Current Rules for Heroica in the Shirtcliffe household / Alternate Rules for Heroica / Alternative Heroica Rules
(I willl work out meta tags in GSites eventually)
The game in this form is cooperative and consists of one or more hero party players and a one or more enemy players. We have Fortaan and Waldurk and the children like to have all monsters on the map, which means the hero powers have been increased to stop them from dying all of the time.
The basic Heroica rules and dice are used except
1 instead of doing multiple damage, tougher monsters have multiple hits and are knocked back as heroes are when damaged.
2 When attacking two enemy the attacker rolls against one of the enemy. At the same time the other enemy gets to roll against him. If the second enemy rolls a skull nothing happens, if a sword or shield is present the attacker loses a life.
3 To use powers the hero or monster declares at the beginning or end of their move that they will do so and roll two heroic dice. If they roll one or two threes or fours (a sword or shield or double) they activate their power, if not their turn continues as usual once a tiredness check has been carried out. If they roll a shield and another shield or a three (sword) they have a critical success and their power is more effective.
Tiredness-on attempting a power the character rolls a heroic die, if a skull appears they are tired and get a tiredness counter (we use round brown lego one-dots as hats). They cannot use their power until they drink a potion (removing the hat). Any potion can be used to recover hero power. This has the added effect of making all potions useful (move twice does nothing useful in co-op) (we are thinking of ways to make sure that potions do not all get given to the druid (best tactic)).
(Alternative rule, each character gets tokens for power uses instead)
(If you have a lot of the tiles for the dice you can modify them to change these probabilities, if we play a lot that will be our next thing)
4 The monsters are given a turn and can move just as the players do, boss monsters have powers just like players
5 If the shield is rolled in normal play the character may move 5 spaces. With this and other rolls they are not required to move nor to move the full amount allowing tactical moving.
Powers
Knight, Barbarian, Wizard, same as in normal rules, criticals do two damage.
Druid heal two points, can distribute as desired within the party, criticals heal four. Always take a druid along in co-op
Thief backstab, take one step past the monster, roll two dice, if it works monster loses a life and is forced one step forwards and may have to fight another hero. If unsuccessful thief is detected trying to pass monster and stays on front side, must fight normally.(this is a fun power)
Thief second powers pass a monster unseen (monster cannot attack him), open a locked door (pick lock) open a chest (no damage received)
Sage (recover strength, remove tiredness from one other character) this might make sage+druid+barbarian OP, we do not have a sage so have not tried it.
Dark Druid animate zombie (dead monsters rejoin battle as 1 hit monsters) range 5, critical, they get 2 life.
Goblin King takes two turns for each party turn
Goblin hero, move 5 spaces, causing 1 damage to each hero on the path. This one is very nasty.
Second powers
Knight Block- Forces monster to attack him and he cannot be knocked back(monster knocked back instead. Replace shield on dice with skull for this monster attack roll. (this is quite fun)
Barbarian Berserk- stays “alive” on zero hit points for one turn, can try again next turn if not hit again.
Wizard Shock, roll attack for each enemy within 5, wizard automatically tired.
Druid Revive, revives an out of action party member, Druid automatically tired