Burning Wheel vs Daggerheart
Compare Burning Wheel and Daggerheart side by side. See differences in complexity, dice, genre, cost, and more.
| Burning Wheel | Daggerheart | |
|---|---|---|
| Genre | Fantasy | Fantasy |
| Play Style | Crunchy, Roleplay-Heavy, Character Building, Drama, Low-Fantasy, Social Combat | Narrative, Collaborative, Heroic, Roleplay-Heavy, Fiction-First, Theater of the Mind, Character Building, Drama, Beginner-Friendly, Character-Driven |
| Core Mechanic | Roll a pool of d6s (ability exponent = number of dice). 4+ counts as a success. Meet or exceed the obstacle number. Beliefs, Instincts, and Traits earn artha rewards. | Roll 2d12 Duality Dice (Hope + Fear) and add modifiers vs. difficulty. Which die rolls higher determines whether the moment swings toward the players (Hope) or the GM gains Fear tokens to spend on complications. In combat, adversary attacks roll d20 + modifier against target's Evasion. |
| Dice | d6 dice pool | 2d12 |
| Complexity | High | Medium |
| Accessibility | High | Very High |
| Runnability | High | Very High |
| License | Proprietary | Darrington Press Community Gaming License (DPCGL) |
| Cost | $$ | $$$ |
| Publisher | BWHQ | Darrington Press |
| Year | 2011 | 2025 |
| Best For | Groups who want character beliefs and drama to mechanically drive play, with deep subsystems that reward mastery. | Groups who want heroic fantasy with emotionally driven storytelling, where every roll shifts momentum between hope and fear. Great for Critical Role fans and narrative-focused tables. |
| Highlights | Beliefs mechanically drive play, skills advance through use, Duel of Wits and Fight subsystems offer detailed resolution | Every action roll uses 2d12 Duality Dice, and whether Hope or Fear lands higher hands momentum to the player or the GM. Combat runs fiction-first with no fixed initiative, so the spotlight passes by the action rather than a turn order. Characters equip abilities as domain cards drawn from two domains, building a loadout the player can swap between. |
| Considerations | Steep learning curve, meant to be played as written (not hackable), print availability limited | The domain-card system runs best with printed cards, though it can be played from the character sheet alone. Players and the GM use asymmetric rules, so each side has its own procedures to learn. Mechanics are tied to the game's own setting and ancestries, which takes work to reskin for another world. |