🎬 What Are Moves? Actions with Consequences
In many RPGs, you might say "I want to pick the lock" and roll a skill check. In Root, you describe what your vagabond does, and when that matches a move, such as Attempt a Roguish Feat, you roll. The dice don't just tell you whether you succeed; they tell you what interesting thing happens next.
Think of it like improv: there's no "failed" scene. Every result, whether it goes to plan or not, becomes material for the next beat of the story.
Your Five Stats
Every vagabond has five stats: Charm, Cunning, Finesse, Luck and Might. They start between −1 and +2, and advances can raise them later. Your reputation sits on your sheet too, but it isn't a sixth stat: you track it separately with each faction (more on that below).
There are no advantage dice or bonus dice. Instead, moves and gear hand out small bonuses such as +1 forward (on your next roll) or +1 ongoing (while the situation lasts).
🎯 Basic Moves: Your Core Toolkit
Any vagabond can make these, whatever their playbook. Root has eight basic moves:
| Basic move | Roll with | Use it when you… |
|---|---|---|
| Attempt a Roguish Feat | Finesse | use one of the nine roguish feats you're trained in |
| Figure Someone Out | Charm | try to read another character's intentions and feelings |
| Persuade an NPC | Charm | try to talk someone into doing something |
| Read a Tense Situation | Cunning | size up a charged, dangerous scene |
| Trick an NPC | Cunning | lie, bluff or mislead someone |
| Trust Fate | Luck | do something risky that no other move covers |
| Wreck Something | Might | break, smash or tear something apart |
| Help or Interfere | — | mark exhaustion to help or hinder another vagabond's roll |
The cards below show a few of them in play. The 7–9 and 10+ lines summarise the general shape of each result; your rulebook has each move's exact options.
🎪 Attempt a Roguish Feat
When you use a roguish feat you're trained inRoll: 2d6 + Finesse
There are nine roguish feats: Acrobatics, Blindside, Counterfeit, Disable Device, Hide, Pick Lock, Pickpocket, Sleight of Hand and Sneak. Your playbook starts you with some, and advances can teach you more, up to six. If you try a feat you aren't trained in, you don't get this move: you Trust Fate instead.
It goes wrong, and the GM makes a move
You pull it off, but with a cost or complication
You pull it off cleanly
Rolls an 8 (weak hit): "You snag the keys, but the guard's coin purse jingles as you bump it. Either you slip away now and he'll miss the keys in moments, or you smooth it over and he remembers your face."
🧠 Figure Someone Out
When you try to read another character's true intentionsRoll: 2d6 + Charm
No hold, and the GM makes a move
Hold 1
Hold 3
Spend hold, one for one, to ask questions about the character you're studying, such as:
- Are you telling the truth?
- What are you really feeling?
- What do you intend to do?
Rolls an 11 (strong hit, hold 3): The GM answers: "He's terrified and trying to hide it. He means to get his caravan out of this clearing tonight. And no, he isn't telling you everything: there are Alliance weapons hidden in the grain sacks."
👀 Read a Tense Situation
When you size up a charged or dangerous sceneRoll: 2d6 + Cunning
The GM makes a move
Ask the GM 1 question about the situation
Ask the GM 3 questions about the situation
💥 Wreck Something
When you break, smash or tear something apartRoll: 2d6 + Might
The GM makes a move
It breaks, but with a cost or complication
It breaks the way you wanted
Rolls a 7 (weak hit): "The axle snaps with a crack that echoes across the camp. The engine is finished, but every cat in earshot is now running your way."
🎭 Trick an NPC
When you lie to, bluff or mislead someoneRoll: 2d6 + Cunning
They see through it, and the GM makes a move
The trick works, but with a cost or complication
They fall for it
Rolls an 8 (weak hit): "The captain believes you, but says, 'Then you'll know the password for the inner roost.' You'll need to come up with something convincing, fast."
🤝 Persuade an NPC
When you try to talk someone into doing somethingRoll: 2d6 + Charm
They aren't moved, and the GM makes a move
They'll do it, but want something in return
They're convinced and act on it
Rolls a 9 (weak hit): "The commander weighs your words. 'Fine, but only if you vouch for them. If they betray us, that's on you.'"
🍀 Trust Fate
When you do something risky that no other move coversRoll: 2d6 + Luck
Trust Fate is the catch-all: leaping a gap, outrunning a flood, trying a roguish feat you were never taught. Even a hit tends to cost you something, so it's worth getting trained in the things your vagabond does often.
🫱 Help or Interfere
When you help or get in the way of another vagabondYou mark exhaustion to give another vagabond a bonus (or a penalty) on their roll. How big the modifier is depends on the rules in your book, so check there; the key point is that helping costs you something.
⚔️ Weapon Moves: Combat with Consequence
Combat in Root isn't about hit points and damage numbers. It's about positioning, tactical choices and lasting consequences, all tracked with the same harm boxes you use everywhere else. There are three basic weapon moves, and anyone can use them:
🎯 Combat Flow Example
⚔️ Engage in Melee
When you fight someone up closeRoll: 2d6 + Might
The GM makes a move, and you'll likely take harm
You deal harm, but it costs you
You deal harm and come out ahead
By default, an unarmed blow inflicts 1 exhaustion and an armed one inflicts 1 injury.
🤼 Grapple an Enemy
When you wrestle, pin or hold someoneRoll: 2d6 + Might
This one is about control rather than damage: restraining a foe, dragging them somewhere, or holding them still for your allies.
🏹 Target Someone
When you shoot or throw at a vulnerable targetRoll: 2d6 + Finesse
The target has to be vulnerable: in the open, distracted or pinned. A ranged attack on a foe who's ready for you is a different situation, and the GM will tell you what it takes.
Weapon traits and ranges: weapons also have traits such as Sharp, Reach, Weighty and Quick, and ranges of Intimate, Close or Far. The Equipment & Survival page covers gear in detail.
🩹 Harm, Wear and Morale
When the dice go against you, the cost usually lands on one of three harm tracks. Each one starts with at least four boxes, and advances can grow a track to six.
Wounds to the body. Clears with medical care or a long rest.
Spent energy and will. Clears with rest, or when you act on your nature.
Used-up supplies. Clears when you resupply: buying, foraging or stealing.
Depletion does double duty. You can mark it to say you packed something useful after all, and it also works as money: one box of depletion is worth one Value.
Wear is harm for gear. Each significant item has its own wear boxes; if you have to mark wear and can't, the item breaks. Repairs cost 1 Value per box. When it fits the fiction, armor lets you mark wear on it instead of taking injury.
NPCs and groups have Morale too: fill it, and they break or flee. When one of your own tracks fills, the consequences are serious, and your book spells them out.
🏛️ Reputation Moves: Politics in Action
Your standing with each faction isn't just flavour: it's a mechanical resource that opens and closes doors across the Woodland. You track a separate reputation with each faction, from −3 to +3.
Deeds that please a faction earn prestige boxes, and filling enough of them raises your reputation. Deeds that cross them earn notoriety boxes, which drag it down. The higher you climb, the more prestige the next step takes.
🎖️ Reputation moves
When you lean on your standing with a factionRoot's reputation moves include Ask for a Favor and Meet Someone Important. They use your reputation with the faction you're dealing with, and some only open up once your reputation reaches +2 or +3. A bad reputation has its uses too: notoriety can let you lean on fear instead of goodwill.
Weak hit: "The captain knows your name. 'Sir Talon, you may pass. But I must ask: will you carry this sealed message to the commander at Rookwall? It's rather urgent.'"
📊 What Reputation Can Feel Like
The labels below are flavour, not rules: a rough sense of how a faction might treat you at each level.
A trusted ally, given important jobs
Known and respected
Unknown, or a mixed record
Mistrusted and watched
Hunted, with a price on your head
Key insight: even a bad reputation can be useful. Standing at −3 with the Marquisate might make you a very welcome contact for the Woodland Alliance.
🗺️ Travel: Journey as Adventure
Moving between clearings isn't fast travel: it's a choice about risk and resources. You can travel along the path or through the forest, and you choose your pace.
The safer route between clearings, but everyone else uses it too.
Riskier, but the forest offers resources the path doesn't.
Pace matters: travelling slowly brings benefits but more danger along the way, while hurrying costs you exhaustion. And if you're Burdened, carrying more than 4 + Might in load, long journeys cost you exhaustion as well.
A miss: "You make good time, but as you crest the hill above Rootwatch you see Marquisate soldiers setting up checkpoints on every road. They're searching everyone, and you recognise the captain. She definitely remembers your faces…"
🌙 Between Sessions: Drives and Advancement
Root doesn't use experience points. Your vagabond grows by chasing what they care about.
📈 Advance by Your Drives
When you fulfil one of your drivesEvery vagabond has two drives. Each time you act on one, you earn an advance, but each drive can only pay out once per session. That means at most two advances a session.
Spend an advance on one of these:
- Raise a stat
- A new move from your own playbook (up to 5)
- A move from another playbook (up to 2)
- A new weapon skill (up to 7)
- A new roguish feat (up to 6)
- An extra box on a harm track (up to 6 boxes per track)
- A new connection
🔄 End of Session
When a session wraps upAs the session closes, you may swap your nature, one of your drives, or one of your connections to show how your vagabond has changed. Picking up a new drive gives you a fresh way to earn advances.
🎲 The Dice Tell Stories
Here are the exact odds for each stat value. A +3 total usually means a +2 stat with a +1 forward or ongoing bonus.
| 2d6 + | Miss (6 or less) | Weak hit (7–9) | Strong hit (10+) | Any hit (7+) |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| −1 | 58.3% (21/36) | 33.3% (12/36) | 8.3% (3/36) | 41.7% (15/36) |
| +0 | 41.7% (15/36) | 41.7% (15/36) | 16.7% (6/36) | 58.3% (21/36) |
| +1 | 27.8% (10/36) | 44.4% (16/36) | 27.8% (10/36) | 72.2% (26/36) |
| +2 | 16.7% (6/36) | 41.7% (15/36) | 41.7% (15/36) | 83.3% (30/36) |
| +3 | 8.3% (3/36) | 33.3% (12/36) | 58.3% (21/36) | 91.7% (33/36) |
Want to roll some yourself? The Dice Roller handles 2d6 + stat and shows the result band.
🌟 What Makes Root's Mechanics Special
⚡ Failing Forward
Every roll moves the story. A miss isn't a dead end: it's a twist that creates new trouble and new openings.
🎭 Fiction First
The story decides which move triggers, not the other way round. You don't "use" Attempt a Roguish Feat; you describe slipping a lock, and the table recognises that as the move.
⚖️ Meaningful Costs
Weak hits are where the drama lives. They aren't just "you succeed but take damage"; they're "you succeed, so what are you willing to give up?"
🔗 Interconnected Systems
Reputation shapes who will deal with you, gear shapes how you fight, and depletion ties your supplies to your purse. Each system feeds the others.
🎯 Try It at the Table
Plan a Rescue
Situation: Your group needs to slip into a Marquisate keep to rescue a captured Woodland Alliance officer. The keep is heavily guarded, but you've learned that a servants' entrance might be less watched.
Your job: work out which moves might come up and how weak hits could complicate each step:
- Approach: Which moves help you get close?
- Infiltration: Which moves get you inside?
- Rescue: Which moves help you find and free the prisoner?
- Escape: Which moves get you out alive?
- Complications: How could weak hits make each step more interesting?
Approach: travel through the forest to stay off the roads; Read a Tense Situation at the gate
Infiltration: Attempt a Roguish Feat (Sneak, Pick Lock); Trick an NPC with a servant's story
Rescue: Figure Someone Out (can the jailer be bought?); Wreck Something (the chains)
Escape: Engage in Melee or Target Someone to hold off pursuers; Trust Fate on the leap from the wall
A weak hit: "The lock gives, but loudly. Slip inside now before anyone comes to look, or stop to close it properly and risk being caught in the hall."
🗺️ Next: Playbooks
Now that you know how actions work in Root, the next page, Playbooks, looks at the nine core playbooks: the natures, drives, connections and moves that make each vagabond different.