon crawler that launched the genre. Heroquest began the snowball, but WHQ made it into an avalanche. It’s the game that all others are measured against, often ones that have surpassed it in all but the most important way. Rules may get streamlined, the games more complex or focused, but never do they hold the sense of tale-telling, of the childhood wonder I experience each and everytime. And that, cracks and all, is why it’s a beauty of a thing, something that the later versons of the game, whilst technically far better, have never managed to capture.

Does it need a release? No, possibly not.

Should it have one? Absolutely.

Until next time, I remain….

*Hi Stu! Best Questmaster I ever did have.

**and old Heroquest. The new one is a HD Remaster rather than a remake. Like Sonic Adventure DX

***This is not a negative