Daggerheart General Thread [+]

[jmartkdr2]

Ravenloft -- meaning the domains of dread -- are a giant pile of potential frames, given how frames are focused.

This brings up an interesting question: how would one do a traditional campaign world for DH? Would you have a gazetteer of all the lands (etc) and then a section on Campaign Frames you could run within that world? I can see that being a good way to present Eberron.

I woud structure it this way:

Part 1 of the book is a broad overview of the setting, highlighting te things that make it special. So an Eberron book would talk about the Last War and magic-punk and unknown gods. A Ravenloft book would talk about horror in ttrpgs and the vibes of the setting.

Part 2 would be player options: definitely ancestries and items, probably subclasses and maybe classes. An Eberron book would need an Invention Domain and an Artificer class at least. Ravenloft would need a lot less.

Part 3 would be most of the book: a dozen or more campaign frames. For Ravenloft this is straightforward: each frame is a domain of dread. Eberron would be trickier but I’m sure most Eberron fans could come up with 15 ideas.

Part 4 (optional) would be additional GM resources like antagonists or terrain that fits the whole setting and isn’t associated with a frame.

At least that’s my quick answer.

 

[zakael19]

For me, I'd probably pick a cluster of related lands, whether geographically (using older RL) or thematically (using newer), and then just stick to that area in-game.

I've built out what is essentially a regional organization cribbed from some Forged in the Dark games I've seen. Focus down on a singular area with some nations pressed up against each other, toss out 4-6 points of interest per with just enough words to spur the imagination and give the players something to crystalize off, and then add in a bunch of factions with competing interests and aims to spark play and have something to quickly turn to.

Cortes Immer: A port city at the mouth of the Immer River where it meets the Bay of Homecoming. Here, the Magelords of Aare first stepped on to the land they would claim. The lighthouse they built shines a bright white light from a flame held suspended in fields of magic. Rumors have it the count can focus that flame inland should danger threaten the walls, but the shadows threatening the city gather within already. Trade comes in from the lands beyond here and flows out from the Guild Cities to points around the coast and beyond the waves.

Einsinnar’s Lament: A mottled grey-white statue, weathered features barely discernable as an elf. From cupped hands waterspills into a pond. An oasis of wizened cherry trees that grow nowhere else.

Took the time to localize the Ancestries (why did they make everything so long-lived baseline), Communities, and Classes to do a bunch of world building implications as well:

Katari: In the endless wars between Magelords, many attempts were made to create a better and more loyal soldier. Only one succeeded in full, when the Lord of Arventherin wove together the hunting cat of the mountains and human to make new life with the instincts and ferocity of a beast and the creativity and adherence to orders of a sapient. Most Katari remaining are the felid-form ones, descended from the shock troops; those with more human features were made for less warlike pursuits.
Today, the household guard of the Throne of Bells is formed of Katari, and many find employment in similar occupations. They tend to live 80-90 years, some say the frequent napping helps them age slower than humans.

Names tend to have a lot of smushed together sounds (Mrwyr, Grwann, Plirwyr, Arvelir)
• What strange (perhaps lethal to others) food or drink or additive can be traced back to the leash the Magelords once held over your people?
• Why do Katari pity the other ancestries?

Bards: Goblins, Humans, fauns, and dwarves are the most common bardic sorts. Goblins tend to make everything a performance, Humans are concerned with lineage and fame, Fauns play songs under starlight, and dwarves declaim poetry and sagas. Most bards learn from an apprenticeship style arraignment, but the Dwarfholts are known as the best place to learn if you have skill.

It's been fun! Took a bunch of inspiration from 4e's Points of Light stuff in general organization, since I like how that leaves a lot of instrumentality to the player characters.

 

[aramis erak]

I would almost want a Supply/Resource track on the character sheet that you could threaten as the GM using GM moves. This is something that you can do in a number of PbtA games: e.g., Stonetop, Root, Ironsworn, etc.

It's just a countdown timer.

 

[Aldarc]

It's just a countdown timer.

I'm not denying that a countdown timer is one way of doing it. HP is a countdown timer. Stress is a countdown timer. Armor is a countdown timer.

 

[Neonchameleon]

Is attrition based play possible in Daggerheart? Of course. You have short rests and long rests. Long rests need to be taken at home and without them hit points and stress are limited resources.

Is old school dungeon crawling possible in Daggerheart? I'd be more than happy running a conversion of Barrier Peaks or one of the other weird dungeons like Queen of the Demonweb Pits in Daggerheart (as I would Beast Feast). I wouldn't consider running "Ten foot pole" OSR high lethality D&D in Daggerheart. Go big and go dramatic but not gritty and slow.

 

[aramis erak]

Jumping in late on the OSR vibe...

Actual Old School, however, is VERY adjacent to DH... just delete the metacurrencies. The OSR isn't actually all that reflective of the Actual Old School... in part because actual OS was a wide gamut and the vocal segment of the OSR are focused on a rather narrow slice of it,

Personally, I don’t think it’s useful to try and measure Daggerheart against the “OSR gold standard” of attrition-based, room-by-room exploration. I think most of us agree that DH just isn’t built for that. It doesn’t mean you can’t hack it to approximate that feel,

A food count-down, a light count-down, and an ammo count-down, and you're mostly there.

but the system as written clearly leans toward scene-framed play, narrative pacing, and emotional storytelling, not procedural movement and resource counting.

As did a lot of tables in the 70's and 80's. The procedural play was not uncommon, but largely was not the focus for many adult groups. Hell, for comparison, look at Tunnels and Trolls and the way it's played... it's only a year younger than D&D in the market... (I think the 50th version will hit at 51... ie, 2026) stunts in combat were something mentioned, but not actually given a rule... it was just assumed that players would be, until 7th was released.

If you want procedural rigor, yeah, you’ll probably be happier with another system.

Not a lot of actual old school play was procedural rigor...

But if you want emergent tension with a strong narrative spine, Daggerheart can totally do that—as long as you let it be itself. I'm confident that there can be a sweet spot between OSR vibes and Daggerheart’s design.

It hits most of them already.

A dungeon crawling variation just loses the traps, and requires creature conversions.
Or, the traps become a Fear result. Schrödinger's Trap, if you will. It's there and not there until the scene ends, either having been summoned by decay of the waveform via Fear result, or been avoided by fate.

A lot of dungeons' details really don't need to be mapped to the square; indeed, I've occasionally used node-based dungeons in several games: that is, I know what is connected to what, but ignore the halls/tunnels inbetween... as is done in D&D's Out of the Abyss underground wanderings... I made small geomorphs for tunnels, and random encounters then had random tunnels, too.

Many dungeons would be more fun, really, if the exact ranges aren't set in stone on the map...

And then, the one thing that is going to be missing: The save or die traps. But those really weren't all that common. In the TSR modules I had, it was only the tournament modules that did that.

 

[zakael19]

Or, the traps become a Fear result. Schrödinger's Trap, if you will. It's there and not there until the scene ends, either having been summoned by decay of the waveform via Fear result, or been avoided by fate.

Yup, I posted a really quick and rough sample idea of this using some of the Environment concepts way back in the thread. Easy Reaction move or Golden Opportunity response, with the outcome on a fear (the canyon or whatever Environment as what is in essence a log-crossing trap).

 

[Reynard]

It isn't that you could not figure out a way to do OSR dungeon crawling in Daggerheart. It is that it is the wrong tool for the job, so why bother?

 

[doctorbadwolf]

Part 3 would be most of the book: a dozen or more campaign frames. For Ravenloft this is straightforward: each frame is a domain of dread. Eberron would be trickier but I’m sure most Eberron fans could come up with 15 ideas.

13, one of which isn’t the same as the others in some obvious and interesting way.

It’s Eberron. Has to be a Baker’s Dozen.

 

[doctorbadwolf]

I woud structure it this way:

Part 1 of the book is a broad overview of the setting, highlighting te things that make it special. So an Eberron book would talk about the Last War and magic-punk and unknown gods. A Ravenloft book would talk about horror in ttrpgs and the vibes of the setting.

Part 2 would be player options: definitely ancestries and items, probably subclasses and maybe classes. An Eberron book would need an Invention Domain and an Artificer class at least. Ravenloft would need a lot less.

Part 3 would be most of the book: a dozen or more campaign frames. For Ravenloft this is straightforward: each frame is a domain of dread. Eberron would be trickier but I’m sure most Eberron fans could come up with 15 ideas.

Part 4 (optional) would be additional GM resources like antagonists or terrain that fits the whole setting and isn’t associated with a frame.

At least that’s my quick answer.

A more serious response, although my other reply is absolutely correct.

I think that is exactly the right approach, and I hope DP puts out something very much like that for Exandria.

I’ve recently become enamored with the idea of building out my weird aetherpunk setting for Daggerheart. I think it may work better there than in 5e, and tbh I’m burnt out on writing material for D&D right now.

But one thing that drew me to Eberron way back when was that it reminded me of the world of Chevar, which I’ve been writing about and dreaming in and making stuff up for since the 3rd grade or so.