HeroQuest: Welcome to the Jungles of Delthrak

Posts may contain affiliate links. Learn more in our Affiliate Link Policy.

Having just left the “Paradise City” of Elethorn, our valiant heroes ventured to the World’s End Tournament. They face-off against the Ogre Horde, they very nearly end up “Knockin’ On Heaven’s Door“! After a short rest, our heroes are now off to Delthrak where they’re met with a dangerous “Welcome to the Jungle” by its deadly denizens!

Jungles of Delthrak is now available for Preorder! Amazon US | Amazon CA | Hasbro Pulse

Welcome to the Jungle

Lots of new information released by Avalon Hill today, on HeroQuest’s latest Quest Pack – Jungles of Delthrak.

By the way, if you don’t have HeroQuest, or are looking for a second copy, HeroQuest is currently (as of this publication date) 41% off on Amazon US. Head over there to check it out!

Most of this information and images are coming from Hasbro Pulse. There’s also been a lot uploaded to the HeroQuest Fans Discord, I believe some of that also came from the various Facebook fan groups. So if I don’t exactly cite a source, it’s probably because my source isn’t the source of the original posting.

With that all out of the way, lets dig into some of these images (click the images to see larger):

From the back of the box we get a little glimpse into the story of the Dwarves after the events of Kellar’s Keep:

In the dense jungle surrounding the mountains at the World’s Edge, an ancient dwarven civilization finds new roots. A sacred artifact prized by the dwarven refugees of Kellar’s Keep has been stolen, and a Dread affliction racks the land. Crystalline growths have developed on the fauna of the jungle, and the creatures have gone into a frenzy. Venture into the perilous junglelands to uproot the curse that has befallen the region, Vanquish evil, make bold choices, and follow your path to unique endings through an unprecedented choose-your-adventure mechanic. Discover what vile secret looks beneath the canopy – before all is lost.

The box also includes a list of the contents:

• Quest book – Features 16 new quests with a brand new choose-your-adventure mechanic
• 29 miniatures – Introducing the new Berserker and Explorer heroes
• 36 cards
• 39 cardboard pieces – Tiles of some sort

Yay! New Jungle Themed Miniatures

Ah, some new minis, my favourite part! Let’s see what we have here, just from my own initial inspection, before looking too closely at some of the new cards:

Heroes

Looks like we’ve got the male and female poses for the two new heroes, these must be the: Berserker – a type of human fighter maybe meant to be a new version of the Barbarian. An the Explorer, possibly a new version of the Dwarf.

So that just leaves the wizard… I personally don’t see the Warlock or the Druid as being a replacement for the Wizard, well, with the new Druid sculpts in Against the Ogre Horde, maybe that’s not true anymore. I suppose they could pose as the alternate Wizard. Alright, getting off on a tangent here.

In this quest pack we are getting a two for one deal. Two replacement heroes instead of just one. I’m really not trying to incite fear when I say this, but just maybe this is a sign that the end might be near for HeroQuest? This is the first large Quest Pack that we’ve gotten with two different heroes. Maybe they wanted to make sure to get all of the original heroes done, just in case something is happening to HeroQuest in the future. That something could be anything, maybe one final Quest Pack to finally defeat Zargon once and for all, or maybe it will mark the beginning of a second edition of HeroQuest.

Whatever the case may be, I don’t think that Jungles of Delthrak will be the last HeroQuest Quest Pack. I’m hopeful for many more in the future. I mean, come on! We haven’t even gotten remakes of Wizards of Morcar/Zargon or The Dark Company yet.

I’m still thinking that it would be really cool to keep the name Wizards of Morcar and just make Morcar a new enemy UNDER the far superior evil wizard Zargon. There, I said it! Hope I didn’t rock the boat too much there! I still love all of you in the rest of the world!

Animal Companions

Animal companions are one of my favourite new ideas in HeroQuest. That and unthreatened movement! If you haven’t heard of unthreatened movement, look it up in the Into the Northlands quest.

I’m really excited to get my hands on these. We’ve got a raptor, and some kind of bear, cat, lion kind of thing. Now I can have a full party with one hero and 3 companions! Not sure if the rules would allow that, I’ll have to reread them!

New Bad Guys!

Alright, here are the new big bad guys. The aesthetic of these monsters really fits well with the jungle theme.

A Great Spider! This thing looks formidable. I really hope this doesn’t bring a whole new age of multi attacks to HeroQuest. With 8 legs, well, that could be 8 attacks, maybe 4 if it’s using the back 4 for balance. Anyway, sounds deadly!

A Huge Gorilla. Must be pretty smart to have fashioned a club out of bones and rocks. And is that a crystal that I see around it’s neck. Are the Gorillas in the HeroQuest world more than mere animals? Maybe it could be a playable race!?

A Giant Serpent. To me, this feels like a classic jungle denizen. All we are missing is snake-people to worship it.

Now for the small guys. Raptors, and what appear to be Shambling Mounds. All pretty scary stuff if you are a hero waltzing through the jungle. Is it just me, or does it look like the Shambling Mounds are the same coloured plastic as undead creatures. Could these be some form of undead monster?

Old Favourites

Alright, we’ve seen all these guys before. Something is different about these Dread Cultists though. It’s the colour. This was an interesting choice. Maybe they’re not Dread Cultists at all, maybe they’re some other kind of Cultist with the same Dread symbol on their cloak.

In the rules for the Game System, it’s specifically stated that if you run out of a type of monster and need to place another one, you may use a different monster of the same colour plastic. This means that if you run out of Dread Cultists, we can’t use these new ones, or if you are using the new ones, you can’t use the old ones, or any of the other grey miniatures.

The Skeletons and the Goblins, we’ve already seen in Against the Ogre Horde, so they’re nothing new.

Interior Design Pieces

I’ve always liked getting new furniture to set up around the dungeon. Don’t get me wrong, I do still really enjoy the original furniture, but you can never have too much!

We’ve got a nice evil looking statue, well, I guess it looks evil, it’s got skulls all over it. I figure this will have the same quest book symbol as the Rise of the Dread Moon statues, it’s not really a different item, just a different option.

Another item here is easily recognizable. A treasure pile! I’m going to paint this up and use it in the Ice Gremlin Treasure room tile!

The last items here are kind of hard to identify. We’ve got these two translucent pieces, one is definitely a crystalline structure. So this will be part of that Dread curse talked about on the back of the box. Then there’s that viny one. I actually debated putting this up with the new monsters, but I think everyone else is going to think it’s a new monster and I just want to be different! I’m going to say it’s a set decoration!

The last two here, they could be traps of some sort. Maybe a spawning pit for some kind of monster to come out of on each turn. Or they could just be something like an acid pool of some sort. We’ll have to wait and see what’s in the quest book to find out!

Is this a New Mercenary!?

Along the same lines as the animal companions, I also love the idea of mercenaries, though not as new of an idea, it is similar.

What is new, however, is the idea of hiring creatures that are usually enemies, such as the Ogre Mercenary in Against the Ogre Horde. I really hope this is a Goblin Mercenary, and I hope they keep this trend going in future Quest Packs.

Some speculation I have about this one. It have some features that are very similar to the Warlock. The dagger or wand in one hand, and the odd looking claw of the other hand. I definitely don’t think that is just the normal hand, compared to the other hand, it looks way to big. Maybe this is a Mercenary that can cast spells like the Warlock.

New Cards and Tiles to Explore

More Cards!

We can’t quite see all of the cards in the pictures from Hasbro Pulse, but there is quite a bit of information here. I’ll list them off:

You’ve got your standards:

• Dread Spells, of which we see Channel Dread, which comes from Rise of the Dread Moon. This spell would be specifically associated with the Dread Cultist, I wonder if there are any others that can use it in this quest pack, the spells works well with other users of it.
• Treasure, including a new hazard! You find a figurine that appears to be cursed and will inflict damage to the weak willed.
• Artifacts, I only see the top one here, Bracers of the Wild. Very interesting, bracers that affect your movement and allow you to move through furniture. This seems like it would be good for “Boots of the Wild”, atleast it’s not “Breath of the Wild”…
• New Alchemy cards! This is exciting! Alchemy cards are a newer idea from Rise of the Dread Moon.
• And then your standard Hero Skills (Berserker, and Explorer), Hero cards, Animal Companion cards, and Monster cards.

Here are a couple more images that reveal some more of the new cards that we can’t see in the Hasbro image:

Ha! See, the news is developing even as I write this! Now are revealed the names of the monsters! I just can’t type fast enough!

• Giant Ape – Sorry, it’s not a gorilla, same thing right!?
• Blightcrawler – This would be the spider, interesting name, also a formidable foe.
• Serpent – Just serpent, doesn’t sound scary at all, the thing is huge though!
• Blightweaver – It’s NOT a Dread Cultist after all, something else entirely, but with the same stats.
• Raptor – Feathers… yeah, didn’t they say that chickens were descendants of Raptors or something like that.
• Skullblight – Here’s our “Shambling Mound”, looks like it IS undead, some kind of unfortunate dwarf that died in the jungle and reanimated maybe? Looks like it might have a beard.
• Goblin Archer and Skeleton Archer – We’ve seen them before.
• Spawnling – Wait! What’s this!? I don’t see mini’s for this! Looks like smaller, 1-tile spiders, serpents, and centipedes. There must be cardboard tiles for these. They also have 0 Attack Dice and 0 Defend dice. They must just serve as an impedance to the heroes. If they are still classified as monsters/enemies, then heroes wouldn’t be able to move through them.

Also, some animal companions:

• Raptor again – I hope there is some kind of mechanic in the quest book to ride this thing!
• Saberfang – Ok, so not a bear, or cat, or lion kind of thing. More like a Sabertooth Tiger!

We also get a good look at the Hero Skills:

Berserker – Enrage, Retaliation, and Frenzy.

Keeping with the strong aspect of the barbarian, I can see a pretty unstoppable party if you have the Berserker, the Barbarian, AND the Knight. You’ll be dealing an insane amount of damage! Just don’t run into any traps, or take a toolkit with you. Who am I kidding, who buys toolkits!

The Berserker’s skills mainly focus on dealing more damage and attacking multiple enemies. Every skill has some sort of effect that either hurts you to use it, or can only be used if you are missing body points.

Explorer – Treasure Hunter, Danger Sense, Trapsmith

Lets be honest. If you are taking an Explorer, you’re probably not taking the Dwarf. Do you really need two guys on the team who can disarm traps? YES! What happens if one of them dies!

The Explorer’s skills are passive and deal with avoiding hazards, finding more treasure, and finding nearby traps.

Let’s Take a Look at Some of the New Tiles

Here we’ve got a bunch of little guys. Some look like snakes, others like spiders. Then some web traps. So, yes, as I suspected. Instead of having miniatures for the Spawnlings, there are cardboard tiles. That’s alright, we can use our own minis.

Now for the big guys! Yes, all we’ve been asking for, for years, has been more outdoor tiles. The itch was scratched a little bit with the Plaza tile in Rise of the Dread Moon, then again with the outdoor tile in Against the Ogre Horde.

Now we get more selection. I’m assuming that these are double sided, so we may not be able to use all of them at the same time, but it’s nice that they’re here.

It will be interesting to see how they are used in the game.

I saved the best for last:

The Sarlacc Pit!

No, not really a Sarlacc Pit, just a Piranha Plant, or Fly Trap. I don’t know, whatever. It looks like it’ll eat you, I would steer clear of this one!

Choose-your-adventure! I Love those Books!

I’m really interested to see how this mechanic works out in this expansion. Are we going to have branching paths inside quests, or will it be based on the outcome of certain quests.

In my speculation, I see that a decision will need to be made. I figure there will be multiple sources of this Dread corruption affecting the jungle, and the Heroes will have to decide which one to battle.

I see three large creatures in this Quest Pack, these could be the three different final bosses that you need to defeat. Depending on what decisions you make along the way, you may be facing a giant serpent, a huge gorilla, or an 8-legged freak!

I could be completely wrong though, and often am, so we’ll just have to wait and see.

Interested in Avalon Hill games? Check out Talisman – The Magical Quest Game – 5th Edition: Amazon US | Amazon CA

---

As always, I hope you enjoyed my ramblings on this new HeroQuest expansion. Thanks for stopping by, hope to see you again soon!