EPISODES (An Overview)

The first session of "Three Seasons in Sartar" kicked off yesterday with "The Treasure Hunt Rite." While the next post will detail the scenario and how it went in play, a brief entry is needed to explain the format of these episodes and how challenges are designed.

* Episode Type: What is the overall gist of the Episode? Common Types include Assistance, Attack, Nuisance, Quest, and Test.

* Begin With: How does the Episode start? How are events triggered?

* The Situation: What is going on here? Is it more than meets the eye?

* Characters/NPCs: Who are the main characters and or or antagonists?

* Short Term Goal: What is the immediate objective of the players? What are the objectives of the NPCs?

* Long Term Goal: Are there any longer range objectives involved? Are there any future consequences?

* Scenes: “Begin With” is always the first scene, followed by two to four others depending on desired length.

* Conclusion: What are the rewards, results, and/or consequences of the Episode?

In addition to this framework, in any given scenario there will be a Main Episode and possibly one or more Sub-Episodes. Sub-Episodes are essentially "mini-adventures" that occur within the context of the larger tale.

Assigning Resistances

The second edition of HeroQuest uses a simple method of assigning Resistances based on the experience of the player characters and how much of a challenge the event should be. Narrators will have to adjust their Episodes accordingly. For example, if the episode involves conflict with Trolls, for beginning characters these should be minor trollkin with abilities in the 8 (low resistance) to 20 (high) or 3w (very high) range. For seasoned characters, who have played about 10 sessions, the antagonists would now have abilities ranging from 13 to 5w or 8w. These would probably be very skilled trollkin or lower powered dark trolls. Characters with a great deal of experience (say 20 sessions under their belts) would face resistances in the 18 to 10w or 13w range, and the antagonists would be more seasoned dark trolls, and so on.

The standard Resistances are;

Nearly Impossible: Base +W2

Very High: Base +9

High: Base +6

Moderate: Base

Low: Base -6

Very Low: Base - W or 6, whichever is lower

To determine Base Resistance, use a value of 14 and increase by +1 for every two complete sessions you have finished. For example, if you have played ten sessions, the Base is 19.