F around and find out with daggerheart

I was surprised by the rush on Daggerheart, so I didn't get a book this time around. On the other hand, they have released the SRD that is basically the rules without the fancy artwork for free, so if anyone wants to run a F-around-and-find-out game, I would be delighted and would set time off to read the danm thing.

Really interested in Daggerheart myself-- didn't know the SRD contained all the rules! Honestly a bit scared of GMing (even as a forever GM myself), but as a player I'd love to join up

I would be happy to GM a game eventually, but I don't have the bandwidth at the moment. I could be a player though!

I’ll have to take a look at the SRD.

I don't have time to run another game right now either. Got to play in a one-shot yesterday. (First time I've payed for a GM and I was pleasantly surprised).

I would play in a heartbeat though. The game was great.

I'm curious if this will live up to all the hype. Gonna download that SRD. Thanks!

I am going through the corebook, and I absolutely love it. I struggled with PbtA when it first came out and couldn't wrap my head around the concept of the system. But then I got the opportunity to play Masks, Monster of the Week, and now I love PbtA too. Daggerheart has elegantly and masterfully blended PbtA-like gameplay with the flexibility of narrative systems into a D&D-like game. Of course there are plenty of differences between D&D and Daggerheart. In my opinion, D&D leans a bit more towards the combat side instead of the RP and story side, and in the case of Daggerheart, it leans more towards the narrative side. But combat in Daggerheart is not hand-wavy, and you can do pretty cool stuff there. It is more open-ended and not bounded by rigid rules of initiative. I am yet to complete the book, but if someone runs the game, I would love to play. Some elements of Daggerheart also feel a bit boardgame-like, but everything else is really interesting.

It looks interesting. I'll give it a closer read when I have some time, but I might be willing to GM a game to try it out...

I'm taking a look at the SRD, too, but y'know, reading. It looks like there is a lot of interest, so that part is at least settled. If time fits into things, and I figure the system out, and no one else has volunteered by then, I might also be a potential GM, so stay tuned I suppose, but I defer to others, first and so keep the fires burning here. I'll see what happens with reading through.

I'm taking a look at the SRD, too, but y'know, reading. It looks like there is a lot of interest, so that part is at least settled. If time fits into things, and I figure the system out, and no one else has volunteered by then, I might also be a potential GM, so stay tuned I suppose, but I defer to others, first and so keep the fires burning here. I'll see what happens with reading through.

I'd be down to play, if we find a GM! I am currently working on a Campaign Frame, but don't know enough to run yet.

If it happens, I'll probably pull the trigger on a pdf copy. I've been waiting to try and get the book and pdf on the same purchase, but it's looking like I'll have to wait for July on that and I'm not sure I'm patient enough for that.

I've played one session (using the 1.5 beta rules, not the final release) with my regular FtF group and it worked better than I expected. I haven't read through the current rules though I did pick up the PDF/Demiplane bundle on DTRPG and haven't read the GM section of the beta either. I think the hardest part of playing here will be setting up the character sheets :). Should run well and I'd be interested in playing in (one of several maybe) a game here but I'm too busy to run one right now.

I may be up for DMing and learning a new system. I would need few week or a month to study the rules before I start the game though. Could anyone advertise the system to motivate me investing the time? Could you compare it to DnD? From what I read on internet is more or less the same, except
- It adds stress mechanics and don't let player to decide when their PC is stressed instead
- It changes initiative order, but that's the DnD mechanics we are altering on PbP anyways
- Minor mechanical differences (like rolling 2d12 instead if 1d20)
- The different way to "setting up the character sheets" as mentioned by Bullseyepsa

I would also like to warn you that if I'm DMing I'm implying my own vision of the system. For example from what I read their Experience system is the same as DnD Skill system, but more narrow, so be prepared that I will be looking forward for players to very rarely use their +2 (while in DnD players find ways to use their + prof bonus more often than don't).

The devil are in the details. Its more than D&D with some tweaks

There are a lot of token mechanics, mostly Fear/Hope generede by the players die rolls and action tokens used when doing stuff, including combat.

Abilities defined by cards, more than classes, and there is a limit on how many abilities you can have in play. I'm really looking forward to this bit, as I have played a lot of games where players get lost in their characters abilitiy

More narrative outcome of dice rolls. D&D has pass/fail, where DH has pass with hope/fear, fail with hope/fear. This is a element that I really miss from Genesys system where you also had pass/fail with advantage/disasvantage

There is more, but please don't pass it off as a D&D clone

Experiences is more like Aspects in Fate in that it takes the meta currency (Hope) to activate. Theoretically you will always be flush with Hope as statistically every second roll will gain you Hope. But when I played we all succeeded with Fear the first hour or two, filling the GM's pool before he even had time to use any and none of the players had any Hope to spend for the longest time :P

It also remind me of Backgrounds in 13th Age in that they are broad and can contain many "skills" within one Experience.

Stress is similar to Strain in FFG Star Wars. Though you don't fall unconscious when you run out, instead you start suffering HP damage instead. Many abilities require you to take Stress to activate, so in that way you could technically decide to stress yourself out.

Furmyr has explained the system aptly. From what I have read, the gameplay progresses much like PbtA where narrative description is given more focus.

The 2d12 system generates 'Hope' and 'Fear' which are metacurrencies that players and GMs use to activate their abilities or activate enemies (in case of GM). Most class powers need hope to be activated, as GMs use fear to activate enemies and their abilities.

Rolling with hope affects the narrative in a positive way; apart from succeeding in the task, the players also get hope. Rolling with fear (if you succeed even with fear) gives a minor complication to the narrative. GM can bank the fear or immediately introduce something. This is kind of like partial success of PbtA. Failing with fear is like critical failure. Rolling doubles is critical success.

All your powers come from domains, which give you a variety of options that either use hope or stress to activate.

GM uses d20 instead of 2d12 and crits on 20. So, player and GM rolls are asymetric.

Since Hope and Fear are such pivotal resources, when players take rest, GM also replenishes Fear.

These are some of the highlights and I am pretty impressed by the system.

Thanks for sharing. If you don't have a DM by the the end of the month I would volunteer to be assuming interest is still active.

P.S. No I didn't intend to say it's a DnD clone. I could have asked to compare Daggerheart with Dragonbane, Tales of Argosa or a few other fantasy RPG game systems I've played and I feel like it would have similar amount of mechanical similarities with each. I just think comparing to DnD is useful to more people. I could even relate hope and fear to Warhammer Wrath & Glory (Wrath points are like Hope here)

I'm getting more reluctant to run a campaign the more I read into it, because I'm having trouble parsing the economy of how I'd manage a campaign from the SRD alone, handling the card aspect with everything else, other than that, it looks decent for playing thus far. I don't know that I can add more other than what's been said with the Hope and Fear mechanic being the main driver of how it's run. That alone, I like, and think I could run, I just think the card aspect, and domains would lead me to stumble, especially on this type of venue. I'm also not sure I get HP and damage correctly, either, so I think I'll defer to another volunteer, so I'm glad to see another. If there's enough space I'll play, and help learn/teach.

It is difficult to think about the card aspect, but I think we can manage it by imagining it as a feat. Every card ability can be considered a feat. You cannot have more than 5 abilities (feats) at a time. When total number of abilities exceeds 5, you can keep them written as trained abilities (Loadout and vault) which will cost stress to swap with current known abilities (Recall cost). Let me give some examples.

Domain abilities:

1) Get back up (Domain: Blade - ability), Tier 1, Recall cost 1
When you take Severe damage, you can mark a Stress to reduce the severity by one threshold.

2)Rune Ward (Domain: Arcana - spell), Tier 1, Recall cost 0
You have a deeply personal trinket that can be infused with protective magic and held as a ward by you or an ally. Describe what it is and why it is important to you. The ward holder can spend a point of hope to reduce incoming damage by 1d8.

If the ward Die result is 8, the ward's power ends after it reduces the damage this turn. It can be recharged for free on your next rest.

It will take a bit long to type this up and I don't know the commands to make a custom character sheet, but keeping a note like this can help instead of the cards.

I would'nt dream of running campaing in a system I wasn't familiar with. My thought was a one-shot to fuck-around-and-find-out where the system had it strengthen and weaknesses.

The cards and domains I understand mechanically in DH, but I think I will stumble trying to translate that here in PbP and on the website. I don't know the commands for a custom character sheet, either. Otherwise, the system seems rock-solid for play from my first read-through, I just know I would suck at running it. It's one of those SRDs that pique interest in the whole package anyway (you gotta' support the industry somehow). I've seen a lot of references to it, so it seems to be making some impact, if even just the SRD.

Update: I've found a wonderful quick starter. It seems both a great story and a perfect opportunity to run the game the way Daggerheart is supposed to run. So here is my proposal

- Zero preparation/reading from players. All you need to do is to choose one of 5 pregen characters (and no you can't make your own instead)
- There is no adventure hook. We start story with first event of the journey and gradually will narrate the reason journey happens
- We follow the railroaded short scenario the way it is supposed to be run at the table

So if you are interested, pick a character by voting here (first who vote get the character). Once I see all 5 picked I will set up the game

I have been reading through that adventure - I recognise the characters. Be aware that it's for the beta-tes,t and its rule examples are not up to date. They are using some action tokens, for one, that no longer exist.

I'm still going through the rules, I'll likely make my decision on whether to GM by tomorrow.

Oops… I was just reading the thread on a phone, and I accidentally voted (and can’t un-vote)!

The best I could do was to change my vote to Drgwen’s elf sorc, so at least the other four characters are available.

Sorry to cause confusion with the accidental click! Please disregard my vote, and happy gaming to all of you.

I'm interested if you ever make the game!

I've actually been thinking on this! If ever we go through with setting up the game, will we be using the rules as they are from the full release?

Also voted in for the katari ranger! Hope they aren't as underpowered as DnD's HAHAHA

So far I've heard the Ranger is pretty good... But we'll see lol

@Legendary_Sidekick I've added one more voting items "not interested", please choose that one
Everyone - according to @runekyndig the quickstarted and pre-gen characters may not be in sync with latest rules (although I'm reading document dated 5-20-2025), but I plan to run game based on quickstarter rather than current rule-set. If you are more interested in full game using full rules - please change your vote not "not interested"

I want to believe Dmbrainiac will be eventually running a proper game, not just a quick one aimed to disapprove what I've red on internet that
"Daggerheart lacks a strong unique identity to stand out. It's just D&D with some heavy Wrath and Glory design principles"

Okay, I'm going to go ahead and start the forum for my game. I'll be using the full rules on the SRD so it should be a proper game. I'll take up to five players. @runekyndig gets a spot since they're the one who started the thread! I'll choose the other four based on interest and availability so let me know if you want to play. :)

Yes please! :)

Would love a chance to see how it works in PbP format.

It’s more of a whoops—didn’t mean to vote, but yes, I moved my vote there to clean up the poll!

I'm interested!

OK, Looks like no interest in playing the official quickstart, I'm withdrawing my DMing proposal

I'd be down to join a Deggerheart campaign if anyone starts a game!