Dragonbane: dice & strategy guide

Dragonbane (Drakar och Demoner in its Swedish home) is published by Free League as a streamlined, welcoming fantasy game. It is quick to teach, happy to be silly, and quietly lethal — a combination that makes each roll feel like it matters.

The dice and the core mechanic

Dragonbane uses the full polyhedral set. The d20 resolves every skill test, while the smaller dice (d4 up to d12) handle weapon and spell damage, and the d6 covers movement and other minor rolls. Characters have skills rated as percentages of a d20 — a value from roughly 1 to 18 or so — derived from six attributes: Strength, Constitution, Agility, Intelligence, Willpower and Charisma.

The core mechanic is roll-under: to use a skill, roll a d20 and get equal to or under the skill’s value. A higher skill is a bigger “target zone” to land in, so improvement is easy to read at a glance.

How a roll resolves

Roll one d20. If the result is at or below your skill value, you succeed; above it, you fail. A natural 1 is a dragon (a critical success with a bonus effect), and a natural 20 is a demon (a fumble with a nasty complication). It is a tidy, memorable pair.

Boons and banes. When conditions help or hinder you, the GM grants a boon or imposes a bane. A boon means you roll two d20 and keep the better (lower) result; a bane means you roll two d20 and keep the worse (higher) one. Multiple boons and banes of opposite kinds cancel out one-for-one before you roll. This is a clean advantage/disadvantage system that never inflates the numbers.

Pushing a roll. Fail a test and you may often push it — re-roll once, at a price. Pushing typically inflicts a condition tied to the attribute you used (for example, Exhausted for Strength, Scared for Willpower), and each condition gives you a bane on future rolls using that attribute until you recover. So a second chance is real, but it compounds: push too much and your character spirals into a pile of penalties.

Combat is fast and dangerous. Initiative is drawn from cards, actions are simple, and armour subtracts from damage rather than making you harder to hit. Because hit points are modest and good hits land hard, fights resolve in a few tense rounds — and can go very wrong quickly.

Effective strategy

Fish for boons before you roll. Since a boon just means keeping the better of two d20, anything that earns one — good positioning, the right tool, help from an ally, a clever plan — is a large, free improvement to your odds. Set up the shot rather than trusting a single die.

Push with your eyes open. Pushing is powerful for a critical moment, but each condition is a lasting bane on that attribute. Save pushes for rolls that truly matter, and be aware you may be trading this success for several later failures.

Respect the lethality. Dragonbane’s cheerful tone hides sharp teeth. Don’t wade into every fight; use terrain, numbers and surprise, and remember that fleeing is a legitimate tactic.

Round out your skills. Because success scales directly with a skill’s value, a few points invested in a weak but frequently used skill pays off constantly. Broad competence keeps you out of bane territory.

As every test is a single d20 read against your skill, you can roll a d20 in your browser — and for a boon or bane, roll two and keep the lower or higher yourself.

Beginner tips & common mistakes

• You want to roll low. Success is at or under the skill value — the opposite of hitting a DC.
• Boon keeps the lower die, bane keeps the higher. In a roll-under game, low is good, so a boon means keep the smaller number.
• Pushing has teeth. The extra re-roll usually saddles you with a condition and a lasting bane; it is not free.
• Cancel boons and banes first. Opposing boons and banes offset one-for-one before you pick up dice; you rarely roll more than two d20.
• Don’t treat combat as safe. Modest hit points and armour-as-damage-reduction make fights swingy — scout and plan.

Want more Free League dice pools and pushed rolls? Read our Forbidden Lands dice & strategy guide.