Critical Role & Sagas of Sundry - How Do Games Like DAGGERHEART Get Made? (w/ Ivan Van Norman)

Episode Date: June 4, 2025

A bold new era of heroic fantasy tabletop role-playing has begun with Daggerheart! This week on Quests N' Answers, Dan Casey sits down with the amazing Ivan Van Norman of Darrington Press and Hunters Entertainment to talk about how games like Daggerheart actually get made, his journey into the world of game publishing, and much more.   Learn more about Daggerheart: https://www.daggerheart.com/ Learn more about Sin Eater on Kickstarter: https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/huntersbooks/sin-eater-0?ref=3cptpe Official Hunters Entertainment Website: http://huntersentertainment.com Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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Now, you've heard his molyfluous tone spinning yarns about all manner of terrifying tales right here on Geekin Sundry and elsewhere across the World Wide Web. If you look at your gaming shelf, you probably have something there that he helped bring into this world through companies like Hunter's Entertainment and Derrington Press, like maybe a little game called Dagger Heart. Folks, please welcome Ivan Van Norman. And Ivan, thank you so much for being here. Hey, man, that's great.

I'm going to have to transcribe that and put that in like a biography somewhere. That was impressive, man. Look, I just, if people don't toot their own horns enough, I used to play the trumpet, so allow me to toot away on your behalf. I am so bad at doing it myself. I will gladly, like, you know, tie a rope around our legs forever and just keep you around to to toot all day, sir. Yeah, I'll just take one of those, like, long horns they used to have in midfield. medieval halls and, you know, just announce your presence, just reading out his LinkedIn profiles. Brilliant.

Oh, man, to hear a medieval tone with LinkedIn would be, actually, there's a skit. There has to be a skit something. There definitely is. Yes. Someone out there has this market cornered. Yeah. Oh, thanks, Stan. I appreciate you having me.

It's been a hot minute. I enjoy all of our lovely conversations whenever we get to have them at various cons across the world all the time. And it's going to be able to talk games with you a little bit. No, it's always a distinct pleasure to get to spend time with you talking about games. And today we're going to talk about games, gaming, the active play. Now, you folks have a very exciting release that just came out. We're going to talk about that later on, Dagger Heart.

But first, I want to take things all the way back. You know, a new TTRPG has entered the world. But, Ivan, when did you first get into the world of tabletop role-playing games? Man, this is the question, right, that is here at the moment. I, like many people in the entertainment industry, and there's a, to be fair, there is a lot of correlations between like trying to find the space and what has become a hobby and then when that becomes, and this is a term someone gave me the other day and I'm holding on to it, but when it turns from a hobby to a joby, right? Oh, boy. Oh, I know, right. That term getting thrown.

Yeah. But like so many people, I came in with kind of like a dream and a passion and a like not, not. knowing what to do, but I'm just going to do it kind of an attitude. So I think 15 years ago this year, I had graduated college with a bunch of nerds that I played D&D with. We were literally in a fraternity that played D&D that would kind of tell you like how nerdy it was. But we had graduated. We were all in film school. We were all trying to like find our little niche in life. the writer strike had just happened, right? Oh, yeah.

The 2007, 2008 situation. Wow, time is a flat circle. Woo! But we were all out trying to find work. And of course, because we're trying to find work, we have a lot of time in our hand. And I had a buddy who was making games and was doing it, but we were kind of just playing his homebrew for fun and we were kind of trying it out. And I had this moment where we were playing the game.

I'm like, man, this is fun. Like, this is cool. Like, should we make it? Should we try to make it? And we all kind of like wishy-washy about it because we didn't know what, we'd never printed a book before. None of us have done this, really. But then I started to do that thing you do when you're in, when you've learned a lot

about marketing and when you've learned a lot about like small business and stuff is you do research, right? Like, does this thing exist in the world already? And found out that lo and behold, it did not. No one had made the game. that we were thinking about. And this is the original outbreak undead, which was a zombie survival simulation RPG.

And at that time, the only other big zombie game that was out of the world was All Flesh Must Be Eaton from Eden Studios. And at that time, when we were looking at it, they had been out of print of the game for a couple of years. So we were like, wow, this is a thing.

And at that time, Max Brooks, with like, the zombie survival guide, was like hot. The remake of Donna the Dead was out. So everyone was talking about their zombie survival plan. Like that was a party conversation back then. So I, this was before Kickstarter. So I took out a loan.

I took out alone. And we paid for a booth at GenCon Entrepreneur's Alley was the first year Entrepreneurs Alley existed as a concept. And so they were really trying out this new idea where they were giving discounted booth rates for people who had just started their business that year. And, you know, it kind of all just came together. And I distinctly remember being in the room with the two guys that I did the game with Christopher Dilarosa and Robert Watts. I told them, I'm like, hey, guys, I put the deposit down for our booth at GenCon. So this game has to come out in August.

And from that point forward, we had a deadline. And we made it. We barely made it. But we made it. And that was the first year that, you know, I sold, went to Gen Con. It was the first year I sold a game. And it was, thankfully, people liked it. And they paid cash, Dan, because it was really hard to do.

It was before even the apps were really good at, like, taking credit card information Square and all that other stuff was, still just an expensive person thing. Yes. Do, right? The iPhone was a relatively new concept. I was taking cards and going, to like take imprint.

Make a facsimile in triplicates. So that I could run it later, like in the night, and that's what we did. It's like we did the booth for 10 hours. And then I entered in card information the entire night. And that was my first gen con, right? So, but it just showed because we were all so excited about making this idea become a reality

and I had such great support from our community who was excited for us to do this thing and the big difference was is that we kind of captured a zeitgeist moment in which people were really interested in that kind of play

right? And that's a huge part of game design now and it has been for the entertainment industry so much about making a good game it's also about identifying what makes the game unique and good. And two, is it serving a marketplace? Is it serving an audience who's interested in that kind of play?

Or even more importantly, are you doing something unique that people didn't even realize that they would be excited about? Right. And that doesn't always translate to gimmicks. There's plenty of gimmicks out there. But it's like, it's that like feeling in the facilitation of play that is so important when you are bringing a new game into the game. the world, right? Yeah. And I love that idea about the facilitation of play because one thing I love

about tabletop role-playing games in particular, but you could extend that to board gaming and tabletop gaming in general is by and large, it is a communal act. You're not doing something just by yourself. I know there are many amazing single-player games out there. But you are coming together with your friends, your family, your community to do something and take time to pursue this active play, which is so it's just like the first thing to get yeated off of Maslow's hierarchy of needs into the sun. Oh, you want to talk about like a luxury market, right? Uh-huh.

Yeah. A free time? The barrier of entry for RPGs is also so high in comparison to like hobbies. Every once in a while I take a big step back and I'm like, wow, what we are asking players to do is kind of incredible, right? If you're a football fan, right, or soccer or cricket, any of that, when you become a fan of that game, you learn the rules once, right? And then you have a common lexicon with all those people who enjoy that game with you, and you are able to have that conversation, and that is your hobby, right? The players are different, the circumstances are

different. You know, it's oftentimes a big tug of war with the small details that make a difference from game to game. But man, when you tell someone to play a TTRP or even a board game, you have to learn a unique set of rules every single time you sit down to play a new game, right? And there's definitely like a strain of folks that just feels so, it feels so anathema to them that, like, what do you mean there's how many pages is this rulebook? What do I have to do that why are there so many phases? But once you get people over that hump, I feel like there's a whole world of experiences just waiting for them. But it is definitely a challenging thing to do. What's, I mean, I'm curious, going back to the beginning, when you're talking about something like

Outbreak on Dead, what was the biggest challenge in translating your passion and experience as sort of like player and storyteller into something that felt like a viable gameplay experience? Yeah, you know, and back then it wasn't, it was more like a gut feeling than it is. Like it's a lot easier to put it into like an ethos or put terms to it now. But back then when we were doing it, it was truly about like, what's fun? What is fun about this experience? And like saying it again, but like nowadays you can call it things like, well, what's the game loop, right? Like what is the core experience you want your players to feel?

But back then, for us it was, okay, how do you simulate a zombie survival scenario and what would make that cool? Oh, you can play yourself as a character? Okay, well, how do we do that? Oh, we can do a personality test that gives you like your four core stats when you're done. Oh, this feels fun. All right. Now when I'm running games, it is literally about putting the player in that moment to experience that thing that people,

latch on to when they are looking into that genre for zombie survival. It is, what would I do? How would I do it? And what are the challenges that I would experience being in my own world? So, dude, like, the first cons we ran with this game, it was literally, you hear gunshots go off. What do you do? And that was the beginning of a session, right? Like, you're at the con, what's happening?

But that was the story that people were interested in telling their version of it, right? And storytelling is so wide in general And you can really do anything with any type of game But the thing that is in my opinion so Cool about role-playing games Is that there is still a little bit of context Into what you are going to experience or want to experience A lot of systems

Let me try to put a little more like Contrast around that right Like it's any game system has the capacity to do a lot of different genres. But I found that games do very well when they want to pick the genre or the experience they want the player to feel and do that really well. Right. So when you play the board game route, it's a 4X game about Critters.

So you are immersed in the world because of the art, but the play feels like a crunchier, a very dynamic control, expand kind of gameplay. Without Break Undead, you have to make a zombie survival simulation. And so the games you want to run are mostly centered around those kind of stories. When you play Alice is Missing, you want to have this feeling of you. You have this close group of friends who are all in a text thread together. And it's that weird experience when you're in a text thread and everyone's talking over each other, but you're still trying to find out what's going on.

And that's replicating that experience. playing kids on bikes. It's a Goonies, literally kids on bike genre where you're trying to do strange adventures in small towns, you know? If kids on bikes tried to do everything,

like just the core system, like there are things like teens in space and kids on brooms and some other expansions on it, but they add those mechanics in order to make that genre feel more visceral, right? And D&D's been around for so

long that people have hacked that thing to make whatever they want. And that shows the legacy and tenacity of players who want to just, they want to make stories they want to make, right? Yeah. I mean, it's this, it's this medium for, it's like an engine for infinite storytelling. And you can make it whatever you want. But we're lucky right now in that D&D is not the only item on the menu. If you want a specific flavor or setting or system, there might be an option out there for you.

And if not, there are more tools in place to make it a viable reality. So many good things, Dan, and it's so crazy because the deeper and deeper you dive into it. And it's just like anything else. Like any other hobby, the deeper and deeper you dive into it, the more nuanced it becomes. And the more your like palate, it sounds like such a Somali way of talking about. And board games. But it's like... Please stop eating those.

dice, sir. I'm sorry. Wingspan, they are not your tiny little chocolate eggs that you think they are, right? It's a crunchier than I expected. Woo!

Again, they're kind of stuck in there, right? But it's true, the more you play, the more you experience it, the more you kind of see these subtleties between things that help, again, reinforce that style of play, right? That's

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What would you say is the biggest thing you've taken away from putting out something like Outbreak Undead as you went forward in your publishing career? The big thing, it's so crazy because there was this, it was 10 years or so, Dan, of just like nights and weekends. Like, this was what we put our extra time into. And for me, a huge portion of it was every little job I worked that I did in one lily pad hop in my career down the road is everything I took, I applied it back into making games, right, and finding out how to make better games and bring them out into the world. And for me, it became very clear my calling. it became clear very quickly that my calling was to bring the people together and help facilitate the creating of it, right? I found out very quickly that, like, it requires me to really be locked in a room with zero distractions for me to be a game designer. And that's very hard just to operate in the world we are in now with so many things outside of it, right?

Yeah, almost impossible unless you happen to find a cabin in the woods somewhere. Exactly, right? and the time to be able to go into that cabin for as long as it takes, right? So I don't think it's impossible, but I have found that it is that everything I've done, whether it's like how to make a good, how to make a good Kickstarter video, to like what's the right graphics you need to make

in order to make a Kickstarter sing, right? What are the offerings you want to make without accidentally creating all of these ghost costs or these hidden costs that are going to sink the business? model down the road, right? Like what is over-designing and what is under-designing when it comes to trying to, again, create that experience that you want people to play? They have all come from not only like learning out in the wide world what those things are,

but then applying them into, you know, the hobby of making games. Yeah. Right. So that's a very vague way of saying, Dan, everything. Of course. It's all, it's, game design is iterative. And it's, you take these iterations with you to the next one. It's still small business, dude.

At the end of the day, like, everyone's making games. But it's so, it's so hard because creatives are really good at being creative, right? But like an artist, like a sculptor, like anyone else in the world who is making a creative thing. Sometimes it's really hard to take that step back and be like, okay, well, now that I've made the thing, how do I bring it out into the world, right? Like, not everyone was Picasso, can be Picasso and like just literally be prolific with their art everywhere and be a public figure in addition to doing the work they want to do, right? You have to have people who can talk about it and make it available. And help the trains run on time, connect the dots. You need someone to help unite everything.

You need Madame Webb. Her web connects us all. There's an old saying that like I don't, or it's not an old saying, but it's a thing I am frequent in saying. It's like there's a lot of great, for every Spielberg out there that's making something amazing, there's a Kathleen Kennedy executing that vision.

Right. I love that. That's 100%. Very, very true. Well, to sort of unite some of the things we've been talking about so far, talking about the process of helping creatives execute their vision, but also you need to be able to identify what creativity is worth pursuing in a wider setting of where art meets commerce. So I'm curious for you, Ivan, are there, you know, we've talked about D&D, are there other games that have been sort of like revelatory or helped shape your creative palette when it comes to identifying things that resonate?

with you or games that really stuck with you over your career, both as a publisher and just as someone who enjoys playing them. Yeah, that's a really good question. I'm inspired honestly every day as I'm constantly seeing things come out into the marketplace and seeing what people are latching onto and what is making them excited. I think I'll give you the most recent one, right? I think the most recent one that I was shocked and delighted to see grasp the attention of the world and find a really passionate and engaging audience in which to show like, hey, this matters, right? Like, people are into this. It was shadow dark.

Oh, yeah. Right? I'll be honest, it's like there was a part of me that understood that there was a group of people who really were that old school cool and really enjoyed that, like, very heavy agency style of play. where a pike and a halberd have very distinct rules mechanics around it, right? And, you know, I didn't know how much that audience was growing, just from my perspective and from the stuff I was reading and just the areas that I was engaging with on the regular. But man, when that shadow dark campaign hit, I was like, hell yeah. Hell yeah. Like not only are you doing these really great things that are bringing that like old school cool vibe and feeling back into the marketplace, but you're doing these, these, you know, these updates that really make it, that are acknowledging kind of the growth that storytelling and role playing games have had over the last couple of decades. And people are responding to that. And they're putting their money down and they're saying, I want to play that. I want to do a classic done.

and crawl with a torch that goes out in a legitimate hour so that I can see that moment with my friends when they're like, oh, our torch went out and understand that that's a cool moment that everyone can share at the table, right? 100%. I love when people get excited about a unique mechanic like that. It brings to mind for me, one of my favorite gaming experiences, actually with you. It was the first time I got to play at a table with you for 10 candles. I had never played before.

And I found obviously we didn't use actual candles because we were on a set and there's certain rules and regulations. But when I've played since, we've used candles. And it's such a fascinating and like visceral mechanic, like an actual time limiting thing and just adds that level of tactility. You know, we didn't end up getting to do on that show either, Dan, is we didn't end up getting to burn our like hopes and things like that. Yeah, just off camera, the fire marshal was frowning and just, like, putting his axe in his hand, like, you better not. Don't even think about it. Yeah, because he's, yeah, we have an East Coast. Exactly.

We imported him. Let's talk. I want to talk about that a little bit more because you totally reminded me about that. And that was such like a great sign off for like my time doing all the hosting work there and making games. You had never played before. How was that? What was that like for you? Oh, it was a delight?

I love a TTRPG with a high level of lethality or the capability for it. And it was such a fascinating premise where, hey, you know going into this, everyone is going to die. It really resonated with my sensibilities. I loved the creepiness of the setting. And I just loved the experience to get to play a system that was so different than what I had played before. In particular, the idea of shared narration rights. That to me is very cool. Because, as I mentioned before, I love the active play coming together with your friends.

What I love about TTRPGs in particular, it is shared communal storytelling. You are improvising a story together that goes off in unexpected and wonderful ways. And I thought that was just such a unique experience that I kept bringing it up to people for months. I was like, you have to play this game. You have to check it out. It's so cool. And it's one of those things where when I introduce someone to it, they're like, yeah, this is really inventive and really cool. And then it made me, it prompted me to seek out more RPGs in a way that maybe I wasn't before.

Maybe I was feeling a bit more comfortable playing D&D. And like it also harkened back to my, one of my earliest experiences, playing cyberpunk 2020 back in middle school when my guy just got absolutely smoked. And I'm like, oh, wow, I didn't realize that could happen. That's pretty neat. Yeah. That's the big difference between the power fantasy, right? Which is what you're talking about right there, right? and then leaning into the like, oh, consequences, right?

And leaning into consequences. And, yeah, I mean, Ten Candles, especially is one of those ones that really invites the players to really, you know, color outside of the lines, right? When it comes to making the story their own. And if my brain, I'm no spoil. I mean, it's been out a long time. Yes. So deal with it. Spoilers, right?

but if my memory corrects me like you did you uh you basically dot you you jumped in front of a bullet metaphorically i think yes i jumped in front of a uh i i jumped in front of a bullet uh and then a couple more bullets jumped into me yes and it was great it was just a it was such a cool moment and and it's something so many people on that oh yeah i had 40 40 casualties over the course of that series. That was the promise delivered upon. And it's, I just find that super compelling. It's like, if you know everyone's going to die, you don't know how it's going to happen. And we have to make it matter. You have to make it count. You have to do something interesting with that. Make the death better. And what we talked about too, I'm sorry, I want to do, because this is

always a big part of this as well, too. My favorite deaths were actually the ones that didn't matter. Or at least in the story, there were such the quiet deaths. They were the ones that were like, uncelebrated. You didn't have this epic moment where you went out with explosions and things behind you. It was like, oh, and you drowned. Yeah. Right? And it's, and it's just, it's like, oh, because that, that like tears at the emotions, which is, in my opinion, like, what makes horror games. When a horror game is run well, it is always about invoking those emotions. And sometimes those meaningless deaths have so much emotion behind it. Yes, because in this, in this world, we've agreed upon to create together, life goes on, even if your death is meaningless. And it's very

cool. It's a very cool thing to think about. Yeah, it's a, it's a thing. It's weird to be giddy about it, but it's so exciting when those moments happen. So, you know. Well, speaking of cool moments and things to be excited about, I do want to talk about the big exciting thing that as of this recording is pretty new in this world, but has been long herald, and that is dagger heart. So you have been helping to lead the charge over at Darrington Press, the arm of critical role that is creating all sorts of wonderful gaming experiences. For the people out there who maybe don't know, yet if they, in fact, still don't know somehow, what is Daggerhart?

I mean, Daggerhart, in talking a little bit what we were saying earlier, about collaborative games in which players really put their effort into the stories, like Dagger Heart is a fantasy role-playing game that really takes that to hard. heart, right? It wants its players to contribute to the story in a way that is really meaningful, and it feels like a conversation back and forth between the players and the GM in order to make something magnificent. And it's very story-focused, but at the same time it has a lot of great elements and dynamic natures around combat that feel both comfortable and familiar for players who are used to that like, you know, high agency style of combat, right?

I'm very excited to explore this with my gaming group at home, but I know that there's some differences to other systems out there, but what, in your opinion, sets this apart from other tabletop role-playing games, especially in the fantasy space that others might have played? I mean, for me, I think the big one is the fact that we have broken a lot of the, we've broken the core mechanic down into a 2D12 system. So rather than rolling a single dice and then adding a modifier in order to check against a target number, we're doing that with 2D12s, which gives you, for all the math nerds out there,

it gives you kind of a more stable bell curve in which to play with versus a flat percentage across the board with a D20. And it also, because of that, we added another element onto it, is called hope and fear. And hope and fear allow this great thing where you, depending on which die is the highest when you make this check, you can either give like a beneficial reward to players if you roll with hope. Or you can give a resource called fear to the GMs that they can use and either to like challenge or raise the stakes or essentially affect players later on down the road if they so

wish. I love that. I love the sort of push and pull of like, okay, do I really? I need to push myself now. It's, you know, it reminds me a little bit of something I love about like Blades in the dark, for example, which is, you know, taking stress to alter the consequences of what's going to happen. I love the 2D12 as well.

I feel like the D12, it's the dye that gets the least amount of shine in other role-playing games. Yeah, it's great, though. How did the conversation arise to say, you know what? We want to, we want to give the D-12 some love for a change. Think about it. It's like if you are looking at a full polyhedral set. Right.

You have a D2 coin flip, very rarely used, right? But like D2, D4, D6, D8, D10, D12, D20, right? So there's a huge gap between the D12 and the D20 that, like, you know, statistically there's not a lot of room for maneuvering inside of there. But you, Daggerheart is a heroic game. It is a heroic game that celebrates its players. And we found that with the 2D12, not only are you allowing them to generate this resource that allows them to do these cool things, whether it's activating like card abilities or getting additional bonus modifiers with their experience, but it also gives them, like those dice support players. Mathematically, it is more likely to do well for them than not because it's instead of that like harsh, like single percentage.

line that the D20 often does. And that's countered by this physical representation of challenges that can also generate 50% of the time with fear, right? And the thing that came out of that that's also so beautiful is it allows this like very storytelling focused mechanic that is in a lot of other games where you have this like succeed with consequences or fail with, succeed with consequences, fail with consequences. And it's this succeed with fear, you know, or succeed with hope or fail with fear and fail with hope. Where with you're failing with hope, you may not exactly execute what you wanted, but you're still going to, you know, be able to move the story forward with a hope and be able to have a positive impact inside of it as well, too.

So rather than this like binary success failure thing, which we're all but familiar to when we've been doing it for years, it gives it a little bit more of a spectrum where players have more room for interest. interpretation on how things are going. And no matter what, and the designers are very fond of saying this, and it's a really great way of saying, it's like every dice moves the story forward. Cool. Right. Yeah, there's, I mean, in other games, there's nothing worse than feeling like you squandered your turn.

I like the idea of, we were talking about this with 10 candles as well, consequences aren't just a punishment. They move the story forward in an interesting way. Yes. You failed to pick the lock? Well, did you fail to pick the lock or did it open, but it made such a big, loud sound that guards heard it nearby? Or, you know, did you see another way out, but it's now being covered by like a defense system? Like, there's always a way to move the story forward.

And if you as the DM have the permission, basically, to say, okay, well, this is a success with hope. So it went splendidly. Well, this was a success with fear. So there's got to be a consequence in here, right? Oh, you failed with hope? Okay, well, how can I move the story along, but not say there's a direct correlation between what you did and what you didn't do, right? Or did you fail with fear, which is just like, okay, that not only did you not do it,

but then something bad happens. So it didn't happen and something worse will happen later potentially. Right, you know, but that's no different than rolling a one on a 20, right? No, I get it. You know, this case, though, it's just there's a higher percentage of any of these four things happening in a session, right? I'm someone who obviously is like an end user. I'm always thrilled to see the final product, but I'm also someone that is very curious about the creative process and how the proverbial fantasy sausage is made. Right.

How long, like, give me a sense of like, what is this sort of like time scale of how Daggerheart went from concept to completion? Like, how long does it take to go from, like, an inkling of an idea to the book that we see before us? Oh, this is a game years in the making. And I think a lot of people, it's challenging because I think it's hard sometimes to realize that, like, iterative playtesting and design is a, it's a marathon, right, in order to get it done. So we've been talking about a game like Daggerheart ever since Darrington Press was formed, right? We didn't know what the game was. We didn't know what it meant. We didn't know where it was going to go yet.

But we knew as soon as I started Darrington Press that like we were open to something like this happening. Right. And so when the right game came along, which was Spencer's design for Daggerheart, like it was just like, I remember looking at it and being like, here it is. Here it is. We found it. So now we just need to cook. We just need to let it cook. And it was a long journey

with a lot of different elements being put into place in order to make it happen. And there is usually in game design, there's this moment where you're working on the rules as much as you possibly can, and then you get to the point where you execute the book. And when you have something as just a loose concept, it can take a long time to get the game to the point

where you're like, okay, we can commission art now. Yeah. Right? And even then, though, you still want to do a little bit of things like art and concept design and things like that so you know what tone and what mode and what thing. And it all is just an investment is what it is. And it's, yeah, years in the making. That's the long way of saying it took a lot of people a lot of time to make this game.

Well, it's very exciting that it is finally out in the world. I'm wondering, though, you mentioned part of this iterative process, what's one of the biggest ways it changed over the course of that iterative play testing? Sure. I mean, it's even in its core mechanics, like there are just some things that were tweaked, literally even up from the open play test leading into the closed play test, leading into the final delivery. Like the one we like to talk about all the time is armor, right?

Like armor was just, we knew we needed some. something we know we wanted like one other lever and that when we talk when I talk to Spencer about this stuff all the time it's like well how many how many knobs do we want to add to the game like how many things do we want people to track when they're actively playing the game and we knew we wanted one more knob or lever outside of hit points

but we also didn't want it to become like a raw number deduction super heavy math thing so there was so many different versions of what what armor looked like that could serve both of those masters at the same time. And when it finally did land on what it was, it was like, it was such a ding, ding, ding, ding, ding moment in order to like finally make that work. But, but yeah, I mean, like, there was a lot more tokens at some point. Cards were literally on the character sheet and were like placed into them on the mat. So it kind of felt like you were, you know, building your character by putting cards on the sheet.

You know, and then, of course, you're like, you're actually play that. And you're like, wow, these cards are just slipping off the sheet the whole time, right? And there's so many things. This is why Interim Playtesting is so important. It's because on the design table in the Excel sheet, you can make a lot of choices and things might work on paper. But as soon as you get them to the table and people start getting their sticky hands on it, you start to see how survivable those mechanics are, right? Because you can think that you've created a perfect system and then players will just find like Kool-Aid man through the wall and figure out a whole way to break it open. I mean, that's that is one of the reasons.

And if I'm honest, one of the biggest luxuries that we had. And I'll be honest, a lot of people in the industry don't get is the sheer amount of playtesting we were able to do. When you're a small publisher or when you're a new creator, your playtesting is, limited usually by the time that you can invest into running the game. And it's even harder because you know, when you're in the forest, you only see the trees, right? And so it even being able to extend beyond of having some, it's what I told new designers all the time.

I'm like, have somebody else run your game, right? Like, have someone else play your game and observe them. Or hand them a sheet. Like, you know your game is starting to get to a place where it's okay and you can start doing it when you can hand your rules to another person and have them teach it to your to a group of players instead of yourself. That's the first major milestone that you really have to break when it comes to finding a balance in your in your game design. So we were just able to do so much of it and so many people participated inside of the open beta which was just magnificent that like

that allowed the heat into the furnace to be able to forge a much better weapon. Yeah, I mean, it's a real testament to the incredible critter community and like all of these people that really want to help. Study and play. Come together on a Windows 11 PC. And for a limited time,

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Coke Zero Sugar, Real Coca-Cola Taste, Zero Sugar. Be a part of this world that it feels like they get a small part in shaping together. There's usually not that level of interactivity between sort of like publisher, creator, and the customer. But I think that's particularly cool, that sense of community. grown there. And even the, even like, even outside of the critter community, all the people who are like, and they're the, they're the people who, they're the Somaliers. They're the ones who played 20, 25 systems. And they can tell the vintage at this point. And they can tell what's being pulled from what. And those people, I mean, they're amazing too, because they're the ones who, they're the ones who are going to, they're the ones who are going to help a game go from good to great and last longer than it's original. release, if that makes any sense. Oh, absolutely. You need those people that can understand how a lot of these systems interact in a way that

maybe you didn't consider because you're so close to it. Yeah. And no matter what, there will always be something you didn't see. Of course. And that's what Erada and second editions are for. Yep. So we talked a bit about armor and how that sounds like it was maybe the toughest nut to crack for you folks.

That was a tough nut to crack. Yeah, I think things were falling into place and a vision was being made. That was the one that was constantly elusive. And besides just the general balancing of the domains, which is also, that is just a, that is a, I like to say, that's a math problem.

That just requires a computer to sometimes, a human computer to sit down and fix, right? Yeah, just got to get a mentat, import them from Iraqis to just run the numbers. Give them a bunch of spice cake and let them go. Exactly. I'll go to town. Is there a mechanic or,

aspect of dagger heart of which you are proudest or most thrilled that you folks were able to incorporate into this? Oh, fear. 100%. Fear's not a new concept, right, by any stretch of the imagination. Like for me, the first version, I think of seeing that was like the West End Star Wars system with the light side and dark side play in the game. But even when we were, even outbreak, had a risk mechanic in which players generated risk when they went out the door and the GM spent risk in order to make encounters more dangerous or flat out put obstacles in front of people, right?

But the way that I think fear is executed in a storytelling focused game like Daegahart is so slick. It's so slick. And it really, I keep saying these things, but it really does give GM's permission to do something and validate that choice because they have a resource

in which to lean into it, right? And at the same time, it doesn't feel punitive. You know what I mean? Because a lot of, a lot of those mechanics at times can feel punitive, like, oh, I'm spending this much in order to like...

It's us versus the DM. Yeah, right? I'm just doing all this in order to like double the hit points and kill you one shot, right? It doesn't feel like that at all because what fear really wants to do and what it's really, it's objective is to constantly feel like that that is a

back and forth conversation. Like the players get something, the GM gets something. And it really, I think you said it earlier. It's like it's that tug-a-war that really makes you feel like that you're on a dance floor moving people back and forth rather than this like, I'm going to, you know, I'm going to camp in your base and spawn kill you, right? Kind of an attitude. that can just come when you give, you know, power and resources to people in those positions, right? So for people who are getting ready to maybe run their first campaign of Dagger Heart or play their first sessions, they want to get their gaming group to try it out, are there any pieces of advice or quick tips you would give them or just thoughts you would give them as they sit down to play for the first time or maybe embark on this journey? I highly recommend that you check out a new show that we just launched called Get Your Sheet Together, which is a perfectly charming and sincere way in order to lay out everything that is Daggerheart.

And so many people are visual learners and not necessarily auditory learners. Just like the great tabletop era, sometimes showing people how to play is the most valuable way in order. to help communicate that. So I would check out, get your sheet together. It's a great way to learn Daggerheart in an episodic couple minutes at a time situation. If you're curious about Daggerheart,

but you don't want to throw down the monies yet in order to invest inside of it, we do have our system resource document. That's on our website. That is part of our community gaming license that you can check out and see again, what are the core rules of this.

game and see if it's something that plays to your strength and it's something you're interested in. And if you're doing it for the first time, you can, and you like, again, it's one of those like, oh, you know, do I want to get my free introductory course? StartPlaying Dot Games is hosting Daggerheart sessions constantly online. So if you're willing to throw down a little bit of money to be at a seat and have Daggerheart be played to you as a player so you can experience what the, again, what the gameplay feels like. Those are all great ways to get started. Fantastic.

And if people also want to see the cast play, you folks are also launching Age of Umbra, I think eight episodes. Eight episodes. And it's a grim, dark world that Mr. Mercer put together. And we have that campaign frame. It's a, it's fun. The art's great. It's, uh, it's cool.

Yeah. Yeah. When I saw the trailer, I was like, I'm in. Let's go. Yeah. Let's go. Let's do this. All right.

I'm, I'm ready. to see Matt run, run Dark Souls. Let's go. Yes, exactly. Exactly. Well, Ivan, congratulations again to you and the entire team over at Derrington Press, critical role. So thrilled to see this out in the world.

Can't wait to start my gaming group on this adventure as well. Absolutely. As we wind down, we always like to leave our listeners and viewers with some recommendations to spice up their next gaming nights. Oh, yeah. obviously dagger heart not withstanding. Right. It's an ex, go, go pick it up.

You can find it wherever find games are sold. You heard the schfeel. Go and go and check it out, right? Yes. So I have my question for you, what is one of your favorite TTRPGs that you think people might be sleeping on or should get more shine?

Hmm. Well, I think we talked about one of them, which is 10 candles, right? And there's a lot of joy in that. I have a few. I'm going to do a few of them. One of them is a shame. That's great.

...plug as well, too, because I have to do it as well. I think it goes to show I never can answer this question without talking about dread, right? Dread is probably the best horror role-playing game, period, end of story, no questions, right? It really invokes this visceral, emotional feel when you play the game because the mechanics is forcing you to pull blocks from, you know, a tower of blocks. say in order to kind of like a legally distinct tower of blocks tower of wooden blocks right um and that that act of pulling those those blocks already give you that like anxious dread if you will right um that then the game is just so good about reinforcing that right so oh it's so good one of my favorites I'm going to play it next week for the first time in a long time with some friends.

And it will feel like putting on a favorite jacket, I think. That's great. I love to hear that. I feel like I should give hunters a little shout out. They have a great solo, a solo journaling game that's coming out. Is this a sin eater? Sin eater, yeah, right? Oh, the art's so cool on it.

And solo games are really finding a marketplace right now. is what they are. And, you know, whether they were designed for solo play or not, like, it's just, it's just kind of a fun thing to be able to experience. I, I credit it a little bit to the lit RPG movement. That's also happening in, like, books and fiction right now as well, too. But, like, yeah, it's just great. So, Sin Eater's awesome.

It has a, it has a very, um, the arts has a very morke-bork kind of attitude towards it, but it is really about, it is about eating sin. right so um it's they're going to launch i think when this goes up it'll probably be either just out and or it'll have been out for like a week or so on kickstarter so fantastic uh you are if wadiway also recommended that so folks you heard it here first uh and now second pick it up yeah if he's got good taste i'll uh i'll say that exactly exactly real somaliers palette there uh besides that man i'm if the uh the other other ones, board games, two board games

I think you should try out, Dan, if you haven't, have you played Raptor yet? I have not played Raptor. So the copy I have is from Madagot, but it might be with some other publishers now, but it is a two-player, asymmetrical, chess-like game that

plays, that uses cards that feel like the classic card game war. You are either playing the Raptor, or you're playing the group of scientists, and you're both putting a card down in order to either do the ability on the card or take basic actions based off the difference of the numbers from the cards you play in order to either A, capture a bunch of baby raptors on the board, or B, try to eat all the scientists to clear them off the board. It's really

slick and very, very good. That sounds incredibly. You had me at chess like, but then I love anything that incorporate some cards in there too, so I'm definitely picking this up. Asymmetrical, and that's the thing too. It's like, it's weird to say both chest like an asymmetrical at the same time, but when you play it, you'll understand. I look forward to it. So that's the game you would bring to Game Night. If everyone was like, you know what, we're going to play whatever you want,

we'll read any rulebook, we'll watch a video, Raptor. Raptor and Fury of Dracula. Fury of Dracula, why is he so mad? What is it? What is it? What happened? Is it because you're constantly trying to follow his blood trail and get him to stop sucking blood? Who knows?

Who could say? Who could say? Why is this Drac so angry? Just running across Europe laying vampire traps everywhere. It's like he's got a beef or something. No wonder he hopped that boat.

I get it. He booked a voyage on the demeter. That's actually one of the reasons I love Fury of Dracula is there are rules for like hopping on a boat and like you can move you can move around Europe a lot quicker if you get on a boat. but he takes damage because he doesn't like being on a ship, Dan. Dracula doesn't like being on the water, right?

I get the seasick very easily. He's just rubbing his home dirt all over his face just for comfort like it's drama mean. Oh, my gosh. You know, whatever it takes. I'm not a big cruise guy myself, so I feel you, Dracula. I'd be furious too.

Yeah. Oh, last one. And then I'm going to let you go, Dan. I'm so sorry. Sorry. No apology needed. Yeah. I've never played this game.

No one will play this game with me. But since you did say if it would force anyone to sit down and play the game with me, Panamax. Are you familiar with Panamax at all? I am not. It sounds like a VCR. It is a resource management game about getting ships through the Panama Canal. Amazing. I love when a game is so specific like that.

You've got your Supermax ships that barely fit through, and you've got your basic ones, and there's the three little parts of the Panama Canal. It's like, okay, you can put ships in here, and they can stay here, but you've got to take priority through the different lock steps. The rulebook is huge. No one will invest the time with me, and I just want to play Panamax. It's been in my shelf for 10 years, you know. Just calling to you like the green goblin mask. See, it even made Jeremy leave. That's what he did.

He's well too. You know what? He got the sense we were wrapping things up. But speaking of wrapping things up, Ivan, thank you again for joining us today. I really appreciate it. Where can people find you on the worldwide web if in fact you want to be found? I'm on the internet at Hydra underscore Lord. in most social medias.

And I think that's the best way of doing it. You can find me... I'm not in front of the camera very often anymore, Dan, so I'm mostly working the games behind the scenes nowadays. So just pop off a message somewhere or check us out at Darrington Press and Hunter's Entertainment and every other place where beautiful games are sold

and go buy Daggerheart and back Sin Eater and let me know if you want to play Panamax. Yes, especially Panamax, especially Panamax. Ivan, thank you again. And to everyone out there, we'll be back with another question and answers each and every week right here on Geekin Sundry's YouTube channel or wherever fine podcasts are served. And thank you again to everyone for listening. But for now, folks, tell us what games are you playing this week? What are you most excited to introduce to your table? Let us know in the comments and we'll see you folks next time.

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The war is over and both sides lost. Kingdoms were reduced to cinders and armies scattered like bones in the dust. Now the survivors claw to what's left of a broken world, praying the darkness chooses someone else tonight. But in the shadow dark, the darkness always wins. This is old school adventuring at its most cruel. Your torch ticks down in real time. and when that flame dies, something else rises to finish the job.

This is a brutal rules-light nightmare with a story that emerges organically based on the decisions that the characters make. This is what it felt like to play RPGs in the 80s, and man, it is so good to be back. Join the Glass Cannon podcast as we plunge into the Shadow Dark every Thursday night at 8 p.m. Eastern on YouTube.com slash the Glass Cannon with the podcast version dropping the next day. See what everybody's talking about and join us in the door. Oh, please, not that music. That music gives me nightmares from my childhood. Could we get something a little bit lighter? Some lighter music here.

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