Hero Quest – Story and Lore – Part IV – The Return of the Witch Lord and small quests
Skulmar – well, when we get to the Return of the Witch Lord, we have the first major character is the witch lord himself, as he returns.. But we have plenty of new guys to help him out. First is probably Skulmar. Skulmar is the Captain of the Dead, the Witch Lords army. While not equal to his lord, He is one of the second in commands and when all 3 are fully together, major trouble!
You first met him quite a bit through the book, as expected, where he has a fairy strong stat line and fights with the Forgotten Legion. It appears that the reason the three big undead badies haven’t been together is because Skulmar and his Forgotten Legion are Encased in a block of magical ice which holds back this elite force of the undead. While Skulmar’s stat line isn’t too bad, like I said, he is a real coward.. The moment you enter the room with him and his forces, the ice brakes and you are now in a room with.. well, with 23 monsters, mostly skeletons with some zombies, mummies and Chaos Warriors.. yikes.. however, if his side starts to lose, he’ll leg it to the exit stairs as fast as he can, which is fairly fast. Can you beat him before he escapes? possible.. cause the stairway is right at the start of the map, in the room next to the Legion, and it doesn’t come to live until you go to leave, most likely leaving him an escape room.
Storywise.. it’s kinda expected that you HAVE killed him more then let him escape as the next we hear, in the game ending story, it was believed that Skulmar was killed but he has escape Kalos with many of the Witch Lord’s most powerful spell books, being aided by Sir Ragnar. While Ragnar was caught and executed, Skulmar is still out there and you will soon have to fight him…
Except.. you don’t. It hints at a next undead expansion but that never came to be. However, this wasn’t quite the end of Skulmar. In the Marvel Winter Special, the Monsters are introduced with a little story where Skulmar vists Morcar, along with a Chaos Dwarf Milnik. The Witch lord is heavily implied to be.. well, probably not dead but out of it for the long term, and Skulmar is put in charge as Morcar’s new second in command. As he is a dwarf, Milnik is given to work for Skulmar as a guide to the tunnels as the two talk about the various monsters. While we can debate how much the marvel special is ‘official’, I see no problem with saying it was. It was written by Ken and Jo Walton, with Paul Travers and Steve Baker was Games workshops advisor. (Jo was a sci-if/fantasy writer who started with doing Role-playing games work, with Ken (her husband at the time)).
Anyway.. while it would be a bit redundant to do ANOTHER undead expansion, it does seam like a planned expansion which was never made.
Kessandria – The Witch lord’s other second in command was Kessandria the Witch Queen. Not as much is known about her as she first appears in the penultimate mission, ‘The Last Gate’ where she is guarding. well, the last gate. With her, are the Doom Guard Elite Chaos Warriors who have a slightly stronger stat line then normal. the Witch Queen is kinda average in her line but she is immune to all but fire magic, and she is able to (once only) cast the Swift Wind spell. However, once she is attacked, she will flee much like Skulmar did, though she has much farther to run. Reguardless of the outcome, she is never seen or heard from again.
King Agrain – While only a background Character, King Agrain was the ruler of Kalos when Morcar launched his attack on the stronghold. When Kalos was given to the Witch Lord, he build this own stronghold under the now ruins.
King Agrain was described as one of the great kings of Kalos and a feared warrior, with fair laws in his kingdom. Very much respected. He also dabbled in magic himself and created the Halls of Vision, a maze of magical rooms which guard his Secret Workshop. And we have the Keys of Agrain… Basically, the Keys are 4 large gems. When you get into his workshop, you can find the Gems (one each for the heroes?) which means the Guardian Mummies will NOT attack anyone holding a Gem and any doors which disappear due to killing a mummy, will return to help give safe passage through the magical rooms. You can then sell them but they aren’t worth a huge amount (well, 100 gold each).
We don’t know quite what happened to the guy but most likely he was killed when Morcar wasted his city. We never met a mummy or skeleton which is either IDed as being him or could logically me him.
Bellthor – When you are finally into the Witch Lord’s subterranean fortress, the first gate is gated by Bellthor. Loretome describes him as a terrible guardian, I call him a very nasty Gargoyle (in the HQ term.. he doesn’t have a drainpipe). He will start off like a statue gargoyle in that he won’t attack nor move or take harm at first. however, once every player is in the room, the door will disappear and he will come to life.. this kinda gives the heroes an out but not a useable one. He will ONLY come to life when ALL players are in the room with him.. so as long as one doesn’t, he won’t attack.. problem is, you can’t end the mission without killing him.. so it isn’t a useable out.
He has a standard but tricky stat line, and a secondary attack as once per turn, he can breathe his poisonous breath on any one character in the room (regardless of distance). This gives 6 dice in attack and attacks the mind points for each skull rolled. IF the mind points become 0, they are knocked out and removed from the board.
If he is killed, before all Heroes are knocked out, he will explode, filling the room with a poisonous gas which will knock out everyone in the room anyway… So it’s kinda a false sense of hope. This leads to the Heroes being captured by the Witch Lord. So major character in the story but.. not really much of a character in his own right. Either way, he is dead after this so doesn’t matter too much
Milnik – Lets move to the Marvel Winter Special before the next book. Milnik is a Chaos Dwarf who, being a dwarf, knew the various mountain tunnels well and Morcar assigned him as second to Skulmar after the Witch Lord was out of action. He guided Skulmar around Morcar’s dungeons and described the various monsters to Skulmar. He probebly likes Rice pudding as it describes his beard as being full of old rice pudding. He appears quite sarcastic but appears to have his usage.
Mildred and Husband – A very small joke in the Marvel Special is when Skular is introduced to a group of Orcs playing cards and upsets them by refering to the group as chaps. One is greatly insulted as Mildred is his wife. Mildred and husband are about to start a fight, with others egging them on, when Skulmar destroys them with a ball of fire.
Gwynt The Weather-wizard & Erongil Corpsemaster- The Winter special has a scenario to play which deals with 2 new characters. The first is Gwynt. He was a wise weather-wizard who lived in the keep of the windmaker. However an evil Sorcerer ‘Erongil Corpsemaster’ tried to get him to join Chaos (or maybe just Morcar?) and he refused. So Erongil killed him and took over the keep.
Erongil is a fair stat line and multiple Body points. He is inside the main chamber within a circle of power. No magic can harm him in there and any magic item or weapon (like the Spirit Blade) cannot enter, so if a hero enters the circle, they will drop it on the floor behind them. He is also wearing strong magic armour but it will crumble away when killed. On top of this, he can summon 1 undead creature per turn at random (Zombie, Skeleton or Mummy) to anyplace in the same room.
Gwynt, however, is in a tomb in the dungeon. If you enter him his tomb room before you have defeated Erongil, He will appear and tell them that no magic can cross the circle of power. If you enter it AFTER Erongil’s death, he’ll tell you to search beneath the tomb for a reward, which allows you to get 500 gold coins.
Marvel Heroes – As we are on the marvel special, there is a short comic story which features a few characters. The Elf is named ‘Galadrus’, the Barbarian ‘Zull’, the Dwarf is called ‘Strom’ and the wizard is ‘Akron’, who is a pupil of Mentor. They are sent to find the Sword of Zalmir which was stolen by the Orcs. The story itself is… a little thing. After being sent to the chamber with the sword, they mostly just have to get out. Oh and no comment on who Zalmir was.. guy that had a fancy sword I guess.
Hinsgri, Eshlil & others – Hinsgrim was the Captain of the Emperor’s Elite Guard, the Dark Company. Eshil was a member of his unit.
Hinsgrim may have been loyal and highly regarded but fell into darkness and he and his men sworn allegiance to Chaos (maybe you shouldn’t have called them the ‘Dark Company’?). Eshlil was the only one that didn’t and he fled to the Emperor to tell him of what was going on and report that Hinsgrim had fallen from grace. Eshlil was seen as a spy by many of the Emperor’s top lords who wished to kill him to claim that Hinsgrim was still loyal but knew he wasn’t. The Emperor claimed that Mentor had warned them but they didn’t act in time and felt to the ‘old city’. the Emperor wanted the whole Dark Company destoried and Hinsgirm killed for what he did. A lord called ‘Lorrie’ claimed that if the Emperor gave him one legion, he could do the job but the Emperor didn’t want any more lords turning evil (they never say that Hinsgrim was a lord but it’s implied). Mentor chooses 4 warriors (up to) to deal with this threat.
While nothing much of Eshlil is heard, Hinsgirm is met and defeated while with a Chaos Sorcerer Delzarron who has little more said. Hinsgirm is like the Doomguard Chaos Warriors in the game with a pretty strong stat line, but has 5 body points. Delzarron has a Chaos Warriors stat line but has 3 body points and once per turn can summon an undead creature into the room he is.
As well as them, there was one more character you met as you hunt the Dark Company, Vadmin Gorfell, is someone that died and you can met his Ghost. When you do, first Mentor warns you not to fight him, When you find his tomb, he is using a Zombie figure (though stated to be a Ghost) who cannot be defeated unless you cast a spell which inflicts 1 body point of damage. So he was some fancy guy that lived in the Old City. On a side note.. ‘Old City’… in the Empire? Oh god, it’s first appearance Mordhiem….
Galimatias, Munzuk the Hun and the Cabiri Lords – okay, this is gonna be a bit tricky.. there were a few Hero Quest novels released and I don’t have any of them and when they are for sale, they go for a ungodly price. But two of them came with missions which I do have.
‘Running the Gauntlet is a Solo Wizard mission and features two notable characters.. maybe. You are crossing the Sea of Claws when you become shipwrecked on a small palace in the sea. Inside are the Cabiri lords, powerful wizards who are descended from a mix of men and sea-nymphs. They give you a quest to find the great treasure The Wand of Galimatias’. Galimatias was a mighty wizard from long ago and may have created the labyrinth it’s located in.. or not. Maybe the book gives more information.. Either way, you have to find his wand There is also Munzuk the Hun, who is a bit more of a character. AS you explain the labyrinth, you can find a Barbarian on a stretcher being tortured by an Orc. If you choose to release the Barbarian after killing the orc, he will reveal he is Munzuk the Hun, and he now owes you his life. He’ll accompany you for the rest of the mission. However, anytime he loses a body point, he will demand 50 gold coins in payment, else he just wanders off.
After you have escaped, you are to hand over the wand to the 4 Cabiri lords who gave you this mission. You, however, can choose to keep the wand instead and have to fight the 4 lords, powerful wizards. while weak of combat, they each have one of the 4 spell types to use.
Lord Thunrir, Thidrand, Balash, Grashlyg and Balor – in ‘A Growl of Thunder’, the Barbarian has a solo mission with a bit more story. He has returned to his tribe to find the great stave-hall in flames. Helping the rest of your clan save the people they can, you find Thidrand, your father’s Steward. He reports that your father, Lord Thunrir, lord of the tribe, is still inside and soon to die. When you find him, he reports that it was an attack by the Orcs of Stalac tor, who attacked using magic and stole 3 sacred treasures of Thunder God. He then dies leaving you to avenge him and the tribe and get back the items.
When you get to the stronghold, you need to deal with the Chaos Sorcerer who aided / was in charge of the attack, Balor. Balor has his own Chaos Warrior Honour guard. Balor appears talking with the Elders of the Orc tribe and there is the third treasure, Thor’s Hammer, on the table in front. If the Barbarian has the other two items and lifts the Hammer, The Orcs are instantly kills leaving only Balor to fight. It is also stated that Balor’s personal coat of arms is 4 serpents, interwinding to form an eight pointed star.
Balash is a wizard who can be found being beaten by 4 orcs and much like with Running the Gauntlet, you can gain his aid. If you keep the orcs busy for 3 turns in a row, he’ll have water and earth spells and will join you.
There is also Grashlyg. For some reason, as being a tor, this would be an old Dwarf hold, the Orcs have created a burial mound for Grashlyg, an ancient Orc warlord. If you enter the room with this mount, Grashlyg awakens as a undead Wight who will attack anyone (including fellow monsters) in his way.
Next time, We have to deal with a horde of Ogre’s and Morcar’s most powerful Wizards.