Additional Rules

The following rules apply to many aspects of the game.

Rounding Up

This game doesn’t use fractions; if you need to round to a whole number, round up unless otherwise specified.

Rerolling Dice

When a feature allows you to reroll a die, you always take the new result. You do not choose between the first result and the new one, unless the feature specifically says that you can.

Incoming Damage

When a feature refers to incoming damage, it’s describing the damage amount a target is currently receiving. For example, the dwarves' “Increased Fortitude” feature allows a PC to spend 3 Hope to halve incoming physical damage. This means that the GM tells the player how much damage their PC is taking from an attack. The player can then decide to spend 3 Hope to take half as much damage instead. If the player wanted to do this again on an additional attack, they’d need to spend another 3 Hope.

Simultaneous and Stacking Effects

If two or more effects can apply to a situation, and the rules don’t tell you which order to apply them in, the player controlling the effects (including the GM) can apply the effects in any order. For example, if one ability lets you spend a Hope to retaliate after an attack, and another ability lets you gain a Hope when you mark a Hit Point, you can decide to gain the Hope first, then spend it to make the attack. Similarly, if you have multiple moves that can trigger in a situation (such as two moves that occur “after a successful attack”), you can use them together and choose in which order to activate them. If you want to apply two or more effects, they must both be able to successfully resolve to be used together. Otherwise, you must choose which one applies. For example, if you can clear a Stress every time you roll with Fear, and you have an ability that lets you make a roll with Fear into a roll with Hope, you can’t clear a Stress and then change the roll to be with Hope instead of Fear. As always, if there’s any uncertainty, the GM arbitrates how effects apply. At the GM’s discretion, most effects can stack. For example, if two bards give you a Rally Die, you can spend both of them on the same roll. However, you can’t stack conditions, advantage or disadvantage, or other effects that say you can’t.

Ongoing Spell Effects

Once a spell's effect is in play, as long as it doesn’t mention an expiration, it continues until a PC or the GM ends it, or until the fiction changes in a way that would naturally stop it. This means that if you cast a spell and then switch out that domain card for another in your vault, the spell’s effect can remain active, even though that card is no longer in your loadout.

Spending Resources

If a rule tells you to spend a resource, you lose that resource once you spend it. For example, when you spend a Hope on an ability, you clear a Hope that you’ve marked on your character sheet. Similarly, if a bard gives you a Rally Die, when you choose to spend it and add its result to your roll, you lose that die and return it to the other player. Unless an effect states otherwise, you can’t spend Hope or mark Stress multiple times on the same feature to increase or repeat its effects on the same roll. For example, if a feature says you can “spend a Hope to add 1d6 to the damage roll,” you can’t spend 2 Hope and add 2d6 instead. If a feature says “mark a Stress to gain a +3 bonus to your Spellcast Roll,” you can’t mark 2 Stress and gain a +6 bonus. However, on an effect like the Guardian’s Hope Feature, which says “Spend 3 Hope to clear 2 Armor Slots,” you can spend 6 Hope to clear 4 Armor Slots, because this effect isn’t applying its bonus to a specific roll—you’re just activating the feature more than once.

Using Features After a Roll

Some features let you affect a roll after the result has been totaled—such as the seraph’s “Prayer Dice,” the faerie’s “Wings,” or the Grace domain’s “Endless Charisma.” In this case, you use it after the GM declares if the roll succeeds or fails, but before the narrative consequences unfold (such as damage being rolled) or another dice roll is made.

End of the Scene

Sometimes certain effects, bonuses, or conditions state that they last until the end of the scene. At the GM’s discretion, a scene continues until the current narrative situation has played out. A chase scene might end when the PCs have caught their quarry or when they’ve escaped pursuit. A battle scene usually ends when one side has fled, surrendered, or been entirely defeated. If there’s uncertainty about when a scene is considered to be over, throw it to the table and see what the players think makes sense. You don’t have to linger in a scene after the most engaging actions and interactions have occurred. If you want to play out their implications or process the emotions but the heat of the moment has passed, that aftermath can take place in its own scene.