Richard and Karl Play Daggerheart

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Welcome to Richard and Karl Play Daggerheart—part actual play, part GM roundtable. Download free play along content at https://rajkevis.itch.io In each episode, Richard and Karl bring the world of Daggerheart to life through immersive gameplay, then break it down behind the screen. After the dice settle, they dive into what worked, what didn’t, and how to run it better—sharing insights, tips, and lessons for both new and veteran Game Masters. Whether you're here for the story or the strategy, this podcast is your companion for mastering the heart of Daggerheart. 

  1. 5d ago

    Episode 18: Parking Fines And Murder Raccoons

    Send us Fan Mail We bounce from AI privacy frustrations and hidden campus resources into a high-stakes Daggerheart session where a petty arrest spirals into murder, framing, and open warfare. We level up Karl’s Juggernaut, stress-test combat options, and unpack GM techniques for delivering lore without stalling the action.  • debating AI subtitles, targeted ads and consent around contact data  • discovering a library collaboratorium makerspace with 3D printers, drones and a holo room  • breaking down anime pacing and why modern adaptations feel breathless  • opening the Daggerheart session with a mundane arrest and a dangerous setup  • leveling to six, weighing multiclassing vs subclass upgrades and proficiency choices  • adding a homebrew “take a scar” option to keep players in the fight  • running a timed investigation scene where each skill check unlocks different lore  • surviving a city battle, pain beast ambush and a chase after a raccoon assassin  • negotiating a risky alliance and clarifying the campaign’s stakes  • assigning homework to build Zippo as an NPC or a second character sheet  Support the show Download episode content at https://rajkevis.itch.io/

    2h 16m

  2. Jun 12

    Episode 17: When The Rat Cult Wins

    Send us Fan Mail We debate why D&D 5.5 feels less deadly, then test Daggerheart’s “death is a choice” philosophy in the worst possible way when a sewer cult, a rat demon, and a jar of serpent sickness collide. We walk through the mechanics behind Hope, Fear, death moves, and scars, then do a GM teardown of how a solo character can accidentally turn a side quest into a citywide disaster.  • D&D 5.5 changes that lower lethality, from healing to damage guidance  • Why modern TTRPGs move away from permadeath as character writing gets deeper  • Daggerheart death moves, player psychology, and why “avoid death” feels bad  • Homebrew idea to always take a scar when exiting the scene  • Finding a D&D group through random players and what actually works  • Forgotten Realms novel publishing and a pitch for a fan literary magazine  • Strange Horizons rejection and what “fit” means for submissions  • Actual play setup: meeting the king, undercity masks, and information brokers  • Trading for sketchy “fire resistance” salve and an improvised invisibility potion  • Ratfolk clinic politics, old grudges, and the offer to pressure the crown  • Cult ritual countdown, demon summon threat, and fear driven escalation  • Post game breakdown: event cards, adversary roles, and solo balance problems  Send us those comments in shade. Tell me why I’m wrong about this game.  Buy our stuff on itch.io. Or don’t. Download it for free, I don’t care.  Support the show Download episode content at https://rajkevis.itch.io/

    2h 17m

  3. May 22

    Running The Wish Thief One Shot

    Send us Fan Mail We run Daggerheart’s free adventure The Wish Thief and stress-test its mystery, chase, and combat pacing while riffing on why D&D 5.5 feels like a half-step that adds table friction. We end up with a stolen wish tiara, a countdown-driven investigation, a night festival chase, and a dockside showdown that gets messier than planned.  • GM and player dynamics and why tables thrive on bold choices  • D&D 5.5 edition drift and why small changes can create big confusion  • How internet feedback and focus grouping can flatten creative design  • Using collaborative worldbuilding prompts to build a city fast  • Running a gifting ceremony as a structured improv mini-game  • Investigation countdown pressure and the “quantum culprit” approach  • Chase mechanics that stay playable and cinematic  • Keep-away combat objectives and why they beat pure damage races  • Post-session critique on what we would run differently next time  Donate to the Osborne collection of childhood literature, like legitimately. Donate to libraries.  A bunch of our adventures are up on Itch.io, and I am planning to put up more this weekend.  Support the show Download episode content at https://rajkevis.itch.io/

    2h 28m

  4. May 8

    Episode 15: Lightning Volcano And Fire Cats

    Send us Fan Mail We bounce from game dev brain rewires to interactive fiction teaching war stories, then drop into Daggerheart where a lightning volcano turns exploration into a survival puzzle. We bribe fire cats with fish, steal a power boost from a wounded tree spirit, and learn the hard way that waking a dragon on purpose has consequences.  • Unity Vector2 and Vector3 as more than coordinates  • Using vectors for distance, angle, and force in physics  • Designing a bot opponent with A star pathfinding  • Why easy mode should make imperfect choices  • The Shawshank Redemption as a masterclass adaptation  • Teaching Twine and Inform 7 to humanities students  • Inform 7 prose rules and world simulation logic  • Grad school travel budgeting and conference panels  • Daggerheart exploration at the lightning volcano  • Fire cats, offerings, and the burning heart tree  • Siphoning gauntlets and the decision to fight  • Dragon horde reveals and a brutal solo battle  I’ll eventually get around to putting more free adventures on Itch.io now that I’m on summer vacation in air quotes  I also put my Inform 7 text-based game on my Itch.io for free    Support the show Download episode content at https://rajkevis.itch.io/

    2h 14m

  5. Apr 3

    Episode 14: Shark Dentist

    Send us Fan Mail We spiral from a decade long Unity project and Windows upgrade paranoia into a Daggerheart session where the ocean itself tries to kill us. Lyra rows into a petrified ash town, picks a fight with the supernatural, and barely escapes a lightning lava nightmare with a pocket full of weird loot. • Unity dev setbacks, Visual Studio autocomplete failure, and the one setting that fixes everything  • Windows 11 TPM requirements, registry workarounds, and why you should fact-check us  • School overload, writing feedback, and the strange logic of ordering drinks you dislike  • Shark combat tactics, water disadvantage rulings, and becoming the shark dentist  • Looting an ash-covered general store for practical gear and a premium bedroll  • A haunted city “echo” with a five turn disaster countdown and spectral attackers  • Escaping by boat as blue magma hits seawater and the world snaps back  • A hidden cat cave, a journal-poem, and lore threads tied to electricity  • A cliff climb progress counter, Fear management, and an earned portal seed  Thank you, people who have been supporting the campaign by buying our itch.io modules. Support the show Download episode content at https://rajkevis.itch.io/

    1h 57m

  6. Mar 6

    Episode 13: What Do We Owe A Captive Flame?

    Send us Fan Mail A quick detour through two-player greatness—Fox in the Forest, The Crew, and the new Lord of the Rings co-op trick-takers—turns into a full-blown design jam on how theme should shape mechanics, not just decorate them. That idea becomes our compass as we rejoin Daggerheart mid-battle, where grayscale koi bend time long enough for a desperate sprint to the boats and a hard-earned rest that unlocks a level 5 glow-up. We name our signature move—Precise Pressure Points—dial up combo potential, and feel how character growth can be both math and meaning. Once aboard, the world gets thornier. The ship’s engine room hides a hamster wheel powered by a captive fire spirit, a “cleaner” alternative sold as pragmatic and humane. Is a storm a someone? Can you free a force that doesn’t negotiate? Before we can answer, the cafeteria becomes a stage: chili that burns a little too perfectly, four “nurses” with the wrong posture, a bandaged tattoo, and an engineer who’s awfully good at the captain’s lock. We lean on instincts and sleight-of-hand—apology dabs, quiet poisons, and a spinning kick that lights out three at once—then unmask the saboteur at the skull-and-crossbones door. This one blends game design talk with crunchy tabletop moments: detecting lies in flavor text, reading a room like a hand of trumps, and deciding whether utility justifies a cage. We also get some real-life texture—DIY craft vs AI shortcuts, the joy of time reclaimed after a move, and why protests need clean asks to land. By the end, the assassins are in irons, our reputation with Haven soldiers spikes, and the moral question of the spirit engine still hums beneath the deck. Sail with us toward the glassed coast, where the choices only get sharper. If you enjoyed the ride, follow and subscribe, share with a friend who loves card games and chaotic RPGs, and drop a review telling us: would you free the flame or keep the ship running? Support the show Download episode content at https://rajkevis.itch.io/

    1h 60m

  7. Jan 16

    Episode 12: A Fortress, A Turtle, And A War Doctor’s Dilemma

    Send us Fan Mail A fortress rides in on the back of an elder mountain tortoise. The grass dies ahead of its march. Our lighthouse hospital—powered by a star-drawn barrier of blue roses—has hours before dusk, and a withering mage on the ramparts is already carving rot into the wall. We’re in charge, like it or not, and the choices aren’t pretty: fortify the gate to funnel the fight, or seal it and dare them to scale the walls. Count boats against bodies and hope the math bends. Arm a medical camp without losing its soul. We pull the camera tight on Lyra, seven years wiser and suddenly the highest-ranking medic on site. Volunteers line up—a brusque Goliath, a twitchy smuggler, a one-legged draconian with taped scalpels—and we get to work. Acid vials from the lab. Shrapnel bombs packed with syringes. Drip fang and gorgon root poisons ready for last resort. Ravens scatter with pleas for help while storm-prayer stitches lightning into the clouds. The barrier brightens with fertilizer and fades with fear. Then the line breaks in the most direct way possible: a sprint into the sea of steel. We showcase how to run mass combat that stays cinematic and clear—spotlighting clusters, using environment cards, and letting minion math carry tempo. Knights charge and get staggered. Elites crumple under combo spikes. A syringe-bomb detonates mid-command. The mage’s beam scythes the wall. Boats belch black smoke on the horizon. It’s tactics and storytelling in lockstep: how to use terrain, time, and fear as resources, and when to trade pride for people. We leave on a razor’s edge. Reinforcements hit the dock as the turtle fortress presses closer, the barrier flickers, and the field swarms with conscripts and archers. Next up, we choose: retreat to save the camp, hold for a siege, or gamble on a counterstrike up the shell. If you love story-driven TTRPG combat, improvised defenses, and hard calls under pressure, this one delivers. Enjoyed the ride? Follow, share with a friend who loves actual play, and drop a review with your answer to the big question: retreat, hold, or assault the turtle? Support the show Download episode content at https://rajkevis.itch.io/

    2h 42m

  8. 12/09/2025

    Episode 11: Bear Jaws, Blue Lights, And Bad Choices

    Send us Fan Mail A joke about chocolate breath turns into a sharp look at how fantasy worlds inherit bias—and what designers and GMs can do to fix it—before we throw Lyra headfirst into the Witherwild. The fight is fast and feral: a fungus-laced bear, a brawler’s surge, and a transformation that exacts a brutal price. Daggerheart’s stress and hope economy isn’t flavor text here; it shapes the story beat by beat and leaves Lyra with blood on her hands and a blue light in the distance. That light belongs to a coastal medical camp wrapped around a lighthouse that drinks moonlight. Inside the stone walls, doctors in masks triage burns, ledger books stretch back centuries, and an elf with a cane resets bones with unnerving calm. Lyra sneaks through sealed labs and finds the red heart of the camp: a crimson lily whose twenty petals can depetrify the serpent sick—if you can live with the math. She also finds something worse: vials of the sickness itself, locked down like contraband. One theft later, the gates slam shut. The camp hunts a phantom. Rumors bloom. Procedure grinds on. And Lyra, restless and scared, frames a man who can’t prove a negative. We sit with that choice. A week becomes a month. Lyra folds gauze, runs water, and learns names. She befriends a nurse, watches lightning climb a mountain, and realizes that safety can be a place you earned, not a place you found. When the convoy to Alura finally forms, she doesn’t go. We end on a time skip fork and a level up, with a debrief on why Daggerheart’s stagger feels fair, why 5e’s bloat nudges tables away from cohesion, and how a session zero can defuse party friction before it explodes. Support the show Download episode content at https://rajkevis.itch.io/

    2h 6m
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About

Welcome to Richard and Karl Play Daggerheart—part actual play, part GM roundtable. Download free play along content at https://rajkevis.itch.io In each episode, Richard and Karl bring the world of Daggerheart to life through immersive gameplay, then break it down behind the screen. After the dice settle, they dive into what worked, what didn’t, and how to run it better—sharing insights, tips, and lessons for both new and veteran Game Masters. Whether you're here for the story or the strategy, this podcast is your companion for mastering the heart of Daggerheart. 

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