The Dead Setters leave their mark on Duskwall in The Retirement Caper.
After the Brightstone Riots leave their ugly scars on the homes and safety taken for granted by the nobility, the Dead Setters use their rising influence to infiltrate the largest gangs of all: government.
Trains
Rook the Cutter can’t beat them, so he joins them. Unable to simply tear down Imperial authority, he uses his folk hero status and leads Ulf Ironborn, the Reconciled, and the Skovs (still galvanized after the riots) to reclaim the Lost District. With protections supplied from Teatime the Whisper and grudging help from the Silver Nails, the Skovs take back the District and claim it as their own. Rook becomes something of a robber baron, going straight for railroad construction and expansion into the Deathlands. The Dead Setters’ Ghost Market ability and their alliance with the Reconciled, plus ample supply of leviathan essence allow them to make more headway into the wastelands than any expedition in decades. Rook retires into rail tycoon-hood, sort of a combination of Daniel Day-Lewis’ roles from Gangs of New York plus There Will Be Blood.
Birds
Raven the Hound murders Magistrate Rolan Wott and then shoots herself on Bowmore bridge. Her spirit is torn between her Reconciled friend Nyryx, who was possessing her at the time, her spirit-linked ghost-form raven Zeramore, her Tycherosi blood, and her rituals from the Path of Echoes that should have returned her to the crew’s spirit well.
Weeks later, rumors abound of a spectral raven that plucks the life from those who would harm the Dead Setters. Months and years after that, a small cult following of assassins springs up, taking the storied name of the then-defunct gang the Crows. Raven becomes the spectral and enigmatic leader of the new Crows, styled after the Assassin’s Creed brotherhood.
Gears
Deemo the Leech, now a Hull, disappears after the Brightstone Riots. Left with only the desires to discover, acquire, and destroy, she continues her sparkcraft, refining her automatons, and seeding them into Duskwall’s various vital industries. Deemo becomes an information broker, as her clockwork spies are everywhere. Those who cross her are seldom seen again, but rumor has it her hull spies are often powered by the spirits of her former enemies.
Heirs
Teatime the Whisper, aka Habel Tinriver, aka Heir of Scurlock. He travels outside the lightning barriers to claim Lord Scurlock’s ancient castle for his own. Accompanied only by Mr. Clicks, Scurlock’s former hull manservant, Teatime explores forbidden knowledge.
He rejects vampiric immortality in favor of taking on apprentices, passing his accumulated lore to better and brighter (and saner) minds. He is of course murdered by one of these apprentices years later.
Badges
Richter the Spider weasels his way into the vacancy left by Bluecoats commander Bowmore, tragically killed in the riots in an “accident” involving a sack of hand grenades. He uses his cohort of loyal “yellowcoats”, a sort of internal affairs Stasi, to keep one step ahead of regular Bluecoats corruption and assassination attempts. Richter eventually manages to use his connections to the Imperial Navy to get a seat on the Council, and from there he institutes a sort of anonymous “criminal court”, where underworld disputes can be settled with minimal violence. Less violence means more business, which means more graft for the people in charge. Hardly anyone argues with the new way of doing things… for now.
Richter dies of old age, a miracle for someone as divisive and ambitious as he was. His children are not up the task of holding Duskwall’s criminal elements in sync with its corrupt government. Things start to fall apart, a perfect starting situation for a theoretical continuation of our campaign.
~~~
We really shook the pillars of heaven with this campaign. We played weekly since ~March 2016, going from v4 quickstart all the way to 8.1 release. Huuuge thanks to all of you who read these APs and everyone who streamed/APed Blades during that time – I probably watched some if not all your stuff in my attempts to be a better Blades GM.
I’m still running playtests for my #glowinthedarkrpg post-apocalypse hack and I’m playing in a #copperheadcounty crime hack. Blades in the Dark has insinuated itself into my gaming thoughts like nothing since, well, probably the idea of Fate aspects. I’m just so appreciative of this community and John, Sean, and everyone being transparent and available.
For the final time, and for reals this time, #heestcomplete