Director: Dylan Arena
Players: Alex Miller, Adrienne Mueller, James Lawton, Ryan Fox Squire, Sean Nittner
System: Draw Steel
I’ve wanted to play Draw Steel since I heard about it a year ago. I loved 4th edition D&D and as far as I can tell, this is an homage to that. I’ve looked for it at cons and it is never offered. I thought about buying the books to run a game myself but the price point was always just high enough that I didn’t want to buy them without first playing at least one game to see if I liked it. For SeanCon I made one request, for someone to run Draw Steel…and Dylan took up the challenge. I’m so glad he did. The game was a blast and I’m looking forward to playing it more!
Outside the village of Broadhurst, evil was afoot.
Our adventurers had only just arrived when a brawny smith ran into the inn begging for aid. Her daughter had been abducted and the local figures refused to help. “The Gilded Hand doesn’t work for free!” They said callously as they walked out of the inn.
We were not so heartless. At once our band of adventurers were on a quest, to rescue Violet from her goblin captors!
These were our heroes:
- Xena, the Talent, found speaking outload to be grotesque. As our self appointed leader, she gave us direction with her mind. [Ryan]
- Hrunk, the Conduit, a great champion of Grole the One-Handed, offered us succor when we would have otherwise fallen. [Adrienne]
- Mallory Warmhart, the Elementalist, a small creature of ignited the flames within and without! With rad teleportation skills too! [James]
- Glimmer Wind, the Troubador, young as Wode Elves go, she was full of spirit and life. [Alex]
- Saren, the Tactician. A high elf that had seen the fall of the Caelian Empire and countless other losses. He knew that our actions were likely folly, but that inaction would be worse. [Sean]
Highlights
Dylan was great at getting us right into the action. No dithering in the inn, rolling to find out way there, or excessive exposition. We agreed to help and started the adventure outside the tomb of Delius, noting goblins hiding in the bushes, ready to attack.
The character dynamics were delightful. Hrunk as our devout Conduit, Xena as our aloof leader, Glimmer Wind, always ready with a song. Very tropey, very fun.
Our first battle made use of high ground, forced movement to smash goblins into each other (and down stairs) and holding formation as needed to keep our elementalist and talent protected. There weren’t many real threats, but we got to try out our moves which was great.
The second battle was actually scarry. Getting shoved into the brazier was dangerous and since there were so many goblins it was impossible to keep ourselves from being pushed around by them. I loved learning how to coordinate with our recoveries and cool maneuvers. At one point I just decided it stay in the brazier and let my heavy plate armor gleam as they flames licked it. That way I couldn’t be shoved into it any more, and any goblins I grabbed would be burned. It only lasted a round, but it was cool as fuck.
Glimmer wind used a Power Chord to send all kinds of goblins into the brazier. She took out an entire squad in one go, I loved it.
Hrunk’s Healing Grace was incredible, it got us all back up on our feet (literally).
Xena totally saved Glimmer Wind by pulling her out of the fire and behind us. Then Hrunk healed her. TEAMWORK!
We were all pretty okay with making sub-optimal moves and learning from them. I think this is the way to play these games. Don’t go for perfection, go for learning!
My taunts, prepared ahead of time:
- “Tell me your name if you wish to be remembered. If a thousand years I will still walk the land, but you and everyone you have ever known will be naught but ashes.” I think I got a name from this one: Blagh. That also might have just been the sound of a goblin dying.
- Will your friends celebrate your short existence when you die, or will they forget how you toiled fruitlessly for the blink of an eye?
Thoughts on the Game
Dylan often asked what our attacks looked like and it was a good remainder that we were all collectively overwhelmed enough by the game mechanics that we often forgot to describe our actions. Because maneuvers often let you do something that would look like an attack in another game (grab, knockback, use a signature ability) that often means describing not one, but two cool things you do on a turn. I think with a bit more player skill.
I really like how the sample characters abilities are layered on between encounters. It felt very cool to be able to parry blows (though I didn’t use my concussive strike, I certainly will if we play again), but I was glad to digest the character abilities a bit at a time. It’s very smart as a tutorial.
A few rules we were unsure about. How do abilities that have multiple targets (but not AOE) work with squads. I.e. if I fire a Two Shot attack that does 8 damage to two targets that both have 5 stamina does that damage roll over like single target damage would?
Also, can abilities that say “Spend 1 Heroic Resource to do X” be used multiple times as part of the action? I.e. when the Talent uses Remote Assistance, can they spend multiple clarity to give multiple allies edge?
If you make an attack that targets multiple foes and you have edge on one of them (say, because they are marked) do you track potentially different results between foes?
Does reducing potency (say with the Parry move) reduce forced movement? In the game I thought it did, but now that I look again, I’m not sure.
I was disappointed with taunt, because I was only able to lock down one foe at a time (had I used my mark better, I think I could have locked down at least one more). My guess is that in other fights with fewer, tougher foes it would work better, but I really wanted to lay down the taunts.
I’m not convinced surges add anything to the game. It feels like the could have just been replaced by saying “anyone can spend their heroic resources to do X” and then have abilities that give surges give heroic resources. Between the individual heroic resources, surges, and hero tokens, I think we had one too many currency.
I love that you don’t go unconscious when dying. Bleeding is terrible, but if your friends can give you recoveries (and we could) you can heal back up before having to take an action. Nice.
Critical Hits feel fucking awesome in this game. Getting a Tier 3 result and then getting to take another action is so fucking cool.
Just look at these happy nerds:
Questioned asked in the Draw Steel Discord:
Q: When an ability says you can spend a heroic resource for an effect, can do that multiple times. For instance, when the Talent uses Remote Assistance, can they spend multiple Clarity to give multiple allies edge?
A: Only if it has a + in it. So Remote Assistance no, but Minor Telekinesis yes, for example.
Q: If you make an attack that targets multiple foes and you have edge on one of them (say, because they are marked) do you track potentially different results between foes?
A: When an ability has multiple targets (whether a strike with more than one target or an area affect), you make one power roll and apply the total to all targets. If you have edges or banes (see Chapter 1: The Basics) against some but not all of your targets, you might apply a different tier outcome to individual targets.
Q: Does reducing potency (say with the Parry move) reduce forced movement?
A: No. The potency is only the X
Thanks Sean! Fun write up, and thanks for clarifying rule questions
So indeed, when I was giving every member of the party edge, nearly every round of combat, and it felt like cheating, it was indeed cheating.
Lesson learned! Would have been even harder!
I wouldn’t feel too bad about it. You could have still given it to two of us and I’m not sure we always remembered to use it.
But good to know for next time!
I’ll chime in with another thank you for Dylan, and all the players, and Sean for the AP report.
I enjoyed Draw Steel, especially how dynamic the combat felt, with a ton of movement and interesting triggered moves. And I agree that the tutorial structure was great.
A recent Ginny Di video that just got served to me made me interested to see how the Draw Steel negotiation mechanics work in practice. It does seem to address a lot of the problem that you always just want to use your face character for social contests in D&D. Ginny is mostly a D&D YouTuber, and thinks the negotiation system is pretty transferable.
Yeah, I’ve see Matt talk about it and as well as Dadi in Mystic Arts. Negotiation looks like it’s a more nuanced version of the 4th edition skill challenge where rather than losing the challenge after 3 failed rolls, once the person you’re talking to runs out of patience they make a final offer based on their interest. So you might not get exactly what you want, but it isn’t automatically a complete failure either.
One of my tactician abilities is to give all party members a Double Edge when trying to end combat to negotiate. It hadn’t unlocked in the two encounters we had, and I also didn’t think it made sense for either of them, but I can imagine say, if Violet’s life was in jeopardy, breaking from a combat and turning it into a negotiation.