Daggerheart vs Flying Circus
Compare Daggerheart and Flying Circus side by side. See differences in complexity, dice, genre, cost, and more.
| Daggerheart | Flying Circus | |
|---|---|---|
| Genre | Fantasy | Fantasy |
| Play Style | Narrative, Collaborative, Heroic, Roleplay-Heavy, Fiction-First, Theater of the Mind, Character Building, Drama, Beginner-Friendly, Character-Driven | Crunchy, Combat-Heavy, Atmospheric, Character-Driven, Sandbox |
| Core Mechanic | 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. | Roll 2d10 + stat: 10 or less is a miss, 11–15 is a partial hit, 16+ is a full hit. Moves are triggered by fiction. Air combat uses energy management, altitude, and speed on instrument panels. Stress accumulated in missions is relieved between flights through vices and relationships. |
| Dice | 2d12 | 2d10 |
| Complexity | Medium | High |
| Accessibility | Very High | Medium |
| Runnability | Very High | Very High |
| License | Darrington Press Community Gaming License (DPCGL) | Proprietary (PbtA) |
| Cost | $$$ | $$ |
| Publisher | Darrington Press | Newstand Press |
| Year | 2025 | 2020 |
| Best For | 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. | Groups who want a deeply detailed aerial combat game wrapped in a rich, character-driven story about mercenary pilots in a post-war fantasy world. |
| Highlights | 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. | Highly detailed air combat, setting blends WWI aviation with Miyazaki-esque fantasy, character-driven downtime system, free aircraft builder tool, 10 diverse playbook backgrounds |
| Considerations | 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. | Dense and intimidating to learn, very niche aerial-combat focus, requires printing instrument panels and component cards, limited to its specific setting |