Making Moves

Just like the players have moves they can make during the game, you also have GM moves that help drive forward the fiction in response to their actions. Unlike the PCs, you are not typically bound by rules of success and failure on die rolls or given only certain effects you can do—your job is to facilitate the fiction, whatever that requires. GM moves provide inspiration on how you might make that happen.

At its most simple, a GM move is anything you do that guides the story forward. These moves often introduce conflict, reveal new information, or put the PCs in further danger, but they don’t have to—they are simply your opportunity to change the scene in some way. The “Softer and Harder Moves” section offers guidance on when your move should introduce danger or difﬁculty, versus when your move should simply nudge the story along.

Moves are your chance to make things happen in the scene. So what should you do? The upcoming sections provide suggestions, but these decisions are hard to make in a vacuum. The best tool you have at your disposal is listening to your players as they add to the narrative, then weaving your moves into the shared story.

When to Make a Move

Knowing when to make moves (and what kind of moves to make) is almost certainly the biggest part of learning to GM Daggerheart. The frequency and severity of these moves depends a lot on the kind of story you’re telling, the kinds of actions your players take, and the tone of the session you’re running, but the general rule of thumb is: You can make a GM move whenever you want. That’s right! You’re the GM—your job is not to crush the PCs or always act adversarially; your job is to help tell a story, so you should be making moves whenever you see an opportunity to do that.

Always consider make a GM move when a PC:

Rolls with Fear on an action roll.
Fails an action roll.
Does something that would have consequences.
Gives you a golden opportunity.
Looks to you for what happens next.

They roll with Fear on an action roll.

If a PC rolls with Fear, you always have the opportunity to make a GM move (see the upcoming “Fear” section). Whether their roll failed or succeeded, your move should usually build on the action the player just attempted.

Tip: We recommend you only choose to take a Fear when you can’t think of a GM move to use in the situation, or would prefer the narrative keep moving forward without interruption.

They fail an action roll.

If a PC fails an action roll (see “Action Rolls” in chapter 2), you have the chance to describe the failure and what comes next in the story because of it. If it’s a failure with Fear, consider choosing a more harsh consequence or complication than you would otherwise.

They do something that would have consequences.

Sometimes, a PC makes a move that would deﬁnitely have narrative consequences, regardless of whether they succeed or fail. In these situations, you can make a move to reﬂect that outcome. For example, if a PC wants to save someone from a building that’s engulfed in ﬂames, the player might say they want to run inside the building. You could tell the player that if they do, no matter how high they roll, they’re going to take damage from the ﬂames. If they move into the building anyway, you can deal them whatever damage makes sense for the story.

They give you a golden opportunity.

Sometimes, a PC’s decisions give you the perfect opportunity for a dramatic move—perhaps they move too close to a waiting predator or get distracted while keeping watch for intruders. In these cases, a roll doesn’t prompt your move, but you can seize the opportunity for a great dramatic beat. For example, if the PCs are hiding from bandits while discussing the bandit leader’s plans, a PC might say with dramatic irony, “But surely they won’t look in the eaves of every barn in the district!” In response, you might describe the barn door noisily swinging open as a bandit steps inside, a lit torch in one hand and a sword in the other.

They look to you for what happens next.

Your job is to keep the story moving, so when the players aren’t sure what to do, they’ll likely look to you for an idea of what happens next. This is usually a sign that you should make a move to forward the narrative. For example, if the PCs are conversing with each other during a dinner party then they reach a lull in the conversation, they might glance at you to see if it’s time for an NPC to speak or take action.

Similarly, make a move when the PCs seem to be stumped as to what course of action to take in a scene, or when the players seem frustrated about lack of information. When you need to get the scene moving again, a softer move usually does the trick (see “Softer and Harder Moves”), but sometimes a harder move is needed to provoke the PCs to action.

How to Choose a Move

When a player makes an action roll (see “Action Rolls” in chapter 2), the result inﬂuences how the scene changes—but those changes depend on your chosen GM move. Consider the following examples of what you might say to the player after an action roll, and what moves you might make:

“That’s a critical success! You get what you want and a little extra. Gain a Hope and clear a Stress . Tell me how this happens…” Let the player describe their success, then give the party an additional opportunity or advantage in the scene because of it.

“That’s a success with Hope, so you get what you want. Gain a Hope . Tell me how this happens…” Let the player describe their success, then show how the world reacts to it.

“That’s a success with Fear , so you get what you want, but it comes at a cost. Here’s what happens…” Work together to describe the PC’s success, then introduce a complication or cost—but don’t negate their success with this consequence. Maybe they face an attack or gain Stress from an enemy they’re engaged with, get new information that raises the stakes, or realize their ally is in imminent danger.

“That’s a failure with Hope, so things don’t go to plan, but you do gain a Hope . Here’s what happens…” Describe how the PC fails to get what they want, and how the situation goes wrong as a result, by introducing a minor complication or consequence. Maybe they spot a new danger they must now contend with, face an attack or take a Stress from an enemy they’re engaged with, or face collateral damage that puts them in a more difficult position.

“That’s a failure with Fear, so it doesn’t go well! Here’s what happens…” Describe how things go wrong by introducing a major complication or consequence. Maybe the information they get is not good news and also puts them in immediate danger, they become the focus of multiple adversaries, they are separated from their party, or an important opportunity is lost for good.

Tip: If you’re not sure how to resolve a roll, think about it like this:

***Success with Hope:*Yes, and… (You get what you want and take a Hope.)

Success with Fear: Yes, but… (You get what you want, but there’s a consequence.)

Failure with Hope: No, but… (Things don’t go as planned, but you take a Hope.)

***Failure with Fear:*No, and… (Things don’t go as planned and it gets worse.)

Obvious Moves

Sometimes, you’ll know without hesitation how to make a move in a scene. A PC just rolled a success with Fear on a melee attack against a powerful enemy? They get what they want, but it comes at a cost. In response, your move might have the enemy strike back or throw the PC across the battleﬁeld. Maybe you’ve set up the scene so that they’re ﬁghting on a precarious ledge, and the attack from the PC was successful, but momentum carries them dangerously close to the cliff’s edge and they now must make an Agility check to see if they can keep from slipping off.

Other times, the move might not be immediately obvious. In that case, you can draw inspiration from the following “Example GM Moves” section.

Player-Drive Moves

If you’re still not sure what to do, you might turn the decision over to the player, giving them an option of two different things or simply asking them what happens next. They will sometimes put themselves in a more interesting situation than you ever would have done on your own! As a last resort, if the scene should have a cost or consequence and you can’t come up with something, you can always simply have the player mark a Stress and move the scene forward.

Keep in mind, these moves can be used in any situation you ﬁnd them useful. While the mechanics of combat naturally lends itself to tracking when enemies attack, how much damage they do, and so on, the concept of “making moves” applies across all scenarios within Daggerheart. A tense dinner between rivals, an important negotiation, an emotional confrontation—all of these scenes have a back-and-forth between the PCs and the GM. You can use moves to accomplish the single most important part of GMing: listening to your players and responding in a way that builds on the ﬁction you’re creating together.

Avoid Undermining Success

On a success with Fear, one pitfall GMs can run into is undermining their players’ success when making a GM move as the consequence. For example, if a PC makes a Finesse roll in an attempt to move stealthily through a hallway, and they succeed but roll with Fear, don’t use your move to sound an alarm bell or make someone bump into them. The PC succeeded on the roll, and that success should be honored, even if it comes with a consequence. Instead, you could consider options such as introducing a new obstacle at their target destination.

Similarly, if a PC does something cool—such as cleverly casting a spell—you may want to let them enjoy it instead of immediately foiling their schemes, and decide to let the scene play out for a while. Once you feel like the player is satisﬁed with the effect, you can use a GM move and explain how the scene changes to end the effect. If the players are used to you following this approach, then when a particularly dramatic moment or powerful adversary arrives, you can make a big impression by using your move to shut down an effect immediately—showing just how dire the scene is.

Keep this principle in mind as you consider which moves to make (see “Example GM Moves” below), and implement the harder actions with care (see “Softer and Harder Moves” below). Stealing a powerful artifact from the adventurers can spark an exciting story arc—or it can throw icy water on the party’s excitement and make them feel all their work to retrieve it was pointless. As always, communication and collaboration are key, and hard actions shouldn’t negate player agency or feel punitive.

Softer and Harder Moves

When play turns to you, you have many options for how to respond. Some are soft moves that are generally easier on the players—they give the party new information about the scene and offer them an opportunity to react to it. Others are hard moves that are usually harsher, bigger or more direct—the ﬁction happens without the ability to intercede.

The next section contains examples of softer and harder moves in approximate order of severity. Remember that your choice of move is a powerful way to set the tone for a challenge or threat. Before making a hard move, consider whether a softer move might be a better ﬁt, but don’t shy away from hard moves when they further the story.

Example GM Moves

GM moves are your most important tool as a storyteller in Daggerheart. Everyone who picks up the game will interact with them in different ways, and that’s okay! The way you make moves truly defines the story you’re telling, so no GMs should feel like they have to use them the exact same way as anybody else. As long everyone is having fun, you’re staying true to the story, and you’re acting as a fan of your PCs, that’s what matters.

The following examples span the gradient from softer moves to harder moves. Rather than jumping straight to a hard move, it’s a good idea to look down the list until you ﬁnd the move that seems appropriate. Don’t describe your move in the terms used in this section, however—instead of saying “I show the cost of collateral damage“, contextulaize it for the players, describing how to comes to be and why the scene changes because of it.

When you make a GM move, you might…

Show how the world reacts.
Ask a question and build on the answer.
Make an NPC act in accordance with their motive.
Lean on the character’s goals to drive them to action.
Signal an imminent off-screen threat.
Reveal an unwelcome truth or unexpected danger.
Offer the PC what they want in exchange for marking a Stress.
Use an action the characters don’t see.
Force the group to split up.
Show the cost of collateral damage.
Make a character mark a Stress as a consequence for their actions.
End a temporary condition or effect.
Make an attack.
Gain a Fear (on a roll with Fear).
Spend Action Tokens.
Capture someone or something important.
Use a character’s backstory against them.
Take away an opportunity permanently.

Show how the world reacts.

To show how the world reacts, simply think about the way the PC’s move has affected the world and narrate that change in a way that drives the story forward. At its softest, you might describe them successfully breaking down a door, then give them a description of the next room and what danger they find there. You could also make the person they are negotiating with present an option for compromise, or have an enemy they just hit attempt to retreat. This is your opportunity to make the world around the PCs feel real and alive.

Ask a question and build on the answer.

This is perhaps the most collaborative move—presenting the player with a question, and using their answer as truth to build the scene. You might ask them something like, “What do you see here that reminds you of home?” or “What about this place tells you somebody else has been here before you?” Usually utilized when establishing information about a scene or when you’re interested in a specific character or player’s perspective on the current situation, this can be a great way to get the whole table involved in worldbuilding during the game.

Make an NPC act in accordance with their motive.

When a scene includes characters other than the PCs, you can spotlight what these NPCs are doing in response to the actions being taken. You might show a friendly NPC helping the party in a fight, a group of townsfolk taking cover, or an enemy moving positions. Make sure their actions always follow from their motive.

Lean on the character’s goals to drive them to action.

One of the most powerful things you can do as a GM in a scene is use something personal to the PCs to drive the fiction forward. If they have an NPC they care for, you might reveal something they desperately need or put them in danger. If they are seeking out a specific object or creature, you might reveal where it is and why it’s going to be so challenging to get there. Using a PC’s own desires to drive them forward is a great way to reinforce why this scene matters to them.

Signal an imminent off-screen threat.

The rustle in the trees, an alarm bell being sounded, the clanging armor of reinforcements headed their way—this move creates a ticking clock for your PCs in the scene. They need to get moving now.

Reveal an unwelcome truth or unexpected danger.

This is a very versatile move that’s usually applicable in any scene—you’re simply heightening the drama or tension in a narrative way. Maybe an unexpected person steps out of the shadows, or the characters receive is bad news or information that makes them rethink what they thought they knew. A soft version of this move might be to have a Guard Captain emerge to see what her guards are yelling about as you’re fighting them, or simply to move a group of dangerous foes into striking range of the party. A harder version of this move might be an enemy pinning a PC up against a wall or tackling them to the ground, making a PC Restrained until they make a roll to escape the adversary’s grasp.

Offer the PC what they want in exchange for marking stress.

The PC can can get it done, but it’s not going to be easy—this is usually used on a success with Fear when you’re not sure what other consequences apply. When you have a player mark a Stress, describe why it’s stressful in the narrative—or ask the player to do so. Is it physically taxing in some way? Does it bring up painful memories? Are they under significant pressure?

Make a move the characters don’t see.

This is usually most useful when you have something happening behind the scenes that you’re waiting to reveal. You might mark a GM clock, tick a current Countdown an additional time, add more damage dice to an enemy’s upcoming damage roll, adjust a narrative situation the PCs have yet to encounter, or anything else the players don’t see the result of immediately. When you do this, don’t tell them the move, but do create fun tension at the table by letting them know your machinations have changed: “Everything is ﬁne… for now.”

Force the group to split up.

Usually used as either an environmental hazard or an enemy’s trap, splitting up the party can make your players have to think differently than they normally would about how to accomplish a task. It can also make for some fun cutting back and forth in the scene as the two groups work independently before finding a way back to each other.

Show the cost of collateral damage.

This is a great move to use when the player tries to do something powerful and there’s a consequence. That fireball that missed? Maybe it went wide, struck the side of the mountain, and now they hear rumbling from above. An avalanche is headed this way. Whenever the PC does something that could have a significant impact on the world around them, you can use this move to show them the natural ramifications of that event.

Make a PC mark a Stress as a consequence for their actions.

In a parallel move to “Offer a PC what they want in exchange for stress,” this is usually used when a player fails a roll and you’re not sure what consequence to offer—they don’t get what they want and they mark stress because of it. Again, it’s important to investigate the why here. What about that failure is particularly stressful for them?

End a temporary condition or effect.

You can clear a temporary condition or other effect. In combat, you can easily do this by spending an action token (see “Activating Adversaries”), but you can use a move to end an effect at any time. If a PC just started using an effect, however, think twice before ending it—you’ll likely want to wait until ending it would be narratively satisfying, giving it a chance to play out and affect the scene ﬁrst.

When you make this move, lead with the narrative, describing who or what causes the effect to end, then how it changes the PC’s situation. For example, if an adversary is Vulnerable because they’re being held down by a tangle of vines, you might describe them using their blade to hack away at the vines to break free. Or if the effect is caused by a spell, you might describe the adversary unleashing a hail of arrows toward the caster, missing them but inhibiting their ability to focus on the spell any longer.

Make an attack.

This move raises the stakes of a scene very quickly. For example, maybe a discussion in a tavern escalates to violence, or a shady diplomat is tired of being questioned and tries to stab the PC with their hidden blade in an attempt to escape. When you choose to do this, you can have an adversary move anywhere within Close range, make an attack roll with your d20 (see “The GM’s Die” earlier in this chapter), then describe the attack and whether it succeeds or fails. If the PCs decide to ﬁght back, that’s a good time to bring out the action tracker. Once the action tracker is active, you don’t need to use this move to attack—instead, you’ll use action tokens to make future attacks (see “Spend Action Tokens” below).

Gain a Fear (on a roll with Fear).

On a roll with Fear, you don’t have to introduce an immediate cost or complication—instead, you can gain a Fear token and save it for later. When you make this move, describe how the tone or mood of the scene shifts and tension mounts before passing play back to the PCs. See the “Fear” section below for details on how you can later spend this token to augment the scene, such as by using an adversary’s Fear action or adding additional tokens to the action tracker.

Tip: If you are struggling to come up with the consequences of a PC who rolls a success or failure with Fear, this move lets you just take a Fear and move the story forward. But try to avoid making this choice too often—immediate consequences help to drive the story in unexpected and engaging ways.

Spend action tokens.

If the action tracker is active, you can spend an action token to activate an adversary or the environment. This often means making an attack roll, but can be anything that spotlights the adversaries’ tactics and motives or changes the environment in interesting ways. Some adversary and environment moves allow you to spend Fear (along with an action token) on especially unique or dramatic actions. You may also spend these tokens to end temporary conditions or effects. Once you are done spending tokens, play should pass back to the PCs.

Capture someone or something important.

Taking away something the party desperately wants or needs can quickly ratchet up the tension in a scene. You might knock a weapon from a PC’s hand, capture a fellow party member or ally of the group, or steal an object of power right from under their noses. These moves are an exciting, ﬁction-forward way to advance the story.

Use their backstory against them.

Integrating a player’s backstory into your move you make can leave a huge impact on the PC and make the story much more personal to them. Maybe someone from their past shows up here, or a mistake they made long ago catches up with them, or the scene simply parallels something they’ve already been through before—giving them the chance to make a different choice. By grounding the move in a character’s own experiences, it makes the moments that happen next in the scene matter even more to them.

Take away an opportunity permanently.

When things get really dire, sometimes the PCs forever lose the opportunity or opening they once had. A softer version of this move might be collapsing the party’s straightforward pathway through a cave system, forcing them to find another, more treacherous way through. As a harder application of this move, you might instead kill a valuable NPC or destroy a desperately needed object of power. These moves can be used to great effect when you want to twist the trajectory of the story in a new direction.