The HQ toolkit for understanding its secrets

[Der_Renegat]

HQ Esoterica

Im into HQ since it came out in germany as HeroWars. That was in the year 2000.
Understanding the game is kind of a science. Im still learning to understand its full potential. This board and the Yahoo Group were the most useful sources.

I think its a pity that you still have to collect the advanced basics all on yourself. Maybe a HQ companion would be a good idea.

So i had the idea to make a thread thats a source for all the HQ esoterica.


I begin with a quote from ian hammond:

One key difference between RuneQuest and HeroQuest is that HeroQuest is about conflict not task resolution. Only roll when a something is at stake that we care about, not just to accomplish a task. The trick to this is that failure should advance the story as well as success. If failure means no adventure tonight there is no point in rolling. Just have the hero do it. If failure means go left instead of right, then its worth rolling to see how the conflict plays out.

[Der_Renegat]

Why are bonuses weaker than ratings ?

http://www.indie-rpgs.com/forum/index.php?topic=14475.0

[Der_Renegat]

How to select the resistance

Mike Holmes said:

In HQ, there are largely three sorts of resistances you can throw at a character:

Relatively Low Resistance - these are good for showing how easily the character can handle the average conflict if they win, or for showing how mortal the character is if he loses.
Relatively Equal Resistance - these are good for high tension, and showing how cool the character is relative to the dangerous world and dangerous people, and how he's willing to risk.
Relatively High Resistance - these are to show that no matter how good you are, there's always somebody better, or just that the world is a very dangerous place. No shame in losing, everybody expected that. But if you win, then you're the hero.


Easy - this is a 6 resistance, the default. Note that this should only be rolled if there's some potentially fun result for failure; otherwise the "no self-respecting hero" clause comes into play, and it's automatic success. If you're not sure whether or not it'd be fun to roll, ask the player if they'd like to do so.

Moderate - this is probably a 14 resistance, the default resistance "of the world." Note that a novice (13) still has a good chance to do this, but it's very uncertain. I roll a lot at this level, because it's fun to see characters as humans who quite simply fail a lot in life.

Difficult - 5W? This really starts to relate to ability. What's difficult for one character in HQ is child's play for another. But at 5W, it's always uncertain for the vast majority of people attempting it. Even a master's master will fail occasionally. Yet even somebody with no skill at all will often manage such a task.

Very Difficult - 5W2. At this level any human has a good chance to fail, and novices are staring up quite a big hill. Though it's still far from impossible, especially if the character is backed by the drama of a HP, and/or lots of augmenting abilities.

Heroic - This really depends on what you mean by heroic. I'd call it 5W3 for most characters - meaning that they're taking on something that's probably over their head, or for which they had to really prepare hard. Opening up an otherworld is a benchmark here at 10W3. This is probably parallel to 7th Sea's "Heroic."

The Other Heroic - "Hero" in mechanical terms in HQ means somebody who is so talented that their acts take on magical (or mystical) quality to them. To challenge somebody at that level of mythic ability, you need more like a 5W4, or even higher. If you want to make it really uncertain against a player hero augmenting hard to add to a heroic level of ability, you need more like 5W5 or even higher. 5W6 is not out of the realm of possibility. Note that, at this level, these things become impossible for humans who are in a more recognizably mortal level of power.

[Der_Renegat]

Failure means conflict

http://www.indie-rpgs.com/forum/index.php?topic=19806.0

[Mike Holmes]

Cool resources. I'm all for cross-linking references.

That said, I think that what you're forming is a "Forge-centric" view of how to play HQ. No surprise, given the venue, but I just wanted to indicate that. Put another way, there are many out there who have some very different opinions of how HQ runs best.

I think it should be made clear that we're doing a lot of "interpreting" of the HQ text in coming up with these things. It's entirely possible that other readers come up with entirely different, yet semantically as viable, readings of the material. That's the nature of language, especially as HQ was written.

What I'm trying to say is that what we have here is "How some of us here have found HQ to work best." Rather than the "right" way to read the text, or the "right" way to play. Sorry if that's obvious, and maybe I'm just defensive, but I've been accused of pushing my way to play as the only way to play enough times that I don't want anything that's got my name on even part of it to be incorrectly seen as trying to dictate how to play to anyone.

These are suggestions for how one community has come to grips with this ruleset, and how we make it work for us.

In fact, I'm quite aware that my own presence on this forum has a potentially chilling effect on any discussion beyond the viewpoint here. That is, I post so frequently, and to such a high percentage of the threads, that I feel that I have chased off those who have opposing views of how to play. That's probably a very unhealthy thing. My only excuse is that I have so much fun playing HQ the way that I do, that I feel a constant need to elucidate this to others so that, if they're interested in playing like I do at all, that they can use what I've learned.

Which, yes, has the effect of creating a larger community of players with whom I can share play and techniques and such - I have an obvious bias. I just want to say that I'm aware of it, and the effect that it's had. If somebody wants to present a dissenting opinion on this, please try to co-opt me into the effort, as I'd like to make amends for any damage I've done to an open debate here. May be too little, too late, but I want to make the effort.

Mike

[Barna]

As much as I've appreciated your extensive and well-thought-out posts on all the threads I've read, I think you are right Mike. As a complete newcomer to The Forge, I've had two impressions.

One one hand, the level of discussion is amongst the best I've ever seen, in aspects of grammar, politeness and intelectual rigour. On the other hand, sometimes I feel that the general tone of the boards can become a bit too serious and dogmatic. I despise people who criticize RPG theory and "formal" discussion under the banner of "it's just a game"; I'd like them to see how many designers, theories and complex issues are considered so that they can have, say Civilization IV on their PCs. Still, I beleive that sometimes disclaimers such as the one Mike just made are needed.

I've just started reading some RPG theory, and one of the things I liked the most when reading John Kim's excellent page is a notion which apparently was part of what could be called the first intentions of RPG criticism. That is, the idea that every playstyle is respectable in itself. I don't think this point can be emphasized enough, and I beleive that a lot of misguided folks in other boards who diss The Forge could be drawn towards a more critic view of their games if their orientations were not dismissed. That does not mean that The Forge should ignore it's own repectable Narr bias.

I'm sorry to inject this rant in the middle of a thread, but I feel that Mike had a point with his statement. There are way too many good ideas on this board and it's a shame that only a small sector of the RPG community appreciates them.
 

[Der_Renegat]

anybody else has something to add?

would it be possible and in the interest of the people of this board to make it a sticky ?