I've heard a number of complaints or disappointments about the fact that this game will be set in the "Terrinoth Universe," and I'm having a hard time understanding what the big deal is. Of course, I'm not familiar with the original, so I don't have a fondness for the original characters and/or story backdrop; however, I just don't see this as being such a big retheme. From what I can tell, the original had as much of a generic fantasy theme as it gets, and regardless of what the characters are named/illustrated/sculpted like, there's still the generic fighter, mage, etc. that explores a dungeon with a dragon and monsters in it.

Also, I cannot see how a retheme will necessarily change gameplay, as the specific fantasy theme isn't important for this type of game. When Runebound came out, the "theme" was described in a few paragraphs at the beginning of the rulebook...there was no deep story-line, and the characters, apart from name and artwork, were mostly a stock fantasy cast.

At worst, I think what we'll get here is something like Drakon, where Descent miniatures ("characters") are used, but the mechanics and gameplay have nothing to do with Terrinoth.

I do feel that this is a somewhat cheesy marketing strategy by FFG to stamp the Terrinoth brand on all their fantasy games as well as "reuse" miniatures without having to reinvent the wheel. But that's business...I don't really fault them for that. Besides, like I mentioned, the Terrinoth setting of this game seems rather loose and I suspect no-one will care when they are actually playing the game.

The one thing I would love to see, however, is that FFG NOT use the same 12 basic heroes in vanilla Runebound over and over and over again. Okay, the cross over with Runebound and Descent seemed reasonable. But honestly, I would have liked to have seen a little more variety in Runewars. And, boy, it will just bite if I see Mordrog and Mad Carthos in this DungeonQuest game! Honestly, though I love the "Terrinoth" games, I have no personal love or fondness for any of these characters! The good news is based on the posted illustrations, this is not going to happen.

My question I would leave with you all (especially those familiar with the original game) is, what exactly is lost by the Terrinoth retheme of DungeonQuest?

Absolutely nothing...

I agree with the OP, can't see anything will be lost. That being said for the characters included there are 4 "special order" characters for decent/runebound that seem almost impossible to get a hold of as well as the out of print runebound Midnight characters. If they are going to reuse characters hopefully they will look at those ones. Also I doubt many would complain then if they threw in stat cards for decent and runebound. Well I suppose some would complain but then again not matter what they do some will complain...

Kirenx said:

Adding those four would be an AWSOME idea!!! and of course especially when they would add Descent (and Runebound) Character-Stat cards!!! when using Terrinoth they might as well go all the way

What is lost is the Warhammer setting. I like the Warhammer setting; Terrinoth is too generic and shamanistic to be any interesting.

It's not a deal breaker at all but there it is.

Dungeon Quest was never set in the Warhammer world if anything it might of been in the Talisman setting as it had 'Talisman' printed on the box.

Shmoozer said:

And Runewars character cards

tech7 said:

Of course! (but i was just thinking selfishly towards Descent as i own that one too )

Anyways, i recon if these (4) promo figures are added (including sheets for the other games as well) this game would sell extra well, as many will already have at least one of the 3 games also included in the Terrinoth realm, thus extra interested (i know i will be!)

rcmoore said:

I don't have anything to base this on, really, but part of me is expecting the heroes in this game will be all new - and also the same as the "all new" heroes in the Jungles of Zanaga expansion for RB. Not sure exactly how "jungle themed" those heroes will be, but if they're anything like how the heroes in Sands were "desert themed," they'll still be pretty generic.

As far as losing anything with the re-theme, I don't think anything will be lost owing to that, except perhaps for people who hate the Terrinoth artwork, as I suspect it will in fact use that style of art. I don't mind that art myself. My concern is that, having played both Drakon and the old DQ, I think these two games are fairly similar for the niche they fill. Not identical by any means, but I'm not sure if they warrant being two separate games in the same setting by the same company. Maybe FFG will prove me wrong on that point (I'd like to think they wouldn't have done it if I were right.)

Mind Robber said:

There is an edition of dungeon Quest and expansion, which were made by GW and included typical Warhammer miniatures, like the Chaos Warriors.

I have the GW version and all its expansions, the only thing warhammer-ish is the the snotlings (many other fantasy worlds use the concept of chaos).

More gained than lost. Terrinoth is an active game world!

Kirenx said:

I actually have those 4 extra characters and honestly they aren't all that great when added to runebound or decent. However their Runewars cards are phenominal and definetly deserve some kind of print run for runewars players.

I don't know why should anybody complain? I think Terrinoth is a better place to set DugeonQuest. Terrinoth is more heroic then Warhammer (the old version from GW was set in this setting). Besides Terrinoth is so popular that it will bring more new players and will not destroy the good feeling from the Old game.

...Because you don`t mess or tamper with an classic game like that. Terrinoth is a cheesy world. I don`t like that world at all.

And to clear up some mistakes the original DQ had nothing to do with the warhammer world, in the same way as HQ had nothing to do with warhammer. Both games where produced by GW and had some elements drawn from warhammer but not in away you could say it had a "warhammer theme". Maybe later expansion where more themed orientated (I don`t have any of those expansion so I couldn`t tell).

What FFG has done is almost unforgivable. What`s wrong with having a game stay in a non-specific fantasy world?

I am on the fence on this. Love DQ, hate Terrinoth. But maybe once I know more I will "forgive em".

Mal Reynolds said:

Actually, Dungeonquest was first produced by Swedish company Alga. And GW re-themed the game to fit more with the Warhammer setting. So you should really have the same argument against the GW edition.

Franky said:

yeah I know, I own the old scandinavian version of DQ (see some of the other threads). I`ve never played the GW version of DQ, so I wouldn`t know how heavily warhammer themed it is. But people have mentioned that DQ was not warhammer themed. it had certain elements.

Mal Reynolds said:

The GW version of DQ was about as "warhammer-themed" as the previous editions of Talisman. That is to say, there were definitely elements of warhammer present (chaos warriors and such - even space marines in the Timewarp expansion) but most of it was pretty generic fantasy world.

Kirenx said:

The Midnight expansion is not set in the Terrinoth universe. Therefore, it is unlikely that Fantasy Flight Games will use characters from it.

Fun fact: The expansion is not even listed in the product section of Runebound.

I'm fairly certain that Midnight (which was a standalone d20 setting put out by FFG back during 3.0/5) as a line and as a Runebound expansion has been discontinued. And it was a rocking Runebound expansion.

Mal Reynolds said:

Before you can honestly bash FFG for making it terrinoth themed you would have to see the licensing agreement they did with GW. i wouldn't be shocked in the least bit if GW either didn't want them to use their theme of the game or were trying to get some ridiculous amount of money from FFG for that thematic licensing.

As long as the game mechanics stay true and it's still fun to play i could care less if it was themed with Candyland characters.

Personally, because it was a generic setting and I happen to like Terrinoth AND the fact that they provide you with materials for other games set in their world (and hopefully this is the start of a standard trend for them) its all good. It went from a generic killer dungeoncrawl to something tied into a setting a company's already demonstrated their willingness to support. All good IMO.