The Basics | How to Draw Steel #1
This video was originally published on YouTube. For links and references, please see that platform as this page only contains the transcript.
Intro
Hello, everyone! So you want to play Draw Steel, the new kid on the tactical RPG block.
Your Director might want to run it for you, or you might have seen a cool video online talking about how you should try it. Either way, you’ve got to learn the rules first.
In this video I’m gonna teach you the basics: the core mechanic of the game and how you use it to roll for tests. Cool? Then let’s get started…
Power Roll
Just like in Dungeons & Dragons, in Draw Steel you’re playing the role of a hero in a dangerous fantasy world. When you want to do something risky, like sneak past a royal guard or lie to an ogre, the Director will ask you to roll dice to see if you succeed.
In D&D that’s the d20 roll. In Draw Steel we have the Power Roll.
There are three steps to the Power Roll: roll your dice, add your bonus, and check your tier. Sounds a little complex, but it’s super simple.
For the first step, the dice you’ll be rolling are always two ten-sided dice, or 2d10. You just roll them and add the numbers; easy. Just remember that most RPG d10s show a 0 in place of a 10, so a double zero would actually be a 20.
Next, time to add your bonus. Every character in Draw Steel has five characteristics, only one of which will be added to the roll.
The characteristics are Might (for strength and brawn), Agility (for coordination and nimbleness), Reason (for logic and education), Intuition (for instincts and experience), and Presence (for force of personality).
For example, if you’re playing a first-level character that’s very strong, they’ll probably have a Might score of 2. So, when you roll to see if you can break down a door, your Power Roll will be 2d10 + 2. Starting scores range from -1 to +2 and they’re noted at the top of your character sheet.
Now, the last step: check your tier. Once you have your total for the roll, you’ll need to see what outcome tier you got. If you got an 11 or lower, that’s a Tier 1; the worst. If you got between 12 and 16, that’s a Tier 2; the average. If you got 17 or higher, that’s a Tier 3; the best.
The only exception to this rule is when you roll a natural 19 or 20, that is, a 19 or a 20 on the dice, before adding any bonuses. This is called a critical and it’s an automatic Tier 3 independently of how bad your bonuses are!
What each tier actually means in the fiction depends on the difficulty of the task you’re trying to accomplish, but we’ll talk about this in a second.
So, putting it all together… Your strong but very awkward hero is trying to bribe a guard, so your Director asks for a Presence Power Roll. Since your Presence score is -1, you’ll be rolling 2d10 - 1. But hey! Your total was 17! That means you got a Tier 3.
And that’s almost everything you need to know about Power Rolls! Roll your dice, add your bonus, check your tier.
There are only a couple of additional modifiers that can help or hinder your roll on top of your characteristics. These are edges and banes.
Edges are situational advantages you can get on a Power Roll, for example, when sneaking past a sleepy guard or lying to a drunk ogre. If you have an edge on your roll, you gain a +2 bonus; if you have two or more edges, what’s called a double edge, instead of the numerical bonus you simply bump up the tier.
Banes are the exact opposite: situational disadvantages. If you have a bane, you gain a -2 penalty; if you have two or more banes (a double bane), you just have to downgrade the tier.
So let’s examine a simple example: climbing a wall. That’s usually a Might Power Roll, so your buff hero rolls 2d10 + 2 for a total of 16; a Tier 2. If your hero was wearing special climbing gloves, you’d get an edge, increasing your total to 18 and improving our outcome to a Tier 3.
If instead of gloves you had a bunch of heavy gear on your back, that might incur a bane, decreasing your total to 14. Fortunately that’s still a Tier 2!
But, if you had all the weight on your back and it was raining, you’d have a double bane; in this situation, your total would remain 16, however the outcome would be downgraded to a Tier 1.
And what if you have both banes and edges? This part’s easy: they cancel each other out. A bane and an edge becomes a straight roll, a double bane and an edge becomes a bane, and so on.
I know this part sounds a little difficult, but I promise that you get used to it pretty quickly.
Tests
There are two types of Power Roll: tests and ability rolls. We’re gonna cover abilities in the future because they are mostly for combat, so let’s talk about tests.
Tests are… What I’ve been talking about up until now. Everything I said also applies to abilities, but all of my examples have been tests. Want to sneak past a guard? That’s an Agility test. Want to lie to an ogre? That’s a Presence test. Want to climb a wall? That’s a Might test.
So, what’s specific to tests that doesn’t apply to abilities? Two things: difficulties and skills.
The difficulty of a test is, in short, how high you have to roll to be successful; an easy test can be surmounted with a Tier 1, while a medium test requires a Tier 2, and a hard test can only be overcome with a tier 3.
This is all neatly summarized in a table on page 250 of the book. If you look closely at the table, you’ll notice that there are mentions of rewards and consequences.
These rewards and consequences can be described by the Director or pitched by the players. They are usually narrative so, for example, a success with a consequence when sneaking past the guards means that you did it, but you might have left a trail of evidence.
Also note that a critical is always a success with a reward! You succeed and gain something extra, so pray that luck is on your side.
Now, on to skills. These are out-of-combat specializations that your hero gains during character creation. Long story short, they give you a +2 bonus to tests where they are applicable; this is in addition to the characteristic and any edges or banes.
The list of skills in this game is huuuge, so don’t worry about having only a few, ‘cause everyone’s gonna be on the same boat. For ease of reference, they are divided into five groups…
Crafting skills, for creating and appraising goods; exploration skills, for exploring and overcoming environments; interpersonal skills, for social interactions; intrigue skills, for investigation and thievery; and lore skills, for research and recalling information.
It’s up to the player to pitch the use of a skill for a test. So, when the Director demands a Might test in order to climb a wall, the player can ask to use the Climb skill for that test if they have it on their character sheet.
And that’s it! Now you know basically everything there is to know about the Power Roll and tests!
To recap: a Power Roll involves rolling your dice, adding your bonuses, and checking your tier. Your dice are always 2d10s. Your bonuses include one characteristic and any applicable edges and banes; it also might include a relevant skill if rolling for a test.
As for your tier, it will be a Tier 1 on an 11 or lower, a Tier 2 on a 12 to 16, or a Tier 3 on a 17 or higher. Then, for tests, your Director will see if you are successful or not based on the difficulty.
And that’s all for today’s lesson! Make sure to like this video and subscribe to the channel if you want more Draw Steel content. Also check the description for links to my Patreon and The Dice Society’s Discord server.
See you all next time, thank you very much, and goodbye!