When The Party Decided To Play "HeroQuest" To Kill Time Between Adventures

The Crew had been hard at work since they'd first been hired to work the job. It had been a simple smash and grab in a dungeon, and so the guild had scraped the bottom of the barrel to see who they could come up with. What they got was a bunch of do-most-dirty-job crooks and hard cases who got put together on a team, and told to go find a magic globe. A dragonborn deserter from the army who was always ready to bust heads, a kobold sorceress with a rap sheet longer than her tail, a tiefling warlock with a specialty in blackmail, and a half-orc who'd escaped from a prison colony on false papers, they were a motley bunch who were always hard up for cash. They didn't know what the globe was, and didn't really care, as long as they got their membership cut of the job when everything was said and done.

Will Work 4 Phat Lootz

They outdid themselves, and pretty soon that one job spiraled out into madness. The Crew found themselves on retainer to a secretive organization hunting magic items across the world, facing the marshaling forces of a dire threat from a forgotten world, and dealing with bloodthirsty assassins and fellow thieves around every corner. They even won a landmark court case at one point, as mentioned in That One Time The Party Solved The Plot With a Legal Battle.

Of course, the organization that employed them was run by a dragon, and as long as little pieces of his hoard made its way into their hands, the Crew was more than happy to keep fighting the good fight.

However, as with every campaign, we eventually hit a long, slow patch where schedules got disrupted, the DM was feeling stressed, and we were just having some trouble getting together at our usual time and place. When that happened the Crew was on an airship, flying toward an island of underground tieflings who worshiped the lord of shadows. So, to pass the time without losing the spirit of the game, the DM did something interesting...

He had us play HeroQuest... in game, and in-character!

The Best Game Ever Made!

While HeroQuest was a gateway to RPGs for most folks, my group hadn't really heard of it until we came across the above video from Bardic Broadcasts. And as you can see, it's the best commercial that was never made for the game. For those of you who haven't played HeroQuest personally, it's basically a tabletop fantasy board game that's one step down from a full RPG similar to the games Wrath of Ashardalon or Castle Ravenloft from Wizards of The Coast. You all take on roles of the barbarian, the dwarf, the elf, and the wizard, put into a dozen different scenarios that make up their own campaign. You contend with monsters, and the machinations of the evil wizard who sits behind the screen and attempts to lead the heroes to their doom.

Our DM had been searching for a copy of this old game for a while (they tend to go for a few hundred dollars at best, given that it's out of print), and he'd finally gotten his hands on one around the time the campaign hit a snag. So we all decided to let the campaign sit, and play HeroQuest for a while... but we were going to do it as our characters while we were in transit to the next part of the adventure.

And it was goddamn hilarious.

The green dragonborn took the role of the barbarian, and for a while did his best to roleplay the stalwart hero instead of the heavy-drinking, hard-partying skullcracker that he actually was. The kobold sorcerer grabbed the dwarf, adding new aspects to the character's backstory, and bringing in a slew of extended family members whenever one dwarf died. The half-orc monk took on the role of the elf, trying to use grace and flourishes but always falling back on smashing stuff in the face. Even the tiefling warlock occasionally dropped in as the wizard, who was without fail smoking a particularly large blunt in between flinging fireballs and lightning. All the while the game was being run by one of the goliath crew members on the airship, who suggested it as a way to pass the time on their journey.

The Game Within The Game

HeroQuest is a fun game all on its own, and if you can find a copy you should pick it up as long as the price isn't too unreasonable. But roleplaying characters who are, in turn, roleplaying other characters was a trippy experiment, and one that yielded some amusing moments. More than a few jokes between the PCs while they were sitting around the game board recurred even after the campaign picked up and kept going, which was particularly funny.

Every now and again we still do a time skip, and rewind to the HeroQuest scenarios. And I have a feeling that, once the actual campaign is over and the villain vanquished, our heroes will once again pick up their dice cups a flagons to find out just what sort of adventures they can have sitting around that table in the back of the tavern.

Next Time on Table Talk!

With so many games paused thanks to the pandemic, my Runelords tales are on-hold for the time being. But hopefully I can keep sharing a few amusing asides like this week's tale until we can finish out the last of that campaign. So stay tuned, and I'll see you next time on Table Talk!

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