So I’m about to convert another group to WFRP 4e that I previously played D&D with. That will be the fourth group now - all with campaigns still running 6+ months later and in one case years later - which is nice. I thought I would give examples of a few of the things that I really like about the system that makes it different to D&D and it’s various incarnations.
One of the first big differences is the removal of resource management as the main method of challenging the PCs. Not a per-day, or per-encounter ability in sight. Spells can be freely cast without slots though they do carry an element of risk to counter this. Health of characters is represented by a small number wounds recoverable with non-magical means, and injuries which take longer to heal. This leads to is a game that isn’t slaved to the ‘adventuring day’. The DM isn’t waging a war of attrition on the players - trying to whittle down their abilities to get some jeopardy in the fight. There’s no such thing as nova. Every encounter stands on its own merit and there’s no need for the filler encounters we often see in D&D adventures. That’s quite liberating as both a DM and a player. If you want a campaign spread over days or an intrigue with only a few combats, you are sorted.
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When it comes to hitting folks with sharp objects, WFRP 4e moves away from D&Ds approach of testing an attacker’s skill at arms against a defender’s armour. Instead it pits the attacker’s skill against the defender’s skill. The difference between this opposed roll forms the variable part of damage instead of a second damage roll. Armour is then combined with Toughness to act as a damage soak. There are three big impacts of this… firstly damage can swing wildly and therefore a hit is unpredictable unlike the quite predictable damage in D&D. Secondly it lets you be a great fighter because your skill with your weapons makes it so, rather than needing a suit of plate or high dex to defend yourself. An upside of all this is that suddenly unusual skills can be used as interesting and viable alternatives. Want to play a silver tongued courtier - defend yourself and even issue instructions with the Charm or Intimidation skills. Or use animal training to defend against wild animals.
This variety extends to the general tactics of combat which are far more nuanced than D&D. Being engaged in combat is not a question of who you’re standing next to in combat but who you attacked or who attacked you in the last turn. The benefit for attacking someone already engaged is substantial but so is tying them into combat. Ranged weapons get big bonuses for being closer and range can affect how the ranger reacts. All weapons have interesting and substantial abilities that can change how they play. For instance a rapier is fast and the wielder can choose where they go in the initiative order. An axe can hack and damage the foe’s armour. There are many other great tactical nuances. Sitting over all these choices is the advantage system with the choice of running an individual or group system. We run with the group choice (because get on well ) which generates a pool of points that can be spent by any player to boost a roll, perform a combat trick or even gain an extra action. Every successful opposed roll (attack or defense) builds advantage and it is fully integrated into the system with talents and skills in a way that hero points or D&D advantage isn’t. These many choices make combat interesting and not just a question of hacking away at sacks of hp.
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WFRP’s Career system is pretty famous and justly so. You pick any one of 50+ careers to inform your starting skills, talents, ability scores and trappings. They also define your status in society, your income and which of the for-mentioned skills, talents and ability scores you can easily develop. Characters improve their abilities organically and incrementally with diminishing returns for spending XP on the same thing repeatedly. Careers have prerequisites to progress through four stages. For instance informer > spy > agent > spymaster. Each tier opens up more skills and talents that can be developed. Though if you decide your noble wants to become a duelist they can spend a little XP and change to a tier 1 career. This cost increases if you haven’t developed in key ways to discourage dipping for specific skills and talents. It’s also possible to train other skills and abilities outside of your career by finding a trainer and spending some silver and extra XP. Better to think of careers as less of a straight jacket and more of a recipe - suggested ingredients with the options to add more or less to taste or even add your own. New players can stick to the measurements while experienced hands are able to experiment.
More so than any other game I’ve played WFRP 4e let’s you explore social encounters mechanically. Core to this is the status system ranks all careers in three tiers that correspond with the coinage that class most uses - brass for peasants, silver for professionals and gold for the elites. Each tier also has a standing score between 1-5 within it. Your relative status can affect Charm tests and other skills like Leadership and Intimidate. On top of using these skills in combat there are also fun rules for bribery where a successful check lets you find out if they can be bribed and then play a higher/lower game to narrow down what it might cost you. You can blather to actually stun an NPC for a few rounds or cause your enemy to fear you with Intimidate. Even inspire your friends with Leadership to bolster their courage. Most of these effects can be resisted with the Cool skills that represents your resistance to psychological pressure. Including the various psychological effects like fear, terror, hatred, and frenzy.
I’ll freely admit that there are some draw backs. This system is definitely not for everyone. Firstly it is not balanced. It doesn’t even try to be balanced. Some weapons are just flat out better than others though they will be useful in different circumstances. A herbalist is unlikely to be as good in combat as a knight. Some characters can start with a horse, others with good armour. Spells aren’t restricted by level but rather difficulty and magic users take a while to get good at magic then become very good. While priests can bless very easily from the get go. Elves and Dwarves have vastly better starting stats but are punished with less metacurrancy (which is a big deal). As long as you don’t expect all characters to be equally effective at the same things you should be ok. Of course there’s nothing stopping that herbalist becoming really good with a blade, it just might cost them a bit more XP to get there.
The second issue is a side affect of it being crunchy and granular. There’s a fair bit to remember across all these rules accompanied by a bit of maths in combat to compare success levels and remember modifiers. Probably about as much maths as typical 3e combat. That said calculating success becomes surprisingly intuitive and there are usually only a couple of modifiers to apply to any given roll, rather than the many cumulative modifiers applied in 3e. The starter set also provides a simpler introduction cutting it down to just the essentials. If you play on a VTT like foundry the support is excellent with complete automation of every process. Everything has been considered and you can see the maths behind every modifier and roll very easily. Even face to face after a few sessions it becomes second nature.
Finally, it’s not a game where you can be a spectator. Finding trainers, engaging in social combat, even deciding short and long term motivations requires input from the players and a willingness to participate in the character development. Play can be unpredictable and sometimes DM and player will need to work together to explain something. I’m fine with that.
All in all, I think there is a lot here to be excited for. The system scratches an itch that 5r doesn’t fix even though I think 5e is a great system in its own right - just very different. Hopefully this post will encourage a few other people to give it a go just like my latest group have. I highly recommend the starter set and the core book as a first step. Plus The Enemy Within is the best published adventures of all time so worth it just for that.
If anyone has any questions about the system I’m happy to answer if I can.
