Hunter: The Reckoning vs Murder of Crows
Compare Hunter: The Reckoning and Murder of Crows side by side. See differences in complexity, dice, genre, cost, and more.
| Hunter: The Reckoning | Murder of Crows | |
|---|---|---|
| Genre | Horror, Modern | Horror |
| Tags | Investigation, Mystery, Character-Driven, Gritty, Deadly, Atmospheric, Social Combat, Strong GM Support, Lore-Heavy, Urban Fantasy | Rules-Light, One-Shot Friendly, Comedy, Mission-Based, Character-Driven, Random Tables, Low-Prep, Freeform Magic, Fast-Paced, Theater of the Mind |
| Core Mechanic | Roll a pool of d10s, usually an Attribute plus a Skill. Each 6 or higher is a success. Meeting the Storyteller's Difficulty wins. Each pair of 10s counts as four successes. On tests within their creed's Field, Hunters may choose to add Desperation Dice equal to the cell's shared Desperation rating. A 1 on any Desperation Die turns a win into a choice: keep it and raise the cell's Danger, or fail and enter Despair. A failed test with a Desperation 1 always causes Despair. | Roll 1d6 against the relevant Aspect (Beast, Omen or Trickster, rated 2 to 5): a roll below the Aspect succeeds, a roll equal to it succeeds and earns a Portent, and a roll above it fails. A helping Crow counts the Aspect as 1 higher, to a maximum of 5. When a Crow acts in accordance with its Augury, the player may roll two dice and use either; when it contradicts its Augury, or an Affliction affects the roll, the player rolls two dice and Fate (the GM) chooses which counts. A human may roll 1d6 to resist; if the human's roll matches or is lower than the Crow's, the Crow fails even on a success. |
| Dice | d10 dice pool | d6 |
| Complexity | Medium | Very Low |
| Accessibility | Medium | Very High |
| Runnability | Very High | Medium |
| License | All Rights Reserved | Proprietary |
| Third-Party Publishing | Commercial publishing allowed — Storytellers Vault | No verified route found |
| Summary only, not legal advice. Check current terms before publishing. | ||
| Cost | $$ | Free |
| Publisher | Renegade Game Studios | Jon Pessin |
| Year | 2022 | 2026 |
| Languages | English, French, German, Italian, Spanish | English |
| Best For | Groups who want investigation-heavy modern horror in which a cell of ordinary people researches, plans, and confronts a monster at real personal risk. | Groups who want a darkly comic one-shot as a flock of crows plotting a human's death, with tables that set up the hunt at the table. |
| Highlights | Desperation rises after the cell's setbacks, so mounting trouble adds both dice and risk to later Field tests. Overreach lets a player keep a win by raising the cell's Danger, which escalates the quarry's response against the whole cell. Monsters have weaknesses Hunters can discover, so research pays off as concrete advantages in the final confrontation. | Rolling exactly the Aspect's value earns a Portent, letting the player ask Fate one question answered by a brief, obscure vision. Acting in accordance with a Crow's Augury lets the player pick between two dice, while contradicting it hands that choice to Fate. Fate rolls or chooses with the Crows from d6 tables to set the hunt's victim, motive and complications. |
| Considerations | Desperation Dice apply only to tests within a Hunter's creed Field, so a character's signature boost sits idle outside that specialty. The book recommends ending most conflicts after about three turns, which leaves little room for extended tactical combat. The content warning covers themes such as sexual violence and torture, so groups should calibrate boundaries before play. | The premise is the flock plotting a human's death, which will not suit groups uncomfortable with murder as the goal. The rules include no death for Crows: a Crow that takes a fourth Affliction leaves the scene or goes unconscious instead. There are no experience, advancement or campaign rules. |