Daggerheart vs Swashbucklers of the 7 Skies

Compare Daggerheart and Swashbucklers of the 7 Skies side by side. See differences in complexity, dice, genre, cost, and more.

	Daggerheart	Swashbucklers of the 7 Skies
Genre	Fantasy	Fantasy
Play Style	Narrative, Collaborative, Heroic, Roleplay-Heavy, Fiction-First, Theater of the Mind, Character Building, Drama, Beginner-Friendly, Character-Driven	Tag-Based, Fiction-First, Cinematic, Pirates, Ship-Based, Heroic
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 2d6 and keep the best two, then add the Modifier of a relevant Forte, a descriptive Quality ranked from Poor (−2) to Master (+6), and compare the total to a Difficulty Rank's Target Number. Players narrate their own successes and failures, and may invoke Techniques to add dice or a flat +1 even after seeing the roll. Combat is resolved as a Duel, with each side splitting a 3d6 pool between attack and defense and the winning margin lowering the loser's Forte Ranks as damage.
Dice	2d12	2d6 / 3d6
Complexity	Medium	Medium
Accessibility	Very High	Medium
Runnability	Very High	Medium
License	Darrington Press Community Gaming License (DPCGL)	Proprietary
Cost	Free	$$
Publisher	Darrington Press	Evil Hat Productions
Year	2025	2009
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 swashbuckling campaign of sky-pirates and musketeers in an original floating-island world, are comfortable with a light narrative meta-currency, and want skyship battles that give four to six players distinct crew roles.
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.	Players earn Style Dice by narrating their actions with flair and by leaning into their character's Foibles, then spend them to add dice, recover from damage, or assert new facts, tying mechanical advantage directly to dramatic play. Character abilities are broad descriptive Fortes such as "Colronan Musketeer" or "Sha-Ku Ruqrider," so a single Forte covers every related action at the table instead of a skill list while rooting the character in the setting. Before play the group sets explicit dials for firearm lethality, level of magic, and tone, letting the same setting run as cape-and-sword intrigue or deadly piracy.
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.	The Style Dice economy only drives play if the GM actively seeds and awards dice each session, and the genre-reward loop that powers the game stalls when it is left unmanaged. Starting koldun can take all seven Gifts cheaply and the magic stays deliberately open-ended, so it can overshadow other characters unless the GM sets the mysticism level beforehand. Skyship combat layers a multi-step crew sequence and a separate dice pool on top of personal combat, a sharp jump in table overhead from the otherwise light core.