Critical Role's 'Daggerheart' Open Playtest Starts In March

On March 12th, Critical Role's Darrington Press will be launching the open playtest for Daggerheart, their new fantasy TTRPG/

Using cards and two d12s, the system plays on 'the dualities of hope and fear'. The game is slated for a 2025 release.

Almost a year ago, we announced that we’ve been working hard behind-the-scenes on Daggerheart, our contribution to the world of high-fantasy tabletop roleplaying games.

Daggerheart is a game of brave heroics and vibrant worlds that are built together with your gaming group. Create a shared story with your adventuring party, and shape your world through rich, long-term campaign play.

When it’s time for the game mechanics to control fate, players roll one HOPE die and one FEAR die (both 12-sided dice), which will ultimately impact the outcome for your characters. This duality between the forces of hope and fear on every hero drives the unique character-focused narratives in Daggerheart.

In addition to dice, Daggerheart’s card system makes it easy to get started and satisfying to grow your abilities by bringing your characters’ background and capabilities to your fingertips. Ancestry and Community cards describe where you come from and how your experience shapes your customs and values. Meanwhile, your Subclass and Domain cards grant your character plenty of tantalizing abilities to choose from as your character evolves.

And now, dear reader, we’re excited to let you know that our Daggerheart Open Beta Playtest will launch globally on our 9th anniversary, Tuesday, March 12th!

We want anyone and everyone (over the age of 18, please) to help us make Daggerheart as wonderful as possible, which means…helping us break the game. Seriously! The game is not finished or polished yet, which is why it’s critical (ha!) to gather all of your feedback ahead of Daggerheart’s public release in 2025.

 

[Reynard]

You're correct that we're going on in circles, but I want to address this.



No one is talking about the GM forcing the players to do anything. If a player doesn't want to participate in combat and thus doesn't invest in combat skills, there is no problem. I just don't believe that the player making a character weaker in combat automatically means this, as it doesn't mean it basically in any other game, and it is just due a system quirk that might not be instantly apparent that it so here. So if this is the intent, it should be made explicit in the text.

Again, we are talking about a theoretical example in which two characters are compared at max level, each intentionally designed to be at either end of the combat capability spectrum. You are acting like this is a thing that can "just happen" and there is no evidence of that.

 

[Reynard]

So, by your definition, in the real world most players are bad players. Good game design encourages players to be less bad. I don't see anything to encourage that here. You are basically saying "the GM should whack the players with a stick if they aren't as good as professional role-players."

What an absolutely nonsensical take on what I wrote.

1) Game design has no bearing over whether a player immediately tunes out when it isn't their turn or when another player is having a roleplay spotlight scene.
2) I didn't say anything about the GM. The whole group should yell at Todd for being on his phone when things are happening in the game.
3) I said they were a good example being a good player. Do you honestly think paying attention to the game is a "professional role-player" skill or are you just arguing for its own sake here?

 

[Crimson Longinus]

Again, we are talking about a theoretical example in which two characters are compared at max level, each intentionally designed to be at either end of the combat capability spectrum. You are acting like this is a thing that can "just happen" and there is no evidence of that.

Of course it can “just happen” as there is nothing preventing it from happening. Nor do the differences need to be that extreme for it to become a problem.

 

[Reynard]

Of course it can “ just happen” as there is nothing preventing it from happening.

Play in a group with a particular combat to non-combat balance through the life of a campaign, with fellow players and a GM to provide input prevent it from happening. It is weird that you don't consider the issue with respect to the actual table.

Nor do the differences need to be that extreme for it to become a problem.

So based on your analysis, where does it become an issue in the DH playtest?

 

[Crimson Longinus]

Play in a group with a particular combat to non-combat balance through the life of a campaign, with fellow players and a GM to provide input prevent it from happening. It is weird that you don't consider the issue with respect to the actual table.

There is no actual table, there will be thousands of actual tables and we cannot analyse them all. What we can analyse is the text we have.

So based on your analysis, where does it become an issue in the DH playtest?

In the instant there is any disparity between the PC combat capability that the players notice and care about.

 

[Paul Farquhar]

Play in a group with a particular combat to non-combat balance through the life of a campaign, with fellow players and a GM to provide input prevent it from happening.

You are demonstrating that it is not necessarily going to be a problem for all tables. No one disputes that. But, since the rules themselves do nothing to mitigate, it is likely to be a problem at some tables.

 

[Crimson Longinus]

You are demonstrating that it is not necessarily going to be a problem for all tables. No one disputes that. But, since the rules themselves do nothing to mitigate, it is likely to be a problem at some tables.

Right. This is not about whether the CR crew can make the game work. Of course they can. But this is a mass market game that will be played by wide variety of people, many of which will be only familiar with D&D or not even that.

 

[TwoSix]

Of course it can “just happen” as there is nothing preventing it from happening. Nor do the differences need to be that extreme for it to become a problem.

It would take an extreme amount of obliviousness by a player to design a high-level character that is completely useless in combat by accident.

If the character is terrible at combat, it’s almost certainly by intent.

Putting in guardrails to prevent it would be like forcing bards to take a certain amount of offensive spells in 5e.

 

[FrogReaver]

Right. This is not about whether the CR crew can make the game work. Of course they can. But this is a mass market game that will be played by wide variety of people, many of which will be only familiar with D&D or not even that.

I don’t really get it. Who or what is forcing the non-combat focused player to take their turn or not take their turn in combat?

They can choose to do so. But if they are choosing to do so that must be because they want to.

 

[Campbell]

So, by your definition, in the real world most players are bad players. Good game design encourages players to be less bad. I don't see anything to encourage that here. You are basically saying "the GM should whack the players with a stick if they aren't as good as professional role-players."

Being interested and engaged when the focus is on another player character does not require professional acting skills. It requires empathy and curiosity.

Sure, system design can help. I think you can address in other ways though than locking things down to explicit turn sequences.

For instance, one of the things I would personally like to see is having a single option to improve 4 attributes instead of 3 boxes to tick to improve 2 each because there isn't a lot of even non-combat value in raising up lingering scores (so it kind of feels like a trap option to me).

I'd also likely make Proficiency just part of the leveling process.