Faction Mechanics for Dagger in the Heart in His Majesty the Worm

30 May, 2025

I have recently switched systems for my ongoing Dagger in the Heart (DitH in this doc) campaign¹ from HEART itself to His Majesty the Worm² (HMtW). My reasons for doing so are probably worth another post, but as part of this, I'm finding myself both needing and wanting to overhaul the faction mechanics to align with my new system.

IMPORTANT NOTE: If you're playing in my game or another Dagger in the Heart campaign, stop here! Spoilers ahead!

Context

A core part of the Dagger in the Heart campaign is that there are three major antagonists - Ptolemy Bay, an arms manufacturer seeking revenge; The One Who Waits in Ashes, a nihilistic prophet; and Aramos Brightness-Sears-The-Eye, an aelfir mastermind of the Vermissian who fell from grace after the Incident. I want all of these factions to have weight and take proactive action in the setting, rather than just respond to the PCs. I first encountered the idea of mechanizing factions in Blades in the Dark, but, despite running a lot of Blades in the past, I don't think I've ever gotten the faction game quite right.

To accomplish this goal, I need a procedure. His Majesty the Worm does not itself have faction mechanics built-in, but I've been spending a very productive few weeks browsing the blogosphere and, as a result, I've constructed a system that I'm hoping will work well for me. It consists of:

• Simple faction blocks that describe the capabilities, aesthetics, and goals of each faction
• A method for thinking through where factions come into conflict
• A procedure for determining how the factions pursue their goals.

First step: faction blocks

This first step is derived from MurkDice's excellent post on the subject. Factions, per this system, are pretty quick to develop, so I went through all three of the listed factions above plus one more - the Office of Closure and Mitigation, a doomed bureaucracy sent to seal the Heart, who I want to be just as significant as the antagonists.

Here's an example of one of my faction blocks:

Aramos Brightness-Sears-The-Eye

Leader: Aramos himself
Aims:
- Erase the Vermissian Incident and harness the Heart oooo|oooo|oooo
- Restore his reputation in up-Spire society oooo|oooo

Aesthetics:
- Powerful magic and occult knowledge
- Fallen nobility
- Mirrors

Resources:
- Scrying spells with a moderate amount of in-Heart accuracy (most stuff like this doesn't work)
- Tenuous backroom social connections across Spire
- Teams of delvers that are cutouts of cutouts

Members:
- 1d6 close associates
- Each associate manages 2d6 reprobates and ne'er-do-wells

The numbers are derived from a sequel MurkDice post so that I have a sense of raw numbers that Aramos can bring to bear. He doesn't have that many folks under his command!

Second step: faction conflict

Once I had the individual stat blocks set up, I drafted up a MurkDice-style faction diagram to show where they overlap and conflict. This was enormously generative, and inspired me to think more closely about how these factions relate to one another and what specifically they are conflicted over. You can see my results below, which include shortened versions of their assets and notes on where the overlaps occur. I did this in LegendKeeper, but it could just as well be done anywhere else - in fact, I found that platform a bit clunky for this specific purpose so I might do this on paper in the future.

I also would have to think quite a bit about how to present this information if I were turning this into a published product, as I may do for a Triangle Agency project in the future. This diagram relies a lot on abbreviation and memory, but I think it's still very useful to have a visual representation like this.

Third as-yet-hypothetical step: run the factions!

My plan for running these factions and seeing how they develop their schemes is to do so during the City Phase of HMtW as an extra upkeep step when I restock the Underworld Heart.

The procedure I plan to use comes from fellow Bear blogger Matt at Xenio in a Bottle. I am attracted to this system for a few reasons, not least of which its simplicity. The combination of dice pools plus the simple goal system in Mausritter scratches my brain itch for the right balance of faction mechanics. I've run more complex ones before (like Urban Shadows 2E and Blades in the Dark) but the extra effort doesn't seem to correspond to better results, in my experience. I look forward to trying it out!

Conclusion

I hope this was interesting to read through and inspirational for other folks trying something similar. I'm certainly excited to try this out! I have a few more posts in mind demonstrating putting process into practice, so stay tuned!

#rpgs