Helden in der Unterwelt Quick Reference
Fri Feb 13 19:00:10 UTC 2009

Marker Types:

• Green Edged: This is an optional Encounter:
  Brunnen der Weisheit: spend 1 gold and test any skill with 2 dice. Upon failure, increase the skill number by 1 (solitaire: can only be used 4 times).
  Hekate: receive the Golden Staff (magic special weapon) if you can pass her magic test.
  Hermes: can immediately teleport back to Styx.
  Hypnos: can change a black cube to a colored one if can pass a test in that color (solitaire: no test, but can only be used 4 times).
  Niederer Dämon: spend 1 life point and test any skill. Upon failure, increase the skill number by 1. Put the life point on a free corner of the tile. On the fourth life point, this marker (and the life points) exits play.
  Orion: receive the Bow of Hercules (ranged special weapon) if you can pass his ranged weapon test.
  Thanatos: receive the Scythe of Thanatos (melee special weapon) if you can pass his melee weapon test.
• Yellow Edged: These are Items which are generally placed in the yellow boxes of the hero's board. If unwanted, can take 1 gold instead. Dropped items go on the tile; used items go face up next to the treasures and are re-shuffled when treasures are empty. When a hero is drawing a treasure, by spending 1 gold may draw 3 and only keep the one wanted. The other two are mixed back in.
  Armor: A hero can have at most 1 armor, 1 shield and 1 helmet.
  black cube: this is a black weapon. Picking it up places a black cube on the Damned One's board. It must be picked up if the hero has a black cube in its ability. If used, any experience cubes gained must be black. It can never be used to attack the Damned One and may never be traded in for gold. It can only be dropped if the hero has no black cubes in its ability.
  "einmal": this item can only be used once.
  "Goldsack": just collect the printed amount of gold
  "kombinierbar": this is an exception to the usual rule of only being able to have one armor or weapon.
  "Rat des Hermes": The hero can (one time) ignore a red marker's requirement to fight in the skill where he has the least experience and has +2 doing so.
  "Schuhe des Hermes": The hero can avoid any face up enemy. (Apparently even the Centaur can use this.)
  "Spiegel": Can look at face down markers on adjacent tiles before deciding whether to move there and also does not suffer the -2 penalty vs. the Gorgone.
  weapons: A hero can have at most 1 weapon.
• Blue Edged: Task. Put it on the hero board, unless it's full, in which case the task may not be taken. Marker says where it must be delivered. Hades and Persephone are special. Delivering Hades removes 1 black cube from the Damned One and earns the Trident of Hades. Delivering Persephone removes 1 black cube from the Damned One – 2 if Hades is already there – and earns the Mail of Perspehone. These tasks cannot be taken by a hero having a black cube. If held when a black cube is taken, these tasks are dropped on the current tile. (As this is hard to remember, you may wish to store Hades/Persephone in the cubes area.)
• Gray Edged: First, add a black cube to the Damned One's board. All of these require a skill roll.
  Avatars: Losing to one does not incur any loss, but the hero must take a black cube in any ability (if wearing the Mail of Persephone, lose a life instead). Note that any colored experience taken to the right of a black cube is automatically converted to black instead. When defeated, Avatars provide a treasure and an experience cube in any color. Place the defeated marker on the Damned One's board. When all 3 defeated, place the Damned One on the Chaos tile. If another marker is there, current player moves it to an adjacent tile. If all of these are also occupied, this marker is moved to another adjacent tile first. If Chaos not out yet, hold the Damned One back until Chaos appears. (Solitaire: Damned One appears when either of the two following conditions occurs: (1) number of Avatars who have been defeated plus special treasures taken equals 3; (2) number of Avatars who have simply appeared (not necessarily defeated) equals 3. After it appears another black cube is added to the Damned One's board each round.).
  Kreatur: As with Avatars, losing to one does not incur any loss, but the hero must take a black cube in any ability (if wearing the Mail of Persephone, lose a life instead). These yield a treasure if defeated (and then exit play).
  Falle: These are traps. Failing one doesn't cause any damage, but they hold the hero immobile until defeated. A trap only affects one hero and this hero cannot be attacked by others.
• Gray and Blue Edged: First, add a black cube to the Damned One's board. Losing to one does not incur any loss, but the hero must take a black cube in any ability (if wearing the Mail of Persephone, lose a life instead). Defeating the Creature turns it into a Task, which upon delivery removes a cube from the Damned One's board and yields a treasure and an experience cube of any color.
• Red Edged: This is an Enemy which must be fought using the skill in which the hero has the fewest experience cubes (player's choice if tied). Losing incurs the penalty left of the gray dot (for Gorgone this means losing a movement point – use a number marker to indicate this; some require losing the experience cube of the player's choice). Defeating it gives the reward shown at the bottom (and the marker exits play).

• Player chooses the skill and rolls the number of dice he has in that skill. He then picks 2 of these dice to use. If they are equal to or less than their skill number (which may be modified by the enemy), they succeed and earn whatever the reward is. (It's not required to try to win.)

• Only possible if at least one of the combatants has a black cube.
• Wearer of the Mail of Persephone cannot be attacked.
• Each hero chooses which skill to use.
• Subtract the defender's skill number from the attacker's.
• Divide the result by two and round up (down if negative).
• The attacker modifies his skill number by this amount (min/max: -3/+3).
• The attack is done using only 2 dice.
• Winner takes a gold or item or makes the loser lose a Life (not the last one) or a black cube (losers chooses which). In the last case, if the winner has also has a black cube, then this cube is transferred to the Damned One's board; otherwise it is returned to the supply.

• Healing: Spending an entire turn on Styx restores all natural life points. (Solitaire: can only be used to pick up the 4 lives on the tile, one per turn.)
• Life Points from Armor: These are called Artificial Life Points. They cannot be healed or regenerated. When lost, place the points on the item. If all the points granted by the item are lost, discard it.
• Death: Losing the last life point is okay. True, you're dead, but then, you're already in Hades.
  • Place the hero on the Styx tile.
  • All experience cubes are lost.
  • Reset life points, gold and movement points.
  • Tasks are left in the tile.
  • 1 item is kept.
  • Treasures are returned face up with the undrawn ones.
  • Special weapons are placed on the Damned One's board.
  • If they were dropped, it's no longer necessary to complete a task to get the Mail of Persephone or Trident of Hades.

• The game ends either when either A or B occurs:
  1. The Damned One is defeated. To do this a hero must perform the following:
     • Possess either the Golden Staff, Bow of Hercules, Scythe of Thanatos or Trident of Hades.
     • Have no black cubes in the skill associated with this weapon (in case of the Trident, any).
     • Go to the Chaos tile.
     • Fight the Damned One with the special weapon continuously until it has lost as many lives as it has black cubes.
     • If the Damned One wins, it is automatically restored to full strength. Otherwise the player wins the game.
     • Solitaire: The skill used to fight Damned One must change each round, beginning with Magic. No skill can be used again until each is used and each round of three must begin with Magic. Skills having black cubes are automatic losses. Nektar or Ambrosia can be used between rounds.
  2. The last black cube is placed on the Damned One's board.
     • To help avoid this result, players can remove a black cube from the Damned One's board by going to Lethe and turning in any colored experience cube. A hero can instead use this method to lose one of their own black cubes.
     • If it is not avoided, the player with the most black cubes wins. (A tie is a tie.)

1. Add a map tile. If your tile has an open exit, you may draw a new tile and place it adjacent to your tile, orienting any arrow in the same direction as that on the "Styx" tile. If the tile cannot be placed so that an exit lines up with the current room, place it anyway, isolating the new room from the rest of Hades. If after all tiles have been placed there are any markers that cannot be reached, rotate the tile so that it can be reached from at least one side (this occurs before the hero moves on that turn). If there are several possibilities, rotate the tile clockwise until the condition is satisfied.
   If the tile is not a passageway (has a distinct path marked on it), then a PA marker is drawn and placed on it, face down.
2. Move. If you want to move and placed a new tile this turn, you must move onto it and since it has an unrevealed PA that ends your movement. Otherwise, you can keep moving, including backtracking, until you hit a PA, enemy (red or gray edge) or run out of movement points.
3. Take Actions. Actions you can take, in order, are
   1. Combat Enemy or Duel Opponent (at most one)
   2. Use the place (at most once)
   3. Encounter a green marker (at most once)
   4. Accept task (at most one)
   5. Fulfil task(s)
   6. Resolve treasure(s)

1. Put the "Styx" tile in the middle of the table (and in the solitaire game, 4 life points on it).
2. Each player chooses a hero. Their special notes:
   Bard - may ignore any red-bordered marker
   Centaur - cannot carry armor or wear sandals
   Gladiator/Amazon - can re-fight a lost combat at cost of 1 life.
   Gnome - can add two skill values before rolling any test. Any difficulty modifier is only applied once. Use the dice number from any one of the skills. When fighting an Enemy with a gray spot, can do this only if the two skills are tied for least number of experience cubes.
   Shaman - can add 1 vs gray spot creatures and has +1 for non-combat magic.
   
3. Players put correct amounts of gold and life points on their hero sheets.
4. Place corresponding figures on the "Styx" tile.
5. Set out the Damned One's board.
6. Place the 5 special weapons and the Damned One marker on it. Unless playing Solitaire, put a black cube on the Damned One as a reminder to add it to his strength when he enters Hades.
7. Create draw piles of face down "PA" markers, treasure markers and tiles.
8. The round black markers and 2 "Tor zum Hades" markers are not needed (used only for combining the game with Return of the Heroes).

• Each gold, experience cube and skill level increase is worth 10 points.
• Each skill level lowering and black cube deducts 20 points.
• Multiply the total by the number of natural life points.
• Divide by the number of black cubes on the Damned One's board at the start of the last duel.