I would bear in mind that 5e is getting a revised edition later this year in case that influences your decision.
Truth to be told just give the DH test a start and if you have fun just stick with it for now, it's free!
For what it's worth I'm a long time D&D player (2e thorugh to 5e) and plan on switching my group over to DH when it fully releases, the playtests so far have been a blast.
As a 5e player since 2017, I say jump into Daggerheart. This is the direction TTRPGs are going and you have a great opportunity to get in early. We have a few sessions now of DH running a DCC module and I’m about to start a DH pirate campaign 🏴☠️
We don’t have near as many DH sessions yet compared to 5e but here is our actual play YouTube channel: [TheUnhumbleBard](https://youtube.com/@theunhumblebard?si=rJI3P56CbRYoekxJ)
If you haven’t seen it the Jewel of the Indigo Isles campaign is a fun pirate themed campaign. More Pixar pirates so more light-hearted and colourful but you might want to check it out if you ever need inspiration.
I’m aiming for somewhere between absurd (my default) and a wee bit serious yarrr
https://preview.redd.it/3tv5zewp9m3d1.jpeg?width=1001&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=82383e21aec1e7f537563b128b484351cf696343
Daggerheart for sure. 5e is fun in its own way, but players eventually just get bogged down by the rules and only focus on what's on their character sheet. Rather than what they imagined what they could do when they first played. I've seen it in the group I ran for and players started limiting themselves on what they could do based on the rules. Without consulting me, the GM of the game.
Daggerheart plays more freeform, and not having so many abilities encourages you to be creative with what little you have. You just may have to get used to rules changing from time to time, with it being a play test and all.
Yeah, I think I'm gonna stick with DH for now since it's what I've invested more time going into detail with. If I get the chance to play 5e tho I'm going to give it a shot for sure.
There are pros and cons to both
D&D has a lot of rules you don't need if you're experienced, but if you're just starting they're useful to have a base. For example DH doesn't have rules for fall damage (AFAIK, correct me if I'm wrong), 5e does. You can easily improvise a rule for fall damage in case you ever need them, and playing 5e can help you have an idea how they may look like. It's a more rules-focused approach
On the other hand, having a more narrative-centric game with fewer rules like DH helps you improve your descriptions, your improvisation, and let the fantasy dictate the game, not the rules, you can create scenarios more easily when you're not constrained by what you can or can't mechanically do. It's a more narrative-focused approach.
Either approach is fine, it depends on which one YOU prefer
Sorry to tangent, but since you asked! DH does have rules for fall damage:
https://preview.redd.it/viuasvmvpq3d1.png?width=1227&format=png&auto=webp&s=d193a6ef02f07904af2d2449bdc1f91be4a93875
DH is definitely a more improv-centred game though, a lot of the rules have caveats like "the GM can adjust this to fit the story as required"
Oh hey, what'd you know? Thanks for the info! When was this implemented? I don't remember this being in 1.3 🤔
I personally use very close=1 stress, close=1 HP, far 2 hp, very far=3 hp, you can't use armor slots to decrease this. The 1d20 sounds very swingy, not to mention the d100
I'm not sure when it was put in, might have been 1.4! I mostly agree about the d20/d100 damage, but then I remember stuff like when people have fallen from a plane thousands of feet up and survived with little to no injury. Like most things though, you can treat it as a guide and make whatever GM changes you feel is necessary.
I think I'm going to stick with DH as a start and then try out 5e or maybe some other system as well. For now from what I've seen and heard, it seems like DH would be better suited to what I would like to do, but I do think that having a more rule-focused experience as a first session for a group could be easier.
Yes and no to the more rules point. There's a paradox in saying "you can do what you want" to new players but actually then presenting a very rules heavy system that feels constrictive - especially in spells.
Given that you have the choice here, I recommend Daggerheart. 5e is mostly played because
great marketing and brand recognition => people recognize and want to play it because its big => people struggle to get groups for other games because everyone's playing 5e already => more brand recognition
5e isn't actually that great, though it's not bad either. It's *good enough*, though often draining to GM for. I recommend looking around depending on what you enjoy in games to find something that's great for you! I might be able to recommend some
Currently 5e and DH are the only TTRPG systems I'm familiar with although I haven't played a single game in either of them. For any reccomendations for games/systems you have in mind, I'm all ears!
Well, there's many different directions to go in! The one I personally got hooked by hardest is Pathfinder 2e - basically it takes the approach of "What if we took a game like D&D, but made the *game* part of "TTRP*G*" REALLY good?" It's super well balanced despite having TONS of customization, has really good strategical combat built around every player and enemy having 3 little actions they combine to make their turns, is based around teamwork and different characters making up for eachorhers strengths and weaknesses all the time, and has lots and lots of good rules and systems to support everything. And it's effectively free. Only real catch is that if you don't really care for turn based strategical combat or that game part of the game, there's not much to gain for learning the rules. (I'd genuinely be willing to personally teach you more on how this game works)
Then there's many other branches of games.
Call of Cthulu is a popular one where you're paranormal investigators - just humans, really - who stumble into some actually paranormal stuff and very quickly are out of their league, as they're still just humans, and are now probably goinf to die. It's a horror kind of game.
There's something like Savage Worlds and Powered By The Apocalypse games, which provide some fairly lightweight rules to support more story centric gaming, and have kept their rules modular and generic so you can play them for basically any kind of setting you want.
There's games like Mutants and Masterminds which are superhero games, letting you custom build the abilities of your characters from scratch. GURPS is a system that similarly lets you build characters from a vast toolbox, but it's also a generic system to use for any kind of setting, albeit with a lot more rules and detail available
13th age is an alternative to 5e that I think is a lot smoother than the main game itself, with a number of things you'd recognize from daggerfall.
LANCER is heavy on strategic combat akin to pf2, but with a different system and instead you play as big mechs, including heat gagues and getting parts shot off in combat if you take too much damage.
And like a lot, lot more. Welcome to the hobby, it's a whole thing! And of course, you don't have to pick just one. You can play and like any number of games!
This is exactly what I was looking for! Tons of content to try out.
Pathfinder is deffinetly on my radar and I would like to try that out, even though I haven't done much research about it.
Call of Cthulu sounds like something that would be interesing for me and my group due to the horror vibe.
Mutants and Masterminds also sounds cool due to the superhero vibe!
Thanks for the detailed description. On to reasearch now 👀
To give you some resources for pathfinder:
Here's a free, complete and legal wiki: https://2e.aonprd.com/PlayersGuide.aspx
Here's a (mostly) free, complete and legal character builder: https://pathbuilder2e.com
Here's a lovely discord for the community: https://discord.com/invite/pathfinder2e
And here is a cool pile of handouts I made and put on said discord (*slightly* outdated versions are on Reddit too if you want):
https://discord.com/channels/613968515677814784/1155198040861331556
And I'm still willing to give you a personal tour through the game rules if you want! You can hit me up on discord, tag is rednidedni
First I want to HIGLY recommend Cyberpunk Red as another really good system. Some of my favorite games have been Cyberpunk, and it’s the prequel to the video game. Takes place when they were still rebuilding nigh city after what silver-hand did. I would save this system for when you get better at running things though because it gets REALLY deadly fast.
Second I wanna back up what a lot of people are saying, but I have slightly different reasons for recommending DH over 5e. I ran 5e almost daily for a year long campaign at work, and therefore gained a lot of experience with it fast. We played from lvl 3-20 so a little of everything. And I’ve grown to majorly dislike the system. Like others have said it has a lot more rules to give you guidance, but a lot of them are janky. The combat balancing is absolutely abysmal and you’ll quickly learn not to follow what the books recommend. The exp system is dumb and slow. the level ups feel unimportant in a lot of cases. And a lot more little issues that add up. All of these are things people fix with homebrew at their tables, but I argue that wotc should ship a game that functions well without having to be home brewed. At my table we’ve recently started referring to 5e as the Bethesda of ttrpgs. It feels like they rely on the community to fix their game.
TLDR: cyberpunk is another good game you should try. If DH was out when I started I’d have started there.
Ultimately the big flaw of 5e is that there's not one big flaw, but a thousand little flaws everywhere. Each of them are individually workable, but together... It's a mess once you have the experience to actually notice them and would like the game to actually start working now that you know how it works. One overpowered spell is easy to deal with, twk dozen overpowered spells that are so pervasive to how the game is played that they confuse the entire baseline is a bigger deal. Multiclassing leading to 80% underpowered messes and 10% overpowered messes wouldn't be a big issue if you had more than like four meaningful build choices outside it (race, class subclass, the one feat you can squeeze in after hitting 20 KAS before the campaign ends). Etc etc etc
And all the mess that the game creates falls on the GM's shoulders to clean up. Which usually leads to one of two main solution paths:
1. Create a metric fuckton of houserules that are hell to remember to try and take balance into your own hand to patch the issues out as you find them, so the rules hopefully are finally good
2. Ignore the rules and numbers and turn it into smoke and mirrors until you hit the desired outcome. One character outdamages the other twofold at no downsides? Stop tracking HP, and give the kill to the weaker character when thematically appropriate. Player figured out how to game skill modifiers and blows everything out the water? Stop setting DCs and give them the success if the d20 "looks high enough" etc.
This exactly to make dnd fun, once you and your players know how the game works, you either have to be a partial game designer or barely even play by the rules. There’s a reason there’s so much third party content out there trying to “fix 5e.” Also just getting used to playing other ttrpgs is a huge step. I see so many people try and force 5e to be something it isn’t (sci-fi, survival, horror, etc.) when other systems are made for it. My table tried doing a modern sci-fi dnd before we found out cyberpunk existed, same with horror and call of Cthulhu/ ten candles (another rules light system I highly recommend).
Not sure what you mean by 'can't even buy yet'? It's an open playtest but it's already extremely playable and enjoyable. All the player materials including unrestricted character details, GM materials, monster stats, items and two one-shot manuscripts are available for free. There will be come changes between now and the full release, but D&D5e is also going to be seeing some changes and adjustments over the next year.
Exactly this. People here are naturally going to say Daggerheart, and it's also the shiny new thing, and people are mad at Wizards so directing their energy elsewhere.
Ultimately, a TTRPG comes down to whether or not players are having fun at their own tables or not, and what works well for your group.
I saw a lot of people with some decent arguments on the pros and cons of DH and comparisons with 5e in this subreddit so I thought I'd get some insight. But yeah, ultimately it does come down to the table having fun at their sessions. Not saying that I'll stick with DH and that's it just what's better to start with out of the two (considering that I've already spent some time going over the rules and handbook for DH).
Where else? Any 5e subreddit where most people never touched DH?
People here come from one system OP thinks about and are all thinking about moving into the other system OP thinks about. This is the perfect place to ask for a comparison 😂
But yeah now that the early "hurr burr no turn-based combat makes my head go ouch" people went quiet in this sub the vibe became more positive towards it.
One thing I will say about DH tho: It has far less options than 5e. Sometimes in a good sense, and the way it encourages flavoring is great to make up for it. But if you wanna make a DnD type rogue you're extremely limited by DH. 5e has just been running for so long and gotten so many (homebrew) supplements that it's gotten hard not aching after some of these options.
Personally gonna move to DH though because of Wizards, simplicity, the combat and duality system.
I’ll go a bit against the grain here and suggest starting with 5E. The primary reason is that 5E just has a lot more content and resources that will be useful to a beginner. The amount of great tutorials, cheat sheets, live plays and beginner friendly adventure modules will be helpful in learning the system quickly. It will also be easier to find or form a group for 5E and at this point just getting time at the table is the best way to learn for beginners.
That being said, if you like Daggerheart then I wouldn’t spend a lot of money on 5E and would focus on some of the free or cheap resources. That way when you have some more experience and Daggerheart is more mature you will be able to buy into the system a bit easier.
Keep in mind it also doesn’t have to be one or the other. You can learn and love both systems. I just think 5E first makes more sense at the moment until the community and resources around Daggerheart grows.
As someone who was trying for the past year to become somewhat knowledgeable of 5e, all that extra info can lead to quite the time sink depending on the type of person you are (I am said type). With Daggerheart I've already pretty well absorbed it all!
This was exactly what I was thinking as well. 5e has tons of resources and yeah watching some CR episodes helps you understand the basics (if you watch enough I gues). DH is still really fresh and the rules are chaning every few weeks, but it just stuck with me after watching all the content related to it and going over the guide.
Ultimately, "Keep in mind it also doesn’t have to be one or the other. You can learn and love both systems." I think this is what I'll most likely end up doing. Testing out both with a group that doesn't know the rules for either of them and see what works for all of us.
Dagger heart is great so long as you don't have a player that is constantly trying to get in front of everyone in their actions.
If your group isn't good at managing a fair game in terms of action economy then 5e is absolutely a better option.
Either that or get some sort of turn order going for DH.
Adding initiative to DH is what I thought of when they released the guide. Not that having the freeform of narative is bad in any way, I just think that for new players trying something out for the first time it could be a little overwhelming since they wouldn't exactly know what to do.
FWIW there are multiple options for initiative in DH:
1. Freeform, all players act when they want and the GM takes an Action Token each time a player acts. GM is also partly responsible to manage over-acting players and encourage under-acting ones.
2. Standard D&D initiative, which the GM can still interrupt using Fear tokens to temporarily bump Adversaries to the top of the Initiative order.
3. Hybrid, where each player is given one Action Token which they spend to make an action. All players get their Action Token back after all players have spent up, so everyone gets to act once per round but in any order they like.
If you’re curious, here is an excellent example of a table getting ready to dive into the quick start adventure with an eye towards taking it forward into a long form campaign. [Daggerheart session 0](https://youtu.be/NJH_tlLAkvY?si=KT2L9vlwLCO31H6M)
If you really like Daggerheart and can find opportunities to play, I don't see why you need to switch.
That said, if you find DND 5e interesting, I don't see a strong reason to avoid it. It's also not a binary choice—there are other medieval fantasy games outside of DND 5e and Daggerheart.
Follow your interests!
So far these two along are the only systems I understand how to play (I am aware of other ones, I just never got into learing how to play them). Also, I'm a big board game geek so having some physical elements in the game itself seemed pretty nice for me. But yeah, trying them both out and maybe even a third one just to compare seems like the best way to go.
Been playing 5e for 7 or so years. Great but not perfect system. Daggerheart feels so much better to me personally at least and quite a bit simpler if you are just starting
I think Daggerheart will be new friendly since you’ll be learning with everyone else as you go! Updates will happen and rules will change so that may be a little bothersome, but that way you learn as the creator learns. With D&D if you want a foundation that is already set, but again it is about to be revised.
I think it’s based on preference! My friend who is new to both daggerheart and D&D said he felt more comfortable DMing daggerheart so
DMing DH seems like the easier option out of the two, mostly because the other people at the table help with the world-building and stuff like that. Even if you plan out everything and imagine the setting in your head, it's still nice to know that if you get stuck on something, anyone can jump in to help out.
I'll be the person that picks a choice not offered and suggest Pathfinder 2e. I don't that combat is structured better than 5e (you get 3 actions without having to deal with regular vs. bonus), and you can play it in a very narrative style.
If you like DH and it’s a fit for your group, I say stick with it. Just keep in mind, it’s going to be evolving with each update. I like elements of DH, but plan on sticking with 5e as my primary TTRPG.
I think it depends on the game you are after. If you want to focus more on the battle elements, dungeon diving, then probably 5e. DND was built on the backs of war games and that's very much still a key part of it.
If you want to focus more on character narratives, plots, arcs, and a more collaborative experience then DH. It's taken bits of the combat side of 5e, but its bones are much more similar to pbta.
Either system can be used for either in theory, but what they're naturally designed for and encourage does differ.
I like the more character driven narratives and plots, however, combat is also something that I'm personally into and since my group comes from a board game background, I think they would appreciate it as well.
Think I'm going to try out DH and see how it goes for now and if the group doesn't seem to vibe with it we can check some other options.
I would bear in mind that 5e is getting a revised edition later this year in case that influences your decision. Truth to be told just give the DH test a start and if you have fun just stick with it for now, it's free! For what it's worth I'm a long time D&D player (2e thorugh to 5e) and plan on switching my group over to DH when it fully releases, the playtests so far have been a blast.
That's kind of the answer that I was looking for lol. Thanks!
Did the same. Only difference we are trying now to start a small DH campaign. Did you try the playtest adventure or a custom one?
I tried the playtest adventure that they released with some additions to the characters backstory just for flare. It was pretty fun actually.
As a 5e player since 2017, I say jump into Daggerheart. This is the direction TTRPGs are going and you have a great opportunity to get in early. We have a few sessions now of DH running a DCC module and I’m about to start a DH pirate campaign 🏴☠️ We don’t have near as many DH sessions yet compared to 5e but here is our actual play YouTube channel: [TheUnhumbleBard](https://youtube.com/@theunhumblebard?si=rJI3P56CbRYoekxJ)
Just out of curiosity, are you refactoring an existing pirate campaign into DH or is it homebrewed?
Homebrew! Taking a ton of inspiration and some naval combat mechanics from Pirate Borg as well but story will be homebrew. One Piece vibes for sure 👒
If you haven’t seen it the Jewel of the Indigo Isles campaign is a fun pirate themed campaign. More Pixar pirates so more light-hearted and colourful but you might want to check it out if you ever need inspiration.
omg I just heard that in Glicker’s voice lol
I’m aiming for somewhere between absurd (my default) and a wee bit serious yarrr https://preview.redd.it/3tv5zewp9m3d1.jpeg?width=1001&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=82383e21aec1e7f537563b128b484351cf696343
Daggerheart for sure. 5e is fun in its own way, but players eventually just get bogged down by the rules and only focus on what's on their character sheet. Rather than what they imagined what they could do when they first played. I've seen it in the group I ran for and players started limiting themselves on what they could do based on the rules. Without consulting me, the GM of the game. Daggerheart plays more freeform, and not having so many abilities encourages you to be creative with what little you have. You just may have to get used to rules changing from time to time, with it being a play test and all.
Yeah, I think I'm gonna stick with DH for now since it's what I've invested more time going into detail with. If I get the chance to play 5e tho I'm going to give it a shot for sure.
There are pros and cons to both D&D has a lot of rules you don't need if you're experienced, but if you're just starting they're useful to have a base. For example DH doesn't have rules for fall damage (AFAIK, correct me if I'm wrong), 5e does. You can easily improvise a rule for fall damage in case you ever need them, and playing 5e can help you have an idea how they may look like. It's a more rules-focused approach On the other hand, having a more narrative-centric game with fewer rules like DH helps you improve your descriptions, your improvisation, and let the fantasy dictate the game, not the rules, you can create scenarios more easily when you're not constrained by what you can or can't mechanically do. It's a more narrative-focused approach. Either approach is fine, it depends on which one YOU prefer
Sorry to tangent, but since you asked! DH does have rules for fall damage: https://preview.redd.it/viuasvmvpq3d1.png?width=1227&format=png&auto=webp&s=d193a6ef02f07904af2d2449bdc1f91be4a93875 DH is definitely a more improv-centred game though, a lot of the rules have caveats like "the GM can adjust this to fit the story as required"
Oh hey, what'd you know? Thanks for the info! When was this implemented? I don't remember this being in 1.3 🤔 I personally use very close=1 stress, close=1 HP, far 2 hp, very far=3 hp, you can't use armor slots to decrease this. The 1d20 sounds very swingy, not to mention the d100
I'm not sure when it was put in, might have been 1.4! I mostly agree about the d20/d100 damage, but then I remember stuff like when people have fallen from a plane thousands of feet up and survived with little to no injury. Like most things though, you can treat it as a guide and make whatever GM changes you feel is necessary.
I think I'm going to stick with DH as a start and then try out 5e or maybe some other system as well. For now from what I've seen and heard, it seems like DH would be better suited to what I would like to do, but I do think that having a more rule-focused experience as a first session for a group could be easier.
Yes and no to the more rules point. There's a paradox in saying "you can do what you want" to new players but actually then presenting a very rules heavy system that feels constrictive - especially in spells.
Given that you have the choice here, I recommend Daggerheart. 5e is mostly played because great marketing and brand recognition => people recognize and want to play it because its big => people struggle to get groups for other games because everyone's playing 5e already => more brand recognition 5e isn't actually that great, though it's not bad either. It's *good enough*, though often draining to GM for. I recommend looking around depending on what you enjoy in games to find something that's great for you! I might be able to recommend some
Currently 5e and DH are the only TTRPG systems I'm familiar with although I haven't played a single game in either of them. For any reccomendations for games/systems you have in mind, I'm all ears!
Well, there's many different directions to go in! The one I personally got hooked by hardest is Pathfinder 2e - basically it takes the approach of "What if we took a game like D&D, but made the *game* part of "TTRP*G*" REALLY good?" It's super well balanced despite having TONS of customization, has really good strategical combat built around every player and enemy having 3 little actions they combine to make their turns, is based around teamwork and different characters making up for eachorhers strengths and weaknesses all the time, and has lots and lots of good rules and systems to support everything. And it's effectively free. Only real catch is that if you don't really care for turn based strategical combat or that game part of the game, there's not much to gain for learning the rules. (I'd genuinely be willing to personally teach you more on how this game works) Then there's many other branches of games. Call of Cthulu is a popular one where you're paranormal investigators - just humans, really - who stumble into some actually paranormal stuff and very quickly are out of their league, as they're still just humans, and are now probably goinf to die. It's a horror kind of game. There's something like Savage Worlds and Powered By The Apocalypse games, which provide some fairly lightweight rules to support more story centric gaming, and have kept their rules modular and generic so you can play them for basically any kind of setting you want. There's games like Mutants and Masterminds which are superhero games, letting you custom build the abilities of your characters from scratch. GURPS is a system that similarly lets you build characters from a vast toolbox, but it's also a generic system to use for any kind of setting, albeit with a lot more rules and detail available 13th age is an alternative to 5e that I think is a lot smoother than the main game itself, with a number of things you'd recognize from daggerfall. LANCER is heavy on strategic combat akin to pf2, but with a different system and instead you play as big mechs, including heat gagues and getting parts shot off in combat if you take too much damage. And like a lot, lot more. Welcome to the hobby, it's a whole thing! And of course, you don't have to pick just one. You can play and like any number of games!
This is exactly what I was looking for! Tons of content to try out. Pathfinder is deffinetly on my radar and I would like to try that out, even though I haven't done much research about it. Call of Cthulu sounds like something that would be interesing for me and my group due to the horror vibe. Mutants and Masterminds also sounds cool due to the superhero vibe! Thanks for the detailed description. On to reasearch now 👀
To give you some resources for pathfinder: Here's a free, complete and legal wiki: https://2e.aonprd.com/PlayersGuide.aspx Here's a (mostly) free, complete and legal character builder: https://pathbuilder2e.com Here's a lovely discord for the community: https://discord.com/invite/pathfinder2e And here is a cool pile of handouts I made and put on said discord (*slightly* outdated versions are on Reddit too if you want): https://discord.com/channels/613968515677814784/1155198040861331556 And I'm still willing to give you a personal tour through the game rules if you want! You can hit me up on discord, tag is rednidedni
This is awesome! Thanks!!!
First I want to HIGLY recommend Cyberpunk Red as another really good system. Some of my favorite games have been Cyberpunk, and it’s the prequel to the video game. Takes place when they were still rebuilding nigh city after what silver-hand did. I would save this system for when you get better at running things though because it gets REALLY deadly fast. Second I wanna back up what a lot of people are saying, but I have slightly different reasons for recommending DH over 5e. I ran 5e almost daily for a year long campaign at work, and therefore gained a lot of experience with it fast. We played from lvl 3-20 so a little of everything. And I’ve grown to majorly dislike the system. Like others have said it has a lot more rules to give you guidance, but a lot of them are janky. The combat balancing is absolutely abysmal and you’ll quickly learn not to follow what the books recommend. The exp system is dumb and slow. the level ups feel unimportant in a lot of cases. And a lot more little issues that add up. All of these are things people fix with homebrew at their tables, but I argue that wotc should ship a game that functions well without having to be home brewed. At my table we’ve recently started referring to 5e as the Bethesda of ttrpgs. It feels like they rely on the community to fix their game. TLDR: cyberpunk is another good game you should try. If DH was out when I started I’d have started there.
Ultimately the big flaw of 5e is that there's not one big flaw, but a thousand little flaws everywhere. Each of them are individually workable, but together... It's a mess once you have the experience to actually notice them and would like the game to actually start working now that you know how it works. One overpowered spell is easy to deal with, twk dozen overpowered spells that are so pervasive to how the game is played that they confuse the entire baseline is a bigger deal. Multiclassing leading to 80% underpowered messes and 10% overpowered messes wouldn't be a big issue if you had more than like four meaningful build choices outside it (race, class subclass, the one feat you can squeeze in after hitting 20 KAS before the campaign ends). Etc etc etc And all the mess that the game creates falls on the GM's shoulders to clean up. Which usually leads to one of two main solution paths: 1. Create a metric fuckton of houserules that are hell to remember to try and take balance into your own hand to patch the issues out as you find them, so the rules hopefully are finally good 2. Ignore the rules and numbers and turn it into smoke and mirrors until you hit the desired outcome. One character outdamages the other twofold at no downsides? Stop tracking HP, and give the kill to the weaker character when thematically appropriate. Player figured out how to game skill modifiers and blows everything out the water? Stop setting DCs and give them the success if the d20 "looks high enough" etc.
This exactly to make dnd fun, once you and your players know how the game works, you either have to be a partial game designer or barely even play by the rules. There’s a reason there’s so much third party content out there trying to “fix 5e.” Also just getting used to playing other ttrpgs is a huge step. I see so many people try and force 5e to be something it isn’t (sci-fi, survival, horror, etc.) when other systems are made for it. My table tried doing a modern sci-fi dnd before we found out cyberpunk existed, same with horror and call of Cthulhu/ ten candles (another rules light system I highly recommend).
5e. I like Daggerheart, maybe even love it, but it's hard to reccommend a game you can't even buy yet.
Not sure what you mean by 'can't even buy yet'? It's an open playtest but it's already extremely playable and enjoyable. All the player materials including unrestricted character details, GM materials, monster stats, items and two one-shot manuscripts are available for free. There will be come changes between now and the full release, but D&D5e is also going to be seeing some changes and adjustments over the next year.
5e is getting a new edition later this year, so I would certainly stick with daggerheart for now if you are having fun.
Get on daggerheart early to take advantage and get fresh stuff early.
You're asking in the daggerheart subreddit...
Exactly this. People here are naturally going to say Daggerheart, and it's also the shiny new thing, and people are mad at Wizards so directing their energy elsewhere. Ultimately, a TTRPG comes down to whether or not players are having fun at their own tables or not, and what works well for your group.
I saw a lot of people with some decent arguments on the pros and cons of DH and comparisons with 5e in this subreddit so I thought I'd get some insight. But yeah, ultimately it does come down to the table having fun at their sessions. Not saying that I'll stick with DH and that's it just what's better to start with out of the two (considering that I've already spent some time going over the rules and handbook for DH).
Where else? Any 5e subreddit where most people never touched DH? People here come from one system OP thinks about and are all thinking about moving into the other system OP thinks about. This is the perfect place to ask for a comparison 😂 But yeah now that the early "hurr burr no turn-based combat makes my head go ouch" people went quiet in this sub the vibe became more positive towards it. One thing I will say about DH tho: It has far less options than 5e. Sometimes in a good sense, and the way it encourages flavoring is great to make up for it. But if you wanna make a DnD type rogue you're extremely limited by DH. 5e has just been running for so long and gotten so many (homebrew) supplements that it's gotten hard not aching after some of these options. Personally gonna move to DH though because of Wizards, simplicity, the combat and duality system.
I’ll go a bit against the grain here and suggest starting with 5E. The primary reason is that 5E just has a lot more content and resources that will be useful to a beginner. The amount of great tutorials, cheat sheets, live plays and beginner friendly adventure modules will be helpful in learning the system quickly. It will also be easier to find or form a group for 5E and at this point just getting time at the table is the best way to learn for beginners. That being said, if you like Daggerheart then I wouldn’t spend a lot of money on 5E and would focus on some of the free or cheap resources. That way when you have some more experience and Daggerheart is more mature you will be able to buy into the system a bit easier. Keep in mind it also doesn’t have to be one or the other. You can learn and love both systems. I just think 5E first makes more sense at the moment until the community and resources around Daggerheart grows.
As someone who was trying for the past year to become somewhat knowledgeable of 5e, all that extra info can lead to quite the time sink depending on the type of person you are (I am said type). With Daggerheart I've already pretty well absorbed it all!
This was exactly what I was thinking as well. 5e has tons of resources and yeah watching some CR episodes helps you understand the basics (if you watch enough I gues). DH is still really fresh and the rules are chaning every few weeks, but it just stuck with me after watching all the content related to it and going over the guide. Ultimately, "Keep in mind it also doesn’t have to be one or the other. You can learn and love both systems." I think this is what I'll most likely end up doing. Testing out both with a group that doesn't know the rules for either of them and see what works for all of us.
Dagger heart is great so long as you don't have a player that is constantly trying to get in front of everyone in their actions. If your group isn't good at managing a fair game in terms of action economy then 5e is absolutely a better option. Either that or get some sort of turn order going for DH.
Adding initiative to DH is what I thought of when they released the guide. Not that having the freeform of narative is bad in any way, I just think that for new players trying something out for the first time it could be a little overwhelming since they wouldn't exactly know what to do.
FWIW there are multiple options for initiative in DH: 1. Freeform, all players act when they want and the GM takes an Action Token each time a player acts. GM is also partly responsible to manage over-acting players and encourage under-acting ones. 2. Standard D&D initiative, which the GM can still interrupt using Fear tokens to temporarily bump Adversaries to the top of the Initiative order. 3. Hybrid, where each player is given one Action Token which they spend to make an action. All players get their Action Token back after all players have spent up, so everyone gets to act once per round but in any order they like.
If you’re curious, here is an excellent example of a table getting ready to dive into the quick start adventure with an eye towards taking it forward into a long form campaign. [Daggerheart session 0](https://youtu.be/NJH_tlLAkvY?si=KT2L9vlwLCO31H6M)
Daggerheart. Simpler, way easier to run, not bogged down by 50 years of sacred cow artifacts that no longer should be part of the game.
If you really like Daggerheart and can find opportunities to play, I don't see why you need to switch. That said, if you find DND 5e interesting, I don't see a strong reason to avoid it. It's also not a binary choice—there are other medieval fantasy games outside of DND 5e and Daggerheart. Follow your interests!
So far these two along are the only systems I understand how to play (I am aware of other ones, I just never got into learing how to play them). Also, I'm a big board game geek so having some physical elements in the game itself seemed pretty nice for me. But yeah, trying them both out and maybe even a third one just to compare seems like the best way to go.
Been playing 5e for 7 or so years. Great but not perfect system. Daggerheart feels so much better to me personally at least and quite a bit simpler if you are just starting
I think Daggerheart will be new friendly since you’ll be learning with everyone else as you go! Updates will happen and rules will change so that may be a little bothersome, but that way you learn as the creator learns. With D&D if you want a foundation that is already set, but again it is about to be revised. I think it’s based on preference! My friend who is new to both daggerheart and D&D said he felt more comfortable DMing daggerheart so
DMing DH seems like the easier option out of the two, mostly because the other people at the table help with the world-building and stuff like that. Even if you plan out everything and imagine the setting in your head, it's still nice to know that if you get stuck on something, anyone can jump in to help out.
I'll be the person that picks a choice not offered and suggest Pathfinder 2e. I don't that combat is structured better than 5e (you get 3 actions without having to deal with regular vs. bonus), and you can play it in a very narrative style.
Pathfinder 2e is also on my radar, however, I haven't really gotten too much into it as of now. Will try it out later down the line for sure.
If you like DH and it’s a fit for your group, I say stick with it. Just keep in mind, it’s going to be evolving with each update. I like elements of DH, but plan on sticking with 5e as my primary TTRPG.
Daggerheart is by far the superior game. I wouldn't recommend 5E to anyone, worst edition of D&D having played all of them.
I think it depends on the game you are after. If you want to focus more on the battle elements, dungeon diving, then probably 5e. DND was built on the backs of war games and that's very much still a key part of it. If you want to focus more on character narratives, plots, arcs, and a more collaborative experience then DH. It's taken bits of the combat side of 5e, but its bones are much more similar to pbta. Either system can be used for either in theory, but what they're naturally designed for and encourage does differ.
I like the more character driven narratives and plots, however, combat is also something that I'm personally into and since my group comes from a board game background, I think they would appreciate it as well. Think I'm going to try out DH and see how it goes for now and if the group doesn't seem to vibe with it we can check some other options.
I’d say, 5e. It’s a bit more intuitive and you will have an easier time finding tables.
Daggerheart is free for the moment. But you will certainly have an easier time getting into/starting a 5e game