Daggerheart and West Marches go well together: a shared frontier, a rotating cast of players, and characters who stick around for a long campaign. This guide covers the system-specific decisions for running one on WestMarches.games: levels, tiers, XP, and gold. The same setup scales down to a few friends on weekends and up to a sprawling online game with several GMs and players in every time zone, running for years. For world prep, scheduling, and session flow, see the companion guide on running West Marches.
WestMarches.games sets each character's level from an experience ladder: the total XP needed for each level. Daggerheart runs from level 1 to 10, and since XP is handed out per session, you can think of the ladder in sessions instead of points. Here's one that works well for an open table, at roughly 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 levels come fast, so new characters feel useful right away. Then the gaps widen. The jump into tier 4 is steep on purpose: getting to level 10 takes about as many sessions as the whole climb to level 8. Like the late levels in an online RPG, the top of the ladder stays something to chase. Not everyone gets there, and that's the point.
You set this up under Community Settings → Experience Ladder. The platform ships with a longer default ladder, so for Daggerheart just enter the ten levels above, or your own numbers. The XP column is only the session column with the multiplication done for you. Pick a per-session amount that fits your group and the rest of the ladder follows.
The curve also keeps most of your community playing together. Most characters sit in tiers 2 and 3, and that's where most expeditions happen, so groups form easily. Once a player pushes past level 8, encourage them to roll a second character. A veteran can then keep joining the everyday tier 2-3 quests instead of waiting around for the occasional tier 4 outing.
Daggerheart sorts play into four tiers, and a character's level decides which one they're in. Tier 1 is level 1, tier 2 is levels 2-4, tier 3 is levels 5-7, and tier 4 is levels 8-10. Use those tiers when you build the map: the further a region sits from the home base, the more dangerous it should be. The country around town is tier 1-2. The deep wilderness, and whatever waits at the edge of the map, is tier 3-4. Players read this the way they read zones in a video game: a higher-tier region is a goal to grow into, not a wall.
Tiers are also a clean rule for deciding who can sign up to an expedition. When you post an adventure, set its level requirements accordingly:
Combat-focused adventures should stick to the matching tier. A tier 1 character has no business in a tier 4 fight, and a tier 4 character walks all over a tier 1 one. The math only works when everyone's in range.
Roleplay or exploration-focused adventures can open up across several tiers. The math matters less, and a mixed group of veterans and newcomers is part of the fun.
In most games, tougher monsters pay out more. Daggerheart isn't built that way, and your campaign shouldn't be either. It's a story game first, so reward players for the time they put in: a session is worth the same XP whether the group played it safe or threw itself at something well above its tier. People take the hard quests because they want the challenge, and nobody falls behind for playing it cautious.
Daggerheart abstracts money on purpose. Wealth comes in handfuls, bags, and chests, and loose coins aren't counted at all. Stopping a scene to add up coppers kills the moment, which is a fair call for a story table.
West Marches leans the other way. Here gold matters: with a community marketplace, it's what players spend between sessions on gear and the next expedition. So turn coins back on. The book already left the switch in for you. The optional rule counts ten coins to a handful, and the usual ladder takes over from there: ten handfuls to a bag, ten bags to a chest. WestMarches.games tracks the gold and lets you hand it out with XP at the end of an adventure, and the marketplace is where it goes back out, logged in each character's Rewards Log.
Players still carry copper and silver for a meal and a bed at the inn. Don't track that. It's flavor, not bookkeeping.