10,000 Swords Against Heaven vs Call of Cthulhu
Compare 10,000 Swords Against Heaven and Call of Cthulhu side by side. See differences in complexity, dice, genre, cost, and more.
| 10,000 Swords Against Heaven | Call of Cthulhu | |
|---|---|---|
| Genre | Fantasy, Scifi, Horror, Post-Apocalyptic, Cyberpunk | Horror, Modern |
| Tags | Martial Arts, Tactical, Character Building, Classless, Fiction-First, Survival, Resource Management, Sandbox, Dark Fantasy, Weird | Investigation, Deadly, One-Shot Friendly, Atmospheric, Roleplay-Heavy, Mystery, Fear & Stress Mechanics, Corruption, Skill-Based |
| Core Mechanic | Roll a pool of d6s equal to the relevant Cultivation rating, adjusted for the circumstances. Each die showing 4–6 counts as a Strike. Meet or exceed the action's Demand to succeed; opposed checks compare Strike totals. | Roll d100 equal to or under your skill percentage. Success tiers at half (Hard) and one-fifth (Extreme) of the skill value. Bonus and penalty dice adjust the tens digit. Failed rolls can be pushed for a second attempt at greater risk. |
| Dice | d6 dice pool | d100 |
| Complexity | High | Medium |
| Accessibility | Very High | High |
| Runnability | Low | Very High |
| License | Third Party License | Chaosium Fan Material Policy |
| Third-Party Publishing | Commercial publishing allowed — Core rulebook Third Party License | Not yet researched |
| Summary only, not legal advice. Check current terms before publishing. | ||
| Cost | Free | $$ |
| Publisher | JK Saavedra | Chaosium |
| Year | 2026 | 2014 |
| Best For | Groups seeking cultivation campaigns with reactive tactical combat and open-ended exploration. The setting centers communist revolution against divine and capitalist rule. | Investigation-driven horror where combat is deadly and sanity is fragile. Great for one-shots. |
| Highlights | Two-stage Interrupt cascades let combatants spend Actions to respond before an opponent's declared action resolves. Licenses from fifteen Sects combine with limited Meridian slots to support changeable martial and magical loadouts. Magnetite is both currency and a source of XP, making cultivation compete with equipment purchases. | Tracking Sanity as a depletable score ties mental erosion to the fiction, so confronting cosmic horror mechanically wears characters down. The percentile skills resolve on a d100 roll-under, with Hard and Extreme bands at half and one-fifth of the rating. Bouts of Madness convert failed Sanity checks into temporary phobias, manias, or loss of character control. |
| Considerations | Characters start fragile by design; the book expects many to die at Stage 0 before cultivation takes hold. Casting Magick prevents Defense Checks, making positioning and allied protection important. The premise centers communist revolution, and the book warns of sexual violence and body horror. | The chase rules add a detailed positioning subsystem whose complexity outweighs how often it sees use. Character creation allocates points across a long list of skills, a slow first step for new players. In long campaigns the sanity spiral can strip a character of player control as madness accumulates. |