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Five Torches Deep

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Basics

  • 5e + OSR
  • Layout designed for utility
  • Streamlined gameplay
  • Highly compatible

Five Torches Deep (FTD) is a streamlined adventure game combining the best mechanics and principles of 5e, the OSR, and modern game design. The core of the game is familiar to anyone who has played 5e or previous editions of the game, but every mechanic has been pared down, modified, or expanded upon to create a coherently gritty, resource-focused, roguelike, old-school experience. 

The game’s about tough choices, risk vs reward, and using as much out of character smarts as in-character mechanics. It’s just about everything we (Ben and Jess) have come to expect from an OSR adventure game: brutal, challenging, streamlined, and accessible. 

How is it different?

  • 5e skeleton, OSR meat
  • Succinct but complete
  • Modern layout for ease of reference

FTD is a blend of old and new, digital and tabletop. It loots the corpses of four decades of gaming in just 48 packed pages. It’s able to comprehensively recreate an authentic OSR experience while bringing plenty of new subsystems to the table. Heavier than Knave or Into the Odd, more concrete than the Black Hack, less epic than 5e, more familiar than the Whitehack, and less “edgy” than other dungeoncrawlers. It hits the sweet spot between post-clone ultra-light rules and burdensome mechanics. 

Mechanics

  • Familiar but fresh
  • Comprehensive adventure play
  • Favors cleverness over crunch 

FTD strips 5e down to its skeleton and fleshes it out with mechanics focused on resource management, clever problem solving, and streamlined OSR gameplay. Combat is a last resort, magic is dangerous and wild, and every ability matters.

Character Creationthere’s only four classic races, each with a distinct method for generating ability scores and class restrictions. 

Character Classes: warrior, thief, mage, or zealot. Classes follow the design structure of 5e (scaling proficiency bonus, class features at set levels, etc) with more specialized “archetypes” unlockable at level 3. These archetypes bring in classics like the Barbarian, Warlock, and Druid without completely reconfiguring the class itself. And with only four starting classes, it’s easy to roll up a random character at level 1.

Level 9 Cap: PC play beyond level 9 is a different type of game. FTD focuses on dungeons and adventure, not domains, strongholds, and cataclysms. This makes a tighter gameplay loop: delve into dungeons, fight monsters, learn spells, acquire loot, repeat.

Ability Scores: the classic six abilities return, but special attention has been paid to ensure that ability scores and modifiers have a mechanical impact. Your STR score defines how much Load you can carry; your CON how many hours you can go without rest; your CHA the number of retainers you can command, and so forth. 

Default DC: the assumption is that (almost) all tasks and checks are DC 11. This expedites gameplay and helps make it more predictable and transparent for the players. 

Advantage / Disadvantage: easily the most elegant bit of tech from 5e (and the games that they took it from). Enough said. 

Inventory and Resource Management: a system to track carried load and supplies. Should you bring heavy weapons and armor or leave enough room to abscond with more loot? Equipment can be used, damaged, foraged, crafted, and repaired. The system adheres to quick but logical gameplay (no dice, no bean counting, but very light abstraction).

Retainers and Hench: in proper old-school style, PCs are expected to travel with a retinue of retainers and loyal followers, called “hench.” There’re rules for specific types of retainers and the commands you can give them in battle.

Wilderness Travel: distances traveled and resources consumed depending on terrain, light, and weather. The interplay between Travel Turns, supply, and resilience makes for difficult choices. 

Travel Turns: a simple system in which the GM regularly rolls on a table every hour in a dungeon or day in the wilderness. Travel Turns create a cyclical ritual: mark spent torches, reduce supply, note hours traveled (make a Resilience check as necessary), and track if monsters spring an ambush or stumble into the party.

Volatile Spellcasting: all spells can be cast quickly - demanding a spellcasting check with potentially calamitous results - or over the course of hours, which necessitates no such check. Casters then must decide if they are willing to risk wandering monsters or a potentially high DC that could result in loss of limb or sight.

Rest and Healing: rests have been broken into “safe” and “unsafe,” which have different mechanical effects on healing and exhaustion. There are few quick ways to restore HP, encouraging the need for consumables and cautious rest. High-level characters need days to rest sufficiently and heal back to full.  

Debilitating Injuries: any time a PC is reduced to 0 HP, they will die unless an ally resuscitates them. After being stabilized, the incapacitated adventurer must roll on an injury table; many of which have consequences that result in permanent Ability Score damage or loss of limb. Parties beyond level 1 usually comprise of mangled adventurers that bear the scars of their past mistakes. 

Monster Generation: Quick monster generation: refer to monster category, HD, add any relevant techniques, and done! Techniques and tactics allow for enormous flexibility in only a few pages. FTD makes monster creation or conversion a cinch, and can be done on the fly. 

Tools and Principles: guidelines on how to get into the mindset for OSR play, an adventure framework, and even generators for charged situations and dungeon layouts (including a novel technique leveraging a classic six-color puzzle cube). 


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Reviews (37)
Discussions (110)
Customer avatar
Ben D October 02, 2023 3:17 am UTC
PUBLISHER
FYI we have an issue with the print edition. Working to resolve it ASAP.
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Customer avatar
Ben D October 05, 2023 10:10 pm UTC
PUBLISHER
This has now been resolved. Thanks for your patience.
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Customer avatar
Dirk B November 06, 2023 1:13 am UTC
I am not seeing the Print on Demand version available. Is there an estimate on when it will be available again?
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Customer avatar
Leif W November 10, 2023 3:23 am UTC
PURCHASER
I still don't see the print on demand either. Will it be available son?
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Customer avatar
Ben D November 21, 2023 3:52 am UTC
PUBLISHER
That is strange. I see it available. Let me work with support to fix again.
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Customer avatar
Ben D November 22, 2023 6:59 pm UTC
PUBLISHER
This should now be fixed
Customer avatar
Samuel S April 11, 2023 4:03 am UTC
PURCHASER
I love Five Torches Deep, but I think it's really funny that you roll on the Injury Table (p. 22) AFTER you are stabilized. That's fine if it's an effect like Shaky or Addled, but I'm imagining the scenario where the Warlock brings their Warrior friend to their feet to find they can only bring them to one, like nobody really noticed that they had a surprise amputation for a minute.
Any designer reason why you roll on the Injury chart after being stabilized instead of the moment you're brought to 0 HP? I plan on just having the Injury apply the moment you are injured.
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Customer avatar
Ben D April 11, 2023 12:47 pm UTC
PUBLISHER
Because if you’re not stabilized you’re dead. There’s pressure to keep someone alive due to the time limit, then you can see how messed up they are. Adds a second layer of tension.
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Customer avatar
Samuel S April 12, 2023 6:12 pm UTC
PURCHASER
Ah, that makes sense. Thanks for the reply!
Customer avatar
Jeremy H January 29, 2023 9:58 am UTC
PURCHASER
Have you guys settled on an official license that allows a third party creator to make monster books for your system?
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Customer avatar
Ben D January 29, 2023 2:06 pm UTC
PUBLISHER
Nothing official, but compatibility is totally open. So long as it isn’t claiming to be an official product then go for it.
Customer avatar
James G January 28, 2023 2:29 am UTC
Dungeon crawls = repetitive and boring.
Customer avatar
Geoff M January 25, 2023 11:36 am UTC
PURCHASER
Hi, looks great. Does this game system use the D&D OGL ?
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Customer avatar
Ben D January 25, 2023 1:55 pm UTC
PUBLISHER
No.
Customer avatar
Keith J January 15, 2023 9:32 pm UTC
It says no dump stats in the preview, but when you're rolling 3d6 just about every stat is a "dump" stat.
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Customer avatar
Ben D January 15, 2023 9:39 pm UTC
PUBLISHER
Welcome to the OSR. What we mean by no dump stat is that every attribute has a roughly equal impact on the game, unlike other systems similar to 5e.
Customer avatar
David H December 11, 2022 7:39 am UTC
PURCHASER
Very cool! I did have a question though. After making four human characters (a theif, a zealot and two fighters) half were over-encumbered by the time I was done with their gear, and the other half had barely any load free for supplies, let alone treasure. For play, I just had them not take all the starting gear but was wondering if I'd missed something.

Are characters supposed to start out with barely any room for supply picking stuff up? Are retainers supposed to carry everything else even at level 1?
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Customer avatar
Ben D December 11, 2022 3:48 pm UTC
PUBLISHER
The starting gear is all of their available gear and wealth, and what they can’t carry they can sell or trade or store.
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Customer avatar
David H December 13, 2022 6:24 am UTC
PURCHASER
Ah. A bit clearer now, thanks for answering!
Customer avatar
Jakob N September 29, 2022 1:52 pm UTC
PURCHASER
A One-Handed(1h) Weapon wielded in two hands is better than a Two-Handed(2h) Weapon (Including a Fix!):

Method:
I have simulated 100 million rolls for: 2d6dl1, 2d8dl1 and 2d10dl1 ("dl1" meaning to drop the lowest die and use the higher result only).

Results:
2d6dl1 (avg. of 100M):
Odds of 1 per roll 2.779611%
Odds of 2 per roll 8.336456%
Odds of 3 per roll 13.890876%
Odds of 4 per roll 19.443394%
Odds of 5 per roll 24.997294%
Odds of 6 per roll 30.552369%
Average Result: 4.53199411 = ~4.532

2d8dl1 (avg. of 100M):
Odds of 1 per roll 1.562998%
Odds of 2 per roll 4.691088%
Odds of 3 per roll 7.811618%
Odds of 4 per roll 10.942475%
Odds of 5 per roll 14.060039%
Odds of 6 per roll 17.191393%
Odds of 7 per roll 20.309586%
Odds of 8 per roll 23.430803%
Average Result: 5.88212007 = ~5.882

2d10dl1 (avg. of 100M):
Odds of 1 per roll 1.001619%
Odds...See more
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Customer avatar
James G January 29, 2023 9:48 am UTC
Why would you waste your time doing that?
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Customer avatar
Garth R February 14, 2023 11:00 pm UTC
Why do Monte Carlo on something easy to calculate directly?
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Customer avatar
Garth R February 15, 2023 12:05 am UTC
To elaborate, take 2d6 drop lowest. The odds are exactly:

1: 1/36
2: 3/36
3: 5/36
4: 7/36
5: 9/36
6: 11/36

Average: 161/36, or 4.472 repeating.

Standard deviation: sqrt(2555)/36, or about 1.4041.

There's no need to do random trials.
Customer avatar
Ogre J August 15, 2022 4:52 am UTC
PURCHASER
A Fighter is proficient in Medicine. A Cleric is proficient in Healing. Would both of these classes get their proficiency bonus to stabilization checks?
A Healer's Kit gives characters advantage on stabilization checks, correct? Or does it follow the rules in the 5e PHB?
Is a Healer's Kit supply exhausted per use, or per successful use?
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Customer avatar
Ben D August 15, 2022 1:59 pm UTC
PUBLISHER
Yes, proficiency bonus to stabilization checks. Kits can provide advantage, contextual tools that obviate a check, or provide a bonus equal to proficiency. Generally if the character has two out of three of time, tools, and knowledge there’s no need for a check.
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Customer avatar
Ogre J August 20, 2022 6:15 am UTC
PURCHASER
Thanks for your response! I really appreciate it. Are kits spent when used? That seems to be what the SUP cost to them implies. Like, after you use a Healers Kit to stabilize someone, do you need to spend SUP to use it again? Likewise, do you need to replenish a Smith's Kit after every repair? Or is this SUP amount covering more of an edge case where one may happen to lose the kits through misfortune?
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Customer avatar
Ben D August 20, 2022 3:17 pm UTC
PUBLISHER
No hard and fast rule. I use 1 SUP per use, so most kits have two uses and need SUP to refill. The kit itself doesn’t get destroyed, it’s just empty. So for a healers kit maybe you’re out of bandages and thread but still have small knives and a needle.
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Customer avatar
Ogre J August 21, 2022 4:49 am UTC
PURCHASER
Thanks! 1 SUP per use was not an interpretation I was considering.
Customer avatar
De la Viscario R July 24, 2022 10:30 pm UTC
Hi, do you have an email for business contact?
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Customer avatar
Ogre J August 15, 2022 4:53 am UTC
PURCHASER
He posted it several times in the comments below: bendutter@gmail.com
Customer avatar
John H June 11, 2022 1:01 am UTC
PURCHASER
This is one of the best ttrpgs that I have ever played.
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Customer avatar
Ben D June 11, 2022 11:36 am UTC
PUBLISHER
Thank you! Don’t forget to leave a review if you can.
Customer avatar
Noah E May 20, 2022 4:12 pm UTC
PURCHASER
At present, do you have a Roll20 sheet or suggestions for using a Roll20 sheet?
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Customer avatar
Ben D May 20, 2022 9:44 pm UTC
PUBLISHER
There are some fan made ones but none that we’ve used.
Customer avatar
Daniel E April 12, 2022 5:39 am UTC
PURCHASER
I have a few questions after an initial read-through that I don't think have been covered here.
1. Why have the weapon damages been bumped up (usually by one die size) compared to 5e? This reduces compatibility with stat blocks from both 5e and B/X, For example, a 5e hobgoblin has a 1d8 longsword by default, but FTD gives the equivalent 1h sword (arming sword) 1d10 damage.
2. The SUP rules are intriguing but confusing.
- It seems PCs can buy abstract SUP, but presumably they can also buy the concrete items (for the same cost?)? So then, I suppose the strategy would be to buy one of each item you might need, and abstract SUP points after that?
- Thieves get "Ammunition (1 load, 1 SUP to refill)". According to the SUP rules, 5 SUP is one load, and 1 SUP gives you one fight's worth of arrows. Does that mean they start with 5 fights worth of arrows?
- None of the classes start the game with any gp, and none of them start with any torches (nor can they use SUP to get them since...See more
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Customer avatar
Ben D April 12, 2022 12:25 pm UTC
PUBLISHER
1. More lethal, and to account for fewer sources of damage modifiers.

2. Yes, buying specific items and refilling them with sup is an optimal strategy. For thieves, yes. SUP can be traded back into gp.
Customer avatar
Craig W January 09, 2022 4:32 am UTC
PURCHASER
I have another question in regards to spellcasting and "known" spells.
Are known spells meant to represent limits on what a character can learn, or just what they can hold in memory at a given time?
For example, let's say a level 8 Wizard progresses to level 9 and chooses to learn Wayfarer because he likes the idea of teleporting around.
Since he is now max level and only 1 level 5 spell can be known, does this mean that Wayfarer is the *only* level 5 spell he will *ever* be able to use (outside of scrolls) or can he learn multiple level 5 spells and only "know" one at a time (similar to memorization)? IE, could he "forget" Wayfarer to learn another spell?
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Customer avatar
Ben D January 09, 2022 2:44 pm UTC
PUBLISHER
Good question. We meant it as the only spell that character could ever learn. But if the character went to enough fuss to forget the spell and learn another, then that would be fine. What we don’t want is people hot swapping their entire list every rest.
Customer avatar
Craig W November 10, 2021 4:42 am UTC
PURCHASER
I have some quick questions. My experience is almost exclusively BECM and a *tiny* bit of 2nd ed, so I am pretty new to proficiencies.
Let's say I am playing a Zealot/ Cleric. My Ability Proficiencies are Wis, Cha. My proficient checks are: spellcasting, history, insight, healing, politics, divine magic.

Question 1: Do I get my proficiency bonus to every roll involving Wis and Cha, or only saves?

Question 2: can I only make checks for the "skills" listed? For example, if I want to Intimidate someone, am I able to do it, even without Intimidate being one of my proficient checks?

Question 3: As a Zealot, I can heal 1D6/ level HP after a safe rest. As a Cleric, I can take Advantage in healing. So would I be able to roll 2D6 and choose the better of the two?

Thanks!
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Customer avatar
Ben D November 10, 2021 1:51 pm UTC
PUBLISHER
1: GM discretion. Usually just reaction rolls / saves.

2: Like with all OSR everybody can try everything. The proficient check keywords are just to indicate the PC is better (proficient) at those tasks. Most GMs use it to indicate that the player with these proficiencies often doesn’t even need to roll if it makes sense for them to be able to do those things. But if they HAVE to roll, they get a bonus.

3: Correct, roll 2d and take the better.
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Customer avatar
Craig W November 11, 2021 6:19 pm UTC
PURCHASER
Perfect. Thanks. The first two match what I was thinking so it was mostly the third question that I was unsure of, partly because someone had suggested to me that Advantage could only apply to a D20, but if it applies to any die, that's great.
Customer avatar
Guilherme E September 12, 2021 7:29 pm UTC
PURCHASER
Do you have any suggestions about the beast companion and two-handed combat for the ranger archetype?
Reply
Customer avatar
Ben D September 12, 2021 7:55 pm UTC
PUBLISHER
I don’t understand. Those are not features of FTD’s Ranger. Do you mean creating those as types from 5e?
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