I’d love some feedback on my approach to entanglements.

I’d love some feedback on my approach to entanglements.

I’d love some feedback on my approach to entanglements.

At the end of a score, I’ll roll the entanglement and then have the group immediately resolve it. Sometimes this means the crew makes a hard choice, other times it comes down to a roll.

Example: I rolled a Reprisals and Ulf Ironborn kidnapped a friend of the crew and was holding him ransom. The crew decided to “fight back” by rescuing the kidnapped friend and I had one character make a desperate action roll.

Some questions:

1) Does this feel like the right way of handling this type of entanglement?

2) Would it make sense to have them roll Tier (or relative tier) instead?

2) Since it’s outside a score, should the player be able to push themselves, get help, or make a group roll?

3) Should they be able to use any left over armor from the group roll?

4) Should they be able to resist consequences?

I’d love some advice on dealing with heat with simultaneous sessions (dual GMs).

I’d love some advice on dealing with heat with simultaneous sessions (dual GMs).

I’d love some advice on dealing with heat with simultaneous sessions (dual GMs).

I’m running more two-table sessions tomorrow and Wednesday. One issue is that the crew suffers heat from two scores at once – this makes it very easy to gain a wanted level.

Any suggestions for mitigating this? Should I allow a single downtime action (or two) for folks between assigning heat from the second score?

Just kicked off our Megacampaign (open table play) last night with 8 players & two GMs.

Just kicked off our Megacampaign (open table play) last night with 8 players & two GMs.

Just kicked off our Megacampaign (open table play) last night with 8 players & two GMs.

We had done most of the crew creation over email but wrapped up in person and finished character creation. They’re a crew of Hawkers with the Ghost Market ability. They sell mind-expanding drugs that let folks glimpse the true reality of the world.

With set-up out of the way, a few NPCs dropped by the HQ to pitch scores:

Confiscated shipment: a rival’s drug shipment was caught by the bluecoats – it’s still on the boat at The Docks, lightly guarded. The next morning it was going to be transported to a high security warehouse.

New Markets: the leaders of a nearby, low-level gang were just sentenced to Iron Hook. It’s a perfect opportunity to expand turf but other gangs are eyeing the territory also.

Muscle for a Friend: The Red Sashes are conducting a synchronized assault on all Lampblack holdings. They’re calling in allies help and want the crew to hit a drug den / flophouse.

Our players chose options 1 and 3 and we broke into two groups. The scores were a blast to play and full of great complications. For the first mission, the rival gang also showed up to reclaim the drugs. For the third mission, the Lampblacks were ready and cracked out on rage essence. Both missions got out of hand the crew left a wake of corpses and rubble.

Overall, a great start to the new campaign. Most sessions will be single GM but I’m hoping we can go multi-table with some regularity.

I’m a bit confused as to the how coin gets split between characters and the crew.

I’m a bit confused as to the how coin gets split between characters and the crew.

I’m a bit confused as to the how coin gets split between characters and the crew.

The payoff section has the coin associated with different sized score. Is that for the entire crew or per player?

If it’s for the entire crew, how do players earn coin?

If it’s per player, how does the crew earn coin?

Any rules about when characters can lend / borrow crew coin?

A crew starts with 2 coin. How many coin does each character start with?

My 20-something players are figuring out what type of crew they want for the mega-campaign.

My 20-something players are figuring out what type of crew they want for the mega-campaign.

My 20-something players are figuring out what type of crew they want for the mega-campaign. We’re going to use ranked-choice voting to make the decision. Here’s the progress so far:

I’m looking for some advice at adapting Blades in the Dark to an open table / West Marches style play.

I’m looking for some advice at adapting Blades in the Dark to an open table / West Marches style play.

I’m looking for some advice at adapting Blades in the Dark to an open table / West Marches style play. I’ve checked out some of the existing threads on the topic (links below) but I have a few twists / new questions.

The Context

– I’ll be running an open table with maybe 20 players (with only 4 playing on a given night)

– The players will all belong to the same crew

– While some nights might feel like one-shots the world will be persistent and there will definitely be room for campaign length stories to unfold

– The GMs will also rotate a bit and we’ll have an email thread to keep the world in sync

Some General Open Table Questions

– How should I handle character experience / leveling up? I recently ran a similar campaign in D&D 5e and kept all players at the same level, regardless of how many sessions they ran. Do you see any issues with that here? Should I give a stock about of XP per score / session?

– How should I handle downtime for absent players? In one of the other threads, someone suggested moving downtime to the start of a session; this makes sense as it makes it easier to prep for an upcoming score.

– Should I change anything about crew XP? I don’t think this is affected; am I missing anything?

Questions Regarding Multiple GMs

-We’re still figuring out what this will mean. One option is to give each GM a different part of the city. This lets them specialize a bit and hopefully minimizes the odds of contradicting storylines / NPCs across sessions. Characters can move between districts from session to session.

-If we take the multi-district approach, any advice on modifying faction relationships / fame by district?

-Any other thoughts on rotating GMs?

If you’ve run this style campaign in Blades, I’d love to hear what worked and what didn’t!

Thanks,

Randy

### Links

Somewhat recent thread on this style: https://plus.google.com/+ParkerDHicks/posts/TmResKTLar7?sfc=true

Andrew Shields gang-based approach: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1QtJxtygvG33wWTfUt14Z10RxHUIkVbAICznRwwHwt3Y/edit – I want to have a crew that evolves.

I recently ran a campaign for a group of ~15 rotating players.

I recently ran a campaign for a group of ~15 rotating players.

I recently ran a campaign for a group of ~15 rotating players. On any given night 3-5 players would show up and they were all bought into a frame story which has the players aligned as part of a faction.

I’m leaning toward to BitD for our next campaign as the faction system seems perfect for this style of play. Any thoughts on the pros / cons of using BitD for our next campaign? Any suggested hacks?

Other consideration – we’re thinking of having two GMs and are considering having two main factions that are diegetically aligned (perhaps sister organizations) with players either having a different character for each GM or the ability to temporarily switch factions.

This Saturday I ran / played Blades for the first time.

This Saturday I ran / played Blades for the first time.

This Saturday I ran / played Blades for the first time. We had a great time and I look forward to playing it again. Here is a quick play report and some suggestions for improvements.

# Play Report

I was the GM and there were four players. No one had played Blades before and only I had read the rules. I played the trailer for Dishonored to give people a sense of the world of Duskwall.

We followed the quick-start instructions and it took us about an hour to create characters and crew. I mentioned some of the relevant mechanics as they players filled out their sheets but it was still a lot of work to do at once, without full knowledge of the rules.

I opened actual play with the scene in Baz’s office. The players had chosen to start with a negative relationship with the Lampblacks so they politely declined his offer and said they’d stay out of the Lampblacks way. They were soon approached by a representative of the Red Sashes and were told that their boss wanted to talk; a meet was arranged in a neutral pub. The crew also turned down the Sashes’ request for assistance and approached the bar tender, a friend of the crew.

The bar tender told the crew of a possible heist – the Dockers had helped themselves to some Spirt Essence off a recent shipment and it was sitting in a warehouse while they looked for a buyer. Our crew accepted the job and decided to go the Infiltration route. They used their gang of assassins to distract the dockworkers on guard and then picked the locks to enter the warehouse. They were leaving the building with the loot when a dockworker came down the side alley; one of the players zapped him with channeled lightening.

I did an okay job of enforcing the game mechanics – I wasn’t consistent in telling people which type of action (e.g. Daring) or the effect level but that didn’t seem to be a problem.

The score was a success but was witnessed by a nearby gang – the Eels – who asked for some coin or rep in exchange for their silence (they threatened to tell the Dockers). Our crew agreed to give them some rep – partial credit for the score – and offered future opportunities to collaborate.

During one of the player’s downtime, he kidnapped a Lampblack to interrogate him about the Lampblack’s plans. The crew persuaded the thug to switch allegiances and so they learned of the Lampblack’s scheme. The gang was going to raid an old city oil depot and then use the fuel to burn down the Red Sashes’s temple complex / base. The players decided that their next score was to sabotage the raid on the depot and then attack the Lampblack HQ in the chaos. Prior to executing this plan, they went to Lyssa and got her blessing to take action to ‘end the street war and restore peace’ – they didn’t explain how, though.

They infiltrated the depot a few hours prior to the Lampblack raid and planted explosives. They also had the Eels tip off the Bluecoats that something big was about to go down at that location. The crew then staked out the depot until a good number of Lampblack’s entered the building. They then blew the explosives, killing many thugs, maiming others, and leaving most of the survivors to be picked up by the cops.

The crew immediately followed up this success by storming the Lampblack HQ – there were limited members present and the crew outnumbered Baz and his lieutenants. They made Baz and his goons an offer: join the Imperial Guard and cede your territory or die here and now. Baz was intimidated into taking the offer.

The session ended with the players’ crew moving up a tier and taking over the Lampblack HQ. They probably didn’t have the Hold to do so but it made sense within the story.

# System Feedback

Let me start by saying that I really like where Blades is going – the theme is excellent and the core game loop around Scores is very fun and yields good stories.

With that said, there were a ton of new terms to learn and rules to track. I can see a lot of it being useful in a long running campaign but most of it could probably be cut for a first session. Similarly, the players found the character sheets a bit overwhelming at first.

I suggest an even faster quick-start that throws the players right into the story. This super-quick-start might have:

– Pre-gen characters, or maybe just a slimmed down character creation

– Skip the crew creation at first

– Start with a score already selected, so the players first choice is which approach to take

This would immediately get players into the action and allow the GM to only convey the relevant rules. After this opening score, players could finish character creation and then create the crew. This opening score could be the catalyst / origin story for the crew’s formation. The GM could then walk through additional rules and dump the players out into the bigger Duskwall sandbox.

I’ll point to the Fantasy Flight Star Wars Beginner Box modules as masterful examples of how to gradually introduce mechanics to players in a fun / exciting way.