As interested in playing daggerheart as I am, I'm now even more excited to run my shadow dark game. So much good content in the core rule book and zines already, and now you tell me you making third party content for it! I can't wait.
Have you considered a Pathfinder 2 and DC20 compatibility module? A plug-in PDF or something to just change stat blocks and check DCs? I'm ending my time with 5e with the end of my current campaign, and will be moving to PF2 and / or DC20 very soon.
would be cool if you opened up your content to other systems, it looks cool but ugh 5e is so stale and I struggle to get excited about it anymore, especially after playing pathfinder 2e and seeing how much more satisfying and unique character creation and leveling works in that system, also combat is so much more tactical and your actions feel more meaningful, shadowdark seems kinda interesting, but at a glance looks like modded dnd rather than "50 years of innovation"
Yeah I'm increasingly becoming aware of the differences between what my players want and what I want haha. I hate tokens and props and stuff too, but my players love them. I'm increasingly realizing that GM's want less to do, and players want more to do. And so a lot of GM's that I know really like rules light systems but the players like crunchier systems. It's making me more and more aware of a concept that I haven't heard other people talk about yet, so for now I'm calling it player facing crunch versus GM facing crunch. For example, I really like how dagger heart has this complex armor system for the players to use. But so far I haven't had any enemies have armor. Which is great, armor is fun for the players because it gives them more to do, and it's hell for a GM because it gives them more to do XD. It makes me wonder if there's more "grit" that the players could be asked to do that the GM doesn't have to do.
Yeah, handing your group a problem to deal with like "Here's 5 damage, figure out the armor" is kinda the whole fun of D&D on both sides. Watching players figure out stuff and enjoy your work is why I love it so much. Some other similar puzzles you can try to attempt: 1. (Environment) Making traps active hazards that the party has to deal with. Make the spike pit obvious and dangerous, and let them figure out how to cross it. You don't even need a solution, just a cool trap, they'll come up with something. 2. (Social) Make the party prove their innocence via a false or half-truth accusation, bonus points if they suddenly look down and go "oh" when they walk out of a villager's house bloody from a demon encounter nobody else knows about. 3. (Combat) Give bosses or important fights a "setpiece" item or skill that is a problem, not a stat block. Such as a towering shield will block any attack in the direction they're facing. The party needs to change tactics to either disarm, get around the shield, or flank them to win.
@@littlemonztergaming8665 those are good ideas, but not exactly what I'm talking about. I'm talking about having gritty mechanics that add to the immersion but place the burden of book keeping on the players instead of the GM so that everyone is sharing work load at the table. I'm talking RPG design, not encounter design. Though those are definitely good ideas for encounter design that bring the players into an active creative space and I'm all about that. And it's definitely related to what I'm talking about. It's just not precisely the thing I'm talking about.
Honestly, when it comes to the similarity between Daggerheart and 5e, it feels like a move that justifies itself more than anything else. I'd be flabbergasted if Campagin 4 wasn't in Daggerheart, so even if Daggerheart's just to free CR to use something other than DnD, it'll probably be worth it to them. Still, Daggerheart could have been a lot more similar to 5e than it is and, as someone fascinated by game design, I've loved seeing the reactions all around to the Open Beta.
No matter how fun and well suited for Critical Role Daggerheart is, the 5e audience is way too big to justify the transition to the Daggerheart system. Critical role is a company, after all, and they can't always go for the ''fun'' option, especially when it comes to such impactful ones as this. I don't see them stepping away from 5e. From a business perspective, it just makes no sense to do so.
@@Baily16 That's a very good point. Still, the OGL incident scared a lot of creators. In an instant, all the work they'd done could have been owned and repurposed by Hasbro. The 5e audience may be big enough to keep them from switching, but a lot of CR fans don't play 5e (me included) so it might be worth the insurance to no longer be under WotC's thumb? We'll have to see!
@@Baily16 After the release of The Legend of Vox Machina and Campaign 3, I see that more and more young fans came to the fandom for the story and the roleplay and not specifically D&D. It was true that back in the C1/early C2 days the majority was there for D&D, but as someone who's been watching them since 2017, I can see that's no longer the case.
@@pippastrelle The OGL thing could definitely play a part in their decision going forward. I think for such a big company that's much more of a "we'll deal with it when it happens" kind of thing though. Especially with how flexible CR is. Changing systems when something bad does happen isn't the end of the world.
@@Baily16 "I cant wait to see Legendary people like Matthew Mercer, Laura Bailey, Liam o Brian and Ashley Johnson play a game together in the SAME ROOOM AHHHH. What you mean they do not play 5E? I guess my interest suddenly disapeared" I just cant with some of the fandom, its like some people lost the ability to think...
Tbh, “medieval if you squint” is actually kind of insulting as a writer. It’s a gross oversimplification of high fantasy in general. Lotr is “medieval if you squint”, so is red wall, chronicles of narnia and sometimes even Minecraft, to say that any of those are the same is ridiculous.
@@ShadestheMothman, you're correct. However, I think it mostly depends on how seriously one treats that. Context is everything. I can see saying the phrase in a tongue-in-cheek manner.
@@MannyBrum I dont think its against Western Fantasy, rather against generic Western Fantasy. European medieval settings have a lot to offer but people just throw knights, fortresses and dragons in without outlining a specific setting and doing even surface level research. This leads to a lot of fantasy feeling generic and uninspired.
I think the action token/no initiative system is totally fine so long as no one gets their turn skipped. It seems to me really weird that they didn't at least include an optional rule that requires everyone to go before someone can go again. But with this one change, the action token system actually creates a very cool and unpredictable flow of combat we're rolling with fears this big "oh shit" moment, without introducing any toxic elements. And honestly, if your table can't handle the responsibility of choosing which players go first in a round then the players can absolutely just roll initiative. That absolutely should be included as an optional rule as well. But importantly, the monsters shouldn't have to roll initiative, cuz it's a b**** and a half to roll initiative for monsters and this system is a very cool way of getting around that.
Actually that's great ! Because according to the update video released on the CR, they actually do have an initiative optional rule that gives players a limited number of action tokens
When I design encounters in 5e I tend to roll the initiative for enemies then and there. Players won't ever see those rolls anyway so having a list ready to go instead of creating it during the play simply saves time and softens the momentum break that is an initiative roll quite a bit
@@Dschonathan I delegate the initiative rolls for mobs entirely to one of the players (any of them that's savvy and experienced enough to understand how it works). That way I don't have to worry about it at all. They usually get it sorted while I set up the battle map. as a plus I don't have to keep track of whose go it is, the players will tell me.
@@Dschonathan that's really cool. I don't like spending a lot of time prepping though, so I still prefer systems that don't involve the enemies rolling initiative. Currently, when I run DND 5e, I just have the enemies go after the players. I find that it makes the players feel more badass and I can compensate by simply throwing harder encounters at them. I also really enjoy the "planning phase" feeling of the players deciding collaboratively on what to do, but that's table to table. Some tables won't do that very well. I'm blessed to have a group of players that are active and considerate when collaborating with each other.
Watched the overview video for the 1.3 changes, and I'm super excited to dive deeper the updated beta materials. A lot of what they talked about were the changes I hoped to see
@BobWorldBuilder very nice changes to advantage and disadvantage, and also I like the optional rules for distance and action limits. With the option for more rigidity, I think it places itself in the sweet spot between 5e and PbtA styled games where I believe the game has the most potential
I think the action system they are introducing gives just enough much needed structure to the play round. If someone super excited wants to take a bunch of turns right up front, it means the more reserved player has the freedom to lay down a few actions after the excited burst
thank you for mentioning Pathfinder, because I can't help but feel all the people complaining about how similar Daggerheart is to 5e are forgetting the next most popular TTRPG literally began its life as a reprinting of D&D mechanics. Shadowdark, everyone's new favourite, is an OSR game very clearly inspired by BX D&D, but no one's complaining about how that's not fresh and new. Darrington Press, as you mentioned, is clearly aiming for the 5e crowd who won't try a different game, but *might* now that Critical Role is putting out a new game, so OF COURSE they're going to make their game very superficially similar because they have a clear vision of their target audience and what they want. Personally I'm just happy to see that it's not another roll over d20 system, and I'm very happy to see them lean into inspiration from narrative forward systems like Blades in the Dark and PbtA. It's a similar enough feel to 5e that my 5e-only players tried it and loved it, and these are the same people who swore they'd never play a different a game, so that's enough for me to be invested and want to support the project.
I think the core issue people are having is that-as shown in this video-Critical Role themselves were the ones claiming the game would be 'fresh.' When any company makes a promise about their new product, and then fails to deliver on that promise, the people who bought into the idea of the new product because of that specific promise are going to be upset, and justifiably so. It's not a bad thing that their game isn't entirely different from 5e; It IS a bad thing that they essentially claimed it would be, and seemingly are failing to deliver.
Yeah the "Its too similar to DND" complaints are absurd to me. DND defines the TTRPG fantasy genre and has decades of material. It's going to be nearly impossible to build a system that doesn't in *some* manner feel similar. Better to be similar but interesting where it counts in my eyes.
@@ninja5879 Never heard of Shadowrun? Mutants and Masterminds? Literally Any of the world of Darkness series? Call of Cthulhu? GURPS? It's really, Really not that hard to make a system that's different from 5e as a fantasy system. Take away Vancian magic and you're halfway there.
@@Necroes mutants and masterminds I great. CoC and Shadowrun I've both played. They're mediocre, overly complicated, cumbersome systems *in completely fucking different genres*. They try so hard to be different and unique they end up worse than alternatives. Personally, I enjoyed a lot of Shadowrun, specifically 4e and the combat mechanics. But so many other aspects of that system are just dog shit. But anyway, I was talking about the fantasy setting. None of your examples cover that. Shadowrun is scifi, MnM is superhero power fantasy, and CoC is horror sci-fi mystery. Literally none of them apply to my comment other than Gurps, which is in and of itself heavily tied to early DND despite being mechanically fairly different, and is very era specific in its structure. Your comment is just naming other random popular systems but id bet you've never actually played them.
In my in-person groups, 5e inspiration is given out as physical coins and all of my players love it. I allow them to share the inspiration and the group will often offer up their own inspiration at a climactic moment or when someone is struggling with bad rolls. It adds an extra sense of comradery and teamwork, that I feel isn't quiet there in my online games where my players will forget they have the resource. For the Critical Role Show, I think this will help the players remember their resources at a quicker glance and let others jump in with a "Oh you have 3 Hope, you can use your class ability" to their fellow players
I played with a DM at dunracon that used coins like that (he was running a pathfinder? game) and I really liked it. We could donate coins we'd earned for actually being engaged (can't tell you how many groups I've been in (online) that just don't seem engaged in the RP part of a TTRPG) to help a really important roll go through that was a couple points off. Most of us only carried one or two at a time, you had to do something more than just basic RP and engagement to earn one. Feeling completely embarrassed that I can't remember his name, but his games were fun, and the coin idea was definitely an interesting and cool idea.
@@BobWorldBuilder I’ve been a fan for a long time. The first comment I ever made on one of your videos got both a like and a reply!!! Dream come true. Keep up the amazing work! :D
Dagger Heart is ripe for accessories. Considering CR already has a very extensive merch line, I'm sure they will cash in on it. Different trackers, card packs for domains/classes, etc. So much bank.
One thing I've come to realize is that their games seem to employ lots of artifacts/tokens and such. I know it can be fun and more "tactile", but damn does it make their games less accessible? I mean, you can play mouseritter, cairn etc with just some dice and paper to track things. Even some other types of tabletop games that allow you to play with a normal deck of cards. Again, I think it's fun merchandise, but I also think sometimes it's just too much to depend your game on (even if they allow you to print your own stuff)... I think I just prefer stuff to be at least a bit leaner.
Interesting point, though from what I can tell Daggerheart really doesn't really require anything but the sheet for your character and die, the rest is just further set dressing that perhaps improves the gameplay experience. There is something to be said for Tokens and Cards - a useful marker, easy to reference, harder to forget that important item while its in your 'deck'.
@@foldionepapyrus3441 Hah! That's a great point as well, these help with the "readability" of these abstract currencies and mechanics in general for sure! Happy to know that in their case these artifacts are purely optional. I like it when games help ppl gain intuition into creative solutions, so I think I still prefer the more accessible routes - leaning more into what the players generally already have at home vs pressuring (collections, or otherwise - MTG cough, cough :P) to buy more stuff. Sometimes one could just draw their own minis and use them as paper cut outs, re-thinking a normal deck of cards as dungeon generation+enemy encounter generation (like the Escape the City adventure, or the game Regicide), etc. is more what IMO is an accessible direction.
@@VitorGuerreiroVideos i've thought of ways to play this without the cards/tokens. love the idea, but realistically, cards can get damaged, or you may have more than one player running the same class or wanting the same skills, so im thinking of a modified character sheet with a section to list your skills, and boxes next to them so you can check the ones in your load out. would include the name of the skill, the cost to unvault them, and a one-two liner to get the gist of what the skill does. you can still reference to the material or actual card if you cant recall the information. regarding the tokens/pieces, ive used for other types of games regular coins, painted white on one side and black on the other. those same ones could be used as hope/fear tokens, or action/fear tokens, considering hope is tracked on the character sheet.
@@Kiloku2 I would bet/expect that in this case (Daggerheart) they would release their own VTT packages compatible with all the main services. IDK much of the inner workings of the game but I'm betting you could work with generic default tokens that come with the VTT? But yeah I can see the tracking of stats, currencies, etc being the hardest part in this case.
Tbh, Daggerheart thematically is to 5e as Pathfinder was to 3.5e. The main difference between these is that Pathfinder was really just a mechanical polish for 3.5e, whereas Daggerheart is very reminiscent but distinct in how it plays.
Don't forget Pathfinder 2e, which is, ironically enough, the equivalent to D&D 4e. There *are* differences, like the snazzy new action system, but it's hilarious how many of the same changes they wound up making
I think we're seeing MOST companies following Pathfinder 1e's trajectory: hook them with similiar-but-slightly-different-from-5e, and in the second or third iteration, try and do new and complex things. Spot on review.
@@BobWorldBuilder haha! I actually really like that it became a thing (somehow?)! Now everyone starts to pay more attention to their mic placement, or at least be more aware of it :D
It's a deliberate style many content creators do to differentiate themselves from corporate and big content creators who have super professional setups with hidden mics everywhere. It's not because they don't understand how mics work or anything weird tbh.
IMO the train in the background is kind of nice, but I grew up in a place where trains were often heard off in the distance. What I've heard about Daggerheart so far (that's mostly from your channel) sounds cool, but doesn't make me eager to play it. The cards and whatnot look nice, and I bet my players would like them until about halfway through the first session when they start to lose them. And I as the GM have all I can keep up with already. I'm still writing my character sheets on notebook paper because it's too much hassle to print out "real" ones, so I definitely wouldn't use class-specific sheets. I'm most interested in the hope and fear mechanic. I think I'd have to see how it plays out in an actual game before knowing how I feel about it.
Yeah I probably should've spent more time on Hope and Fear because I do like how it plays out. Though I wish "action tokens" and fear tokens" were merged into just fear, so the GM has one currency instead of two.
Sounds good and might be worth a try when it comes out. I hear your concerns about GM overload though. Since I started running Symbaroum I've realized just how much it helps me as a GM when the players roll all the dice and I almost never have to. I get freed up to pay more attention to the scene, tracking whats going on, and note taking rather than fiddling with dice or cards or whatever.
Yeah, if it's tougher to GM than other popular options, that could really hurt the game in the long run. I'm wondering if they'll provide some kind of alternative ideas for tracking these things or omitting the tracking for the GM.
Symbaroum is arguably one of the best original ttrpgs that have come out. Mechanics clean, rules light,tons of things characters can use or create, world that is fascinating and mysterious and dangerous, I’ve been running Throne of Thorns for the past 3 years for my Wednesday group and they will continue playing it. Daggerheart is hopefully going to be my Tuesday groups game and we go through the changes as it evolves. Though not perfect, I believe there is a lot of potential with it and am very excited to see more content
For the timing of this Video I'm guessing this is based on V1.2? If so I'd love to see a video on your thoughts on the 1.3 changes, though I'm sure you're already thinking about that!
Talking about the 'freshness' section is my biggest problem is my biggest problem with all these new competing systems. What new things do they really offer? A lot of them really feel like popular homebrew rules/tweaks rolled into a 'D&D system killer' but then doesn't truly offer anything fundamentally different. The one thing that has me at least intrigued about Daggerheart is the 2d12 with Fear/Hope mechanic - that's at least something different.
Great review! Really enjoyed your insights! I'm overall very positive about Daggerheart so far, having played & DMed both., I do have concerns about the amount needed/cost of all the fiddly bits: aka Duality Dice, Action Tokens, Class Dice, Class modifier tokens, Action tracker, GM Tokens/Fear Tokens, and of course, extra card decks when players need duplicate cards for shared domains, ancestry, etc. We had some possible solutions but will be curious to see what comes out of the Beta. A Box set like what you received seems the best first approach. Secondcomplaint, I liked most of what the Seraph does mechanically, but I think the word "Seraph" & the flight ability would be better as an ancestry(literally an Aasimar). Seraph means angel, yet clerics/paladins are mortal beings of any race, and there are some cooler terms that are synonymous with Cleric/Paladin/Holy Warrior. The 40 page Quick start I thought was the best onboarding experience of any ttrpg I've played. Thanks for the video!
As someone who has played many games based on the "powered by the apocalypse" system, specialist character sheets for classes/roles/archetypes (whatever the current game calls them) is a great feature, especially if the character sheets have role specific features (resource pools, action points, experience tick marks whatever). Not only helps to introduce new players, they are a good reminder for all types of players, often make character creation easier etc. Now i actually miss customized character sheets when return to games that dont have them and for example I see the perpetually empty "mana pool" field that takes up space on my non-magical martial character - space could have been used for my role-specific resource points
the game is really, a *lot* like PBTA. for example "roll 2d12" seems like a way of hiding that very fact and i find that a bit sucky, considering that there already exists a very good PbTA D&D-like - Dungeon World. and that game is much more friendly to custom table flavor, carrying much fewer setting assumption in its ruleset as a person simply choosing a game to play and not a fan of critical role, i see zero reasons in picking this corporate thing over Dungeon World
Hey Voluntary Shill, great video. Super unfortunate to post this immediately after the 1.3 release. The rulebook was edited down to 300 pages...but still, it's a DM Guide, Rulebook, sourcebook, and campaign setting book wrapped into one thicc volume. I won't be surprised if they edit it further, both to trim length, and to organize it into rules/advice/character creation/setting. Also, a lot of character options changed...including several of the ones you mentioned. For Freshness: it might not be the most unique, but there's a reason nearly every full RPG has a handful of stats, classes, and racial/background features. It's a great way to game-ify the actions a PC takes, and make them feel unique. You might even be able to define a full-sized RPG by having this type of character creation. The freshness is indeed in the hope/fear. Scaling success was probably my favorite part of the Star Wars RPG, and DH managed it with two dice instead of....I think my highest SWrpg roll was nearing 20 dice. As a DM, Daggerheart felt very fresh, and well worth playing again. In my premade adventure, combat ran fine with 4 people. I originally thought open initiative would be an issue; it was not. It ran significantly better than initiative for 4 players and a bucket of monsters. The fact that players didn't get a turn unless they had an action ready to go meant that everyone was paying attention and took their turn quickly and/or flavorfully. That flows so much better than someone's initiative coming around and something changed which caused them to rethink, or they're not ready because they were distracted, or they have to think of who goes next. There was never an awkward pause, despite 4 players learning how to play their new characters in a new system. Lastly, something you didn't mention is that a lot of focus has been put into making this easy game easy to run as a DM. I could feel it. The players have crunch; abilities, resource management, initiative to take actions, etc. I, as the DM, have only one resource (interchangeable fear/action). I don't decide when I go. I don't need to worry about armor, positioning, action economy, stress, etc. And enemies are easy to run; you choose which enemy to use, use their big ability if they have one. Keep using fear/actions until you're out of tokens or enemies. There's not much decision-making there, which leaves headspace for the story/scene. They've done incredibly well to reduce status effects, concentrations, caveats, exceptions etc. All of that means a smoother game.
Great review and the abacus tracker is genius - but more and more I coming back round to OSR systems that facilitate emersion rather than focus on 'mechanical' processes - why I love Shadowdark.
I'm the one that keeps asking for more of these "medieval" games! I still don't have a system I'm quite satisfied with. Maybe I will make that one day.. but in the meanwhile I keep checking out all the other games =)
I know, right? Who goes to an action movie and complains that it's just another movie with guns and explosions? I think the main thing that draws people to D&D vs other systems is the variety of playstyles it allows, plus for the most part it's setting agnostic. A lot of these indie games tend to tie their classes and races to their own setting and give them their own names while D&D mostly used stuff from folklore and mythology (and Tolkien, but he mainly got his stuff from folklore and mythology). Maybe it's just me but it's a bit offputting when you have your own setting you want to run and the rulebook has very specific and lore-based mechanics that really only work in the RPG's official setting. D&D does have some stuff like that, but the vast majority of it is not. Also a lot of indie games try to focus mostly on roleplay, or mostly on combat, or mostly on exploration when D&D is a system where you can focus on any one of those three or equally on all of them.
@@MannyBrum Yup, I don't usually like heavy ties to a particular setting because I have my own that I'd like to use. That's why I don't like classes either because they heavily imply what kind of characters ought to be wandering around in the world.
Great video and always nice to see a critical point of view - meaning pros and cons. I think Daggerheart is a great TTRPG for the style Critical role plays and many more. I wish I could try it out, but my group at the moment is busy enough with PF2.
Dungeon theory and it's designed with both 5e and Shadowdark in mind? Bob.. I didn't know you felt that way, why to leave such a perfect gift at my feet... I don't know what to say. EXCEPT TAKE MY MONEY YOU HANDSOME MAN
The main takeaway is that this system is made for people familiar with 5E and not much else (a lot of CR fans), not that there is anything wrong with that! But that also means, it's probably not for me. Thanks for the critical review Bob!
I don't think that's the case though. It's significantly different. The engagement differs greatly from 5e. Plus, the cards make it easier for newer players to learn.
This makes me excited to play. One of my players is going on matleave soon so we're probably going to do some in between sessions in the mean time. Perfect time to try out some new stuff
Thanks, Hank! DH is certainly taking the safer route, compared to their Candela Obscura which has a much more distinct tone/look (maybe not for its genre, but definitely compared to other CR releases). C&S is the cutting edge.
Oy! Everyone one of your past videos in the forest appeared to leave no trace. You broke a branch out of convenience, really? Just hassling you. I do miss the PA forest though. Possibly my favorite backpacking space in the US.
Thank you for the honest review. I will have to try it out. Also, I love the background music changes, the overly dramatic "bad stuff" bgm made me laugh
Excellent review! Also thank you for being the first person to talk about the overlap with DH and 5e classes!!! I've read/watched a good number of reviews that talk about leveling and the domains but no one really addressing the classes themselves. When I opened the playtest material for the first time and looked at the classes it immediately killed my interest...and that bummed me out so bad. Sure there's nothing wrong with having staples like rogue and wizard etc but there was just nothing unique to get me to want to learn a new game just to play the same thing
Great video Bob! My players also really enjoyed playing daggerheart and asked for an extended campagin and we'll be running the session 0 sometime this month. Hope to hear your thoughts on some of the 1.3 changes in some way!
My biggest takeaways are the armor system, and giving two resources to the GM, I feel like armor should always take damage before HP, and adding an option for stress was weird, and seemed like too many steps. And as for the action tokens and fear, I don't understand why they just couldn't lump those two together, at least in terms when a player rolls with fear, it should just give another action token.
I had the same thought about action tokens and fear tokens. It could simply be "spend two fear to..." instead of converting two action tokens to one fear, and so on.
I'd need to read the playtest more closely to actually understand how armor works, but PF 2e shields might be a really good model for what they're going for. At least if you have the Shield Block reaction, you can use the shield to reduce incoming damage, which then gets applied to both you *and the shield*
Actually, tangible example for PF 2e shields. It takes an action (5e: bonus action) to raise your shield and get its AC bonus (typically +2). Then you can use a reaction to reduce incoming damage by its Hardness (e.g. 5 for a steel shield), but any remaining damage also gets applied to your shield. If it hits 0, you can't raise it at all any more, and if it drops below half health (e.g. steel shields have 20 max), you can still raise it and use Shield Block, but it no longer gives an AC bonus
@@justineberlein5916 I understand their armor rules, and how they work, but what I feel like is too much, and I also feel that way about PF 2e, but to a much lesser extent is that armor should always take damage before HP, unless you've got some piercing attacks.
@@TheCosmicViking At least with PF 2e, Hardness is actually a more general concept, similar to damage thresholds in D&D 5e, where any time you attack an object, you reduce the damage by the Hardness. So conceptually, it *is* taking damage before you. It's just that if you take more damage in an attack than your shield is essentially rated to absorb, it starts affecting the structural integrity of your shield and potentially causes it to break
It's the bits and bobs that are my problem. the space my group plays in is small and we have just enough space for 5e and SD. with all the cards, tokens, and coins I know we're going to be knocking things on the floor.
I'm sorry but Shadowdark is the one so far that's been a better DnD alternative. The game is simple and easy to run and also similar to what we played all these years.
I as a GM felt completely different about the combat, though I get your points . For the first time it felt like I was actually on par with the players, having to manage my own resources and being a "fair" competitor Also I think the 1-3 hitpoint system helps for describing what's happening, as pure damage numbers are so abstract. When my players hit and I can tell them "it was a really severe hit" they know how they're faring
Great review! I only play online and it really sounds and looks like Daggerheart is made for live gaming. I went through the basic rules with my group and nobody liked the fact that you roll a big number for damage which then translates to 0-3 damage. Not sure if I want to homebrew anything out from it to my home game either.
Nice, like this new freshness. You need to check out the Cairn 2E kickstarter and do a video on it. It's FLYING and yes you are a shill for Daggerheart but thats ok!
I love the art style for Cairn 2e! My quick take on it though is that I like Cairn 1e for how small, simple, and ~Tolkien~ it is. Cairn 2e is bigger (still not huge or anything) and some of the new backgrounds feel a little too high fantasy for me.
Another great video Bob :) Although some may prefer other systems myself and my group prefer D&D 5e for it's overall flexibility and robustness in all situations. We've tried Call of Cuthulu, Monster of the Week, Startrek RPG, Warhammer RPG and Numinera. These all have quite radically different rulesets to D&D. After a few sessions of each, where we initially found the systems interesting and thematic, we would start to really hate certain aspects of each ruleset, compared to D&D 5e. They are all somewhat flawed in one way or another where D&D 5e is >generally< good in most aspects. I honestly don't think its just because of marketing that its the biggest system out there, it may not be perfect but it is good overall. This is why Daggerheart feels like it could be a great alternative for us. It's taken what works well from D&D and added its own twist without needlessly adding gamified rules to be different for the sake of being different.
Thank you! Yeah 5e is really good at being a generally good game for most people. Most D&D clones/variants work from that baseline, or from a previous edition of D&D, and don't get any flak for it. I think it's a good move to make a game that's familiar-- particularly if you have a company depending on it.
Great Review! I ran the quick start session a few weeks back, in the place of my regular game, due to low player numbers. I hadn't planned to run it, nor had I done much prior research. However, I ran it and at least for myself and the 3 players, it was amazing. I personally found the combat to be much more fluid that 5e, and I do think that at least for my group it may benefit in combat (though I'm not sure how it would end up in cases of disagreement). Whether or not I would run a whole campaign, I'm not sure. But for the one session it was very successful.
I couldn’t care less about the freshness of the game. I play several TTRPGs, perhaps what I was expecting from Daggerheart was a candela concept but beefed up a bit for fantasy… While there are some really great points to this system, what we found was that this is a weird combination that frankly, took the worst aspects of DND and Candela. It is more complex than DnD, by a large factor, but they seemed to have thrown away the guidelines and guardrails. I really do wish critical role the very best of luck and hope they continue to do what they do, but for me, I threw Daggerheart in the trash. I am crazy excited for “delve” though. This looks fantastic!
I get why your players feel like lack of initiative could be a challenge even tho they didn't have issues with it in the test play. But. I've been playing cypher for a couple years now, which operates similarly, with 5 players + gm and it really hasn't been a problem. Everyone goes and not in the same order. We change it up depending on circumstances and what would help the group. If anything, it's made immersion and collaboration way better. Combos are really possible bc the table doesn't arbitrarily change 5 times before turns come back around. It's awesome. I'd actively hate going back to set or random turn orders.
I think it's important to note that action tokens are intended to be recognizable as character-specific, so that if you feel like one person is hoggin the spotlight, it's obvious to everyone because they have more of their action tokens on the card. This is a sneaky "optional rule" now in 1.3 with the "initiative-based" system which is actually a learning tool for how you're supposed to be using the action tokens in the first place, with just more strict guidelines. The intent is not that the loudest player gets to play the game, you don't need rules to put the brakes on that kind of player and you're probably already dealing with their loudness outside of initiative (I hope) in the same way you would keep them from hogging the spotlight in combat.
The abacus is a brilliant idea, and I can't see myself trying to run this without something like that. Most recently, I ran a one-shot using the short, free Tunnel Goons ruleset, and we--a group who usually uses 5e--had a blast!
It seems like their first update to the game is definitely taking some of these criticisms into consideration. Very curious to try their freeform initiative.
I had the same idea for the abacus counter thingy =D In fact, I made a 3d file for my 3dprinter Wasn't thinking to share it, but might just plop the file somewhere for people who want it =D
I've GM'd for 2 sessions of Daggerheart so far -- the quickstart adventure, and then another session continuing the story -- and I have had similar experiences as you. I've found it can be overwhelming keeping track of how to use fear and action tokens, to the point where I'm focusing less on imagining the game and how it's playing out.
It's not really fair for people to expect something completely different. Like you said it has to still be familiar, unless you just go creating completely new classes, but let's be real. Fight, magic, machine. How many is there before it isn't high fantasy anymore? The same with species. The core of humans, elves, and dwarves are a staple or ttrpgs. Plus, the fighting system does feel completely different. Other than using dice it's not the same at all. I really hope it takes off. WOTC needs a legit threat.
Yeah unless there's an online tool for it, I feel like the GM would need to be tracking all of the tokens themselves? Not sure though. I'd have to try it.
I love your positivity about it. I totally agree there are some great things about it and I agree with you about the pros and cons of the Fresh part (nothing new under the sun) I don't think this will bring people. There's a lot of lazy players and DMs who love to go by the seat of their pants. They putting a big ask to get all the things you need to play as well unless they start promoting Demiplane like they did DND Beyond and even then some won't go to it. I love your positive attitude don't change
I'm curious about the Range/Movement mechanics. To me, it seems like the biggest time waster is figuring out which squares a spell effects, where to walk to, and then you just sit there and don't move after engaging an enemy, and if an enemy tries to run away the players want to chase them down and expect it to be on the maps. Getting rid of that in a GOOD way (not just theatre of the mind-ing for all the sticklers in the group) would do a lot to improve combat flow for me and exchanging tokens SOUNDS like a step back.
Excellent point. Honestly, I probably didn't think to spend time on it here because my group already doesn't use squares. For groups that do use a grid, I think trying DH style distance and moves could be a real eye-opener
@@davidholman6709 It's ranges, things are 5,15,30,60,120 feet away. It feels like an improvement but people are already confused about pencils,cards,paper measurements.
@@davidholman6709 yes, they are called something like melee, very close, close, near,far,and very far. It just means there reducing the amount of squares but they still there to me
💥 My book, Delve, is LIVE on Kickstarter! www.kickstarter.com/projects/bobworldbuilder/delve-5e-shadowdark?ref=apoi0j
This looks sick, can't wait!
As interested in playing daggerheart as I am, I'm now even more excited to run my shadow dark game. So much good content in the core rule book and zines already, and now you tell me you making third party content for it! I can't wait.
Honestly loved the train ambience lmao. You should film more outside.
Have you considered a Pathfinder 2 and DC20 compatibility module? A plug-in PDF or something to just change stat blocks and check DCs? I'm ending my time with 5e with the end of my current campaign, and will be moving to PF2 and / or DC20 very soon.
would be cool if you opened up your content to other systems, it looks cool but ugh 5e is so stale and I struggle to get excited about it anymore, especially after playing pathfinder 2e and seeing how much more satisfying and unique character creation and leveling works in that system, also combat is so much more tactical and your actions feel more meaningful, shadowdark seems kinda interesting, but at a glance looks like modded dnd rather than "50 years of innovation"
Yeah I'm increasingly becoming aware of the differences between what my players want and what I want haha.
I hate tokens and props and stuff too, but my players love them.
I'm increasingly realizing that GM's want less to do, and players want more to do. And so a lot of GM's that I know really like rules light systems but the players like crunchier systems.
It's making me more and more aware of a concept that I haven't heard other people talk about yet, so for now I'm calling it player facing crunch versus GM facing crunch.
For example, I really like how dagger heart has this complex armor system for the players to use. But so far I haven't had any enemies have armor. Which is great, armor is fun for the players because it gives them more to do, and it's hell for a GM because it gives them more to do XD.
It makes me wonder if there's more "grit" that the players could be asked to do that the GM doesn't have to do.
I agree with all of that!!
Yeah, handing your group a problem to deal with like "Here's 5 damage, figure out the armor" is kinda the whole fun of D&D on both sides. Watching players figure out stuff and enjoy your work is why I love it so much.
Some other similar puzzles you can try to attempt:
1. (Environment) Making traps active hazards that the party has to deal with. Make the spike pit obvious and dangerous, and let them figure out how to cross it. You don't even need a solution, just a cool trap, they'll come up with something.
2. (Social) Make the party prove their innocence via a false or half-truth accusation, bonus points if they suddenly look down and go "oh" when they walk out of a villager's house bloody from a demon encounter nobody else knows about.
3. (Combat) Give bosses or important fights a "setpiece" item or skill that is a problem, not a stat block. Such as a towering shield will block any attack in the direction they're facing. The party needs to change tactics to either disarm, get around the shield, or flank them to win.
@@littlemonztergaming8665 those are good ideas, but not exactly what I'm talking about. I'm talking about having gritty mechanics that add to the immersion but place the burden of book keeping on the players instead of the GM so that everyone is sharing work load at the table.
I'm talking RPG design, not encounter design.
Though those are definitely good ideas for encounter design that bring the players into an active creative space and I'm all about that. And it's definitely related to what I'm talking about. It's just not precisely the thing I'm talking about.
A good game has depth for Players but simplicity for the GM
Check out Crown and Skull. NPC rules are completely different than player rules.
Honestly, when it comes to the similarity between Daggerheart and 5e, it feels like a move that justifies itself more than anything else. I'd be flabbergasted if Campagin 4 wasn't in Daggerheart, so even if Daggerheart's just to free CR to use something other than DnD, it'll probably be worth it to them. Still, Daggerheart could have been a lot more similar to 5e than it is and, as someone fascinated by game design, I've loved seeing the reactions all around to the Open Beta.
No matter how fun and well suited for Critical Role Daggerheart is, the 5e audience is way too big to justify the transition to the Daggerheart system. Critical role is a company, after all, and they can't always go for the ''fun'' option, especially when it comes to such impactful ones as this. I don't see them stepping away from 5e. From a business perspective, it just makes no sense to do so.
@@Baily16 That's a very good point. Still, the OGL incident scared a lot of creators. In an instant, all the work they'd done could have been owned and repurposed by Hasbro. The 5e audience may be big enough to keep them from switching, but a lot of CR fans don't play 5e (me included) so it might be worth the insurance to no longer be under WotC's thumb? We'll have to see!
@@Baily16 After the release of The Legend of Vox Machina and Campaign 3, I see that more and more young fans came to the fandom for the story and the roleplay and not specifically D&D. It was true that back in the C1/early C2 days the majority was there for D&D, but as someone who's been watching them since 2017, I can see that's no longer the case.
@@pippastrelle The OGL thing could definitely play a part in their decision going forward. I think for such a big company that's much more of a "we'll deal with it when it happens" kind of thing though. Especially with how flexible CR is. Changing systems when something bad does happen isn't the end of the world.
@@Baily16 "I cant wait to see Legendary people like Matthew Mercer, Laura Bailey, Liam o Brian and Ashley Johnson play a game together in the SAME ROOOM AHHHH. What you mean they do not play 5E? I guess my interest suddenly disapeared" I just cant with some of the fandom, its like some people lost the ability to think...
"ribbets aka the best guys ever"
- a wise man
🐸
Tsuyu besto one!
FrogWorldBuilder
Ribbits and Clank are my two favorites.
also "dwarves aka dwarves" lol
"Medieval if you squint" is a great pull quote, though.
Tbh, “medieval if you squint” is actually kind of insulting as a writer. It’s a gross oversimplification of high fantasy in general. Lotr is “medieval if you squint”, so is red wall, chronicles of narnia and sometimes even Minecraft, to say that any of those are the same is ridiculous.
@@ShadestheMothman Yeah, that quote sounds like someone who is sick of Western Fantasy wrote it.
@@ShadestheMothman, you're correct. However, I think it mostly depends on how seriously one treats that. Context is everything. I can see saying the phrase in a tongue-in-cheek manner.
@@ShadestheMothman It is definitely reductive.
@@MannyBrum I dont think its against Western Fantasy, rather against generic Western Fantasy. European medieval settings have a lot to offer but people just throw knights, fortresses and dragons in without outlining a specific setting and doing even surface level research. This leads to a lot of fantasy feeling generic and uninspired.
I think the action token/no initiative system is totally fine so long as no one gets their turn skipped. It seems to me really weird that they didn't at least include an optional rule that requires everyone to go before someone can go again. But with this one change, the action token system actually creates a very cool and unpredictable flow of combat we're rolling with fears this big "oh shit" moment, without introducing any toxic elements.
And honestly, if your table can't handle the responsibility of choosing which players go first in a round then the players can absolutely just roll initiative. That absolutely should be included as an optional rule as well. But importantly, the monsters shouldn't have to roll initiative, cuz it's a b**** and a half to roll initiative for monsters and this system is a very cool way of getting around that.
Actually that's great ! Because according to the update video released on the CR, they actually do have an initiative optional rule that gives players a limited number of action tokens
When I design encounters in 5e I tend to roll the initiative for enemies then and there. Players won't ever see those rolls anyway so having a list ready to go instead of creating it during the play simply saves time and softens the momentum break that is an initiative roll quite a bit
@@Dschonathan That's brilliant, and I'm definitely incorporating that into my games!
@@Dschonathan I delegate the initiative rolls for mobs entirely to one of the players (any of them that's savvy and experienced enough to understand how it works). That way I don't have to worry about it at all. They usually get it sorted while I set up the battle map.
as a plus I don't have to keep track of whose go it is, the players will tell me.
@@Dschonathan that's really cool. I don't like spending a lot of time prepping though, so I still prefer systems that don't involve the enemies rolling initiative. Currently, when I run DND 5e, I just have the enemies go after the players. I find that it makes the players feel more badass and I can compensate by simply throwing harder encounters at them.
I also really enjoy the "planning phase" feeling of the players deciding collaboratively on what to do, but that's table to table. Some tables won't do that very well. I'm blessed to have a group of players that are active and considerate when collaborating with each other.
Watched the overview video for the 1.3 changes, and I'm super excited to dive deeper the updated beta materials. A lot of what they talked about were the changes I hoped to see
Yeah I think the change to accumulating Fear will help a lot.
@BobWorldBuilder very nice changes to advantage and disadvantage, and also I like the optional rules for distance and action limits. With the option for more rigidity, I think it places itself in the sweet spot between 5e and PbtA styled games where I believe the game has the most potential
I think the action system they are introducing gives just enough much needed structure to the play round. If someone super excited wants to take a bunch of turns right up front, it means the more reserved player has the freedom to lay down a few actions after the excited burst
I think it’s amazing that at the exact same moment, for me that Bob complained about the train there was a train driving past me, drowning him out.
My friend when I told them about Daggerheart: "Dang this train is ruining my bit"
Wow Bob, I didn't expect you to be that spot on
Trains: the final boss of Daggerheart
@@BobWorldBuilder meet the BBEG- Norfolk Southern
@@BobWorldBuilder SUPLEX THE TRAIN!
The first review of Daggerheart that I've seen that both was based on actual play and didn't feel sycophantic. Thanks!
thank you for mentioning Pathfinder, because I can't help but feel all the people complaining about how similar Daggerheart is to 5e are forgetting the next most popular TTRPG literally began its life as a reprinting of D&D mechanics. Shadowdark, everyone's new favourite, is an OSR game very clearly inspired by BX D&D, but no one's complaining about how that's not fresh and new. Darrington Press, as you mentioned, is clearly aiming for the 5e crowd who won't try a different game, but *might* now that Critical Role is putting out a new game, so OF COURSE they're going to make their game very superficially similar because they have a clear vision of their target audience and what they want. Personally I'm just happy to see that it's not another roll over d20 system, and I'm very happy to see them lean into inspiration from narrative forward systems like Blades in the Dark and PbtA. It's a similar enough feel to 5e that my 5e-only players tried it and loved it, and these are the same people who swore they'd never play a different a game, so that's enough for me to be invested and want to support the project.
I think the core issue people are having is that-as shown in this video-Critical Role themselves were the ones claiming the game would be 'fresh.'
When any company makes a promise about their new product, and then fails to deliver on that promise, the people who bought into the idea of the new product because of that specific promise are going to be upset, and justifiably so.
It's not a bad thing that their game isn't entirely different from 5e; It IS a bad thing that they essentially claimed it would be, and seemingly are failing to deliver.
@@Necroesmechanically it's pretty fresh (or atleast very different from 5e), races/classes are familiar because it's just a typical fantasy setting
Yeah the "Its too similar to DND" complaints are absurd to me.
DND defines the TTRPG fantasy genre and has decades of material. It's going to be nearly impossible to build a system that doesn't in *some* manner feel similar. Better to be similar but interesting where it counts in my eyes.
@@ninja5879 Never heard of Shadowrun? Mutants and Masterminds? Literally Any of the world of Darkness series? Call of Cthulhu? GURPS?
It's really, Really not that hard to make a system that's different from 5e as a fantasy system. Take away Vancian magic and you're halfway there.
@@Necroes mutants and masterminds I great.
CoC and Shadowrun I've both played. They're mediocre, overly complicated, cumbersome systems *in completely fucking different genres*. They try so hard to be different and unique they end up worse than alternatives. Personally, I enjoyed a lot of Shadowrun, specifically 4e and the combat mechanics. But so many other aspects of that system are just dog shit.
But anyway, I was talking about the fantasy setting. None of your examples cover that. Shadowrun is scifi, MnM is superhero power fantasy, and CoC is horror sci-fi mystery.
Literally none of them apply to my comment other than Gurps, which is in and of itself heavily tied to early DND despite being mechanically fairly different, and is very era specific in its structure.
Your comment is just naming other random popular systems but id bet you've never actually played them.
In my in-person groups, 5e inspiration is given out as physical coins and all of my players love it. I allow them to share the inspiration and the group will often offer up their own inspiration at a climactic moment or when someone is struggling with bad rolls. It adds an extra sense of comradery and teamwork, that I feel isn't quiet there in my online games where my players will forget they have the resource. For the Critical Role Show, I think this will help the players remember their resources at a quicker glance and let others jump in with a "Oh you have 3 Hope, you can use your class ability" to their fellow players
I also use "hero coins" as a kind of inspiration, so I'm not against all tokens, but I have a limit I guess :P
I played with a DM at dunracon that used coins like that (he was running a pathfinder? game) and I really liked it. We could donate coins we'd earned for actually being engaged (can't tell you how many groups I've been in (online) that just don't seem engaged in the RP part of a TTRPG) to help a really important roll go through that was a couple points off. Most of us only carried one or two at a time, you had to do something more than just basic RP and engagement to earn one. Feeling completely embarrassed that I can't remember his name, but his games were fun, and the coin idea was definitely an interesting and cool idea.
The abacus idea is fantastic
Thanks! :)
@@BobWorldBuilder I’ve been a fan for a long time. The first comment I ever made on one of your videos got both a like and a reply!!! Dream come true. Keep up the amazing work! :D
Dagger Heart is ripe for accessories. Considering CR already has a very extensive merch line, I'm sure they will cash in on it. Different trackers, card packs for domains/classes, etc. So much bank.
IDK why but your look reminds me of a modern day firbolg.
Hahah I love it
Huh, that explains why I like Firbolgs as someone who also has an urban outdoorsy with a beard and longer hair look.
I'm with you, Bob! The mechanics must dissolve and support the collective mind-zone you need to get into to experience a really good TTRPG session.
Well said!
One thing I've come to realize is that their games seem to employ lots of artifacts/tokens and such. I know it can be fun and more "tactile", but damn does it make their games less accessible? I mean, you can play mouseritter, cairn etc with just some dice and paper to track things. Even some other types of tabletop games that allow you to play with a normal deck of cards. Again, I think it's fun merchandise, but I also think sometimes it's just too much to depend your game on (even if they allow you to print your own stuff)... I think I just prefer stuff to be at least a bit leaner.
Interesting point, though from what I can tell Daggerheart really doesn't really require anything but the sheet for your character and die, the rest is just further set dressing that perhaps improves the gameplay experience. There is something to be said for Tokens and Cards - a useful marker, easy to reference, harder to forget that important item while its in your 'deck'.
@@foldionepapyrus3441 Hah! That's a great point as well, these help with the "readability" of these abstract currencies and mechanics in general for sure! Happy to know that in their case these artifacts are purely optional. I like it when games help ppl gain intuition into creative solutions, so I think I still prefer the more accessible routes - leaning more into what the players generally already have at home vs pressuring (collections, or otherwise - MTG cough, cough :P) to buy more stuff. Sometimes one could just draw their own minis and use them as paper cut outs, re-thinking a normal deck of cards as dungeon generation+enemy encounter generation (like the Escape the City adventure, or the game Regicide), etc. is more what IMO is an accessible direction.
@@VitorGuerreiroVideos i've thought of ways to play this without the cards/tokens. love the idea, but realistically, cards can get damaged, or you may have more than one player running the same class or wanting the same skills, so im thinking of a modified character sheet with a section to list your skills, and boxes next to them so you can check the ones in your load out. would include the name of the skill, the cost to unvault them, and a one-two liner to get the gist of what the skill does. you can still reference to the material or actual card if you cant recall the information.
regarding the tokens/pieces, ive used for other types of games regular coins, painted white on one side and black on the other. those same ones could be used as hope/fear tokens, or action/fear tokens, considering hope is tracked on the character sheet.
It made it a lot more difficult for my group who plays online. I had to improvise some stuff in a spreadsheet.
@@Kiloku2 I would bet/expect that in this case (Daggerheart) they would release their own VTT packages compatible with all the main services. IDK much of the inner workings of the game but I'm betting you could work with generic default tokens that come with the VTT? But yeah I can see the tracking of stats, currencies, etc being the hardest part in this case.
Tbh, Daggerheart thematically is to 5e as Pathfinder was to 3.5e. The main difference between these is that Pathfinder was really just a mechanical polish for 3.5e, whereas Daggerheart is very reminiscent but distinct in how it plays.
Don't forget Pathfinder 2e, which is, ironically enough, the equivalent to D&D 4e. There *are* differences, like the snazzy new action system, but it's hilarious how many of the same changes they wound up making
@@justineberlein5916 No way. Pathfinder 2e is far closer to 5e than 4e. Paizo wasn't stupid.
Pathfinder 2e was an attempt to polish and streamline the game, just like DnD 5e. Coming from similar roots, they ended up in similar places.
Pathfinder is basically Protestant D&D
I think we're seeing MOST companies following Pathfinder 1e's trajectory: hook them with similiar-but-slightly-different-from-5e, and in the second or third iteration, try and do new and complex things. Spot on review.
Pathfinder isn't similar to 5e at all lmao
You know what they mean. @MrPsyren99
I'm glad you use a real mic to hold in your hands instead of holding a tiny lavalier to your face like some weird people do
It's actually really neat that Rode got to develop a handle for their super weird and awesome (bc how accessible they are) lav mics/tinny recorders :D
Haha thanks, though I still love it when people clip a tiny lav to some other goofy item so they can hold it like a normal mic
@@BobWorldBuilder haha! I actually really like that it became a thing (somehow?)! Now everyone starts to pay more attention to their mic placement, or at least be more aware of it :D
It's a deliberate style many content creators do to differentiate themselves from corporate and big content creators who have super professional setups with hidden mics everywhere. It's not because they don't understand how mics work or anything weird tbh.
There's a great video about this called "Why TH-camrs Hold Mics Now", definitely a recommended watch
IMO the train in the background is kind of nice, but I grew up in a place where trains were often heard off in the distance. What I've heard about Daggerheart so far (that's mostly from your channel) sounds cool, but doesn't make me eager to play it. The cards and whatnot look nice, and I bet my players would like them until about halfway through the first session when they start to lose them. And I as the GM have all I can keep up with already. I'm still writing my character sheets on notebook paper because it's too much hassle to print out "real" ones, so I definitely wouldn't use class-specific sheets. I'm most interested in the hope and fear mechanic. I think I'd have to see how it plays out in an actual game before knowing how I feel about it.
Yeah I probably should've spent more time on Hope and Fear because I do like how it plays out. Though I wish "action tokens" and fear tokens" were merged into just fear, so the GM has one currency instead of two.
Sounds good and might be worth a try when it comes out. I hear your concerns about GM overload though. Since I started running Symbaroum I've realized just how much it helps me as a GM when the players roll all the dice and I almost never have to. I get freed up to pay more attention to the scene, tracking whats going on, and note taking rather than fiddling with dice or cards or whatever.
Yeah, if it's tougher to GM than other popular options, that could really hurt the game in the long run. I'm wondering if they'll provide some kind of alternative ideas for tracking these things or omitting the tracking for the GM.
@@BobWorldBuilder Someone will make a phone app. And VTTs will support it eventually. Granted I would rather use something physical at the table.
Symbaroum is arguably one of the best original ttrpgs that have come out. Mechanics clean, rules light,tons of things characters can use or create, world that is fascinating and mysterious and dangerous, I’ve been running Throne of Thorns for the past 3 years for my Wednesday group and they will continue playing it. Daggerheart is hopefully going to be my Tuesday groups game and we go through the changes as it evolves. Though not perfect, I believe there is a lot of potential with it and am very excited to see more content
Man, I love trains. Thanks for keeping those little interruptions in the video. Delightful!
It came in at all the dramatic points!
For the timing of this Video I'm guessing this is based on V1.2?
If so I'd love to see a video on your thoughts on the 1.3 changes, though I'm sure you're already thinking about that!
Yep haha, will probably do a video on 1.3 by the time 1.4 comes out :P
Very thorough and fair. You also come across as a nice guy. Which you are. Well done. -Professor DM
There are people who think Bob isn’t a nice guy? I’m legit shocked.
Talking about the 'freshness' section is my biggest problem is my biggest problem with all these new competing systems. What new things do they really offer? A lot of them really feel like popular homebrew rules/tweaks rolled into a 'D&D system killer' but then doesn't truly offer anything fundamentally different.
The one thing that has me at least intrigued about Daggerheart is the 2d12 with Fear/Hope mechanic - that's at least something different.
Yeah Hope/Fear resources are definitely the stand out feature of the rules
It's the freedom to not be saddled with 50 years of legacy cruft. Not everyone is fully exercising that freedom, but they could, and some are.
Great review! Really enjoyed your insights! I'm overall very positive about Daggerheart so far, having played & DMed both., I do have concerns about the amount needed/cost of all the fiddly bits: aka Duality Dice, Action Tokens, Class Dice, Class modifier tokens, Action tracker, GM Tokens/Fear Tokens, and of course, extra card decks when players need duplicate cards for shared domains, ancestry, etc. We had some possible solutions but will be curious to see what comes out of the Beta. A Box set like what you received seems the best first approach. Secondcomplaint, I liked most of what the Seraph does mechanically, but I think the word "Seraph" & the flight ability would be better as an ancestry(literally an Aasimar). Seraph means angel, yet clerics/paladins are mortal beings of any race, and there are some cooler terms that are synonymous with Cleric/Paladin/Holy Warrior. The 40 page Quick start I thought was the best onboarding experience of any ttrpg I've played. Thanks for the video!
Great points! I also agree that the quick start adventure did a fantastic job.
Im happy Crit knows the right people, I mean the community as a whole, invited them along the journey. Especially so early in the development cycle.
As someone who has played many games based on the "powered by the apocalypse" system, specialist character sheets for classes/roles/archetypes (whatever the current game calls them) is a great feature, especially if the character sheets have role specific features (resource pools, action points, experience tick marks whatever). Not only helps to introduce new players, they are a good reminder for all types of players, often make character creation easier etc.
Now i actually miss customized character sheets when return to games that dont have them and for example I see the perpetually empty "mana pool" field that takes up space on my non-magical martial character - space could have been used for my role-specific resource points
the game is really, a *lot* like PBTA. for example "roll 2d12" seems like a way of hiding that very fact
and i find that a bit sucky, considering that there already exists a very good PbTA D&D-like - Dungeon World. and that game is much more friendly to custom table flavor, carrying much fewer setting assumption in its ruleset
as a person simply choosing a game to play and not a fan of critical role, i see zero reasons in picking this corporate thing over Dungeon World
Hey Voluntary Shill, great video.
Super unfortunate to post this immediately after the 1.3 release. The rulebook was edited down to 300 pages...but still, it's a DM Guide, Rulebook, sourcebook, and campaign setting book wrapped into one thicc volume. I won't be surprised if they edit it further, both to trim length, and to organize it into rules/advice/character creation/setting. Also, a lot of character options changed...including several of the ones you mentioned.
For Freshness: it might not be the most unique, but there's a reason nearly every full RPG has a handful of stats, classes, and racial/background features. It's a great way to game-ify the actions a PC takes, and make them feel unique. You might even be able to define a full-sized RPG by having this type of character creation. The freshness is indeed in the hope/fear. Scaling success was probably my favorite part of the Star Wars RPG, and DH managed it with two dice instead of....I think my highest SWrpg roll was nearing 20 dice. As a DM, Daggerheart felt very fresh, and well worth playing again.
In my premade adventure, combat ran fine with 4 people. I originally thought open initiative would be an issue; it was not. It ran significantly better than initiative for 4 players and a bucket of monsters. The fact that players didn't get a turn unless they had an action ready to go meant that everyone was paying attention and took their turn quickly and/or flavorfully. That flows so much better than someone's initiative coming around and something changed which caused them to rethink, or they're not ready because they were distracted, or they have to think of who goes next. There was never an awkward pause, despite 4 players learning how to play their new characters in a new system.
Lastly, something you didn't mention is that a lot of focus has been put into making this easy game easy to run as a DM. I could feel it. The players have crunch; abilities, resource management, initiative to take actions, etc. I, as the DM, have only one resource (interchangeable fear/action). I don't decide when I go. I don't need to worry about armor, positioning, action economy, stress, etc. And enemies are easy to run; you choose which enemy to use, use their big ability if they have one. Keep using fear/actions until you're out of tokens or enemies. There's not much decision-making there, which leaves headspace for the story/scene. They've done incredibly well to reduce status effects, concentrations, caveats, exceptions etc. All of that means a smoother game.
I Love ALL Bob Worldbuilder videos! Especially when he films outdoors. Bob in the wild for the win.
Bob WorldTourer!
Great review and the abacus tracker is genius - but more and more I coming back round to OSR systems that facilitate emersion rather than focus on 'mechanical' processes - why I love Shadowdark.
I'm the one that keeps asking for more of these "medieval" games! I still don't have a system I'm quite satisfied with. Maybe I will make that one day.. but in the meanwhile I keep checking out all the other games =)
Same haha
I know, right? Who goes to an action movie and complains that it's just another movie with guns and explosions? I think the main thing that draws people to D&D vs other systems is the variety of playstyles it allows, plus for the most part it's setting agnostic. A lot of these indie games tend to tie their classes and races to their own setting and give them their own names while D&D mostly used stuff from folklore and mythology (and Tolkien, but he mainly got his stuff from folklore and mythology). Maybe it's just me but it's a bit offputting when you have your own setting you want to run and the rulebook has very specific and lore-based mechanics that really only work in the RPG's official setting. D&D does have some stuff like that, but the vast majority of it is not. Also a lot of indie games try to focus mostly on roleplay, or mostly on combat, or mostly on exploration when D&D is a system where you can focus on any one of those three or equally on all of them.
@@MannyBrum Yup, I don't usually like heavy ties to a particular setting because I have my own that I'd like to use. That's why I don't like classes either because they heavily imply what kind of characters ought to be wandering around in the world.
I kept counting how many times Bob got stabbed by sticks in this video. Good on you for fighting back!
"Oozing Kobold" 😍👍
"Dang it, that train is ruining my bit!" 😃😃😃
Your abacus idea is brilliant. I've been toying with the idea of using one to track every time a monster gets hit.
Great video and always nice to see a critical point of view - meaning pros and cons. I think Daggerheart is a great TTRPG for the style Critical role plays and many more. I wish I could try it out, but my group at the moment is busy enough with PF2.
Thanks! It's definitely worth trying the quickstart one shot of DH
Dungeon theory and it's designed with both 5e and Shadowdark in mind? Bob.. I didn't know you felt that way, why to leave such a perfect gift at my feet... I don't know what to say.
EXCEPT TAKE MY MONEY YOU HANDSOME MAN
The main takeaway is that this system is made for people familiar with 5E and not much else (a lot of CR fans), not that there is anything wrong with that! But that also means, it's probably not for me. Thanks for the critical review Bob!
I don't think that's the case though. It's significantly different. The engagement differs greatly from 5e. Plus, the cards make it easier for newer players to learn.
I love that train sound. Reminds me of a place where I grew up AND it seemed to punctuate your points. The train agrees!
This makes me excited to play. One of my players is going on matleave soon so we're probably going to do some in between sessions in the mean time. Perfect time to try out some new stuff
preciate the vid, Bob! bummed to see the art and overall tone/style of DH feeling recycled... I had high hopes indeed. Is CROWN n SKULL fresh?
Thanks, Hank! DH is certainly taking the safer route, compared to their Candela Obscura which has a much more distinct tone/look (maybe not for its genre, but definitely compared to other CR releases). C&S is the cutting edge.
Also, I'm really looking forward to the Shadowdark version of Delve! Thanks so much for that, and my you enjoy much success.
...huh, when you phrase it the way you did, you could use the tracker from the Digimon TCG to track Action/Fear tokens pretty well
Oy! Everyone one of your past videos in the forest appeared to leave no trace. You broke a branch out of convenience, really?
Just hassling you. I do miss the PA forest though. Possibly my favorite backpacking space in the US.
BROOO!!!!! Thank you for making content for Shadowdark!!!
Happy to do it! :)
Thank you for the honest review. I will have to try it out.
Also, I love the background music changes, the overly dramatic "bad stuff" bgm made me laugh
Glad you enjoyed it!
Excellent review! Also thank you for being the first person to talk about the overlap with DH and 5e classes!!! I've read/watched a good number of reviews that talk about leveling and the domains but no one really addressing the classes themselves. When I opened the playtest material for the first time and looked at the classes it immediately killed my interest...and that bummed me out so bad. Sure there's nothing wrong with having staples like rogue and wizard etc but there was just nothing unique to get me to want to learn a new game just to play the same thing
Great video Bob! My players also really enjoyed playing daggerheart and asked for an extended campagin and we'll be running the session 0 sometime this month. Hope to hear your thoughts on some of the 1.3 changes in some way!
That is awesome!
Dude the abacus is actually a really good idea
My biggest takeaways are the armor system, and giving two resources to the GM, I feel like armor should always take damage before HP, and adding an option for stress was weird, and seemed like too many steps.
And as for the action tokens and fear, I don't understand why they just couldn't lump those two together, at least in terms when a player rolls with fear, it should just give another action token.
I had the same thought about action tokens and fear tokens. It could simply be "spend two fear to..." instead of converting two action tokens to one fear, and so on.
I'd need to read the playtest more closely to actually understand how armor works, but PF 2e shields might be a really good model for what they're going for. At least if you have the Shield Block reaction, you can use the shield to reduce incoming damage, which then gets applied to both you *and the shield*
Actually, tangible example for PF 2e shields. It takes an action (5e: bonus action) to raise your shield and get its AC bonus (typically +2). Then you can use a reaction to reduce incoming damage by its Hardness (e.g. 5 for a steel shield), but any remaining damage also gets applied to your shield. If it hits 0, you can't raise it at all any more, and if it drops below half health (e.g. steel shields have 20 max), you can still raise it and use Shield Block, but it no longer gives an AC bonus
@@justineberlein5916 I understand their armor rules, and how they work, but what I feel like is too much, and I also feel that way about PF 2e, but to a much lesser extent is that armor should always take damage before HP, unless you've got some piercing attacks.
@@TheCosmicViking At least with PF 2e, Hardness is actually a more general concept, similar to damage thresholds in D&D 5e, where any time you attack an object, you reduce the damage by the Hardness. So conceptually, it *is* taking damage before you. It's just that if you take more damage in an attack than your shield is essentially rated to absorb, it starts affecting the structural integrity of your shield and potentially causes it to break
It's the bits and bobs that are my problem. the space my group plays in is small and we have just enough space for 5e and SD. with all the cards, tokens, and coins I know we're going to be knocking things on the floor.
my group played it using tablets, phones, dice, and minis. Demiplane helped a lot.
I'm sorry but Shadowdark is the one so far that's been a better DnD alternative. The game is simple and easy to run and also similar to what we played all these years.
I as a GM felt completely different about the combat, though I get your points . For the first time it felt like I was actually on par with the players, having to manage my own resources and being a "fair" competitor
Also I think the 1-3 hitpoint system helps for describing what's happening, as pure damage numbers are so abstract. When my players hit and I can tell them "it was a really severe hit" they know how they're faring
I am glad that you didn't have to debunk any claims of being "funky" as well as "fresh"
That would have been a short segment haha, not very funky
*Bob was exiled to a forest for this review*
Looks to me like he gets a "favored terrain" bonus there, though.
Omg! Yes! An abacus! 100% agreed! Had the same thought, while reading the adventure. xD
Excelente video! Me encanta que siempre nos des tu mirada objetiva, es lo que mas valoro de tu canal. Gracias!
Looking forward to me Daggerheart, Bob. Great job!
yey, already signed-up for notification! lookig forward to get it! hehe
Thank you!
I hope Bob includes his Favored Enemy in Delve… Trains!😂 Great review!
20:00 either an abacus, or a fidget toy popper
Good call!
Oh shit, fidget toy popper brilliant
I love how you're randomly in the woods. 👍
Same! I spend too much time indoors these days!
Rolling on a random table to decide where to shoot the next video.
Great review! I only play online and it really sounds and looks like Daggerheart is made for live gaming. I went through the basic rules with my group and nobody liked the fact that you roll a big number for damage which then translates to 0-3 damage. Not sure if I want to homebrew anything out from it to my home game either.
Thanks! Yeah I think DH will need new tools support online groups.
Fuckin’ hell this man’s got fantastic hair.
It was a good day lol, thank you
Nice, like this new freshness. You need to check out the Cairn 2E kickstarter and do a video on it. It's FLYING and yes you are a shill for Daggerheart but thats ok!
I love the art style for Cairn 2e! My quick take on it though is that I like Cairn 1e for how small, simple, and ~Tolkien~ it is. Cairn 2e is bigger (still not huge or anything) and some of the new backgrounds feel a little too high fantasy for me.
You can't have a familiar scenario with a different scenario.
It's simply impossible.
Thanks for this review video. Sidenote: there is another indie fantasy RPG called 'Delve' by Feralgamersinc... just FYI, cheers!
My pleasure! And yeah "Delve" is a few things already (zines, games, etc)
Here is my like, comment, and view for the video. I can't wait for your next video, Bob (unless it's more DH content -_-)!
Thank you! And no worries, taking a break from DH for at least the next few
"Like bending in Avatar"
But... Avatar's bending is a very hard magic system 😅
Always appreciate your content. Currently going back through older videos on specific topics for a little gaming technique tune-up.
Thanks! :)
Another great video Bob :)
Although some may prefer other systems myself and my group prefer D&D 5e for it's overall flexibility and robustness in all situations.
We've tried Call of Cuthulu, Monster of the Week, Startrek RPG, Warhammer RPG and Numinera. These all have quite radically different rulesets to D&D. After a few sessions of each, where we initially found the systems interesting and thematic, we would start to really hate certain aspects of each ruleset, compared to D&D 5e. They are all somewhat flawed in one way or another where D&D 5e is >generally< good in most aspects. I honestly don't think its just because of marketing that its the biggest system out there, it may not be perfect but it is good overall.
This is why Daggerheart feels like it could be a great alternative for us. It's taken what works well from D&D and added its own twist without needlessly adding gamified rules to be different for the sake of being different.
Thank you! Yeah 5e is really good at being a generally good game for most people. Most D&D clones/variants work from that baseline, or from a previous edition of D&D, and don't get any flak for it. I think it's a good move to make a game that's familiar-- particularly if you have a company depending on it.
Great review! Now I know more to respond to my players asking about it lol
I'm thinking classes and races are conversions from 5e is because they want to use the system for campaign 4 and not replace the world.
Right it would make sense for them to do so
Great Review! I ran the quick start session a few weeks back, in the place of my regular game, due to low player numbers. I hadn't planned to run it, nor had I done much prior research. However, I ran it and at least for myself and the 3 players, it was amazing. I personally found the combat to be much more fluid that 5e, and I do think that at least for my group it may benefit in combat (though I'm not sure how it would end up in cases of disagreement). Whether or not I would run a whole campaign, I'm not sure. But for the one session it was very successful.
I couldn’t care less about the freshness of the game. I play several TTRPGs, perhaps what I was expecting from Daggerheart was a candela concept but beefed up a bit for fantasy…
While there are some really great points to this system, what we found was that this is a weird combination that frankly, took the worst aspects of DND and Candela. It is more complex than DnD, by a large factor, but they seemed to have thrown away the guidelines and guardrails.
I really do wish critical role the very best of luck and hope they continue to do what they do, but for me, I threw Daggerheart in the trash.
I am crazy excited for “delve” though. This looks fantastic!
I get why your players feel like lack of initiative could be a challenge even tho they didn't have issues with it in the test play. But. I've been playing cypher for a couple years now, which operates similarly, with 5 players + gm and it really hasn't been a problem. Everyone goes and not in the same order. We change it up depending on circumstances and what would help the group. If anything, it's made immersion and collaboration way better. Combos are really possible bc the table doesn't arbitrarily change 5 times before turns come back around. It's awesome. I'd actively hate going back to set or random turn orders.
I think it's important to note that action tokens are intended to be recognizable as character-specific, so that if you feel like one person is hoggin the spotlight, it's obvious to everyone because they have more of their action tokens on the card. This is a sneaky "optional rule" now in 1.3 with the "initiative-based" system which is actually a learning tool for how you're supposed to be using the action tokens in the first place, with just more strict guidelines. The intent is not that the loudest player gets to play the game, you don't need rules to put the brakes on that kind of player and you're probably already dealing with their loudness outside of initiative (I hope) in the same way you would keep them from hogging the spotlight in combat.
The abacus is a brilliant idea, and I can't see myself trying to run this without something like that. Most recently, I ran a one-shot using the short, free Tunnel Goons ruleset, and we--a group who usually uses 5e--had a blast!
It seems like their first update to the game is definitely taking some of these criticisms into consideration. Very curious to try their freeform initiative.
If I let my players name the NPCs, we'd end up with a cast of Austin Powers characters...
I just cannot get interested in Daggerheart.. something about it that I can't quite put my finger on..
I’m not sure I need or want this Kickstarter…. But because Bob is one of the nicest people, im going to back it. Nice people deserve our support
I had the same idea for the abacus counter thingy =D
In fact, I made a 3d file for my 3dprinter
Wasn't thinking to share it, but might just plop the file somewhere for people who want it =D
I'll have to make it more cool looking first haha, cause the current design is... functional =P
Awesome!
Twigs, trains, and a Daggerheart review. Great vid.
Thanks for watching!
Goodness, I would love to see what you think of running a Cypher System game. Great review!
Sorry Bob but the twig @15:51 totally mogged you when it started touching your hair.
I've GM'd for 2 sessions of Daggerheart so far -- the quickstart adventure, and then another session continuing the story -- and I have had similar experiences as you. I've found it can be overwhelming keeping track of how to use fear and action tokens, to the point where I'm focusing less on imagining the game and how it's playing out.
It's not really fair for people to expect something completely different. Like you said it has to still be familiar, unless you just go creating completely new classes, but let's be real. Fight, magic, machine. How many is there before it isn't high fantasy anymore? The same with species. The core of humans, elves, and dwarves are a staple or ttrpgs. Plus, the fighting system does feel completely different. Other than using dice it's not the same at all. I really hope it takes off. WOTC needs a legit threat.
Great review. It sounds like this might be a hard game to play online, what do you think?
Yeah unless there's an online tool for it, I feel like the GM would need to be tracking all of the tokens themselves? Not sure though. I'd have to try it.
I love your positivity about it. I totally agree there are some great things about it and I agree with you about the pros and cons of the Fresh part (nothing new under the sun) I don't think this will bring people. There's a lot of lazy players and DMs who love to go by the seat of their pants. They putting a big ask to get all the things you need to play as well unless they start promoting Demiplane like they did DND Beyond and even then some won't go to it. I love your positive attitude don't change
Dwarves a.k.a. dwarves 😂
Super excited to see more Daggerheart content from you! I hope there's more to come!
But man, the timing is rough. You should check out v1.3!
Daggerheart and Legends in the Mist are going to be my go to fantasy RPGs starting next year. This year, it's still DnD and Tiny Dungeons.
Thank you for keeping "Kick-Sharter" in the final video 😂
Lol, I love that this video came out the same day as a patch notes
Go test it again!! Lol 😆😆
Yep lol, I'm glad it's at least on the same day instead of too late xD
I'm curious about the Range/Movement mechanics. To me, it seems like the biggest time waster is figuring out which squares a spell effects, where to walk to, and then you just sit there and don't move after engaging an enemy, and if an enemy tries to run away the players want to chase them down and expect it to be on the maps.
Getting rid of that in a GOOD way (not just theatre of the mind-ing for all the sticklers in the group) would do a lot to improve combat flow for me and exchanging tokens SOUNDS like a step back.
Excellent point. Honestly, I probably didn't think to spend time on it here because my group already doesn't use squares. For groups that do use a grid, I think trying DH style distance and moves could be a real eye-opener
Wait how does Daggerheart do it? There's basically 2 approaches, range bands & counting squares. Would love to find a middle way
@@davidholman6709 It's ranges, things are 5,15,30,60,120 feet away. It feels like an improvement but people are already confused about pencils,cards,paper measurements.
@@abigfavor I see, so range bands but with concrete numbers attached.
@@davidholman6709 yes, they are called something like melee, very close, close, near,far,and very far. It just means there reducing the amount of squares but they still there to me
Daemon is still pronounced "Deemon" I know im "that guy" and its all good. You're classy and awesome Bob. Keep it up!
The Pathfinder 1e comparison was great. I love all Bob Worldbuilder videos!!!
20:24 That reminds me of the spellslot tracker i built
Glad to see your honest opinions. GL with Delve