Playing the Game

When you’re the guide, you present the players with a situation, and the players tell you how their heroes respond. You announce how the situation changes as the result of the decisions the players made, and you ask the players what their heroes will do next.

Most of the time, you use the facts of the story and the world to draw conclusions about how the story continues. If a hero goes into the biggest library in the realm looking for a common book, you might declare that they find the book after a little searching, since this is a reasonable and likely outcome.

Sometimes, though, if there’s risk or danger involved, you’ll ask the players to roll dice to find out what happens. When you use the dice to resolve an action, you start by establishing a few details of what the heroes are attempting and what might go wrong, then roll the dice, and then announce what happens. The following sections of this document explain this process in detail, but in brief, the process looks like this:

• Determine whether you need to roll dice, or whether you should just tell the players what happens.
• Choose which game action most closely describes the task.
• Announce the possible results of success and failure.
• Explain the effects of the dice and let the player roll.
• Based on the result of the dice roll, announce what happens.

To Roll or Not To Roll

You should only ask the players to roll dice to resolve an action if there’s a chance for success as well as a chance for an interesting consequence of failure.

Chance of success: Decide whether there’s any chance of success based on what you know about the situation and the approach the heroes are using. If there's no chance of success, don't roll dice. Just explain how the situation prevents progress and ask the players what they'll do next.

Interesting consequence of failure: If there’s little or no chance of failure, or if failure only provides a trivial delay, don’t bother rolling. Allow the heroes to succeed, either through casual effort or through trial and error, and narrate the outcome.

If the hero is trying to achieve something impossible, but you believe a more modest goal is achievable, present the lesser achievement to the player and ask whether they’d like to proceed.

If the effects of the hero’s action won’t be apparent until later, you can delay rolling the dice until then.

Choosing an Action

Once you’ve determined that there’s a chance of success and that failure might bring an interesting consequence, choose which of the game’s actions best describes the task the hero is attempting. If it’s not obvious which action is most appropriate, ask the player to describe their hero’s behavior and intentions in greater detail. If none of these actions seem appropriate, just decide what happens based on what you think makes the most sense in the circumstances, without rolling the dice.

Results

There are three possible results when you resolve an action:

• Complete success. The hero accomplished their goal with no setbacks.
• Mixed result. The hero accomplished their goal, but also encountered a setback.
• Complete failure. The hero did not accomplish their goal and encountered a setback instead.

As the guide, you’ll announce what these three results will look like, and ask the player if they still want to attempt the action.

Accomplishments

Announce what the player will achieve if they’re successful, based on how the player has described the hero’s activity, and based on what you know about the situation and the obstacles.

If a player announces that the objective of their action is to help another hero with a later task, this is an assisting action. You’ll need to know this later when the players roll the dice.

In most situations, a successful action should result in the hero achieving just what the hero intended. However, resolving an action might only yield partial progress toward the hero’s goal if one of the following is true:

• The task requires prolonged effort and provides multiple opportunities for failure or undesired consequences.
• The task requires contributions from several heroes, and you judge that they should all resolve actions to determine the consequences of their attempts.

In these cases, you will represent the progress the heroes make by drawing a progress clock, which is a circle divided into segments. Divide the circle into just a few segments for a simple task that requires only a few actions, or many segments for a more difficult or prolonged task. As the heroes accumulate success, fill in segments of the clock, according to the rules on interpreting the dice. When the clock is full, the heroes reach their goal.

Using clocks to measure progress is never mandatory. As the guide, you may decide that a task is not interesting enough to merit a clock and resolve it as a single action instead.

Setbacks

Now that you know what the hero might achieve, use your knowledge of the situation to announce possible setbacks. A setback is something that might go wrong as the result of the hero’s action. There are four forms of setback:

• Immediate setback. A threat, obstacle, or undesirable consequence appears immediately.
• Future setback. This setback will lead to a new threat or obstacle in a future scene.
• Injury. An injury resulting from failure will reduce a hero’s health level.
• Mark a clock. You can use a setback clock to represent a situation that’s getting worse, or to track a limited resource such as time, ammunition, or fuel. This is similar to a progress clock, but you fill it in as setbacks occur, according to the rules for interpreting the dice. When the clock is full, an undesired event occurs.

Remember that when the hero achieves a mixed result, they’ll receive an accomplishment and a setback, and the setback should not cancel the accomplishment.

Rolling the Dice

Now that you’ve announced the possible results of the action, it’s time to roll the dice. The player will roll two six-sided dice and look at the numbers that came up to determine whether each die passes or fails.

The rules below explain which numbers pass and which numbers fail. For each rule, you’re not trying to exceed the listed number; you must match the listed number exactly.

Sixes always pass.

Fives pass if the action the hero is using is one of their preferred actions, as supplied by their role.

Fours pass if the hero’s activity relies on their expertise, as supplied by their role.

Threes pass if the hero’s health level is Strong or Fair. Threes fail if the hero’s health level is Shaken, Hurt, or Down.

Twos pass if another hero has previously performed an assisting action to benefit the current action, as described earlier in “Accomplishments.” If the assisting action produced a complete success or a mixed result, twos will pass when resolving the current action.

If a hero resolves an action and rolls a two, and no one has yet performed an assisting action, another hero can immediately try to assist if the players can describe how the assisting hero can cooperate in the nick of time. In this case, the hero who started the current action sets aside their dice for now. The assisting player then describes their hero’s activity and resolves an appropriate action. If the assisting action produces a complete success or a mixed result, the assisted hero can evaluate their original dice roll knowing that their twos will pass.

Ones always fail.

Announce which numbers will succeed and which will fail before the player rolls the dice. If the player still wants to attempt the action, let them roll. The result of the action depends on which dice pass or fail.

If both dice pass, this is a complete success, and the hero receives their accomplishment.

• If you’re using a progress clock, mark two ticks on the clock.

If one die passes and the other fails, this is a mixed result. The hero receives an accomplishment and a setback.

• If you’re using a progress clock, mark one tick on the clock for the accomplishment.
• If you’re using a setback clock, mark one tick on the clock for the setback.
• If the setback would injure a hero, reduce the hero’s health by one level.

If both dice fail, this is a complete failure. The hero receives a setback.

• If you’re using a setback clock, mark two ticks on the clock.
• If the setback would injure a hero, reduce the hero’s health by two levels.

Always narrate the result. Don’t just say “you succeed” or “mark off one health level.” Explain what the result looks like in the story.

Health

You may reduce a hero’s health level if they receive a setback from an action. Reduced health might indicate cuts and bruises, concussion, nausea, fatigue, shock and confusion, or spiritual scars, depending on what’s happening in the story.

A hero starts out Strong, and as their health gets worse, they become Fair, then Shaken, then Hurt, then Down. When a hero is Hurt or Down, dice that roll threes don’t pass for their actions. When they’re Down, they’re incapacitated, unconscious, restrained, or otherwise debilitated, and they cannot affect the story.

As the guide, when you decide that the heroes are out of danger and have time to quietly rest and recover, you can allow the heroes to restore their health to Strong. This shouldn’t take long. True heroes are ready to get back into the action as soon as they catch their breath and dust off their clothes.

Destiny

If a player can explain how either an event in their hero’s history or an aspect of their pursuit might be useful in the situation they’re facing, they can use their destiny to achieve one of the following:

• Declare that an action resulted in a complete success, regardless of how the dice came up. The player may ask for this benefit this either before or after rolling the dice.
• Declare a fact. If the guide or any of the other players believe that the suggested fact is particularly improbable or unbelievable, the player declaring the fact must find a mutually agreeable substitute.
• Restore one hero’s health to Strong. This could be any hero in the group, including the hero who is using their destiny. This doesn’t necessarily mean the hero’s injuries are healed; it may simply mean that the injured hero now has the determination to ignore their pain and fight on.

In all cases, the player must narrate how the benefit gained relates to the pursuit or the historical event they’re relying on. A player using their pursuit to justify the use of destiny may refer to the implied events or motivations behind the pursuit when declaring how they turn failure into success. A player who uses their hero’s history to justify the use of destiny may only refer to certain specific historical events:

• The events provided by the early history and relationship history questions attached to the hero’s role.
• Events added to the hero's recorded history at the end of each session of play.

After gaining one of the above benefits from their destiny, a hero cannot use their destiny again until they have exercised their pursuit, as described next.

Pursuits

When a player uses their hero’s destiny to influence the game, they cannot use their destiny again until their hero attempts to make progress toward resolving their pursuit. This attempt must either include a task that carries a chance of failure, or a request to another hero who has a reason to refuse. Play out the attempt, resolving actions as necessary, to determine whether the hero succeeds. Whether the hero succeeds or fails, the hero recovers their destiny and may use it again later.

The attempt doesn't need to completely resolve the pursuit, and the amount of effort involved in the attempt doesn’t matter. The task could be something the heroes can resolve in a single action, or it could be an entire mission on its own.

There’s no game benefit for completely resolving a pursuit, though it may make sense to declare a pursuit as resolved—either successfully or otherwise—based on the circumstances of the story. If a player believes they’ve resolved their pursuit, they can switch to a new pursuit, either arising from the circumstances of the prior pursuit or from a different source entirely. A player may also switch pursuits temporarily if the story blocks them from making progress toward their current pursuit, or if they’re bored with their pursuit and want to try something else. When a hero switches to a new pursuit, they can choose one of the other pursuits listed for their role, or a pursuit from a different role, or an entirely new pursuit invented by the group.

A player may also choose to keep the same pursuit through the entire game, perhaps resolving it in the final session of the game, or leaving it open as a quest the hero will pursue indefinitely.

Example of Play

Freya the warrior has descended into a tunnel beneath a barrow, seeking the creature that preys on her village. As she raises her torch, a spectral figure lunges from the shadows, once human, but twisted by time and hatred. Its jaws stretch impossibly wide and as it bellows a piercing shriek, the guide announces that the sound drives deep into Freya’s skull, threatening to drive her senseless.

The guide asks the player what Freya will do. The player announces that Freya will stand strong, steeling herself against the inhuman assault, and will command the specter to depart.

The guide agrees that this is a risky action with interesting consequences of failure. The guide declares that the appropriate action here is “FOCUS your will and spirit,” and since FOCUS is a preferred action for Freya, her fives will pass. Her expertise is “weapons and tactics,” which doesn’t apply here, so her fours will fail. Her health is Strong, so her threes will pass, but she’s not receiving help from another hero, so her twos will fail.

The guide declares that if Freya succeeds, the specter will flee; if she fails completely, she’ll lose two health levels as the specter looms over her; if she gets a mixed result, she’ll lose one health level, but the specter will hesitate and recoil, giving Freya a chance to try something else before the specter attacks her again.

The player rolls the dice and gets a five and a two. The five passes, but the two fails, giving a mixed result. The player decides to use Freya’s destiny to convert this to a success. Freya’s history shows that when she was a child, she fell ill and a wraith came to steal her soul from her weakened body, but she fought it off. The player points to this item to justify the use of destiny, declaring that Freya has never feared spirits since her childhood victory against the wraith.

With a complete success, the guide announces that the specter realizes it is no longer the most fearsome thing in the barrow. It retreats from Freya’s anger, fading away to nothingness.

Continuing The Story

At the end of each session, every player may add a single item to their hero’s history, based on the events that occurred during the session. Adding events to a hero’s history provides new experiences to justify the use of destiny. When players choose events to write down, they should choose events that might be useful in a later session.

This isn’t mandatory. If a player believes their hero didn’t learn or achieve anything worth noting during a session, they can skip this step.