I love Daggerheart. I've played it since the early beta, when I built an encounter manager for it (Freshcutgrass.app), and I've played in two different Daggerheart West Marches games since then. I haven't run one myself. So the GM advice on this page is what I'd do after seeing it from the player side twice.
It's a good fit. But some of Daggerheart's rules assume one GM and the same table every week, and a West Marches game breaks that. This page covers the four places where it matters on WestMarches.games, which are levels, tiers, XP and gold. For world prep, scheduling and session flow, see the guide to running West Marches.
In Daggerheart, the GM does. Characters level up when the story says it's time.
At a home table that works fine. At an open table it's a pain. Tuesday's party and Saturday's party might share one player between them, with two different GMs, and nobody is watching the whole campaign. So who's meant to decide?
Use experience points instead. WestMarches.games levels each character from an experience ladder, which is the total XP needed for each level, and GMs hand out XP at the end of every session. Here's a ladder that works for an open table at about 1,000 XP a session.
| Level | Tier | Total XP | Sessions to reach |
|---|---|---|---|
| Level 1 | Tier 1 | 0 | Start |
| Level 2 | Tier 2 | 1,000 | ~1 |
| Level 3 | Tier 2 | 4,000 | ~4 |
| Level 4 | Tier 2 | 8,000 | ~8 |
| Level 5 | Tier 3 | 13,000 | ~13 |
| Level 6 | Tier 3 | 19,000 | ~19 |
| Level 7 | Tier 3 | 26,000 | ~26 |
| Level 8 | Tier 4 | 36,000 | ~36 |
| Level 9 | Tier 4 | 50,000 | ~50 |
| Level 10 | Tier 4 | 68,000 | ~68 |
The first few levels come fast, so a new character feels useful right away. Then the gaps get wider.
You don't have to type any of this in. A community created with Daggerheart as its game system starts with this ladder under Settings → Experience Ladder, and if yours was set up before the ladder existed, Reset to Defaults on that page loads it. Want your own numbers instead? Enter them there and set Maximum Level to 10. The XP column is just the sessions column multiplied out, so pick your XP per session first and the rest follows.
Running something smaller, like a few local friends rather than a big Discord? Scale it down.
Getting from level 8 to level 10 takes almost as many sessions as the whole climb to level 8 (32 against 36, if you're counting). That's on purpose. Level 10 is the endgame, something to chase, and most characters will never get there. I think that's fine. A campaign where everyone hits max level in six months has nowhere left to go.
It also keeps the community playing together. Characters spend most of their time in tiers 2 and 3, so that's where most expeditions happen and groups fill up easily. When a player pushes past level 8, nudge them to make a second character. The veteran comes out for the occasional tier 4 trip, and the new one keeps the player in the everyday games.
The ladder starts at 1, but I'd start new characters at level 2. That skips tier 1 entirely, so a new player isn't stuck waiting for someone to run a tier 1 game.
Set Starting Experience to 1,000 under Settings → Experience Ladder.
A character's level decides their tier. Tier 1 is level 1, tier 2 is levels 2-4, tier 3 is 5-7 and tier 4 is 8-10.
Build the map around that. The further a region is from home base, the more dangerous it gets. So the country around town is tier 1-2, and the deep wilds (plus whatever lives at the edge of the map) are tier 3-4. Players read it the way they read zones in a video game. A tier 4 region isn't a wall. It's somewhere to grow into.
Tiers also give you an easy rule for signups. Set each adventure's level range by tier.
Most games pay more for tougher monsters. Don't do that here. Daggerheart is a story game first, so pay for the time people put in. A session is worth the same XP whether the party played it safe or threw itself at something well above its tier. People take the hard jobs because they want the challenge, and nobody falls behind for being careful.
Daggerheart keeps money abstract on purpose. Wealth comes in handfuls, bags and chests. Nobody counts loose coins. At a regular table I'm with the designers on that, because stopping a tense scene so someone can add up their coppers is the fastest way to kill it.
West Marches is different, because gold is what players spend between sessions. With a community marketplace it stops being bookkeeping and becomes part of the game. So turn coins back on. The rulebook already has an optional rule for it (ten coins make a handful). You hand out gold with XP at the end of an adventure, players spend it in the marketplace, and every purchase shows up in the character's rewards log.
Don't bother tracking copper and silver for a meal and a bed at the inn, though. That's flavor.