Daggerheart General Thread [+]

You’re misreading the table as a hard rule when it’s clearly a guideline.
No. That’s why I called it advice, not a rule. I have read the whole thing at least twice now, but thanks for assuming. As advice goes, it’s pretty bad. As you note at length it contradicts so much of the other advice given in the book.
 
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No. That’s why I called it advice, not a rule. I have read the whole thing at least teoce now, but thanks for assuming. As advice goes, it’s pretty bad. As you note at length it contradicts so much of the other advice given in the book
That's not the way I'm reading it. You called the rules terrible earlier, and as guidelines, they're not. They're really useful as a starting point for the GM for different kinds of encounters. Are there places to go after that? I sure think so. I get the impression you're saying "spend Fear to make all the encounters as rough as possible," which is sort of the polar opposite advice. And, I don't agree with that. I'd say if the GM spent all their Fear to wreck the party in every encounter, a couple of things would happen. One, the party would be in a lot worse shape when they reach the "boss" encounter, and two, the GM wouldn't have the Fear to make that encounter, which the session was building up to, really memorable.

If you're trying to say "there's advice in the book and I don't agree with it," fair enough. What you're coming off as saying to me, is "the advice in the book tells you how to run terrible encounters." And ... let's just say I disagree with that. To each their own, at the end, I suppose. What advice do you have along these lines for guidance for a GM?
 


Is the Quick Start adventure a good representation of how you all expect to run games? Any good 3rd party adventures out there for comparison?
I've run the Quick Start and it was decent as these sorts of things are. There is also a supplement about the location for the adventure which lets you expand on it a bit. I have heard third parties are making adventures, but haven't seen any yet. I am sure someone will come along with more information shortly.

For the quick start, it's something you can run really fast, or take a more moderate approach and explain things to the players, along with just letting them establish parts of the setting. I took the latter approach, and the group enjoyed it.
 

Is the Quick Start adventure a good representation of how you all expect to run games? Any good 3rd party adventures out there for comparison?
I'm not sure yet. There is an adventure that I think was for the playtest that is similar.


Also I have this one from a recent kickstarter

https://www.drivethrurpg.com/en/product/528405/a-tale-of-two-farms

Which has a similar format.

I have one I need to put together. I wonder if there is a template somewhere?
 

Is the Quick Start adventure a good representation of how you all expect to run games? Any good 3rd party adventures out there for comparison?
For something like a one-shot or a convention game, absolutely. For a campaign, I would say no. Daggerheart strikes me as a PCs front-and-center as protagonists style of game. In my view that means prepping situations that directly involve the PCs' goals and motivations rather than canned adventures. If you wanted to run a canned adventure, I'd suggest finding PC goals and motivations and pointing those towards the canned adventure. Like one PC wants to find their long-lost brother so plant rumors that the brother went to a relevant location near the start of the adventure. Just don't string the players along and actually pay off the goal and motivation.
 

For something like a one-shot or a convention game, absolutely. For a campaign, I would say no. Daggerheart strikes me as a PCs front-and-center as protagonists style of game. In my view that means prepping situations that directly involve the PCs' goals and motivations rather than canned adventures. If you wanted to run a canned adventure, I'd suggest finding PC goals and motivations and pointing those towards the canned adventure. Like one PC wants to find their long-lost brother so plant rumors that the brother went to a relevant location near the start of the adventure. Just don't string the players along and actually pay off the goal and motivation.

Hmm this may be the challenge for me. I've been looking at things and reading the non-youtube stuff out there and I'm not completely bouncing off it, but I (in that more OSR/Shadowdark style) take the approach more naturally of playing the adventure, not playing to the PCs, if that makes sense.

Quite a shift for me mentally.
 

Hmm this may be the challenge for me. I've been looking at things and reading the non-youtube stuff out there and I'm not completely bouncing off it, but I (in that more OSR/Shadowdark style) take the approach more naturally of playing the adventure, not playing to the PCs, if that makes sense.

Quite a shift for me mentally.
Yeah. I feel you. It's definitely a shift in playstyle. To be fair, it's just my opinion. But it does strike me as needing something like the attitude presented in the Game Master's Handbook of Proactive Roleplaying.
 

Hmm this may be the challenge for me. I've been looking at things and reading the non-youtube stuff out there and I'm not completely bouncing off it, but I (in that more OSR/Shadowdark style) take the approach more naturally of playing the adventure, not playing to the PCs, if that makes sense.

Quite a shift for me mentally.
I think you can run it with the mentality you're comfortable with, and make use of some of the narrative elements when you feel comfortable with them. I've played a bunch of OSR style games, even though it's not my preferred playstyle, and the central element I get from them as you present a situation and the story is what comes out of the choices the players make. So in effect there's no intent of a predefined story.

And I think you could run DaggerHeart that way too, without hitting against too much of what the game is trying to accomplish. In many ways, how the dice fall in terms of Hope/Fear could be used in a very OSR way: you just use them as part of creating the emerging story.

I'm a big fan of taking a game and doing what you feel comfortable with it, and I think DaggerHeart can do what you're looking for. All I'd say is that when some detail of the setting comes up and you'd typically use an oracle or some other die roll to determine, just ask the players for their input.
 

Let me just add one more thing: I have played and run the adventure "The Lost City" more times than I can count, from B/X days to 5E. I think you could take that and get it to run with DaggerHeart really well.
 

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