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.

 

[TwoSix]

Oh, I would try to run it “by the book” at first. But I can foresee it quickly spiraling out of control as three 12 year old girls yelled over each other trying to take their actions all at the same time, and me trying to rein them in and discern what each of them was saying. Or, if I turn out to be a crappy Daggerheart GM, I would probably have to keep prodding them to do something as they sat around goofing off instead of paying attention.

I feel like you can probably create some rules to enforce social conventions, without necessarily changing the standard initiative system. Like, just have them roll a d12, whoever is highest goes first, and then go clockwise. If someone has a really good idea of something they can do right now, then you can ask to "skip ahead" and take your turn early, if the other player agrees.

I don't think "strongest attacker gets to go as many times as they want until they roll Fear" is something the system is balanced around. Just create a "let's be sure everyone gets a turn" light guidance mechanism as a table convention.

Edit: To be clear, it's not about adding rules to the playtest. It's more just about giving a little bit of guidance, while still allowing for the free-flowing nature of the base system as desired.

 

[Zaukrie]

I think it gives players the ability to cast fireball first, then rush into the cavern. Rather than go in some random order. The one time my players really took advantage of going in any order last night was when the druid tried to take control of a ball of fire an enemy had created so it stopped burning them, rather than having someone else go. Not that it worked, but it made sense for her to go.

 

[UnplayedRanger]

I think if I ever run this game with my group I will institute the following houserule:

Initiative: At the start of combat, each player rolls their Duality Dice and adds their Agility modifier to determine the order of combat. If a player Rolls with Hope, they still mark a Hope slot. If a player rolls with Fear, the GM still collects a Fear. If more players roll with Fear, the enemies act first.

If I was gonna hack on an initiative system, I’d just steal Savage Worlds’, and deal out new cards every round. On a Joker, all players gain hope. And that player gets to go first.

 

[Gorck]

A slight nitpick: I don't really like the way the Active Weapons and Inventory Weapons are listed on the character sheet. Say my Warrior has a Longsword and Dagger as his Primary and Secondary weapons and a Greatsword as his Inventory weapon. If I decide I want to switch to using my Greatsword, I would have to erase the Longsword's information from the Primary slot and write the Greatsword's information in its place. Then I would have to erase the Greatsword's information from the Inventory Weapon slot and write in the Longsword's information in its place. That's a lot of needless erasing and re-writing for something that might be a temporary switch.

I would prefer it if the Weapons section had Primary, Secondary, and Other: ________ (where you write Primary or Secondary on the line), and then have check-boxes to the left where you would check off which weapons are active.

Likewise for Armor and Inventory Armor.

 

[Reynard]

A slight nitpick: I don't really like the way the Active Weapons and Inventory Weapons are listed on the character sheet. Say my Warrior has a Longsword and Dagger as his Primary and Secondary weapons and a Greatsword as his Inventory weapon. If I decide I want to switch to using my Greatsword, I would have to erase the Longsword's information from the Primary slot and write the Greatsword's information in its place. Then I would have to erase the Greatsword's information from the Inventory Weapon slot and write in the Longsword's information in its place. That's a lot of needless erasing and re-writing for something that might be a temporary switch.

I would prefer it if the Weapons section had Primary, Secondary, and Other: ________ (where you write Primary or Secondary on the line), and then have check-boxes to the left where you would check off which weapons are active.

Likewise for Armor and Inventory Armor.

I'm not sure what you mean. There is a third weapon entry in inventory with all the same details.

 

[Campbell]

I feel like you can probably create some rules to enforce social conventions, without necessarily changing the standard initiative system. Like, just have them roll a d12, whoever is highest goes first, and then go clockwise. If someone has a really good idea of something they can do right now, then you can ask to "skip ahead" and take your turn early, if the other player agrees.

I don't think "strongest attacker gets to go as many times as they want until they roll Fear" is something the system is balanced around. Just create a "let's be sure everyone gets a turn" light guidance mechanism as a table convention.

Edit: To be clear, it's not about adding rules to the playtest. It's more just about giving a little bit of guidance, while still allowing for the free-flowing nature of the base system as desired.

Yeah. My general viewpoint is that when a game includes player principles and best practices you should trust and expect players to follow them. If you have a player that is not interested in playing the game in that way, then it's probably not the best game for them. The same can be said for the GM's principles and enumerated best practices. It's up to us to keep each other accountable. No game can protect us from bad faith play. The purpose of any game is to facilitate a conversation we all want to have.

That being said I would keep in mind that just because the action tracker is in place it does not mean the GM stops leading the game's conversation. Just like in any other scene you can shift the spotlight and ask a particular player what their character is doing in the moment. When you make your move, you can also take actions which if not responded to can lead to consequences.

 

[Gorck]

I'm not sure what you mean. There is a third weapon entry in inventory with all the same details.

Yes, you can carry a third Weapon in your inventory as your Inventory Weapon (below the "Inventory" section of your character sheet). But, in order to make your Inventory Weapon become your Active Primary or Secondary Weapon, you would need to erase each of the two weapons and re-write their information in the other spot on the Inventory sheet. My proposal would be to change the name of the "Active Weapons" section to just "Weapons" and have all 3 weapons slots listed in one place. Then have check boxes to the left of them where you can check off which ones are active. That way if you swapped out you weapons, whether out of combat for free or during combat marking off a Stress, you just need to erase the check in one box and check the other box.

 

[Reynard]

Yes, you can carry a third Weapon in your inventory as your Inventory Weapon (below the "Inventory" section of your character sheet). But, in order to make your Inventory Weapon become your Active Primary or Secondary Weapon, you would need to erase each of the two weapons and re-write their information in the other spot on the Inventory sheet.

Why?

 

[Fifth Element]

This kind of thinking always strikes me as odd. Why would you house rule a game you haven't played yet?

Because many people can see how a rule would work without having to play it first, and knows their own preferences and those of the other players?

 

[Reynard]

Because many people can see how a rule would work without having to play it first, and knows their own preferences and those of the other players?

"A" rule is often wrapped up with a bunch of other subsystems.