Daggerheart – First Impressions

First impressions of the brand new TTRPG by Critical Role and Darrington Press.

Mechanics: Balance, player options & uniqueness

Hope & Fear

Daggerheart replaces the traditional d20 with a 2d12 system for making attacks and checks. The system also introduces the mechanic of Hope and Fear. 

Each roll you make with the two d12 involves one die representing Hope and the other Fear (might be useful to have them in different colours). The higher die determines success of the check and generates one of 2 resources dependent on which dice was higher. Hope fuels player abilities, while Fear empowers the GM to oppose the players. This mechanic ensures that every roll has meaningful consequences, adding depth to gameplay. 

For example, even if you succeed on a roll’s check, but the higher of the two dice was Fear, then you will pass the check, but the DM will accrue a fear point, which they can spend later on a variety of effects, empowering enemies, debilitating allies or simply causing a stroke of bad luck.

So passing the checks imposed by the GM is not the only outcome and this fuels narrative possibilities further.

This sounds like a lot of fun and could certainly take the monotony out of points in the adventure where a lot of checks are made. However, while it sounds cool for players, I imagine it would be tiring for the GM to constantly have to find ways to use those fear points that build up on the fly. Managing players as they do under predictable things is hard enough without an extra layer being added. This seems like an overall win, with a caveat.

Combat Dynamics

Freeform turn order

Unlike many traditional TTRPGs, Daggerheart doesn’t use initiative. Instead, the GM sets the scene, and players decide among themselves the order of actions. For each player action, the GM generates a fear token, and can choose to act in between any players turn with accrued fear points potentially allowing the GM to make enemy actions or the environment more dangerous for the players. This promotes collaborative storytelling and opens the door to interesting moments of teamwork. 

Hope and Fear dice also play a part here. If the fear die is the higher of the two, the GM can push some interesting storytelling in even the most routine of battles.

Armor & Damage Thresholds

Characters don’t just have hit points, they have health tracks with specific thresholds. Characters will have minor, major, and severe damage thresholds, based on the damage rolled by the DM. Depending on which number the damage falls into, this will determine the hit points removed by the player.

Damage is applied in set chunks and players can choose whether to spend limited use armor slots to block incoming damage. Armor needs to be repaired later during downtime if it’s damaged, so there’s a lot of decisions at play. 

This generates meaningful decisions in the moment and makes each round of combat feel more impactful. That said, it also adds time to each exchange as players weigh their options, especially for newcomers still getting a feel for the numbers. Frankly, it just feels over complicated and while it has lots of narrative potential, hand wringing by some players could really make this agonsing to sit through at the wrong table.

Board game vibes & tactile play

Combat in Daggerheart leans hard into visual aids: tokens, cards, health tracks, and domain sheets. This makes it feel more like a kind of board game at times, engaging players who like having physical elements to interact with. For minimalist players though, it might be a bit much, and there’s certainly more room needed at the table. Not every group has unlimited space to play in, those playing at restaurants or gaming clubs could find it claustrophobic. 

Character creation & customisation

Character creation is modular, taking the following steps – 

Choose a Homeland – Each Homeland provides a small mechanical bonus and some narrative fodder.

Pick a Class
Classes in Daggerheart are more or less parallel to the ones in D&D, each class comes with:

• A Domain (their area of magical or narrative influence)
  
• A set of Class Talents
  
• A core ability
  
• A suggested playstyle or role in the group
  

Select a Subclass
Once you’ve chosen your Class, you narrow it down further with one of two subclasses, which gives your character additional abilities and shapes their playstyle. For example, a Mage might become a Firebrand or a Seer, with one more explosive and the other more well rounded.

Pick two Archetypes
Archetypes represent a character’s personality and narrative direction. Each archetype gives you a narrative prompt and an ability that can be used to support roleplay and decisions. Examples include “The Leader,” “The Lover,” or “The Trickster.” These are all about who the character is, not just what you do.

Choose three Talents
Talents are special moves or passive abilities that give a character mechanical identity. You’ll pick three from the class list to start, but you’ll gain more as you level up. These often tie into your Domain and Subclass and help set you apart from others in the same class.

Assign your stats
Characters have six core stats: Strength, Dexterity, Constitution, Intellect, Wisdom, and Charisma. You’ll assign values based on a point-buy or standard array, depending on your table’s preference. These values are added to your Hope & Fear die rolls when attempting actions.

Define Bonds and Story Questions
You define Bonds with other characters (player or NPC) and answer personal questions that help shape a character’s backstory. These aren’t just for flavor, they can be referenced during play for mechanical advantages or roleplay prompts.

Gear up
Each class has starting gear, and you may get additional items from your Homeland or background choices. 

This creation process is quite streamlined, while it seems like a lot to choose from at first, it falls into a fairly simple decision tree. Each of these steps has a small selection of choices, so you are unlikely to get stuck at any particular point. However, cumulatively they add up to characters that can be quite unique mechanically from someone else at the table with a similar build.

I was impressed with how breezy to put together a character that immediately felt very distinct despite only being first level. It didn’t have an A4 backstory, or levels of play and anecdotes to shape their personality, but the character already felt very much alive.

Flavour: Settings, classes & tone

Setting & themes

The settings for Daggerheart are loosely referred to as ‘Worlds’ & ‘Realms’, with the areas where players operate divided into the following realms;

Core realms:

• The Mortal Realm: The primary setting where mortals reside. Historically, gods walked among mortals here, but over time, the Forgotten Gods were overthrown by the New Gods. The Mortal Realm now contains remnants of divine influence and is overseen by lesser deities known as Faint Divinities.
• The Hallows Above: A celestial plane housing the New Gods. Once accessible to mortals, it is now largely beyond their reach.
• The Circles Below: A realm of banishment for the Forgotten Gods, now home to demons and other dangerous entities.
• The Realms Beyond: Other planes of existence, including the Elemental Lands, the Astral Realm, and the Valley of Death. These are largely unexplored and difficult to access.

The world also has some notable locations loosely outlined in the source book. There’s not a huge amount of detail given, but this feels like it’s by design, leaving the GM’s and players to fill in the blanks and add detail as it suits their own story.

Notable locations:

• Fanewick (The Witherwild): A huge overgrown forest plagued by conflict between the woodland’s natural inhabitants and neighboring cities that exploit their resources.
• Althas (Five Banners Burning): A continent once unified under the gods, now divided into five nation, each with different loyalties and agendas.
• Plover Caves (Beast Feast): A interwoven cave system where a magical spell once kept beasts at bay. With the spell starting to fade the nearby settlement faces an impending threat.
• The Halcyon Domain (Age of Umbra): A cursed land where the dead rise as monsters. Communities live a life under threat, breeding strong warriors as communities fight to reclaim lost territories.
• Echo Vale (Motherboard): A place where the people have learning to use remnants of ancient technology to their advantage, but forgotten, rogue automatons pose a very real threat.
• The Drylands (Colossus of the Drylands): A desert landscape where mining towns extract powerful crystals from the remains of old gods, while rumors abound of the resurrection of the awakening colossus, Kudamat.

There are some fun ideas here and it’s useful that the lore is fairly light. Players can get to grips with the concepts quickly and see where their character might fit in without delving into pages of detail. On the one hand the world is not terribly well defined and doesn’t really feel that different from D&D or Pathfinder. On the other hand this lends well to being an adaptable backdrop, easy to mould to your games narrative.

You can read more about the Worlds and Realms of Daggerheart in our recent guide.

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Presentation & production

Daggerheart boasts great production values, with very visually appealing materials that enhance the gaming experience. The art is of the highest caliber, even beating out the illustration in the newest edition of D&D at times. The art is well themed too, with a consistent light and expressive style throughout, drawing contrast to the more inconsistent style’s in the 2024 players guide. 

The core set includes a well organised rulebook and ability cards, all designed with clarity as a priority. Seamlessly hopping from passages of text to grids and tables, all in a very accessible way that breaks up larger sections and never feels like a chore to read.

However, it’s a minor gripe but there are no character sheets included or dice. Of course, dice sets are easy to buy, but you do need differently coloured D12’s (for the Hope and Fear dice) and sheets can be printed, but the product is not cheap, as such you would expect it has everything you would need to get going included with the purchase.

Final verdict

Daggerheart presents a compelling alternative to traditional fantasy RPGs, blending familiar elements with newer mechanics that prioritise narrative depth. While it may not drastically deviate from other products in its setting, the unique features and emphasis on storytelling make it a worthy addition to any RPG collection. 

However, the big question is whether this is enough to pull you away from your current system. And I think this largely depends on what you want from your TTRPG. If you’re looking for crunchy, tactical combat, Daggerheart has this to an extent, but you’ll find more of this in D&D and other systems than in Daggerheart. But if you’re looking for a system that better integrates collaborative storytelling into its mechanics, then Daggerheart might well be what you’re looking for.

Spotlight on Daggerheart