Dungeons & Dustbunnies vs Pathfinder

Compare Dungeons & Dustbunnies and Pathfinder side by side. See differences in complexity, dice, genre, cost, and more.

	Dungeons & Dustbunnies	Pathfinder
Genre	Post-Apocalyptic, Fantasy	Fantasy
Play Style	Rules-Light, Comedy, Gonzo, Beginner-Friendly, One-Shot Friendly, Theater of the Mind, Improvisation, Survival	Tactical, Crunchy, Combat-Heavy, Character Building, Dungeon Crawl, High-Fantasy, Grid-Based, Heroic, Ascending AC, Exploration, Classic Fantasy, Lore-Heavy
Core Mechanic	Decrease Dice — each character has one die, starting at d20, that serves as both their health and their resolution roll. To attempt a risky action, roll the die against the Difficulty your class assigns that skill; meeting or beating it succeeds, while a normal failure costs only the attempt. The die steps down a size (d20 → d12 → d10 → d8 → d6 → d4) whenever you roll a 1, take major damage, or voluntarily force the scale to convert a failure into an automatic success. A character whose die would drop below d4 falls Exhausted or dies; sleeping in a safe shelter resets it to d20 and consuming a sugar ration steps it back up one size.	Roll d20 + modifier against a DC. Four degrees of success: critical success (beat DC by 10+), success, failure, and critical failure (miss by 10+). Each turn grants three actions to spend freely on strikes, movement, spellcasting, or other activities. Multi-attack penalty (-5/-10) discourages repeated strikes and encourages tactical variety.
Dice	d4–d20	d20
Complexity	Very Low	High
Accessibility	Very High	Very High
Runnability	High	Very High
License	Proprietary	ORC
Cost	Free	Free (ORC)
Publisher	Castamar RPG Studio	Paizo
Year	2026	2023
Best For	Groups who want a quick, comedic one-shot or short campaign as thumb-sized survivors scavenging a household that has become a hostile wilderness, with a ruleset light enough to read in a few minutes before the first session.	Groups who want deep character customization, tactical grid combat with meaningful turn-by-turn decisions, and a richly detailed fantasy setting with free rules.
Highlights	The Decrease Dice mechanic collapses health and resolution into a single die, so every roll both tests the action and visibly wears the character down as the die shrinks toward d4. Forcing the scale lets a player turn any failure into a guaranteed success by stepping their die down a size, making each clutch moment a deliberate trade of long-term stamina for an immediate result. Monsters are rated by a Threat Die that attacks and spells whittle down, and several — the chitin-armored cockroach, the static-charged dustbunny — shrug off ordinary weapons until players expose a weak spot or switch to fire, water, or magic.	Complete rules available free on Archives of Nethys. Three-action economy gives every turn meaningful tactical decisions. Character customization through ancestry feats, class feats, skill feats, and general feats at every level. Four degrees of success on every roll add granularity to outcomes.
Considerations	Combat has no initiative or turn order — the GM narrates enemy intent and players react with defensive rolls — so there is little structure for tactical positioning. Rolling a 1 on any skill check — including routine Stealth, Alertness, or social rolls — steps the die down the same as taking a hit in combat, so avoiding unnecessary rolls becomes a survival strategy rather than a purely narrative choice. There is no advancement system: skills are fixed at character creation and the Decrease Die only ever recovers to its starting size, so characters do not grow mechanically over a campaign.	New players must learn the trait system, conditions, and four degrees of success before combat runs smoothly. Multi-attack penalty and numerous combat actions can slow turns for indecisive players. Character creation requires selecting feats from multiple categories at every level, which can overwhelm new players.