Shadowrun vs Spire: The City Must Fall

Compare Shadowrun and Spire: The City Must Fall side by side. See differences in complexity, dice, genre, cost, and more.

	Shadowrun	Spire: The City Must Fall
Genre	Cyberpunk, Fantasy	Fantasy
Play Style	Crunchy, Tactical, Heist, Character Building, Faction Play, Lore-Heavy, Skill-Based, Mission-Based, Urban Fantasy	Dark Fantasy, Narrative, Character-Driven, Espionage, Social Intrigue, Fiction-First, Gritty, Deadly, Mission-Based, Roleplay-Heavy
Core Mechanic	Roll a pool of d6s equal to attribute + skill, counting 5s and 6s as hits. Meet or exceed a threshold to succeed. Situational advantages generate Edge points rather than modifying dice pools directly; Edge is spent on tactical effects like rerolling dice, adding successes, or imposing penalties on opponents.	Roll a pool of d10s (one base die, plus an additional die each for having the relevant skill, domain, and mastery) and take the highest result. Results run from 1 (critical failure, double stress) through 2–5 (failure), 6–7 (success at a cost), 8–9 (success), to 10 (critical success). Difficulty reduces the pool by 1–2 dice.
Dice	d6 dice pool	d10 dice pool
Complexity	Very High	Medium
Accessibility	High	High
Runnability	Very High	High
License	No open license	All Rights Reserved
Cost	$$$	$$
Publisher	Catalyst Game Labs	Rowan, Rook and Decard
Year	2019	2018
Best For	Groups who want cyberpunk-fantasy heists with deep mechanical subsystems for hacking, magic, and combat.	Groups who want long-form campaigns as operatives in a revolutionary resistance movement, where faction politics and moral compromise shape each session as much as the missions themselves.
Highlights	The setting fuses megacorporate intrigue with magic and metahuman races, so a single team mixes street samurai, mages, and deckers. Distinct subsystems model Matrix hacking, spellcasting, drone rigging, and astral space, each carrying its own rules depth. The Edge economy converts situational advantages into a spendable resource for rerolls, extra hits, or penalties on opponents.	Five separate resistance tracks (Blood, Mind, Shadow, Reputation, Silver) let different types of harm accumulate independently, each with its own fallout table. Fallout mechanics convert accumulated stress into concrete narrative consequences (broken limbs, criminal records, vendetta NPCs, or being burned by the Ministry) rather than flat stat penalties. NPC Bonds maintain their own stress tracks; calling in favors puts allies at risk, and bond fallout can cost safe houses, informants, or key relationships. Character advancement is tied to changing the city itself: small changes earn Low advances, moderate changes Medium, and huge or irreversible changes High. The change does not have to be for the better.
Considerations	Matrix hacking runs on its own timescale and can leave non-decker players idle during a run. Character creation spreads across attributes, skills, magic or resonance, gear, and lifestyle, making the first build long. Dice pools grow large at high skill, so counting hits on a fistful of d6s slows resolution.	The drow revolution premise is deeply embedded in the fiction; the game is built around this specific setting and repurposing it for other campaigns requires significant adaptation. Combat has no rounds, turns, or initiative system; engagements are resolved as a narrative conversation with the GM choosing the order of action. Fallout can permanently remove or severely restrict character capabilities, including arrest, lost limbs, or exile from the Ministry.