Hello!
My name is Orin, and I was a fan of Nat20Mom before it was cool. She’s asked me to review Daggerheart after playtesting it a little ways back, and since I owe her a few favors, I happily agreed. For those that don’t know. Daggerheart is an RPG system published by and created with input from Darrington Press, who are also the team behind incredibly popular DND Podcast Critical Role. Well, they’ve finally decided to do a fantasy Role-Playing Game of their own, and I have.. Some thoughts, both positive and negative.
I’ll start with the positives. Firstly, and possibly least importantly, it primarily uses the humble D12 for dice rolls, and I am a huge fan of that choice. The D12 does not get enough love, and I am ecstatic to see it receive some justice courtesy of Matt Mercer & Friends. Another thing to note – Every fantasy RPG system needs an X Factor to set it apart from the giant that is D&D, whether it be 3D motion like in Polaris or being better in nearly every conceivable way like in Pathfinder 2e – Daggerheart is no stranger to the X Factor, and it has a great one in the form of a whole bunch of little cards. Each class consists of two “domains” and as you level up, you’ll be able to add more and more neat little cards to your collection, illustrating the maneuvers that you have access to – it’s great to see everything at your disposal at all times, and I think leaning into this would be a smart move as Daggerheart continues to evolve. Finally and most importantly, Daggerheart is, in a lot of ways, much softer with rules than the relative crunch of DND and it really encourages players and DMs alike to be as creative as possible wherever possible, and I think that that’s awesome – particularly for inexperienced players who might need a little bit more of a nudge to engage with the world and get into character.
Unfortunately, it’s not all sunshine and French Silk Pie with Daggerheart so far. Firstly, in my opinion, the quickstart adventure is bad – really bad. It’s basically entirely combat encounters, which entirely sidesteps the strong emphasis on in-character performances that I read from the system, and is balanced to be a little too easy to be fully engaging. I’d definitely recommend that an experienced DM make a homebrew one-shot of their own rather than use the one provided for full impact. That said, while the system is pretty breezy once it gets going, getting it going can be a bit of a challenge. The rules guide is a meaty bugger and has VERY few visual aids. Explaining itself takes a lot of words, and this guide takes every chance it can get to shove some words into your line of sight. My final point is that it needs some general rebalancing – I won’t go insanely deep into it for the sake of brevity, but a couple that come to mind:
-Ranges (i.e. melee vs long-range) are kept pretty soft for the sake of those that prefer theatre-of-the-mind playstyles, but the exact dimensions of each were a little funny.
-The hope-vs-fear dice style can really screw over the DM if the players are rolling particularly well and make the game less tense and/or exciting.
-I’m not hard-set on this one, but I’m not sold on the initiative-free combat system. I’m really concerned that it could enable players with Main Character Syndrome to hog the spotlight and make more reserved players feel really left out, but I also realize that this is a big differentiating factor from Big Bad DND and it emphasizes the theatrical slant that Daggerheart is going for, so I’m not sure what I’d propose as an alternative.
Long story short, Daggerheart is a great time with fun classes and a characters-first mindset that I think could be huge, particularly those that aren’t horribly familiar with RPGs from the outset. That said, I think it’s got a pretty long way to go before it’s what I’d call “consumer-ready”. That said, I can absolutely recommend giving it a shot to RPG enthusiast, particularly those that are looking for an RPG that utilizes fewer and smaller numbers, or ones that want to embrace their inner theater kid or nerdy-ass voice actor. Have a great time, and may you always roll with Hope!
-Orin
