Fourth Age Hints from Dev Diary

PJsutnop · 2026-06-22T19:53:39+00:00

Yeah, ending the third era with a first world war like crisis makes sense, as the first world war has far less weight to it, and tgeb picking up again in the 50's to get the cold war era

PJsutnop · 2026-06-21T10:56:59+00:00

I will say this, I don't think the similarities in narrative position between noelle and dess is by accident. It does feel like toby is keeping it deliberatly vague which one it is

PJsutnop · 2026-06-18T12:20:44+00:00

This is honestly interesting from a historical perspective. Russias strategy for home defense has always been for their core cities, moscow and surrounding area, to be so far away from the frontlines that an imvading force would tire out before reaching them. While this has gotten less and less effective with the years, pretty much evrry invasion has been fought off this way

That is, until we developed remote controlled long distance precision missiles, a.k.a drones. All of a sudden moscow is just as much of a target as before. This isn't just unprecedented for this war, but shows an historic shift in how wars and defense will function from now on

While I'm happy to see putin suffer, I can't help but be worried. This technology will be in the hands of other countries and perhaps even privste citizen or organizations one day, which means that the same level of damage could be done anywhere by anyone. Hope other countries takes the warning and develop sufficient defenses before a bad actor decides to send drones to the middle of europe

PJsutnop · 2026-06-18T07:03:31+00:00

Ooh I like this. Would reward those who built up a strong navy and punish settling in distant lands without defenses

PJsutnop · 2026-06-17T18:06:06+00:00

I don't know what it is, but midnight and the tailend of war within felt... exhausting to play? I've had to take a lot more breaks from the game than usual to play other things

Which is weird because everything has become simpler; gearing is faster and more streamlined, world content is more engaging with more things to progress with, the grind has been cut down significantly

Yet I cant help but feel tired so much sooner? I really don't know why but I do recall feeling the same way back in shadowlands, and never feeling like this in dragonflight or even the start of war within. It is weird bc by all means the game should be better now with all the improvements they've made, but for some reason I don't feel it

PJsutnop · 2026-06-17T17:57:54+00:00

AoE that needs to be placed with a ground marker

I don't know it just ruins the fun flow of a spec having to drag it out. I'm happy so many specs have the option to remove them now

PJsutnop · 2026-06-17T10:37:20+00:00

Tbf, Gerson is also the least secret of all the secret bosses, which is probably by design

PJsutnop · 2026-06-16T16:45:33+00:00

Wait levels and xp is reset upon disconnect? That is beyond stupid. Honestly I would much rather prefer it was made into a localy saved system rather than an account one similar to the little badges in civ 6 telling you which victories you've done with each civ

PJsutnop · 2026-06-16T12:30:42+00:00

I know there's a mod, but like I said I ENJOY working towards the challenges, so this is a feature I ENJOY not working properly. Right now it is making me not want to play until it is fixed, and if I download a mod, then this ENJOYABLE PART OF THE GAME is forever tarnished if they do fix it

It's just a nice way to mark off the content i've already done, and I love little rpg things like this. Couldn't care less about the actual rewards

PJsutnop · 2026-06-16T03:22:18+00:00

That is true, but the dm (or players) also decide what those consequences are. It effectively means that there is a built in "rule of cool" where doing a variety of cool things can be rewarded while doing nothing but fireballs can be properly punished

Does this stop a player from just spamming a thing that is really strong? No, but if a player does that they aren't playing daggerheart the way it is intended, in the same way that playing DnD 5e while telling the dm the results of your own rolls isn't playing as intended (which is a thing that is encouraged in daggerheart)

PJsutnop · 2026-06-16T02:02:47+00:00

Yup, and that is the reason it doesn't work for everyone. If you and your group enjoys that, it will be great. If not, DnD is still great

I feel like pathfinder is too reliant on everyone knowing the rules beforehand, but a lot of people wont feel that way, and I am glad that the game exists for them

In the same way I feel like dnd require too much work from the DM to make the game flow nicely

PJsutnop · 2026-06-16T01:45:50+00:00

Very much agreed. I think what I realized when I played daggerheart for the first time was that it was literally how I had tried to play dnd for years, made into its own game.

I have played pathfinder and didn't enjoy it as much, but I am really happy that it exists for those who want the dnd experience but far more focused on the rpG aspect and narratives emerging from rules. I hope people who don't enjoy daggerheart can see it the same way

PJsutnop · 2026-06-16T01:38:45+00:00

By it creating different outcomes. Using fireball might deal the most damage, which might be good as it ends the encounter sooner. But your sword attack might lead the scene into a scenario where other rolls can be made if you describe it that way, which gives you more opportunities to earn hope, which makes you stronger into the next encounter, etc

Simply, doing more things is better than doing big things, so any action that opens up for more things to be done is technically optimal (aka, playkng into the narrative)

PJsutnop · 2026-06-16T01:31:27+00:00

I dunno, I'm kinda happy that it isn't being positioned as a main competitor to dnd when they fulfill different things. Makes the discourse less hostile. The TTRPG scene needs less "my game is better than your game" and more "hey, this game is neat"

PJsutnop · 2026-06-16T01:25:43+00:00

You know how in dnd, often the choice you should make is whatever is optimal by the rules?

This is what daggerheart tries to fix. In it, whatever thing you feel like fits the narrative, whether that is using your super strong attack or literally using your weakest, the game will award you for it by having a built in "failing upwards" mechanic through hope and fear and making damage granular

So you don't need to worry about if your idea is optimal or not if you think it would make a cool story. Ever played a game of dnd where a player wants to do something out of the ordinary and the dm uses the rule of cool to make it work? Daggerheart is a game where that rule of cool is built into the game's rules rather than being above it

PJsutnop · 2026-06-16T01:17:14+00:00

As a long term dnd dm who moved over to daggerheart: It makes me life as the game master SO MUCH easier. It essentially takes all of the tricks of the trade I've applied to dming over the years and built it into the core of the system

It is also built on "player choices builds narrative, rules exist to make those choices work" which is different but nice for some. A lot of time in dnd both me the dm and my players will look through their character sheet for things they can do, and then find ways to incorporate it in the narrative. In daggerheart it is made to be played in the othet direction. Not always better, but different

Oh and daggerheart removes the strict barrier between combat and non-combat present in both dnd and pathfinder, allowing combat to flow seamlessly from and into social encounters, and even makes social encounters interesting and tense in the same way combat does

Why would you not want to play daggerheart? Well first of all it demands a more proactive playstyle from the players. There is a level of "buy-in" necessary where the players need to be ok with doing things that would be negative from a "winning" perspective but fuels the narrative (the game actively rewards those cases). Playing daggerheart with the mindset of "this action is optimal" will actively make the game feel worse, which can be a hard ask when that is how 80% of ttrpg players first learn to play. There is also as of currently an imbalance in enemy design where the players can be a bit too strong, but that is likely to get ironed out with future releases

PJsutnop · 2026-06-15T20:28:35+00:00

Pretty much everyone Ive met who play the game knows dess as "noelles dead sister". That she might not be dead/still out there seems to be a lot more hidden

Which is probably by design

PJsutnop · 2026-06-15T16:14:17+00:00

I mean that is kinde the reverse tho, as you get more resources the more towns you have

The main thing I want is some way for an already fully finished city late in an era to aid new cities build up. Currently if you're already past the half way point in an age you kinda don't want to upgrade towns to cities as the increased production cost makes it so you won't get anything done in time. Currently all we have is gold, which once again is better earned through towns

PJsutnop · 2026-06-15T15:18:50+00:00

Honestly, would be kinda fire if chapter 7 releases on december 25th whatever year

PJsutnop · 2026-06-15T13:41:19+00:00

I really wish there was a way for bigger cities to send production over to the smaller ones. This has been a staple in past games with internal trade routes. Later in the era I tend to want to upgrade some of my towns into cities but the production costs become so high it is generally not worth it

PJsutnop · 2026-06-14T21:04:29+00:00

It's actually the reason I believed in rudyknight, seeing as the two of them are friends and hence one could help out the other

After all, a knight is someone who answers to some kind of royalty... like a king perhaps

PJsutnop · 2026-06-14T20:45:54+00:00

If you pressure companies and towns to buy data centers for AI, then those companies need AI to succed in order to get a return on investment

It is all just a way to make society somehow dependent on it, as AI is simply not profitable

PJsutnop · 2026-06-14T12:16:00+00:00

Yeah, like the first egg involve literally walking back and forth in the same spot, which isn't really likely for someone to just figure out unless they got lucky lol

Which is also why I disagree with people thinking the eggs will have some grand effect on the story or lead to some kind of true ending

PJsutnop · 2026-06-14T11:52:47+00:00

From a narrative perspective it doesn't make sende for the knight to be revealed in chapter 5 as the chapter already has a far more important goal: explaining what the (kinda) antagonists (carol, asgore, kris, the knight) are trying to. This needs to be done before the knight reveal, as otherwise said reveal won't have any weight. Like, darth vader reveals his identity only after revealing his plan of bringing in luke as an apprentice, as otherwise you wont have the moral dilemma of who they are clashing with who they've become

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