I’m not sure if the resurgence of Heroscape is due to new players or to those of us whose collections from the days of yore (OK – 2004-2010) cried out for more stuff, but there’s no question that Heroscape is back. (Honestly, it’s probably a combination of both – which is a good thing, right?!)

Yesterday afternoon, Renegade Game Studios with hosts Anais Morgan (Community Coordinator) and Lee Houff (producer for the Heroscape line) revealed details about the next wave of Heroscape releases – and this looks like the largest wave yet to hit the stores! (Well, eventually – this particular wave of goodies will arrive in two different drops in the spring of 2025.)

And if that isn’t enough Heroscape content for you, I’ll also be sharing some highlights from the Heroscape Game Designer Roundtable… which was a lot of fun for this long-time Heroscape player.

Army Expansions

There are six new Army expansion boxes coming… that’s right, six. The first three boxes will released in February 2025, with the remaining three boxes dropping in April 2025. (It’s like Renegade is drip-feeding us Heroscape content… and I’m here for that!)

The first box – Knight Primus Adelbern & Ordo Borealis – has four Ursine figures… another armored polar bear knight (armed with a mace) and a squad of harpoon cannon wielding armored polar bears. With their addition to the world of Heroscape and the Ursine figures from the Age of Annihilation master set, fielding a Jandar-based polar bear of my dreams is now a viable possibility. (I will note that one of the Ordo Borealis bears looks pretty stoked to be holding a harpoon cannon, while another gives off “I’m holding a cannon but I could easily be playing heavy metal guitar in an 80s hair metal band” vibes. And I love it.)

The second box – Sonlen & Halushia, Scion of the Wild – has two large figures who protect the forests of Valhalla… and wreak havoc on those they oppose. The figures (as you can see) are gorgeous. As a long-time Heroscape player, the return of Sonlen riding a dragon is a nice payoff – his original figure had him with a dragonling perched on his shoulder like a hawk. Halushia can control beasts and has a really nifty Ride-By special attack that allows him to charge a la Lord of the Rings and strike down multiple enemies.

The third box – Hellforge Mandukor – is a single massive figure whose Blast Furnace ability can decimate opponent armies with its ravenous heat. (The first time I saw the army card for the Hellforge, I imagined him running roughshod through a horde of zombies. This could be because I lost to a horde of zombies while playing Heroscape earlier this year.) This figure is an additional Eisenek refugee – making him “buddies” with the Eisenek figures released in Wave 2. (My review of Wave 2 will go live in a week right here on the OG.)

The fourth box – Queen Maladrix and Festering Honor Guard – contains six figures… the huge (size 12) Queen Maladrix figure plus the Honor Guard squad. These insectoids have a voracious appetite to feast on their opponents. The Queen is really big – size 12 in Heroscape terms is dragon-sized. In addition, these beasties can infect enemies as parasites – it’s like something straight out of the Alien film franchise.

The fifth army box – Oathbound Phalanx and Oathbound Legionnaires – contains five figures… another huge figure and a unique squad that is (quite obviously) tied to it. To be technical, each of the squad figures looks like three legionnaires piled on top of each other, which is creepy… but that’s nothing compared to the giant ball of badness that is the Oathbound Phalanx. Stacking Legionnaire figures on the Phalanx army card gives it a powerful multiple attack ability. Yikes.

The final army box – Wing Command Tuck Harrigan and Vorid Glide Strikers – makes me happy in my heart. These five figures are part of a new Valkyrie General’s army (his name is Volarak). The Vorid are sentinent animals, armed with weaponry & flight suits – who glide onto the battlefield much like the original (Rise of the Valkyrie circa 2004) paratroop unit. They are cute – and potentially lethal.

If you want to know more about each of the characters/figures, check out the character biographies on the Heroscape.com site.

All of the boxes will have both standard editions and premium painted editions:

February 2025

• Rising Tide: Knight Primus Adelbern & Ordo Borealis
  • standard – $45
  • painted – $65
• Sonlen & Halushia, Scion of the Wild
  • standard – $45
  • painted – $65
• Hellforge Mandukor
  • standard – $25
  • painted – $35

April 2025

• Queen Maladrix and Festering Honor Guard
  • standard – $45
  • painted – $65
• Oathbound Phalanx and Oathbound Legionnaires
  • standard – $45
  • painted – $65
• Wing Command Tuck Harrigan and Vorid Glide Strikers
  • standard – $45
  • painted – $65

Terrain System

In addition to all the army goodness, there are two terrain expansions coming as well – both in February 2025!

The first of these is The Swamps of Valhalla. Swamp terrain was originally introduced in the second original Master Set (Swarm of the Marro) and it’s really nice to see it return. In addition to the things we’ve had before, the good folks at Renegade have added 3 hex swamp water tiles as well as two Swamp Underbrush pieces. The set will contain 36 swamp terrain pieces and will retail for $60.

The second terrain expansion is The Snow Fields of Valhalla. Snow terrain was in the Thaelenk Tundra box back in original Heroscape… and it includes both snow-y terrain and ice. Much like the Swamp box, the Heroscape team at Renegade has added 3 hex ice tiles as well as two Evergreen trees flocked with snow (which look great). The set will also contain 36 terrain pieces and will retail for $60.

Yes, both of these boxes work with the original “old skool” Heroscape terrain.

Heroscape Paints

As I’ve noted before, I have the miniature painting skills of a four year old with anger issues… but for those of you who are interested, Renegade will be releasing a Heroscape paint set, using Warpaint Fanatic colors (and including a paint brush as well). The set retails for $90 and will be dropping in February 2025.

Promos & Pre-Orders

The Sgt. Drake promo figure from Wave 1 is now available for purchase direct from Renegade for $20. (This is one of the cool things Renegade is doing with promo figures – eventually, each of them will be available for purchase online so you won’t miss out!)

As well, the pre-order promo for Wave 3 is Major Q11, a new heavily armed Soulborg figure that is ready and willing to help out the rest of your original Heroscape Vydar robots. He’ll be available when you pre-order from the April releases.

A big “thank you” to Renegade for creating this next handy graphic to let us know which pre-orders can be bundled and when each of the new boxes will be released.

The final bits in the reveal show (way to go, Anais & Lee) reminded us of the Heroscape Day (it’s October 19th!) promo figure (Cornelius Breech) and gave us a sneak peek of the upcoming game store tournament figure, Thyraxis Dragoon. They also talked about Store Championships coming up in May 2025 as well as the Heroscape Battle Network (which has an excellent Army Builder). We used the Army Builder for our Labor Day epic Heroscape battle – folks who were driving in were able to create their teams ahead of time rather than waiting until they arrived.

More reveals will be coming in February 2025… and I’ll be right here ready to report on them!

Heroscape Game Designer Roundtable

In addition to the Rising Tide Reveal stream, RenegadeCon also hosted a roundtable with Lee Houff, Alex Davy, Dyllan Fernandez, and S. Rowan – all folks working on the new world of Heroscape. What follows is my quickie recap, including some extra information I hadn’t heard officially shared before!

First, some gaming background for these folks

• Alex: worked on Star Wars: X-Wing, Star Wars: Armada, and Star Wars: Legion
• Rowan: worked on Marvel Crisis Protocol and Star Wars: Shatterpoint
• Dyllan: worked on the customs community for Heroscape as well as other wargames

Development Process

“The world is your oyster” when it comes to Heroscape design – you can let your imagination run wild. Design ideas have internal playtesting, followed by review by some of the old school designers of the original Heroscape game, including Craig Van Ness. Following that, there are external playtests with a variety of playtest groups. (Alex shares specifically about the upcoming Revna Acolytes and their resurrection power – I’ll let you watch it to get the gory details.)

And that doesn’t include all the work that goes into developing the actual figures: sculpts, colors, budget, etc. – which is just the pre-production work.

Balancing Thematic Elements With Mechanics

A fun figure has mechanics that are understandable… and understandable mechanics makes a figure fun. (Rowan aptly notes that this is a loop – which is a good thing!) A particular figure or squad is going to be constricted in design by its place in the world of Valhalla – but refining that to work on the table is a key part of iterating the design. The same thing can happen when you’ve got a great mechanic you want to use – and need to fit into the story of the game.

There’s also the possibility of creating a new version of an existing character… which involves pushing them forward in their life/trajectory while honoring their previous story & design. It’s not simply about naming an ability, but making it feel like it echoes and/or amplifies the story and character.

No surprise – sometimes is this is easy to do… and sometimes it’s extremely difficult. (That’s why these folks get paid to do the job, right?!)

Iteration in Game Design

The process of design & playtesting is not a “one and done” process… but if you come in with a strong concept, the iteration process makes sense.

Dyllan shared about the process of adding the lava-dropping death throes of the upcoming Molten Crustaceans… which tells me that we’ve got more Hot Lava Death in our future. (As I was part of one of the playtest groups for the original Volcarren Wasteland expansion, this warms – pun intended – the cockles of my gamer heart.)

Pitfalls in Game Design

Things to avoid:

• the deeply hated “lose/skip a turn” mechanic
• anything that removes agency from players (a hearty AMEN from me, thanks)
• stuff that causes player to not be able to play the game

With Heroscape, you also have to integrate your new designs with the context of the beloved game design and world. Alex is really clear that new things have to work with old things. A great quote: “When you’re given stewardship of a game like this, it’s important to honor everything that has come before with what you’re trying to do.” (At this point, I’ll pause to say “thank you” – as a long-time player, y’all are doing that well.)

Misconceptions About Game Design

Dyllan lets us know that game design doesn’t exist in a vacuum – not just the playtesting process, but also the production, marketing, and timeline considerations. There’s a lot of artistry that goes into designing/publishing games under a very compacted schedule.

Lee likens making a game to a conspiracy board – all the different elements that have to be tied together. (Note: picture is NOT actually a picture of Lee & her conspiracy board.)

How Do You Welcome New Players?

Rowan raises a really good issue – the difficulty of stepping into an army builder game (like Heroscape) when you don’t know enough of the game to figure out what’s “good” – which can easily lead to an unpleasant experience that turns you off from the game.

The solution isn’t simplifying the game, it’s helping carry some of the cognitive load in the early going so that players can learn as they go. Scenarios with pre-built armies act as excellent stepping stones into the game, as do adding simple objectives to educate players to go beyond “to the death” strategies and army designs.

The Battle Box was a specific design choice to make it easier to learn/enter the game. (Ooo… Lee just told us there is an army box coming in 2025 with more Dryan wizards and more beasts to control.)

Integrating New & Old Units

They want to build on classic Heroscape – but a lot of current players don’t have easy access to those resources. The trick is building new units that work without the old materials – but still create synergies that refresh the classic figures in the game. (Dylann tells us how much fun that is by sharing about the Tanuki Tricksters coming up next year that synergize with the Vorids – new stuff – but also with the classic ninjas from the original game.)

My sons and I saw this big time when you pair Sir Denrick (old skool) with the Frostclaw Paladins (new stuff) – yikes, that was powerful.

Player Feedback

Player feedback (well, playtester feedback) is vital. Alex shared that the long-standing Heroscape community has been an important part of his development into designing the game – both in adding things to the game but also watching for problematic synergies. (More Trickster info – had to nerf a power that worked with Tricky figures because of some of the “scary” Tricky figures from classic Heroscape – example “Death Reavers” – the boys & I call them “devil dogs”.)

There are lots of different kinds of players:

• casual players
• thematic army builders (that would be me)
• weird army builders
• serious competitive players

“If we do our job right, there’s stuff in the game for everyone.” (Alex)

Engaging AND Replayable

Living games get some of that from new content… but it also means building sets (for example, the Master Set) that are fun in a variety of ways. So, one of the keys to Heroscape figure design is making sure that figures have multiple ways that can be deployed, depending on the army they’re with and the objectives of a particular scenario. That includes creating bizarre and/or weird ways they can be deployed – which can result in experiments gone horribly wrong or glorious victories.

Replayablity is dependent on answering the question: “Is there something to be experienced that you can’t get out of just one play?” Heroscape by design (map-building, army building, scenarios, etc.) is great for this!

Lee shares about the joy of pulling off a big move with a tricky power in Heroscape – even if you lose, making that happen is part of what keeps her coming back to the game. (Me too, Lee! Making Taelord actually work this summer is a goal I’ve been thwarted in for literal years – and it finally happened!)

Collaboration in the Design Process

Renegade is not siloed off in design teams – they get the privilege of commenting on and giving input into the various elements of game development.

“Too many cooks” does NOT apply to board game design.

Advice for New Tabletop Game Designers (Rowan)

#1: Dig in – play a lot of games.

#2: Play different games. (If you want to make a tabletop wargame, don’t just play tabletop wargames – branch out!)

#3: Play games critically – both what works and what doesn’t. And figure out why.

#4: Make something you like.

#5: Don’t try to revolutionize the industry with your first design.

If you’re proud of your work and you had fun, you’re going to make more games.

Chat Questions

They’d love to make more flagbearers… and Dylann noted that with Ursine they’d love to make a flagbear. (Well done, sir.) Alex did note that putting 12 Valkyrie dice in with a figure is not going to come down at the same price point as the original flagbearers.

Updated squads? Probably… lots of stuff may come back as the game continues to grow. Look for new squads/heroes that bring back older mechanics and roles in new ways – making it easier/cheaper for new players to access those abilities. (Additional hint from Lee: Raelin 3.0 and 4.0 figs on the way. Additional hint from Alex: what if you accelerated the timeline and saw how Grut technology has advanced?!)

What games inspired you?

• Lee: Heroscape, Arkham Horror, Samurai Swords
• Dyllan: Heroscape, Gloomhaven/Frosthaven, RPGs, X-Wing
• Alex: Magic: The Gathering, Warzone, X-Wing, Twilight Struggle
• Rowan: my parents were hobby boardgamers!, you can go to college for game design… Betrayal at House on the Hill

Reminder: my review of the new Wave 2 stuff (releasing later this month) will be appearing in a week or so!