Daggerheart Discussion

[Vael]

Do you use environments right out of the book, or take them as ideas to build your own as applicable to your narrative?

Both. I've used Cult Ritual and Heist (from The Void, and expected to be in Hope & Fear) as written and they've more or less allowed me to run a whole session with them. But I've stolen the Cult Ritual's Desecrated Ground passive in a few other areas. Sometimes with the added "Players may mark a Stress or spend a Hope to ignore that effect on an action roll". I really like Environments, they've done a lot to up my game as a GM

 

[zakael19]

Both. I've used Cult Ritual and Heist (from The Void, and expected to be in Hope & Fear) as written and they've more or less allowed me to run a whole session with them. But I've stolen the Cult Ritual's Desecrated Ground passive in a few other areas. Sometimes with the added "Players may mark a Stress or spend a Hope to ignore that effect on an action roll". I really like Environments, they've done a lot to up my game as a GM

Gotcha, yeah. I've mainly built custom ones that fit what I need. One thing I've been exploring is doing Event encounters following a little along the style of Draw Steel!'s Malice Actions: specific abilities that suggest what it's like to encounter that faction that you can pick and choose from to flavor the specific moment. Like, is this cultish stronghold? Were the players lured into back alleys filled with dangers?

Eg: for the insurgent Sons of Alagondar, Actions/Reactions around their knowledge of the terrain/traps/ambushy things. For the Ashmedai devil cultists, marks of how they've brought the power of the hells in defilement, looping countdowns that represent the heat dialing up, unstable portals summoning in demons, etc.

 

[Thomas Shey]

I AM NOT PICKING A FIGHT WITH 13TH AGE!

This thread is about Daggerheart. I may have responded to a post that mentioned 13th Age, but my comparison was with D&D! My point is not about 13th Age! I didn't claim any comparison to 13th Age. I don't care about 13th Age.

Frankly, I don't care if you were or not; what you indicated was the lack of carefully managed movement was an indication DH was not intended to be tactical, and 13th Age was an example where that clearly wasn't the case. I was arguing with your premise, and using an immediately at hand counterexample to indicate why.

I could probably come up with another half-dozen games with a fairly strong tactical focus that also do broad-strokes movement if you'd prefer.

 

[Faolyn]

So we're leveling faster than what's recommended in the book. We average a level every 2-3 sessions. That will end up a 25-30 session campaign to 10th level, which is actually a great pace for my interest level. (We're nearly to 8th level.)

How long are your sessions?

 

[FrozenNorth]

Well then why does it use so much space and such a huge percentage of the player options on combst options then?

Compared with 13th age which has tactical combat (with theater of mind) Dagger Heart does not look less combat focused

• It has a quite complex ressource management system with stress, hope, armor, health + maybe ressources on ability cards (and fear). Typical for combat heavy games with attrition. 13th age only has 2 per default (health and healing surges). All with short and long rest.

I disagree that the complex resource management has anything to do with combat. Having players mark stress, armor, hope and HP are the principal means I use to enforce consequences outside of combat, whether it social contests or encountering exploration obstacles.

In fact, other systems lack of a stress mechanic is one of the principal reasons I find them more combat focussed than Daggerheart.

 

[Reynard]

I disagree that the complex resource management has anything to do with combat.

Anything? Really?