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

System plays on 'the dualities of hope and fear'.

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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.
 

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TwoSix

Dirty, realism-hating munchkin powergamer
They feel like Fate aspects, which lots of folks have trouble with, and don't really match the name.
I don't mind the name in a vacuum, since they're supposed to be related to the character backstory. But "experience" is too closely related to progression mechanics ("experience points") in TTRPG play, so I worry it may be confusing.
 

Reynard

Legend
Supporter
I don't mind the name in a vacuum, since they're supposed to be related to the character backstory. But "experience" is too closely related to progression mechanics ("experience points") in TTRPG play, so I worry it may be confusing.
The kind of terminology you are supposed to use -- lover not a fighter, say -- is not "an experience" and I find it confusing. They could call them something as simple as traits, or even aspects. Or, use the mechanic as a backstory generator: "Lover not a fighter: I once got caught canoodling with the baron's niece and was able to talk my way out of a hanging by proposing, then I beat feet out of the district."
 


overgeeked

B/X Known World
To clarify what I mean by closed rings. With 9 power sets, there are 36 combinations of 2 sets. The 9 classes in the playtest make a ring, with each powerset used exactly twice by 2 different classes. With 36 total combinations, you can make 4 rings of 9 classes that are closed, as below. This isn't the only way to do it, of course, lots of possible combinations. You can even chain them together to make a single ring of 36.

Playtest set:

Grace/Codex = Bard
Codex/Splendor = Wizard
Splendor/Valor = Seraph
Valor/Blade = Guardian
Blade/Bone = Warrior
Bone/Sage = Ranger
Sage/Arcana = Druid
Arcana/Midnight = Sorcerer
Midnight/Grace = Rogue

Set 2:
Grace/Splendor
Splendor/Blade
Blade/Sage
Sage/Midnight
Midnight/Codex
Codex/Valor
Valor/Bone
Bone/Arcana
Arcane/Grace

Set 3:
Grace/Valor
Valor/Sage
Sage/Codex
Codex/Blade
Blade/Arcana
Arcana/Splendor
Splendor/Midnight
Midnight/Bone
Bone/Grace

Set 4:
Grace/Blade
Blade/Midnight
Midnight/Valor
Valor/Arcana
Arcana/Codex
Codex/Bone
Bone/Splendor
Splendor/Sage
Sage/Grace
Wouldn’t it be 72? 9x8.
 


Zaukrie

New Publisher
This sounds like a cool idea

This doesn't. Converting the d20 roll to a curve is going to mess with the math.
well, gotta do something to get fear vs hope. I guess we could just say "this is my real die" and "this is the bad die"......but I don't really care about changing the expected value of the roll, it just isn't that important.
 



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