{"id":88207,"date":"2026-09-27T06:11:00","date_gmt":"2026-09-26T22:11:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/sgbuzz.com\/?p=88207"},"modified":"2026-09-27T06:11:00","modified_gmt":"2026-09-26T22:11:00","slug":"former-dd-leads-say-critical-roles-daggerheart-represents-a-fundamental-shift-for-ttrpgs","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sgbuzz.com\/?p=88207","title":{"rendered":"Former D&D Leads Say Critical Role’s Daggerheart Represents a \u2018Fundamental Shift\u2019 for TTRPGS"},"content":{"rendered":"


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Chris Perkins and Jeremy Crawford are responsible for a lot of what Dungeons & Dragons looks like today. As two of the lead designers for the 5th edition of the game, they, along with Mike Mearls and many others, shaped much of D&D\u2019s modern look, work that later carried on into the game’s 5.5 edition.<\/p>\n

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The two worked not only on the core rulebooks for both 5e and 5.5e, but also authored some of the most iconic and successful adventures published in the past decade, including Curse of Strahd<\/em>, the best-selling D&D adventure of all time.<\/p>\n

I can only imagine, then, how challenging it must have been for Perkins and Crawford to step into uncharted territory when, in 2025, they both joined Critical Role\u2019s publishing arm, Darrington Press, to work on Daggerheart<\/em>, a game whose rules they didn’t design.<\/p>\n

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\n Chris Perkins and Jeremy Crawford discuss leaving D&D for Daggerheart
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Chris Perkins and Jeremy Crawford during a 2025 interview with Todd Kenreck<\/figcaption>Todd Kenreck via Polygon<\/small><\/figure>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n

\u201cFor me, it was super easy,\u201d Perkins says in a video interview with Polygon. \u201cEven working on D&D, we were building on the work of previous editions and the labors of the people who made those additions. It’s not like we were creating a game out of nothing.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cFor me, it’s actually been a delight,\u201d Crawford adds. \u201cDaggerheart <\/em>is such a fun system to not only play in, but to work on. It has enough flexible parts to take and use to build new things, but it is also a new enough system that there’s actually a lot of design space that we’re exploring for future products.\u201d<\/p>\n

Just like how every edition of D&D builds on previous iterations of the game, Daggerheart <\/em>has been influenced by many other TTRPGs, D&D included. For example, many of Daggerheart<\/em>\u2019s rules resemble D&D house rules that evolved organically over the years \u2014 for example, the Syndicate Rogue feature called \u201cWell-Connected\u201d is essentially the “I know a guy\u201d house rule.<\/p>\n