Blades in the Dark: Discussion – Page 174 – Blades in the Dark G+ Archives

Oh no! One of my players is used as the example of being a weasel on the “Players: Best Practices” page!

Now I just have to decide if I’ll let him read that page.

I’m offering a session of Blades at the Concrete Cow convention on Saturday. I’ll let you know how it goes!

I’m offering a session of Blades at the Concrete Cow convention on Saturday. I’ll let you know how it goes!

https://www.mk-rpg.org.uk/Concrete_Cow_games#Blades_in_the_Dark

V6 looks really nice, love the random tables (can’t get enough…)!

One “typo”: on the Vampire sheet, the Trauma “blades” look very dark (black instead of grey).

Blades in the Dark nominated for Best RPG on RPG Geek!

Blades in the Dark nominated for Best RPG on RPG Geek!

Go vote!

https://boardgamegeek.com/thread/1538957/10th-annual-golden-geek-awards-nominees-announced

Title

I know that part of the games goal is to change the dynamic of play at the table. (At least that’s what i’ve gathered from listening to some interview with John and the GMing section.)

I think that’s really cool. In practice it can be difficult to implement though, especially if you have ingrained bad habits, or something doesn’t click.

So If there was going to be a blades in the dark primer, a starter example which teaches both the initial rules and the… method, play style or ethos? of the game.

What do you think it should include?

I’ve been thinking a set of player moves and principles might be helpful, in the same style as the GM reference. Just as a start.

The current health system seems really complicated, on par with much crunchier games. Are there any plans for…

The current health system seems really complicated, on par with much crunchier games. Are there any plans for alternative health mechanics in the final release?

To get at what I mean, here’s a breakdown of the current damage process:

1. You mess up a roll that has Harm as a consequence and the GM declares that as the outcome.

2. You take harm at a rating of 1-3 when you mess up a roll, the GM decides how much

3. You may decide to mark armor to ignore this harm

4. You can take the damage and put it in the relevant box (3 damage, by the way, puts you in a BAD spot). If you cant mark the box, it goes to the next size up (as expected).

5. If you’d like to mitigate some of that damage, you can make a Resistance roll. You roll Xd, the relevant dice pool, and take 6 – [max single die] stress. This stress is dealt regardless of how well you roll.

6. If you took stress, the GM can reduce the damage of the harm. From the book: “Usually, a resistance roll will reduce the severity of a consequence. If you’re going to suffer fatal harm, for example, a resistance roll would reduce the harm to severe, instead.”

7. If your stress track is full after this, you take Trauma. Once again, the book: “When you take trauma, circle one of your trauma conditions… When you suffer trauma, you’re taken out of action. You’re ‘left for dead’ or otherwise dropped out of the current conflict.”

I’m designing crews and the distinction between claims and crew upgrades is kicking my ass!

Does John or anyone else have any mental constructs they use to figure out what to write next on the claim map and list of crew upgrades? I’m understanding that claims exist to be seized/traded from factions whereas crew upgrades are not so much. I’m kind of stalling thinking of new claims. Should I ditch claims for now and slap an off-kilter, skeletal claims map on the crew sheet until I get to watch more playtests, and direct my attention to fattening the anemic list of crew upgrades?

Next Question: Is Blades in the Dark a game without GM-Screen?

Rolling the GM dice seems to be an “open” die cast, placing index cards and clocks in front of the GM is a invitation for the players to pick them up storywise etc. I found many clues in the text that BinD is an open and thereby an no cheating game.

Which is cool, but…

|Confession Mode activated| I’m a cheater as a GM.

Now, before you bann my from this list, let my explain a bit. I happily cheat on rolling dice everytime I think that it will help the drama and the tension in the story. I cheat too to let the players reach the big final climax instead of being critically wounded during the first encounter.

This all to add to the fun for the players and for me as GM. Story and Fun is first, rules are second.

Last weekend I GMed a game of Star Wars Roleplaying for my kids and their friends (age 9 til 16). I rolled the dice behind the screen mainly to provide the correct sound of rolled dice. They had a blast!

Now, Blades is different, right? It’s not: That’s the story and this is the way to get there. Instead it’s: “What do you want to do? … and can you bear the results?”

Reminds me a bit of Call of Cthulhu games, where the choice in the end is dead or insane and not happily ever after 🙂

How do your play our games? Do you use a screen? Do you show your GM dice results to the players?

Mmm… thinking of it. Are there many GM die cast in the first place? They seems to be mainly on the player side of the game anyway. Fascinating indeed.

BTW old-school again: I prefer players gathered around a table over using skype/hangouts therefor I don’t have a camera as an implicit GM screen.

Question: When and how do NPCs act (especially in combat)?

As mentioned before I come from a background of more rigid combat rules with initiative values and a sequence of PC- vs. NPC-actions.

In my experience the player is only waiting for his/her turn to do his/her mega-ultra-one-hit-kill-them-all-combo and it’s the task of the game mechanics to figure out if the PC is still standing to actually do it. Yes, I already understood that BitD is extremly different with the fiction-first approach, but this will need some training for my group.

One of my first impressions was “Oh, only 3 attributes and a bunch of skills/traits linked to them. Cool, easy to track this for the NPCs.”

Then I realized that NPCs don’t have attributes/traits at all, which made me a bit nervous because I’m out of my already-know-it-comfort-zone.

In chapter “The Core System” I read “When the NPCs have the iniative, the GM says what they do…” but from the rules I don’t see an “initiative” neither for the PCs nor NPCs.

So, my understanding right now is that initiative is a concept which belongs in the fiction part of the game and…

1. NPCs “act” as a consequence from PCs Action Rolls. Maybe the roll was 1-3 or the GM will buff a Position due to knowledge the PCs don’t have yet (like John did in the Cyclop Fight in the first episode) and the NPCs acts/counterattacks as a consequence of a bad die result / Bad Outcome. After that we’re back in the fiction part of the game. To quote the Quickstart here:

“Since NPCs don’t have stats and action ratings, it’s by the severity of their dangers and harm (and the position of the PC’s action roll) that their capabilities are manifest in the game”

2. (Attenion Rule Lawyers!) NPCs act pure fiction first and the PCs have to react with their actions, again with considerung positions etc.

“Also, a dangerous NPC can take the initiative. Tell the players what the NPCs is about to accomplish, then ask them what they do.”

Part 2. will be a stranger and bitter pill for my players chuckle I will see how this will work out chuck building up to evil laughing

Is my understanding of initiative and NPC actions correct?

Hey Blades

Just come away from a great first session with a new group. I’ve recently turned some friends onto the metaphorical crack of rolling dice and doing silly voices, and BitD really got their creative juices flowing.

We ended up with a The Everyn Trading company, a crew of ‘professional’ smugglers. It was a whole mess of fun. I’ll try and post the play report at some point. I ended coming away with reams of questions from play that I thought I’d share/get your thoughts on:

– Smugglers seem to interact with Duskwall in an inherently different way than other gangs do; by their nature they need to cross boundaries. At first glance this has them going much further afield than your average thief/breaker (across lighting walls / into the void sea / on the rail lines).

Can smuggling work entirely effectively within Duskwall? What boundaries exist within the city? What’s taboo/illegal/frowned upon? Can you smuggle between wards/turfs? Can smugglers be the illicit equivalent of a man with a van for other gangs/spirits/other weirdness?

– The vehicle they chose was a old ex-fishing skiff, which raised some interesting questions about Duskwall’s canals.

Do the Bluecoats have patrol boats? What sort of control the Gondoliers/Canal Dockers have? Who owns the water? When you gain turf/smuggling routes could that be a controlled section of water your gang owns? Are there other watercourses around Duskwall (vast cyclopean sewers from an age before)?

– When determining starting faction status, we ended up with +1 for the Bluecoats and the Inspectors (one had done some bounty work and the other was related to an inspector). When we rolled entanglements, someone’s contact got rolled by the Bluecoats. How can the characters leverage their faction status with them to make sure the interrogation goes their way?

I ended making a quality roll for the contact. In this case, does a +1 give them the opportunity to lean on their Bluecoat relationship to interfere? Is that an action roll [sway/consort/command] or would you modify the quality (major advantage?). How would you run it?

I suppose it all comes back to the fiction. If there’s a mark on a sheet, that

means something. +1 with Bluecoats comes from a character’s relationships, so who are those people? What went down? Can they help without risking their own neck? What do they want?

Also could wanted level deteriorate these relationships?

This got me thinking about gang leadership. Conceptually could you have a situation where a gang is pretty chummy with the crew whilst their leadership actively wants them fucked with? Who’s loyalty wins out? Sounds like a potential power keg around leadership.

Stream of consciousness over. Thanks.