Delve: The Dice Game Rulebook

Table of Contents

Table of Contents

• What You Need to Play
• Rules
  • Sample Game
• Adventurers
• The Starting Adventure
• Sands of Time
  • Abandoned Fortress Treasure

What You Need to Play

Play sheet, six 6-sided dice, and a pencil.

Rules

For your adventurer's attack, roll 6 dice up to three times, setting aside any you want to keep. You can stop at any point. You can roll any of the dice each time, even those previously set aside. After the rolls, determine which attack you will make, based on your surviving character's abilities. For example, if you end up with three 5's, a 6 and two 1's, you could use the Fighter's "Charge" to do one point of damage, the Rogue's "Sneak attack" to do two points of damage to one opponent, and the Wizard's "Ray of frost". Note that you can only use a die once, so if you rolled four 6's and use those for the Wizard's "Fireball", they cannot be applied to the Fighter as well. Mark off any damage you do to your opponents on the appropriate checkboxes.

For your opponents, roll a six-sided die for every unchecked box in the current battle that is left. Roll the dice just once. For each successful hit (usually a 5 or a 6), mark off a box on your party.

Once you have finished a battle, move on to the next until either all of your adventurers are killed or you have defeated the Dragon!

Sample Game

Shaded dice are the ones set aside.

Sam starts the game by battling the first opponents, the 3 Orcs.

Adventurer's Roll 1: Sam decides to keep the 6 and the 1 for the Fighter and the Rogue, as well as the two 2's, to try for one of the Wizard's abilities.

Adventurer's Roll 2: The 3's are not helpful, so Sam rolls both of those dice for the third time.

Adventurer's Roll 3: Even though there are three 1's, the Orcs only have two health each, so the Rogue can only use up to two 1's for the sneak attack. Using the Rogue's "Crippling strike" (full house) ability is not helpful either, since it also only damages one opponent, and the two 1's already finish an Orc off. Sam could also use the three 1's for the Wizard's "Ray of frost". Sam decides to use two 1's for a "Sneak attack" to kill one Orc, then use the 6 for the Fighter's "Charge" to weaken another. Sam now rolls for the remaining opponents.

Opponent's Roll: Only three dice are rolled, because there are three boxes remaining on the opponent's side. Since the Orcs hit on a 5 or a 6, Sam marks one of his Fighter's checkboxes for the 5 that was rolled. He is now ready to roll for his adventurers for round 2.

Adventurers

Each adventurer has a set of dice-roll combinations that trigger a special ability. A die can only be used for one ability per round.

Fighter (6 health)

• 6 – Charge: Basic attack. 6's do one damage each, but you can only count up to two 6's per round as this attack.

Rogue (3 health)

• 1 – Sneak attack: 1's do one damage each. Any number of 1's can be used, but only against a single opponent.
• Full house – Crippling strike: The 6th die is the damage inflicted against a single opponent.

Wizard (1 health)

• 3 of a kind – Ray of frost: Roll two fewer dice for the monsters this round.
• 4 of a kind – Fireball: One damage to each opponent, or four damage to a single opponent.
• 5 of a kind – Chain lightning: The 6th die is the amount of damage applied to each opponent.
• 6 of a kind – Demise: All of your opponents in the current battle are destroyed.

Cleric (3 health)

• Straight of 4 – Minor heal: Heal two damage.
• Straight of 5 – Heal: Heal the amount on the 6th die. If it is a 1, heal all living party members fully.
• Straight of 6 – Miracle: Resurrect dead adventurers and restore all party members to full health.

Note: the Sands of Time adventure sheet lists these same four abilities but with 4 of a kind and 5 of a kind swapped between Chain lightning and Fireball. Follow the base Rules sheet's dice counts above; both sheets agree on what each ability does.

The Starting Adventure

Party health: Fighter 6, Rogue 3, Cleric 3, Wizard 1.

Face the following encounters in order:

1st Encounter – 3 Orcs. Hit on a 5 or 6.

2nd Encounter – 12 Kobolds. Hit on a 6.

3rd Encounter – 1 Monstrous Spider and its 3 Offspring. Hit on a 5 or 6. Stuns on a 1. A stun means an adventurer, picked by you, cannot fight the rest of the encounter. A stunned adventurer can still take damage. If all adventurers are stunned, you lose.

4th Encounter – Treasure Chest. Roll a die:

1. Dwarven throwing Warhammer (requires Fighter) – Any number of 6's can be used against the Giant.
2. Black Arrow (requires Rogue) – Three 1's rolled in one round will kill the Dragon.
3. Ancient Staff – The Wizard needs one less die to perform abilities (i.e. Fireball is 3 of a kind).
4. Holy Symbol (requires Cleric) – The Skeletons only require 1 damage to kill.
5. Divine Blessing – You can roll up to 4 times instead of just 3 for your attack each round.
6. Blast Glyph – Kill one adventurer.

5th Encounter – Giant. Hits on a 4, 5 or 6.

6th Encounter – 6 Skeletons. Hit on a 5 or 6. It takes 2 damage rolled in a single round to kill a skeleton.

7th Encounter – Dragon. Hits on a 5 or 6. Roll only 6 dice for the Dragon, but roll them all while it is alive.

Sands of Time

A second adventure for the same party of adventurers.

Party health: Fighter 6, Rogue 3, Cleric 3, Wizard 1.

1-6 Raiders. Roll 1 die for the number of Raiders. Hit on a 5 or 6.

30 Scorpions. Hit on a 6. For the 1st round, only 6 scorpions attack. At the end of each round, add 6 more scorpions until all 30 have entered the battle.

Sandstorm. Roll 6 dice, 3 times. For each 6 rolled, take 1 damage.

Ankheg. Hits on a 5 or 6. If it is still alive after the 1st round, it burrows and will attack again along with the next encounter.

2 Monstrous Centipedes. Hit on a 5 or 6.

Abandoned Fortress. Roll a die.

3 Sphinxes. Hit on a 5 or 6. Apply damage points one at a time to the adventurer with the current lowest health. If there is a tie, you choose.

Time Trap. Does not attack, but if you don't destroy it in 3 rounds, all the adventurers die.

Abandoned Fortress Treasure

Roll a die:

1. Jeweled Scimitar (requires Rogue) – The Rogue can attack multiple opponents.
2. Healing Waters (requires Cleric) – Heal all living party members fully.
3. Spell of Confusion (requires Wizard) – The Sphinxes apply damage normally instead of attacking the weakest opponent.
4. Grappling Hook (requires Fighter) – The Ankheg cannot burrow.
5. Enchanted Hourglass – You have 6 rounds to destroy the Time Trap.
6. Bandits – Only roll 5 dice for the adventurers for the rest of the game.