Rules

Battling Adversaries

Battling Adversaries

The flow of combat in Daggerheart is malleable and driven by the dice. The player characters pass the spotlight between themselves, making moves until someone fails a roll or rolls with Fear, or until the GM spends a Fear to interrupt the players’ turns. When play passes to the GM, the GM can make a move to spotlight an adversary—and, if they wish, can spend any number of Fear to spotlight that many additional adversaries.

A spotlighted adversary can take any action the fiction demands of them, but most of the time, they’ll do one of the following:

  • Move within Close range and make a standard attack.
  • Move within Close range and use an adversary action.
  • Clear a condition.
  • Sprint within Far or Very Far range on the battlefield.

Conditions and ranges are described in the upcoming “Conditions” and “Maps, Range, and Movement” sections, but the following example provides a brief overview of what it looks like when the GM takes their turn. Once the GM has finished, play passes back to the PCs.

Example: After Quinn makes an attack roll with Fear for their druid Shepherd, play moves to the GM. The GM spotlights a nearby adversary who is temporarily Vulnerable , and describes them breaking free from the vines that are binding them to remove the Vulnerable condition. The GM has 6 Fear available, so they spend 1 to spotlight the adversary Shepherd just hit with their shortstaff . The GM describes the adversary pulling their warhammer out of the mud and swinging at Shepherd’s ribs. The adversary succeeds on the attack, then rolls for damage and totals it for 9 physical damage. This damage falls above Shepherd’s Major threshold, but Quinn marks an Armor Slot and reduces the damage by one tier to Minor instead, marking 1 Hit Point .

Spending another Fear to shift the spotlight again, the GM describes an additional adversary sprinting all the way across the battlefield to get to the massive bell that would signal reinforcements. As the adversary prepares to ring it, the GM returns play to the players, asking, “What do you want to do?”

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