Great review. Based on this, I've just bought the boxed set from Free League. I never saw the Swedish original but this is a top-notch game, especially for beginners or for solo. I have already made house rules for kin stats
Got to be wizard as they are so frail and choice dependent at low level. From having to choose spells to damage or stay alive. Then the intensity of being possibly one shotted and those hold your breath moments of dice rolls. To the game changing simplicity of crowd control spells without denying others of chance to participate. Love wizard at low levels.
Regarding initiative, there’s also a heroic ability to choose to keep your initiative between rounds. There’s no modifiers in dragonbane, it’s low math, so you’re never adding/subtracting from your dice roll, so you’re initiative suggestion isn’t keeping with the ethos of the game.
Not sure tossing a d10 roll into the initiative equation is ruining the ethos of the game... I mentioned rolling a die if players at your table balk at the idea of the Agility attribute having no affect on when their characters get to act. I know a lot of players who will not be thrilled with having a card dealt to them which determines when they act. You mention the heroic ability (I remember there being two which have to do with initiative) but no profession begins the game with either of them and it isn't as if characters are going to be constantly learning new heroic abilities. ~ Jeff
Personally I like the initiative system, reminds me a lot of Troika, combat is chaotic and messy, forcing you to make decisions each round, it’s not just everyone taking turns in some predetermined order.
Right, the Veteran get to keep their initiative each round but if they draw a nine, they get to keep a nine; which they wouldn't probably keep. No profession starts with the ability to improve their initiative lot. All that's left is to swap cards. The initiative quibble isn't a big deal, I just mentioned it because I know players who would be very surprised a high Agility doesn't help you get the drop on anyone in combat. ~ Jeff
Honestly, the "Agility should help with initiative" idea is a holdover from D&D and D&D-likes. Several systems (even traditional die-roll systems) use other stats/abilities. Shadowrun uses Reaction and Intuition, for example. LANCER just uses interleaved turns with players choosing who goes next. Free League's love for card draw works just fine.
@@Thegaminggang Page 61 “learning magic” but Tomas has also said that anyone can learn magic. The Professions are not “classes” you are locked in to, they are more like backgrounds to initially determine what skills you’re trained in and what gear you start with, but there are no classes or levels, so where you go from there is upto the player, they can learn a new secondary skill and choose a school of magic, gaining access to spells. Again, it’s just the Mage profession will start with 3 spells and 3 tricks from their school or general, because of their background as a trained mage. On the flip side, here’s nothing stopping a mage from increasing their weapon skills.
Actually, if you take a look at some of the forums discussing Dragonbane, there's discussion about ONLY Mages being able to use magic. Maybe there was a design decision to change that just prior to release. It's not in the book though. ~ Jeff
The guy who wrote (or revised) the magic system is an old friend of mine. Krister Sundelin has been writing games for over 30 years, and aims for elegant systems that enhances roleplaying.
Jeff I had left it some little while but I came back to your helpful post and ordered the rather excellent Dragonbane. Thank you for the heads up. I sometimes sense an odd kinship with the Saxon King Aethelred the Unready since, if my wife is to be believed, I give an inordinate amount of our money to Scandinavians. In this case happily to Free League rather than the previously extant marauding Vikings who were not renowned for their game design. With best wishes.
Great Review! I think that was my major reason for not backing the kickstarter was compared to other Freeleague titles, there was a lack of content. The lack of a hard cover. Still gonna pick it up at some point soon.
Fully agree that there's a distinct lack of just like...stuff? The system itself is wonderful but the meager bestiary, only a handful of spells and lack of stuff like magic items leave a lot of the heavy lifting to the DM. In general i think it's pretty newbie-friendly but i can agree that combat might be a bit complex for most people who're entirely new to the hobby. As for the initiative cards not allowing for high-Agility characters to go higher in initiative i think the mechanics of the game make going first less of a universally good thing compared to other ttrpgs. And swapping initiative also has some interesting tactical effects that doesn't always make that a good option either. It's not that being first in initiative is bad, it's that your position in initiative means different things depending on the given situation. As an easy example, if you know the enemy will likely go down the next time they're hit you obviously want to be able to hit them before they get to hit you. But what if you're the tank but are low on HP, you're first in initiative, you know the monster would 1-shot either you or your mage friend and the monster is last in initiative. In that situation you would want to swap turns with the monster in order to dodge their attack but doing so would also risk them killing your mage, swapping with your mage would still leave the monster last so you're unable to dodge it's attack if the mage misses. In that situation, going last in initiative would have been straight up better. Making it so players with high Agility have a boost to initiative doesn't just mess with the card-based system's ability to never produce an initiative tie(which is a really neat side-effect of the cards tbh) it also just isn't always good for the character in question. Even just the increase to movement speed based on Agility is an overall better reward for a high stat than a boost to initiative would be.
@@galinor7 Oh i disagree that it doesn't have depth, i think all the mechanics that are there all play and interact wonderfully with each other. I was more so lamenting the fact that there just isn't a lot of content. I love most of what's there so far but FL really needs to put the pedal to the metal when it comes to actual content like adventures, settings, HAs, spells, literally any magic items and monsters or i fear outside people looking in may start to view at it as an abandoned game. The Bestiary they just released is absolutely fantastic and we know the Path of Glory adventure is on the way but it's almost been half a year already. Things need to get moving, and quick... The excessively restrictive 3rd party license is also not helping, really puts a chokehold on how quickly new homebrew content can be shared with the community.
As some people wrote already in this system you do not want go first. Especially if monster have high ferocity (number of activation / turns in round). Going back to modern D&D agile bonus does not make much sense here. Also I believe this fallow old AD&D paradigm that each attack when described by GM should not be like one slash and idle wait (like in computer games) but few seconds of skirmish between enemies. The fact that you do not count arrows fallows that type of narration
My No. 1 Solo RPG system
Great review. Based on this, I've just bought the boxed set from Free League. I never saw the Swedish original but this is a top-notch game, especially for beginners or for solo. I have already made house rules for kin stats
Hope you enjoy it!
Thank you so much I’ll send you a email. Great review and fantastic intro
Got to be wizard as they are so frail and choice dependent at low level. From having to choose spells to damage or stay alive. Then the intensity of being possibly one shotted and those hold your breath moments of dice rolls. To the game changing simplicity of crowd control spells without denying others of chance to participate. Love wizard at low levels.
Regarding initiative, there’s also a heroic ability to choose to keep your initiative between rounds. There’s no modifiers in dragonbane, it’s low math, so you’re never adding/subtracting from your dice roll, so you’re initiative suggestion isn’t keeping with the ethos of the game.
Not sure tossing a d10 roll into the initiative equation is ruining the ethos of the game... I mentioned rolling a die if players at your table balk at the idea of the Agility attribute having no affect on when their characters get to act. I know a lot of players who will not be thrilled with having a card dealt to them which determines when they act. You mention the heroic ability (I remember there being two which have to do with initiative) but no profession begins the game with either of them and it isn't as if characters are going to be constantly learning new heroic abilities. ~ Jeff
@@Thegaminggang the Fighter starts with “Veteran” heroic ability, so they get to choose to keep their initiative from round to round.
Personally I like the initiative system, reminds me a lot of Troika, combat is chaotic and messy, forcing you to make decisions each round, it’s not just everyone taking turns in some predetermined order.
Right, the Veteran get to keep their initiative each round but if they draw a nine, they get to keep a nine; which they wouldn't probably keep. No profession starts with the ability to improve their initiative lot. All that's left is to swap cards. The initiative quibble isn't a big deal, I just mentioned it because I know players who would be very surprised a high Agility doesn't help you get the drop on anyone in combat. ~ Jeff
Honestly, the "Agility should help with initiative" idea is a holdover from D&D and D&D-likes. Several systems (even traditional die-roll systems) use other stats/abilities. Shadowrun uses Reaction and Intuition, for example. LANCER just uses interleaved turns with players choosing who goes next. Free League's love for card draw works just fine.
“Mages are the only one who can use magic” that’s incorrect, anyone can learn and use magic, it’s just Mages are the only one to start with magic.
Where does it state in the rules any profession can use magic? Every time I saw magic discussed it specifically mentions mages. ~ Jeff
@@Thegaminggang Page 61 “learning magic” but Tomas has also said that anyone can learn magic. The Professions are not “classes” you are locked in to, they are more like backgrounds to initially determine what skills you’re trained in and what gear you start with, but there are no classes or levels, so where you go from there is upto the player, they can learn a new secondary skill and choose a school of magic, gaining access to spells. Again, it’s just the Mage profession will start with 3 spells and 3 tricks from their school or general, because of their background as a trained mage. On the flip side, here’s nothing stopping a mage from increasing their weapon skills.
Actually, if you take a look at some of the forums discussing Dragonbane, there's discussion about ONLY Mages being able to use magic. Maybe there was a design decision to change that just prior to release. It's not in the book though. ~ Jeff
@Thegaminggang There is a Heroic Ability that allows one to learn a new school of magic. It specifically allows non-mages to pick it.
@@thanatos5150 it’s called “Magic Talent” which non-mages can take so they can learn schools of magic and cast spells.
The guy who wrote (or revised) the magic system is an old friend of mine. Krister Sundelin has been writing games for over 30 years, and aims for elegant systems that enhances roleplaying.
Jeff I had left it some little while but I came back to your helpful post and ordered the rather excellent Dragonbane. Thank you for the heads up. I sometimes sense an odd kinship with the Saxon King Aethelred the Unready since, if my wife is to be believed, I give an inordinate amount of our money to Scandinavians. In this case happily to Free League rather than the previously extant marauding Vikings who were not renowned for their game design. With best wishes.
I can't wait to get my copy!!! I'm a big fan of the main artist! Looking forward to giving it a go.
Love the opening very cool
Same!
That violin is right up my street too.
Thanks!
it was awesome! super impressed
I personally like that the game isn't very fleshed out. It leaves plenty of room for the group to come up with stuff of their own.
I personally like that the game isn't very fleshed out. It leaves plenty of room for the group to come up with stuff of their own.
Great Review! I think that was my major reason for not backing the kickstarter was compared to other Freeleague titles, there was a lack of content. The lack of a hard cover. Still gonna pick it up at some point soon.
Good call!
LOVE THE NEW INTRO!!!
I bought the set after watching your previous walk through.
I hope you enjoy!
Fully agree that there's a distinct lack of just like...stuff? The system itself is wonderful but the meager bestiary, only a handful of spells and lack of stuff like magic items leave a lot of the heavy lifting to the DM. In general i think it's pretty newbie-friendly but i can agree that combat might be a bit complex for most people who're entirely new to the hobby.
As for the initiative cards not allowing for high-Agility characters to go higher in initiative i think the mechanics of the game make going first less of a universally good thing compared to other ttrpgs. And swapping initiative also has some interesting tactical effects that doesn't always make that a good option either. It's not that being first in initiative is bad, it's that your position in initiative means different things depending on the given situation.
As an easy example, if you know the enemy will likely go down the next time they're hit you obviously want to be able to hit them before they get to hit you. But what if you're the tank but are low on HP, you're first in initiative, you know the monster would 1-shot either you or your mage friend and the monster is last in initiative. In that situation you would want to swap turns with the monster in order to dodge their attack but doing so would also risk them killing your mage, swapping with your mage would still leave the monster last so you're unable to dodge it's attack if the mage misses. In that situation, going last in initiative would have been straight up better. Making it so players with high Agility have a boost to initiative doesn't just mess with the card-based system's ability to never produce an initiative tie(which is a really neat side-effect of the cards tbh) it also just isn't always good for the character in question. Even just the increase to movement speed based on Agility is an overall better reward for a high stat than a boost to initiative would be.
Introduce House Rules such as; holding your Initiative, adding Free Actions, Kin stats etc. are so easy to do for an experienced GM
Honestly, I agree. Dragonbane is all tinsel and Christmas lights but of little depth or content. I was quite disappointed.
@@galinor7 Oh i disagree that it doesn't have depth, i think all the mechanics that are there all play and interact wonderfully with each other.
I was more so lamenting the fact that there just isn't a lot of content. I love most of what's there so far but FL really needs to put the pedal to the metal when it comes to actual content like adventures, settings, HAs, spells, literally any magic items and monsters or i fear outside people looking in may start to view at it as an abandoned game. The Bestiary they just released is absolutely fantastic and we know the Path of Glory adventure is on the way but it's almost been half a year already. Things need to get moving, and quick...
The excessively restrictive 3rd party license is also not helping, really puts a chokehold on how quickly new homebrew content can be shared with the community.
As some people wrote already in this system you do not want go first. Especially if monster have high ferocity (number of activation / turns in round). Going back to modern D&D agile bonus does not make much sense here.
Also I believe this fallow old AD&D paradigm that each attack when described by GM should not be like one slash and idle wait (like in computer games) but few seconds of skirmish between enemies. The fact that you do not count arrows fallows that type of narration