Fates Demand Tabletop Skirmish Part 2
Four heroes and matching dice
The earliest version of Fates Demand centred on one Hero supported by simpler Followers.
As development continued, that structure began to feel too restrictive. I wanted every character on the table to matter, rather than concentrating most of the complexity into a single model.
That led to one of the first major changes to the game:
The party became a team of four Heroes.
At the same time, another idea was becoming much more important — the matching dice system.
This has since become one of the core mechanics around which Fates Demand is being built.
Moving to Four Heroes
The move away from Followers fundamentally changed how I thought about the party.
Instead of one central Hero supported by simpler units, each player would control four Heroes, with each character having their own role, statistics and abilities.
Every model could now contribute meaningfully to the game.
It also made party construction much more interesting. Rather than deciding which Followers best supported one central character, the player could begin thinking about how four Heroes worked together as a complete team.
The original idea of building characters from multiple cards also remained important, eventually developing into a broader character-building system.
But the biggest mechanical development during this stage was the dice.
Matching Dice as the Core Mechanic
The matching dice system is not simply a combat mechanic.
It is intended to provide a common language that can be used throughout Fates Demand.
When dice are rolled, players are often looking for matching values.
For example:
2 — 4 — 4 — 6
contains a double 4.
A roll of:
1 — 3 — 3 — 3
contains a triple 3.
And a roll containing four matching values would create a quadruple.
Those matching sets can then be used in different ways depending on what the Hero is attempting to do.
The important question is not always:
“Did I roll high enough?”
Instead, it is often:
“What matching set did I generate, and what can I do with it?”
Doubles, Triples and Quadruples
The size of the matching set matters.
A double is the basic requirement for many simple actions and checks.
A triple represents a stronger result and can unlock more powerful effects.
A quadruple can allow for something stronger again.
The basic hierarchy is:
Double — satisfies a simple requirement
Triple — enables a stronger effect
Quadruple — enables a more powerful effect again
This means that success is not always completely binary.
A double might be enough to complete the action, while a triple or quadruple can allow the Hero to achieve something more significant.
That gives the dice a natural sense of escalation without having to introduce a completely different system for every type of action.
Using Matches to Activate Abilities
This becomes particularly useful when designing Hero abilities.
Instead of every ability relying on another modifier or separate resource, abilities can be built around the matching sets generated by the dice.
A basic ability might only require a double.
A more powerful part of that ability might become available with a triple.
Something particularly strong might require a quadruple.
The same underlying mechanic can therefore support very different Heroes.
Their identities come from what they can do with their matches, rather than every character needing an entirely separate resolution system.
This gives me a lot of room to develop different playstyles while keeping the core rules consistent.
Simple Checks Use the Same System
The matching system also works for straightforward checks.
Not every interaction needs to become an opposed roll.
If a Hero is attempting a simple action, they can roll the appropriate dice and look for the matching set required.
In many cases, a double will be enough.
That means the same mechanic can carry across different parts of the game — abilities, objectives, environmental interactions and other checks — without asking the player to learn a new method each time.
The aim is for players to understand one central concept early:
Matching dice make things happen.
Everything else builds from that.
Attack and Defence
Combat is where the matching system becomes opposed.
When one Hero attacks another, the attacker and defender both roll dice.
Their matching face values then interact.
Importantly, this is not a one-for-one cancellation system.
For example, imagine the attacker rolls:
2 — 3 — 3 — 5
The defender rolls:
1 — 3 — 6
The attacker has a double 3.
The defender has rolled a single 3.
Because that value matches the attacking set, the defender’s 3 blocks both of the attacker’s 3s.
The defender does not need to roll two 3s to cancel both attacking dice.
They only need to produce the matching face value.
That makes the interaction about the value of the set, rather than simply comparing individual dice one at a time.
Why That Matters
This creates an interesting tension in combat.
Generating a large matching set can be powerful, but it is not automatically safe.
An attacker might be pleased to generate a triple of one value, only for the defender to roll that same number and shut the set down.
At the same time, the defender does not necessarily need an equally large matching set.
They need the correct result.
That makes the shape of the dice pool important.
Players are not simply counting successes. They are looking at what values have appeared, how those values group together and how the opposing roll affects them.
Combat therefore uses the same matching-dice foundation as the rest of the game, but applies it in a more interactive way.
Outside combat, matches allow you to do things.
During combat, matching values can also stop your opponent from doing things.
More Than Just Success or Failure
This is one of the reasons the matching dice system became so important to the design of Fates Demand.
The dice are doing more than producing a pass or fail result.
They can determine:
whether a simple requirement is met
whether an ability can be activated
whether a stronger version of an effect becomes available
how powerful that effect can become
whether an opposing character can block it
That gives a relatively simple dice pool a lot of jobs.
It also creates room for future Hero abilities to interact with the dice themselves — changing how matches are formed, how they are used or what different-sized sets are capable of doing.
The complexity can come from the Heroes rather than from constantly adding new core mechanics.
Where the Game Was Heading
Changing to four Heroes gave every model on the table more importance.
The matching dice system gave those Heroes a shared mechanical foundation.
Together, those two decisions moved Fates Demand much closer to what it is becoming now.
There was still a lot to solve.
The four Heroes needed a better way to share actions across a round. Objectives needed their own rules. Combat needed further refinement, and the game needed a structure that allowed players to make meaningful decisions about when each Hero acted.
Those problems would eventually lead into the development of Time, Lance Time and the current round structure.
But by this stage, one of the most important parts of Fates Demand was already taking shape:
Roll dice. Find matches. Use those matches to make things happen.
