Chronicle game rules

You don’t roll for everything. Walking into a tavern just happens. You roll when it could go either way and it matters. Picking a lock while the guards are coming? Roll.

How many dice

• 3 dice, always. Everyone gets a fair shot.
• Plus your Stat. Each Stat is 0 to 3. How you do it picks the Stat: shoving the door is Strength, picking the lock is Agility.
• Plus 1 for a Trait or Bond that helps. You can add a second one for 1 Luck.
• Plus 1 for each friend who helps. If it goes badly, they share the trouble.
• Gear and conditions can add or take away dice.

You never roll fewer than 3 dice or more than 8.

Reading the dice

Count the 5s and 6s. Those are your successes. Then compare with the Target, which is how many you need. It’s usually 2.

The Target

The GM sets the Target before you roll. Most of the time it’s 2. Something easy might need just 1. Something really hard might need 3. Below the Target, any success is still a Partial success, so hard things usually get done. They just cost more.

Very hard is the exception: you need 3 successes, and there is no Partial. Anything less is a Miss. Save it for things that should only work if everything goes right.

On the tabletop the roll card says it for you: “Each 5 or 6 is a success. You need 2 successes. One success still gets you there, with a cost.”

Your character is mostly words. A few small numbers, and a lot of personality.

Stats

You have six Stats, each from 0 to 3. Start with 2, 1, 1, 1, 0 and 0 in any order. Your Role adds 1 more.

Traits

Traits are short phrases about who you are. “Never forgets a face.” “Dockside brawler.” “Too proud to back down.” When one fits what you’re doing, it adds a die. A second one on the same roll costs 1 Luck.

Traits cut both ways. When one gets you into trouble (pride won’t let you back down, the face you never forget recognises you too) and you play it out, you gain 1 Luck.

Bonds

Bonds are the people you care about, and how: “My brother Teodor. I’d burn Thornwharf for him.” You add a Bond to a roll just like a Trait when you act for, with or against them. When someone you’re bonded to gets hurt, you gain 1 Luck.

A good Trait helps on about one roll in three. “Strong” is too broad; it fits everything. “Good at arm-wrestling sailors” is too narrow; it never comes up. “Dockside brawler” is just right.

Making a character

1. Write one line about who you are.
2. Pick a Role: what you do. It gives you +1 to a Stat, a few talents, and starting gear.
3. Pick a Heritage and a Background if you like. Each gives you a Trait, and sometimes a talent.
4. Set your Stats.
5. Write three to six Traits, and a Bond or two.
6. Write a Goal: what does your character want most?

On the tabletop, each pick is one button. Everything it gives you can be rewritten.

Talents

Talents are special things you can do. Some you roll, like a sneak attack. Some are always on, like starting every fight hidden. A few are strong enough that you can only use them once per fight, and a rare few once per session. Your Role gives you a couple to start.

Once per fight means the talent comes back at your next Breather or Rest. Outside combat, a tense scene (an interrogation, a heist, a bargain) counts as a fight.

You can hold up to 3 Luck. You gain 1 when:

• you Miss;
• one of your Traits works against you and you play it out;
• you chase your Goal and it really costs you;
• someone you have a Bond with gets hurt.

Spend 1 Luck right after a roll to add one success: a Miss becomes a Partial success, and a Partial success might become a Success. One Luck per roll. You can also spend 1 Luck to add a second Trait before you roll.

So trouble now means a comeback later. On the tabletop, these are buttons on your sheet.

HP is how much punishment you can take. You start with 12 HP, plus 2 for each point of Strength. Getting hurt takes HP away.

• A Breather after a fight gives you back half your HP and readies your once-per-fight talents.
• A full Rest takes a safe night and one Rations, and brings all your HP back. With no Rations, you only get half.
• Healing, bandages and potions bring some back sooner.

At 0 HP you’re down: out of the fight. You’re not dead. Nobody’s character dies unless their player agrees it’s the right moment for the story. When the fight is over you get back up with 1 HP and a Scar: a new Trait about what it left you with. Like any Trait, it can help you, and the GM can use it against you.

Armour blocks some damage from every hit. Anything that gets through still does at least 1.

Taking turns

Every player takes one turn each round, in any order you like. On your turn you can move, do one thing that needs a roll, and do one quick thing, like drawing a sword or shouting a warning. At the end of the round, the enemies act.

Attacking

Roll your weapon’s Stat. Every success deals the weapon’s damage. Their armour takes a little off.

A Partial success still hits, but the enemy hits back: it strikes you for half its usual damage, and you Defend. A Miss gives it an opening: it attacks you right away, and you’re Exposed, so that hit deals 2 more.

Defending

The GM never rolls. When an enemy attacks you, the GM says how hard it hits (“The ogre swings. 9 damage.”) and you roll to Defend: Agility to dodge, Strength to block, or Will to grit your teeth and take it.

Each success blocks 2 damage. Then your armour blocks its share. Whatever is left comes off your HP.

On the tabletop, type the damage into the Incoming box before you roll, and your HP updates for you.

Conditions

Sometimes you’re Prone, Hidden, Shaken or Bleeding. Each one is a plain sentence like “1 die fewer on attacks.” The tabletop keeps track of them for you.

You have what your character would obviously have: food, a light, travel clothes, the tools of your trade. Nobody counts arrows or coins. You only write down gear that does something in the game.

• Weapons say how much damage each success deals, which Stat you use, and how far they reach.
• Armour says how much it blocks.
• Items can add a die to certain rolls, like a charm that helps you dodge, or give you a little extra HP.
• Consumables get used up, like bandages that heal 3 HP.

Your Role gives you starting gear. The GM can hand out more at any time, and the item library has plenty to choose from.

Magic in this world is real, but it always takes something back. A mage belongs to one school of magic, and each school uses one Stat. To cast, you roll like anything else, with two extra rules.

• You need a link to your target. Seeing it is enough, but a stronger link adds dice: touching it, holding something of theirs, knowing their real name, or having a deal they agreed to.
• It has a Price. When a spell works, the Price is 1 HP. Pay it now, or defer it as a Debt. On a Partial success the GM adds another cost too.
• Silence. On a Miss the world simply doesn’t answer. Nothing happens and no Price is owed.

Standing and Debts

How many Prices you can defer depends on your Standing, from 0 for a pauper to 3 for a great house. A deferred Price becomes a Debt. Debts grow heavier every time you reach a goal step, and the GM can call one in whenever the story suits. Someone always pays, and it isn’t always you.

Schools of magic

There are eight schools in Arkenfall. Each has its own practitioners, rolls one Stat, and leaves a sign that people learn to notice. Pick the one that fits your character; on the sheet, it’s the Magic choice.

The Answer

The Answer (its practitioners are called Askers, and it rolls Will): you ask, and something replies. It needs 2 successes to come at all, but when it does, every success counts double.

Magic can’t make something from nothing, can’t undo the past, and can’t force anyone who hasn’t agreed to it. Fire has to come from a fire. Healing has to come from someone willing to give it.

Your character has a Goal, broken into three steps. Each time you reach a step, you get an upgrade. Finish the Goal and you get two more, then write a new one.

Spend an upgrade on +1 to a Stat (max 3), a new Trait, a new talent, or +3 max HP.

Your job is to make the world feel alive, put interesting choices in front of the players, and let the dice surprise everyone, including you.

When to ask for a roll

• Only when failing would be interesting. If nothing is at stake, just say yes.
• Let the player’s description pick the Stat. If their plan is a stretch, raise the Target instead of saying no.
• Tell them what could go wrong before they roll. Costs should never feel like a trick.

Setting the Target

Costs

A Partial success is where the story gets good. When you can, offer the player a choice of two: “You grab the ledger, but either the guard sees you or you leave Teodor behind.” They stay in control, and you set the stakes.

Good costs are quick to say:

• they get hurt (lose 2 or 3 HP) or pick up a condition;
• they’re spotted, cornered, split up, or out of time;
• something breaks, a friend turns cold, a clue is lost;
• an enemy gets to act right now.

A Miss should change the situation, not stop the story. The door holds, and now the guards are coming.

Enemies

Enemies have HP, armour and a few moves. Their ordinary move happens every round. Special moves are their big tricks; use each one once per fight. Every enemy also has a weakness the players can find.

Enemies also act when the heroes slip: a Miss on an attack gives the enemy its ordinary move at once (with +2, because the hero is Exposed), and a Partial hit lets it strike back for half. This is what keeps a single boss dangerous against four heroes.

As a rough guide, against a hero in medium armour a standard enemy needs eight to twelve hits, an elite about four, and a boss can drop someone in two or three. Four heroes beat a standard enemy in about a round, an elite in two, and a boss in about four, usually with one hero down by the end. When the leader falls, the rest might run.

On the tabletop, switch any Chronicle sheet to Enemy and pick one from the bestiary. Its moves show up on the turn bar.

Keep it moving

• Never stall the game over gear or money. If they’d have it, they have it.
• When a player spends Luck, let it land. It means this moment matters to them.
• Say yes to good ideas. Make the dice decide the rest.

Looking after the table

Talk about tone and limits before you start, and check in as you play. The costs in Chronicle are there to make stories, not to punish anyone. If a cost would spoil someone’s fun, pick a different one. And no character dies unless their player agrees.