Blue Rose vs Skies Above
Compare Blue Rose and Skies Above side by side. See differences in complexity, dice, genre, and more.
| Blue Rose | Skies Above | |
|---|---|---|
| Genre | Fantasy | Fantasy |
| Tags | Character-Driven, Corruption, Tactical, Crunchy, Social Intrigue, Strong GM Support, High-Fantasy, Lore-Heavy, Heroic, Roleplay-Heavy | JRPG, Cinematic, Tactical, High-Fantasy, Heroic, Character Building, Mana Points, Theater of the Mind, Lore-Heavy |
| Core Mechanic | Roll d20 and add the relevant ability, skill, or arcanum modifier against a Difficulty set by the Narrator. Attacks use the same procedure against Defense. Successful damage forces a Toughness save that moves the target along an injury track instead of reducing hit points. | Roll d8 + two Attributes + modifiers against a Target Number (typically 10, increasing in steps of 4 for harder tasks). Natural 8s explode, rolling and adding again; every additional 8 raises the Critical Level, scaling damage and effects. A natural 1 is an Epic Fail that halves the character's Defences until their next turn. Critical hits dealt and taken generate Overdrive: once eight stacks accumulate, characters spend them to take an additional action that round, modeling the limit-break payoff of classic JRPGs. |
| Dice | d20 | d8 |
| Complexity | High | Medium |
| Availability | Paid | Free quickstart |
| Runnability | 5 of 5 book tools | 4 of 5 book tools |
| License | Open Game License Version 1.0a | All Rights Reserved |
| Third-Party Publishing | Commercial publishing allowed — Open Game License v1.0a | Not yet researched |
| Summary only, not legal advice. Check current terms before publishing. | ||
| Publisher | Green Ronin Publishing, LLC | Lost Haven Studio |
| Year | 2005 | 2026 |
| Languages | English, Italian | English |
| Best For | Groups who want hopeful romantic fantasy campaigns where personal motivations, political intrigue, and heroic service matter alongside tactical conflict. | Groups who want a JRPG-inspired tabletop adventure: picking from twelve jobs like Dragoon, Dark Mage, or Engineer, channeling elemental magic blessed by eight goddesses, and journeying by airship across floating sky-islands in the aftermath of a magical cataclysm. |
| Highlights | Acting on a Calling and either nature restores Conviction, turning personal motives into a renewable resource. Reputation and Influence give past deeds and changing attitudes mechanical weight in social scenes. Sorcery risks Corruption that erodes abilities and can culminate in madness or unlife, making forbidden magic a sustained consequence rather than a binary choice. | Exploding d8 with stacking Critical Levels: multiple natural 8s in a row cascade into larger crits and bigger effects, so heroic moments scale rather than cap. Overdrive accumulates from critical hits dealt and received, and spending eight stacks grants an additional action that round, giving combat a JRPG limit-break rhythm. Twelve job roles span melee, magic, ranged, and support archetypes, and characters add a second job at level 12 to cross-pollinate abilities and weapon ranks. Eight elemental goddesses anchor both magic and the bestiary: every Skyfolk lineage is blessed with resistance to one element, and creatures carry specific elemental weaknesses that double incoming damage. |
| Considerations | Character creation combines a background and role with several layers of customization, requiring choices across multiple chapters. Combat tracks actions, modifiers, saving throws, and damage conditions instead of a single hit-point total. Sorcery's Corruption rules attach moral consequences to forbidden magic, so groups must engage with the setting's Light and Shadow framework. | Combat is the most heavily detailed pillar of the rules, with conditions, elemental damage, front/back row positioning, and an optional battlefield grid: investigation, intrigue, and downtime get coverage but less mechanical depth. Light and Dark Mages cannot learn from the opposing path, locking each spellcaster out of half the elemental spell list and pushing magical variety into multi-job characters. The exploding-d8 swing is wide: consecutive 8s can demolish encounters while a natural 1 halves a character's Defences and opens them to brutal counters. Setting and mechanics are tightly woven: Skyfolk lineages, the eight Goddesses, and post-Breaking lore are baked into character options rather than presented as swappable flavor. |