Vol 25: Hope & Heroes

SPOTLIGHT

The abstract, liturgical art of Dominik Mayer and the exquisite compositions of Mat Wilmer grace the deluxe and standard editions of the much anticipated Hope & Fear, revealed this past Tuesday.

NEWS & RELEASES

Hope & Fear Draw Near

Darrington set an August 25 release date for the eagerly awaited expansion book and its many trinkets and baubles. The Triumphant Trio™ give us an unboxing, while the blog fills in the rest. A Daggerheart Nexus discount was also mentioned.

Corporate Raiders

Episode Two—3 Way Synergy—of Acquisitions Incorporated's newly minted Daggerheart series is up on YouTube. Chris Perkins GMs to a rowdy table, including a very horny, 80's-inspired Matt Mercer.

Extracurricular Chaos

Dodoborne is prying a panel from the Dimension 20 dome with the announcement of Polaris University, a Fantasy High-ish mystery series premiering April 21. More to be announced by the comedy troupe on their April 20 livestream, but you can get some giggles today by just saying the show’s initials out loud.

Va Va VTT

Something wicked-sexy this way comes: Daggerheart for Alchemy VTT. While we've known for a while the team is working on the module, this is the first public image of their test build, shared recently in the Discord. Mother, may I?!

Tooltips

Torutu, maker of the popular Daggerheart Obsidian plug-in, has put the finishing touches on DHTools, an attractive resource compendium that sits somewhere between Old Gus’ SRD and the newly minted wiki from Heart of Daggers.

Launch Sequence

The sci-fi expansion book The New Unknown has moved from its taste-testing phase to Kickstarter pre-launch. Group leader Tenawa announced the book officially kicks off April 28th. [Ed: look for an upcoming interview between Pistolheart/Star Trek writer Carlos Cisco and the the trio behind the The New Unknown.]

Stack the Deck

Daggercard, which focuses on easy-to-print homebrew Adversary cards, dropped by the sub to mention the addition of new Environment cards, easier import/export, and advanced search. 

Fantasy Freebie

Darrington revealed the cover art to The Dying Spire, a Tier 2 one-shot sequel to The Sablewood Messengers that will be distributed to participating retailers as part of this June’s Free RPG Day. FLGS’ receive limited copies—check the map to see if yours is participating—though it's likely the module will appear on the DP site as a download.

DISCUSSIONS

Story, Not Stats

Playing D&D modules in Daggerheart is (now) a perennial conversation. Is it doable? If so, which ones? Thus began a recent thread where, among the whispers of Waterdeep and Strahd, PrestigiousEmu had a bankable reply:

"The simple thing … is never convert the system. I take the story beats, NPCs, locations (i.e. the important bits) but never convert the system. That way lies madness.”

Scene Partners

Can’t rustle up a whole table but don’t want to play Solo? How about a Duet? Aside from whether your partner will talk to you again after you murder their Rogue, Daggerheart brings some flexibility to the format where D&D struggles. Here’s RavxnGoth: 

“The Spotlight system works so much better for Duets. With 5e the DM gets 90% of the turns. With Daggerheart it's a lot more back and forth. It benefits from having more options, combat can turn into chases, you can be more liberal with rewarding creativity and finding cinematic ways to overcome overwhelming odds.”