Category: Blades in the Dark: Discussion

I love the new teamwork changes, they definitely smooth things out. The new Lurk ability sounds suitably awesome, and I’m 90% certain that when my crew’s Lurk levels up that he’ll be taking the new ability.

My only question is are you required to spend at least 2 stress and pick one of the features? Can I be a shadowy (but visible) and NOT able to pass through walls for a moment for the cost of 0 stress? If so, can’t I just keep doing it indefinitely? Just being shadowy seems like it would give me potency on prowl actions, which is not unreasonable for a playbook advancement.

Today I’ve been thinking about Resistance, Stress and the reduction or avoidance of consequences. My question is, when a PC resists some kind of consequence, when do you allow the resistance to avoid the consequence vs. reducing its severity?

The quickstart guide leaves it up to the GM’s discretion, suggesting negation creates a game that is more cinematic and less deadly. Does anyone have any rules of thumb they use instead? Do you negate when the PC has a creative or effective method of resisting? Do you negate when the PCs are on the ropes and you’re showing mercy? Do you negate when a PC rolls very well to show how effortless the resistance was? Do you negate when the PC rolls poorly to show how hard the character worked to avoid the close call (and also to avoid piling harm on top of stress)? Do you never negate consequences when resisting? Conversely do you always negate consequences with resistance?

We’re currently in the middle of my group’s second score, and the engagement roll was (1, 1, 1), so it’s been going poorly. Coupled with some stress and harm left over from the previous score, it’s looking likely that the Chimney Sweeps may need retreat and lick their wounds. The dice can be harsh, and I know that blades is meant to be unforgiving at times, so there is nothing wrong with this outcome. However, I’m still considering potential options for a less gritty experience, and I’m curious what kind of games you guys run?

I used to play Pathfinder, but I converted to 5E after seeing how it cut out so much unnecessary complexity, thereby shortening combats a great deal. Still 5E can drag, like most games can, during downtime when players aren’t sure of what to do.

Case in point, last night I played in a 2 hour 5E session that was all downtime. This was the second such session with the party tying up some loose ends in Waterdeep before heading out to continue our main mission. I don’t think anyone is having a great time with these downtime activities because they drag on, but we all feel obliged to complete various side quests. I think if someone said “Hey, can we fast forward through this part?” everyone would agree, but no one wants to say so. It really makes me appreciate the downtime system in Blades where, by default, everyone gets 2 actions and you move on (zooming in when you find those activities exciting, or glossing over things that are not).

A simple question: Do you need to mark armor before you can mark heavy armor in your load?

Asked another way, does heavy armor cost you 2 load or 3?

I’m currently thinking about teamwork moves and would like to discuss On Point: Setup and Backup: Assist. In the fiction, these two moves seem more or less interchangeable, one PC helps another with an action and gives them some sort of advantage. But which character is on point makes a pretty large mechanical difference and I’m not sure I understand why. I’ll give two examples in play.

Adam the Lurk is on point and wants to prowl past a guard into an enemy base. Beth the Slide is backup and decides to assist Adam by distracting the guard using sway. Beth succeeds and Adam now makes his prowl action roll with a better position.

Beth the Slide is on point and knows that Adam the Lurk needs to sneak past a guard into an enemy base. She decides to setup Adam’s prowl action by using a sway action on the guard. Beth succeeds and now Adam is on point and makes his prowl action roll with better effect.

I’m not sure I understand the rationale of these two pretty similar situations ending up with different mechanical benefits. I can imagine PCs awkwardly trying to juggle who is on point in certain situations because they really want a better position on an action, or they really need better effect. It looks to me like you want who is on point to transfer pretty seamlessly, but if Beth was on point and Adam really wants a better position on his roll they might try to force Adam to be on point with an unnecessary special maneuver to achieve that result.

Thoughts?