Daggerheart COMBAT! ...it hits different 

You have to wear the ruby slippers and click your heels each time you say "dagger."

whats your current replacement system for initiative?

Have you played Forge out of Chaos? Best leveling system I have ever seen. Also great combat system. The rest of the game is trash.

No, but you DID learn how to make a Dagger, Dagger attack.. in DAGGERheart! Dagger Dagger Daggerheart!

It certainly can be a thing that some players might always take initiative when possible while others just wait until asked to do their turn. However, I can see this happening in actual combat where a timid mage only acts when necessary. But I am confidend there will be ways to fix this daggerheart if really needed.

yea I agree, especially online, on west marches or new groups having initiative keeps everything going. I play many sessions in Lancer and having no initiative is a nightmare

in that case, there can still be an initiative, but if you want more strategy or RP included, you could include delaying your turns if you want to have that timid mage@@Grakesch

That's a good case for turn order, but I still prefer going around the table (or what my group is currently trying, randomly drawing cards for turn order) so it doesn't pause the game to roll and organize each turn. Like most things, it comes down to group preference.

I make sure to call on each player if they haven't acted yet. Eventually they become more comfortable with practice.

Micro transactions to get reaction/bonus action DLC

Yes. Throwing actual dollars at a GM will increase your chances of winning a fight. I prefer $5's and $10's. $20's are always welcome for an instant crit or god like intervention. GM gotta pay rent.

Good thing most board games arent played with strangers

@@ChicCanyon In this world of the internet, I can't tell if this is sarcasm. Just in case it's not, playing board games with strangers is very common.

@FulcanMal it definitely isnt very common. It might occur but it isnt very common. Playing board games at all in any circumstance isnt very common.

@@ChicCanyonWhat are you talking about? There are boardgame meetups all over the place. Friendly local game stores with board game nights. Bars that host board game nights...I go to these regularly and meet new people all the time.

@FulcanMal lets be clear: you and yooure niche hobbies =/= common. Not anymore than my niche hobbies = common. Common would prevalent. This is not prevalent. At all. In any way. Its nearly the definition of niche.

Would that make it just a "sunglass"?

A "sunmonocle"?

On the same token, I feel like I've seen too many times where players had a preconceived notion, then the initiative roll made them go too soon or have to wait too long for what they had planned. It's all about group preference, and initiative is the default for most people because of 5e, but I think people have more freedom to plan without being locked into an order.

@@BobWorldBuilder I think it also forces players to be far more engaged. I mean, when they feel they have time to wait between turns, how many ACTUALLY spend that time planning to make their turn as efficient as possible? 😉

You can take ready actions if you are not ready to take an action. Or use a homebrew where, if you are higher on the initiative, you may drop to a lower initiative. But I feel like you should reward players with characters that are faster (i.e. higher dex). Give them more choices. But relying on initiative of the player and not the character makes the game into an "extroverts win" mechanic. My girlfriend is very quiet at the table but often gets really into the combat. Without initiative, I can see her going last every round.

This is why I'm a fan of the Edge of the Empire turn order, all players still roll initiative for their characters and the GM for all NPCs, but they are just entered as PC and NPC slots in the initiative track. So when a PC slot comes up, any player that hasn't acted that round yet can have their turn. It's sort of a mix of the two, there is an order but you can swap that order.

@@BobWorldBuilder, writes _"then the initiative roll made them go too soon"_ You can always simply delay and go at any time until your next turn.

I think that's how I'll run it as well. I've played with some very shy players (at first, wow did they open up after some time!), so ensuring they get a chance to go is going to be important at my table.

@@butterflysrage I love how these games can help people open up!

That sounds awesome, jotting it down to keep in my back pocket

@@tomc.5704 it works well for The One Ring system. Those in forward gain an Advantage to attack, those in Open attack normally, those in Defensive get a disadvantage to attack, and those in rearward are the only ones who can use range. Enemies mirror whatever stance the players take. Ryan of the North has a good video covering combat, if you’re interested!

Actually there is a sort of fixed chosen initiative, with stances. It’s definitely more organized than Daggerfart. Which seems like a mess-and a big burden on the GM so far. Not a fan.

Removing the need for Initiative rolls, and counting 5ft distances. Reminded me of your ideas. I think a UDT would be handy for Daggerheart.

I like that the death options are either an automatic retaliation critical, become crippled emotionally or 50/50 chance you die. I think a lot more players would accept death if it meant they get to go out in a blaze of glory. And if death saves permanently cost the character something they'd also have more meaning. In this case I suspect a character eventually runs out of hope slots and is unusable long before that.

This has been a thing since FATE, which likely took it from Fudge, which has been around since 1992. There are all sorts of things out there better for TotM once you get away from the D20 Framework.

Very far measurement doesnt work because theres no definitive distance meaning it ends up requiring clarification every time its used if somebody wants to close distance. Otherwise its okayish but keeping track without a board can be a massive pain since most people cant quanitfy the space through how many moves it took to get from point A to point B... but they can more easily with a measurement

@@thatepicwizardguy I mean, if I had a longbow, my first question would be "is the target within longbow range?" It's not that big of a problem. It's not perfect, but it's good if, like me, you can't always play with a battle map.

You should check out Exalted Essence, which comes from a lovely (if not crunchy) system which has been using the concept of zones for years and is theater of the mind as its core.

Not new in the slightest … pretty standard for “modern” games

Yeah at the end of the day, I think this will at least offer some fun ideas for people who take the time to try it. Like most RPGs haha

I've seen something similar to Blaze of Glory in a couple of other games - The ones that spring to my mind are Fabula Ultima and Escape from Dinosaur Island.

Blaze of Glory pops immediately 2 problems in my head... first in oneshots everyone will be more prone to end the session by doing it and taking unnecessary risk, and that might ruin the verisimilitude of the scene... second if there is any way to revive a character, maybe with just a simple spell, then the best tactic would be to die on purpose again and again, and that too would take me out of the immersion... I know it sounds epic and all, but unfortunately some players tend to overoptimize and those are the results

​@ilvecchiocim most games that use blaze of glory don't have revives really; And most forms of this rule I've seen specify that "this is permanent death make a new character"

Having so many factors and features being random is going to be an issue, a few poor rolls could easily cripple you in short order.

NPC will act when narrative says they fit best

It seems to be the same problem candela obscura had which happens to be designed by the same person. Seems like they always forget inner party conflict.

@@SkittleBombs So this system is more like WWE than like MMA... that's not a good thing (imho).

@@Firecell777They didn't forget it, they just don't want it.

which is a shame in itself@@TheDragonWhimsy

The more meaningful each roll of the dice the better. If you have fun from rolling dice as it is you can just roll them without TTRPG, or add more dice rolling for every little action in the game (but majority of the players would not like this). If you keeping initiative roll then at least make it do some meaningful stuff besides order of turns - like, maybe character lose some of its defence if he rolled really bad (beneath certain threshold) or something, and/or have advantage on attack against enemies that he surpassed on initiative roll by certain number. This will make really high initiative desirable, not just for taking first turn. (Most radical in this, of course Exalted 3e where initiative basically your temporary hp AND attack dice pool lol)

Wow idk how I didn't notice that xD

I came here specifically to comment on the combats section! LOL!😂

There are a lot of great systems like Thirsty Sword Lesbians that lean much more heavily into roleplay where combat almost becomes a roleplay "action". In the case of TSL, combat is literally a single ability (another ability score is "kiss dangerously" which gives an idea of the style of emotion-based roleplay game it is going for)

It’s because they want monsters to get attack of opportunity on FEAR which makes it a lot more back and forth and the. Have a DM turn where the monsters get action points to spend. Rather than round table or fixed initiative which means monsters often get lumped into one move

It’s a cycle that happens every couple of years or so; someone comes along, declares they don’t like or need a staple of RPG design that has been there since the beginning, proceeds to try and reinvent the wheel, fails, then passes on into obscurity.

I say we go back to rolling a d6 each round to determine party or monsters first, then Missiles, Movement, Magic, Melee. Guy? Guys where are you all going?

I find initiative order works for "turn based" combat, but can be very limiting for "cinematic" combat. Sometimes you want to have the opponent strike back directly after a player attacks them (especially when it comes to rivals) like you see in movies, shows, comics, and anime

@@Aussie_Archmage this system dagger heart now allows you to do both When narrative context suggests one or the other is appropriate

Yeah, it's a fun game (based on my limited experience with it), but I think whether or not people give it a chance will depend mostly on how much they promote it in their own shows

Yea I love the monsters act on fear throughout the player turns instead of always in a predictable manner

If you think about it like Professor DM's ultimate dungeon terrain, the zones just represent where action is, and things like corners and hallways are also meant to be abstracted when they involve getting to the action

The Sci-Fi Horror game Mothership also uses very similar distance descriptions, and an initiative-less combat round. Seems to be the way many new games are going. Having run a few Mothership sessions, I find it is a bit difficult for some to adjust, but with more folks playing this way I think the issues will get ironed out and people will discover a groove to make it run smoothly.

As an avid vtt enjoyer, I don't see much point in abstracting distance since they are so easily calculated. I think this works for theatre of the mind games type games. But fails at scale. What if my character uses a sniper rifle for example, how far can I hit? "You can hit very very far." What's very very far? What about verticality? In a vtt I can calculate diagonal distance to see if I am at range against a dragon in a 3d space. "Well the dragon is far horizontally but very close vertically." So is it far or close? "We'll just say far." Again, makes sense for theatre of the mind, but people were already doing that with dnd anyway for theatre of the mind.

I also think they should use timers from ICRPG as the monster moves + opportunity attack when player roll fear on their actions. This coin system seems like too much going on

​@@BobWorldBuilder Bob, this is pure theatre of the mind stuff. It reduces combat, purely mechanically speaking, to the form of ancient JRPG video games. That's totally fine, but it's not the same as measuring on a tactical grid.

That's what the token system is for.

I don’t know if it’s written in the rules, but a DM might choose to limit the number of action tokens (maybe?) so that everyone gets equal amounts of actions before the DM goes.

@@christenh359 That would be a good houserule if it's not RAW

Yes, but each consecutive action must be preceded by, “Hello! My name is Inigo Montoya….!”

i think he was joking about ginny di taking turns over and over without he others getting turns

That sounds interesting!

@BobWorldBuilder if you want to learn more I believe Treantmonk did a video on it

That sounds like popcorn initiative, which first appeared in the marvel super hero game from the 80s. I've used it in various systems to great success.

Thank you! And usually the editor is me, but this was one of a few I've had done by a professional, and they did an amazing job!

That's an interesting thought about the BBEG being "weakened" (able to do less) as the party is weakened.

Thinking on it further a way that should work to counter that problem (if it even turns out to feel like a problem in play) is if the DM's minions have many skills that cost "Player count +x" or perhaps "PC/2 +x" tokens. While loss of a player character will still shift what the DM can do as the living player count changes it won't be as incapacitating as this sounds. For many combat actions that sort of cost even makes some sense - with more targets to keep track of, target, evade etc it should be more taxing to take that action against a larger number of opponents. I am really curious as to how this rule concept will work out though - really adds another layer to the players decision making focus that isn't there in any other TTRPG I can think of. Usually it is always worth it enough to use your power moves, even if its not the absolute best setup for them imaginable and you fear you might need them more later as you do weaken remove the opponets which has no downside, just might not have been the most efficient use of your resources. But with this it really asks the question 'is it worth spending heaps of action points for the fireball equivalent knowing in the process I help fuel a more effective retaliation?'

I think the bad guys need to be on timers/clocks instead for their initiative , and fear is considered an opportunity to act outside of the timer

It’s actually not that unusual, there’s a lot of rpg systems without initiative, for example most powered by the apocalypse systems (such as Masks, City of Mists, Dungeon World). It’s really not a problem in play, often most active players will go first, and it’s up to the GM to make sure everyone gets their spotlight

I'd be interested in the same. I've mostly played D&D, Pathfinder so I'm very used to a turn order. I also play in big groups where I think it could quickly become chaotic without initiative dictating the turn order.

I agree no order would be an issue for quiet players. But my thoughts are that pausing to roll initiative for all monsters, call for all player rolls, and organize it (without it being automated) is not fun for me when there's more than ~6 total combatants. I prefer just going around the table, but currently my group has been using a deck of cards to randomly determine the order.

Typically in games with no turn order it's either handled with 'the players take turns in whatever order they like' so that everyone takes a turn before anyone takes their second turn (but which does mean you can plan for taking two turns in a row if you go last) - as from the sound of it Dagger Heart will do - or it's done in a sort of free wheeling GM handles spotlight way, in the same way as stuff outside of combat is handled. Basically games that don't have turn order usually have turn order, just some of them have the players choose what order to do things in or the GM (and narrative flow) dictates it.

It really helps having your more vocal active players actively try to pull (but not forcing) the quieter ones into their plans. "Hey, wizard, mind softening them up before I charge in?"

+stephenharric8041, writes _"We know in D&D that a party of adventurers can overpower a single powerful creature by virtue of getting so many turns... but that is because it is many vs one!"_ It's also reality. Why do you think pack hunters can take down bigger prey than solo hunters? Why do you think prey animals tend to bunch up and predators try to separate a single individual from the herd?

The answer to the question of why wouldn’t one character in a prime situation take every action is also unclear to me too

If you want a frame work that does the same thing . Try ironsworn it’s the the same chance for fear to hit and the narrative initiative is the premise. Ironsworn is feature complete free as pdf and can be played solo so you don’t have to find a group

+ZandyrBier004, writes _"The 2d12 system is very intriguing and I’m excited to think more on it."_ To me it sounds more like trying to find a use for d12s beyond rolling a Barbarian's hit points.

My pleasure!

Yeah I'm eagerly waiting for actual playtest material haha

i was one of the few who got selected to playtest, myself and my group had our first session last night, but other than than that, I can't say anymore

Like Golf!

That would be a great way to use the zones but also have an established order to help quiet players! Love it!

Yeah that’s pretty much how this will boil down to, is marching order = narrative framing for who acts first in most cases which sound fine to me

Yeah I suspect the final product will need to clearly tell GMs that they are fully encouraged to not play with "that guy". Narrative games often have elements that can be min/maxed beyond their design intentions. But you make a great point that this isn't exactly a light system either. I didn't find the tracking hard since there were boxes for each of these right on the sheet (fear wasn't a thing to track either) though I wasn't playing a spell caster to it was easier for my character. It does seem like it could be a lot for people new to TTRPGs, but I think Critical Role's target audience for this game has some experience.

what if someone needs a set up by someone else?

@@louisst-amand9207 make an exception

Initiative is whatever you want . If you want clockwise you can and that’s eligible RAW. But you can have moments where it’s broken and someone jumps in and that is also RAW

Same! As for CO, my group only played it once so far but we had a good time

My fix for this is a clock /timer, “in 1d4 rounds/turns the monster strike without Fear!” Then the monster will do their GM turn/ organised Wombo combo of doom, that timer counts down to their thematic/narrative big power. All other move monsters do is a basic action /movement, they get to act any time FEAR is rolled (which is like 50% chance per player action. if not including misses as a monster opportunity) This means once everyone has rolled their turn (order that narrative fits best) you tick down the timer.

If you want the game that has all the same mechanics, read ironsworn . It’s a free pdf. Basically the same except dagger heart introduces target numbers and roll for damage. But all the interesting “new” stuff you are hearing is from the ironsworn style of play.

The dm can still attack the quiet players to get them involved, like if there are environmental hazards you have to dodge, they will get a chance to narrate how they face the danger

It (the range system) is actually pretty common these days. Almost all of Free League's games use some form of it, as does Black Hack. I think it goes back to FATE, but I have little experience with that

Yeah, I don't have much experience with other systems besides 3rd 3.5, 4th, 5e, and the fantasy flight system. So that's where I draw my experience from lol. I'd like to branch out more, but my play group has a hard time wanting to switch to anything from D&D.

@@themaplebeard nothing wrong with that, sorry if I came off differently. All I was trying to say was that I've enjoyed it in other places. Most of the systems that use it are lighter (Black Hack is a super light D&D style game. Give it a shot :D ) so it'll work with what daggerheart IS but I have a lot of doubts that it will appeal to many D&D exclusive folks because there are so many rules light bits and bobs in there. I'd love to be wrong though

@@jasonGamesMaster, It's fine. I never took it that way. I just don't have a lot of experience with other systems besides D&D and Fantasy Flight. I've done some other D20 systems, but they all played the same as D&D with feats, movement, and combat :).

Thanks!

Figuring out what the positive and negative "extra" consequences are for every roll does sound like a burdensome chore -- not only in combat, but in every other situation where 2d12 are rolled. "Ok, so you succeed, and also....um....uh...."

@@this_epic_name It's easy in Genesys because I am actually really good in improv and the game is really good at giving you examples and ideas to simplify the concept of rolls that effect the RP. It's not hard as it seems. This "fear" roll though is just a less romantic version of what Genesys has and sounds kind of clunky.

Thank you🎉 you sound like a great player or gm to have at any table