Rapscallion vs Swashbucklers of the 7 Skies
Compare Rapscallion and Swashbucklers of the 7 Skies side by side. See differences in complexity, dice, genre, and more.
| Rapscallion | Swashbucklers of the 7 Skies | |
|---|---|---|
| Genre | Fantasy | Fantasy |
| Tags | Narrative, Pirates | Tag-Based, Fiction-First, Cinematic, Pirates, Ship-Based, Heroic |
| Core Mechanic | Roll 2d6 + trait (Blood, Vinegar, Polish, or Spitfire). On 10+ you succeed cleanly, 7–9 with a cost, 6– and things go wrong. Players choose from 6 character playbooks and 2 ship playbooks. Luck can be spent to Twist Fate (reroll), and the Ante system tracks escalating combat advantage. The Fates (GM) use worldbuilding moves to create a living fantasy pirate setting with magic rooted in Death, Demons, the Sea, and Books. | 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 | 2d6 | 2d6 / 3d6 |
| Complexity | Low | Medium |
| Availability | Free quickstart | Paid |
| Runnability | Book tools not listed | 4 of 5 book tools |
| License | Proprietary | Proprietary |
| Third-Party Publishing | Not yet researched | Not yet researched |
| Publisher | Magpie Games | Evil Hat Productions |
| Year | 2024 | 2009 |
| Languages | English | English |
| Best For | Groups who want a narrative pirate RPG with dramatic character relationships: where your ship has its own playbook, magic comes from dark pacts, and the dice swing between daring success and messy complication. | 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 | Ship-as-character with its own playbook adds group dynamics, Ante system makes combat escalation feel cinematic, worldbuilding tools (World With Laws vs World Without Laws), Magpie Games pedigree, free quickstart to try before buying | 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 | Only a quickstart: full game not yet released, limited to 6 playbooks, pirate fantasy genre is narrow, requires buy-in from the whole table for PbtA-style play, light on crunch | 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. |