Daggerheart looks so refreshing...

I've been playing 5th edition Dungeons & Dragons for the last decade, but Daggerheart looks like the next perfect fit of a narrative role playing system. During my initial reading of the rules, there are so many nice little nuggets of what appear to be thoughtful design that I can't wait to try out with my friends.

The game only has 10 levels.

I'm honestly looking forward to shorter campaigns. I know that the number of levels doesn't directly amount to campaign length, but I think everyone can tell that most campaigns only last, or are designed, for ten or so levels. You can always add more in the future, but I think ten is the sweet spot. We're sure to see some new Daggerheart campaigns come out (hopefully soon) that will center around this ten level spread.

More exciting death mechanics.

When you die in Daggerheart you get the choice between:

- A Blaze of Glory to go out with a bang and do something worth remembering.

- The option to Avoid Death, go unconscious, and possibly gain a "scar" (which I love narratively). 

- Risk it All, which after watching it in action, looks like a bunch of friends yelling excitedly around a craps table about to win $1000. You can risk your character dying or coming back and regaining a bunch of resources. 

This is awesome, and I think exciting mechanics like this should be added to every TTRPG in some form.

Daggerheart centers around resource generation.

Other RPG's have been more centered around attrition. As the adventuring party goes through their day, they have to spend resources to conquer difficulties. These are resources that they will only get back the next day. This presents interesting choices for players, but ultimately, I think it makes them feel bad for having to make that choice.

Flipping that on it's head, there are games where by performing certain actions you will generate resources that you can then spend on something big. We've seen this archetype of generators and spenders become very prevalent in video gaming as well. 

Instead of having to constantly carry and drink mana potions, you now have simple abilities which will generate that mana for you. This feels good to do and is very satisfying when it pays off. Ultimately I think it's the way to go as a large piece of the backbone for the game. 

Major support for physical cards.

Seeing that the base game comes with an entire set of playing cards that are used for your abilities is a big win from me. TTRPG's at there heart are board games, so having some of the most crucial information for it be tucked away on some other page or having to be hand written on your character sheet seems very outdated and inconvenient. 

I still need to get my friends together to try it out but these are just some of the bits that stuck out to me at first glance. I can't wait to try!

Also... As of the writing of this, the news was just announced that Chris Perkins and Jeremy Crawford have joined the ranks of Darrington Press to aid in the design of Daggerheart. Hopefully they will take their large swaths of game design knowledge they learned over at Wizards of the Coast and apply it thoughtfully here as well. Looking forward to it!