Daggerheart "Description on Demand" a GM DON'T

[Kichwas]

Yep, we've decided to try Draw Steel tonight.

I've kind of tried to recommend that one to a few people who's brains worked the opposite from mine. It looks like a very solid game for more gamist players. If they manage good product support I suspect they will end up competing head to head against Pathfinder 2E.

These days when I talk about those games (Drawsteel and PF2E) in too much detail I end up using terms that their fans find insulting - not out of ill intent but because my mental frame has shifted and I'm not seeing it right anymore.

D&D... while it looks very gamist, has a culture that sits more in the middle of all things - being the base that most gamers work with.

But I feel like Drawsteel and Pathfinder's players will look at each other and wonder if they're not looking in a mirror. People will pick one or the other for various details in the engines or the authors - but the players will largely have an easy time of talking to each other. I'd almost suggest Drawsteel and PF2E players all get a copy of the other game to run on 'off nights' as a way to avoid burnout - just like I used to tell people who played WoW or FFXIV before I stopped playing MMOs.

Unlike this thread where some of us have brains that are one shape, others another shape. And most of what we've achieved here is to realize a round peg doesn't fit in a square hole very well.

 

[Neonchameleon]

A good DM is not making it up on the spot. A good DM details the adventure and the world ahead of time.

And a good MC does not have a hard coded world the PCs are plopped into like isikai'd interlopers but has a setting of which the PCs are a part and that thematically reflects that.

Different games and tables have different assumptions and Daggerheart has neither the extreme of an old school DM nor the extreme of a PbtA MC, both of which work extremely well with some significant costs.

 

[kermit4karate]

“In heaven there is no beer…”

Check, please!

 

[kermit4karate]

I guess I really am a narrativist player and have been longer than I realized.

Over the years I have very often debated GMs that tried to give my PC a 'freebie' edge. From getting a whole suit of extra abilities for a GURPS PC, to getting some freebie abilities, and last week I had a silly moment where a GM told me my wizard read something of note (that would give away the nature of something I was messing with) and I had to point out that my wizard was illiterate - so she kept on messing with (even though I as a player figured out what was up). DH doesn't have a built in "flaws / weaknesses' system, but I made her illiterate anyway as hook on a background question: what's the object you've been seeking". I decided the object was the locket she was wearing. She's seeking a way to read the words on it that are the command to open it that only she can see... And that gives me lots of downstream limits.

Noting that reading example in detail because I've had players do things like that many times: purposefully weaken a character they were playing for a potentially more engaging story angle.

It's actually much more common for me to get a backstory that is basically "man this guy's in for a rough time" than it is to get "this guy has the world at his feet, his own iseki harem, and all these toys." I haven't gotten one of those since early high school in the 80s. But I get on average one PC per campaign that has "tragic flaws / power downs that the game system did not in any way require."

When I was GMing Pathfinder I've seen as many players vote against using one of the 'power up' variant rules like Free Archetype as I've seen vote for them. And half the 'vote for' players voted on the belief and personal intention that it would add depth but not power.

Over the years in various games I've seen players ask for a rebuild on a PC because they'd picked something too powerful. And just as many because this other option here was more powerful.

It's not as simple as many will or many won't. It varies by individual and sometimes the mood of that individual.

You've played with much more democratic DMs than I have/am.

My games are like a soccer match. Argue with the ref, even if it's to tell them that you don't want a skill or a special ability being granted (how would they know the gift isn't actually a curse??), and you could get a red card, but players do have the right to pack up and go home...which they don't do because I believe most RPGs benefit from having a single benevolent, decisive dictator.

 

[plecostomus]

I kinda want to hear that story!

I killed a monster with a Toll the Dead cantrip that did somewhere around 6 damage. That was when the DM struck, I think because my cleric never gets a killshot, and he asked, "How does it die?" There were some stages to my response, starting with panic. Then I considered the spell description, which makes it seem like the cantrip does damage with an eerie sound, so I thought maybe the monster should just fall over dead.

That would have been a good choice. But the panic was still there, and I wasn't sure what the DM wanted from this, so instead I said "a bunch of ghostly hands pop out of the air and rip the monster apart".

As we closed out the session, the DM gently suggested that because my cleric had minced the monster to death, we might not get as much monster loot as we otherwise would have.

We all said our farewells... and then about 20 minutes later another player posted in the text channel that giving us less loot because of "flavor" was unfair to me. This player did not ask my opinion before posting. I tried explaining that I was fine with it, but the player was convinced the DM would punish flavor descriptions going forward. The player was having some other stressors at the time that the table could not help with, but they never came back after that session, so I will always remember that the inciting incident for them leaving was the DM asking me how my cantrip killed a monster.

(At the next session the DM said the monster's horns and fangs remained, from which we crafted multiple enchanted items.)

 

[Agamon]

I would say yes but no or perhaps yes in a good way.
You lose the cohesive vision but instead gain a consensus vision which, in a small group format, can be a net gain.

I feel like Daggerheart run "as intended" should have between 3 to 5 players, and 5 is pushing it. For me this was one of the major flaws of watching Critical Role play it. Their cast is too large for their own game. As frustrated as I am that CR picked D&D over Daggerheart, I would never want to run or play in a Daggerheart West Marches game. I feel you would lose what for me is the main reason to pick Daggerheart - 'Description on demand's ability to heavily influence the narrative going forward.

To do that you need a group that very rapidly starts to vibe off each other and round robin the roleplay almost as if by instinct. And that means a small group.

The perfect example of Daggerheart working at it's best is the Dodoborne podcast. If you can get past the comedy and the one player who talks in a funny voice (why do some players who are able-voiced do that... I almost stopped watching Dodoborne over it)... anyway, get past those two things and instead pay attention to HOW they play the game. And how the players will just go on for long stretches roleplaying while the GM is just completely passive, almost silent. The GM will just pop in an odd 'sure' or 'yeah' every so often and the players just run with the story at times.

There are three of them, and they are IMO the 'example case' of 'Description on Demand' when it works to perfection. I doubt most groups could pull it off. But these 3 do it so well I sit there wondering how they are not a bigger 'thing' than they are. Sure they have a rapidly growing fan base, but I can't imagine they won't keep growing.

So that game is more or less "design by group vibing to a 'this is fun' consensus".

And you'd be very hard pressed to get that success if they added even 2 more players. They might be able to get to 4 players if they got extremely lucky. They'd have 'State Lottery odds' of keeping that energy going at 5. And past that and I'd be betting on 'planet killing asteroid' over it still working.

Which you can kind of see when you watch Daggerheart actual plays with larger casts. They end up feeling like D&D games - at least to me. They might be good, but they lose what makes Daggerheart special.

So yeah. There is 'design by committee' in all of this. But when your committee stays small enough that's a good thing.

As an aside - ever since CR made their season 4 announcement the DH community seems to filling up with people planning West Marches games and I'm starting to feel none of those games will manage to capture the 'Daggerheart magic' because it's just too many people to keep the flow going right.

Derik from Knights of Last Call is getting a lot of requests during streams for a Daggerheart "megagame" (sort of a West Marches with multiple DMs). I had the same reaction, DH isn't the right type of system for that style of game. They currently have PF2 and Dragonbane games setup like this, and those games lend themselves a lot better to a setting with pools of PCs with dozens of GMs.

 

[definiteFreakyFishGuy]

Sorry if this question has been already answered, but I am a bit confused about what seems to be a strong coupling between "Description on Demand" and Daggerheart. It seems like DoD is a GM technique that can be used in any TTRPG with a GM.

Are there any particular game mechanics in Daggerheart that makes DoD particularly effective or necessary? Is there any reason why DoD couldn't be used in DND?

 

[BruceWright]

Derik from Knights of Last Call is getting a lot of requests during streams for a Daggerheart "megagame" (sort of a West Marches with multiple DMs). I had the same reaction, DH isn't the right type of system for that style of game.

Eh, I think it would still work.

As said elsewhere in this thread, the player-led portion of the game is extremely dial-able. Keep the player descriptions limited to things local to the party during a session, then share that among players between sessions like a standard WestMarches does with maps and after-action reports.

 

[BruceWright]

Sorry if this question has been already answered, but I am a bit confused about what seems to be a strong coupling between "Description on Demand" and Daggerheart. It seems like DoD is a GM technique that can be used in any TTRPG with a GM.

Are there any particular game mechanics in Daggerheart that makes DoD particularly effective or necessary? Is there any reason why DoD wouldn't be used in DND?

Specifically why I bought this up is that Daggerheart strongly recommends this style of play as core to the ethos of the game.

Of course DH states that any guidance is at table discretion, optional. There aren’t mechanics that require or enforce its use.

But such a prominent new game with this as its core ethos, i felt it bore a fruitful discussion to talk over the pros and cons of it. Especially since a couple of people I talked to about it found it a positively revolting idea.

 

[Agamon]

Eh, I think it would still work.

As said elsewhere in this thread, the player-led portion of the game is extremely dial-able. Keep the player descriptions limited to things local to the party during a session, then share that among players between sessions like a standard WestMarches does with maps and after-action reports.

The games don't consist of parties, but of individual PCs that wander between different groups. Not saying it's impossible, you could do it with Ten Candles if you're a masochist lol. Just saying it files off the system's strengths to fit the system to the game style.