Stras, as per your comment in the Spider thread, I was wondering if you might give us some more spoilers about “Band…

Stras, as per your comment in the Spider thread, I was wondering if you might give us some more spoilers about “Band…

Stras, as per your comment in the Spider thread, I was wondering if you might give us some more spoilers about “Band of Blades.”  It is the hack I am most looking forward to.  In particular, I wonder if it will be amongst the hacks released in January.  I am itching to give it a go!

8 thoughts on “Stras, as per your comment in the Spider thread, I was wondering if you might give us some more spoilers about “Band…”

  1. I’m not sure if it’ll be released in January, it’s a pretty meaty hack with some significant system tweaks, but I might have something for folks that are willing to playtest at that point.

    Ask me some questions if you want previews or spoilers.

  2. I like hearing that it will be meaty.  I would rather more later, than little now (or soon).  I really like the idea you put forward about changing “Heat” to resources.  Is that still the route you are going?

    Other questions:

    1) What are you looking at for the actions?  If the concept is that the characters are all soldiers, I wonder if you are going with a single Skirmish action.  It seems like a broad Skirmish action might end up being almost required in a game like this and/or everyone would try to max it out just to survive.  So, I was wondering how you are handling that…breaking the action down into more discrete actions (dueling, tactics, formation fighting, etc.) or assuming a general degree of combat competence and using special abilities to differentiate, something else?

    2) What are some of the playbooks?  I am curious how you will differentiate characters that are all soldiers.  

    3) I don’t know if you have seen the Battlemaster Playbook from the Grim World expansion/hack of Dungeon World.  I thought it was a really cool concept, and wondering you might have a tactical genius/master strategist playbook similar to the Battlemaster.

    Thanks, and Happy Holidays!

  4. Richard – yes that’s the route I’m still going. Heat is going to be Resupply. And the economy will be tied to some missions. It can be used to enable or boost certain downtime actions. Also the play is a lot more tied to battlefields (theatres of war) so some actions will be available sometimes and not others. Certain common gear getting locked out and repairing via resupply is going to be a thing. Having secondary characters to bring into the field when some of your people are bleeding and recovering will also be a thing.

    1) I’ll see if I can post a list soon. There is actually a single Skirmish action, but keep in mind that Skirmish is hand-to-hand. Snipers won’t be using that often. Much like in blades there are tons of different skills that will be important aside from just how strong you are in a straight-up fight. If a mission is scouting, your Skirmish isn’t that big. Surviving in the frozen mountains? Again not how well you swing a maul or axe. Need to make a mad dash across a battlefield to cover? Yeah, still not Skirmish.  It’s up to the players and the GM obviously but if the game isn’t just a repeated grind-fest. Hopefully the mission generator will keep things fresh and let Sappers with explosives shine as much as the heavy.

    2) It’s divided by role, similar to Blades. In other words a Sniper and a Heavy are not the same character and should (hopefully) play differently. Rank will be akin to a Veteran advance, and among other things changes what you get XP for (I call them Orders. What a Grunt gets XP for is different than what a Sargeant gets XP for).

    3) The Battlemaster is high-fantasy, so much of it’s design isn’t applicable here. That said I’m writing the Spider so you shouldn’t be surprised that Tactics and a corresponding class should appear ^_~

  5. Cool.  Thanks for the info.  I see your point on the Skirmish thing.  Heck, even in the context of a skirmish/duel, actions like Study/Survey could be used to gain vital information about the fight/opponent’s weaknesses, Sway could be used to bluff/feint/trick your opponent, and Wreck could be used against weapon, armor, or fortifications.  As for the Battlemaster thing, I suppose my favorite part about that playbook is the whole “gambits” mechanic which turned the Battlemaster into the retcon king.  I don’t think that aspect is necessarily high-fantasy, and actually fits quite well with the Blades flashback mechanic.  So, I will throw my vote in for something along those lines for whatever tactics playbook you come up with.  Looking forward to it! 

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