Hello
Hello,
I just discovered this game the other week from the mention in the roll20 apocalypse world campaign and I became an instant fan. That said I’m sorry if this was mentioned somewhere else but I just can’t find it; is there any option for like a ‘slacker backer’ who didn’t know about the campaign until after it was finished?
Rituals: You can attune to use strange idiosyncratic rituals to achieve any mundane effect you desire.
Rituals: You can attune to use strange idiosyncratic rituals to achieve any mundane effect you desire. Costs stress based on the magnitude of the desired effect (2-6). Answer the following questions:
• What is the mundane effect you want to achieve and how do you make it weird?
o I want to search the scene for traces of those who attacked. I do this by seeing the ghosts of the actions they left behind..
• What is the weird ritual you preform?
o I pull out my pipe and drop in a ball of the good stuff. You know, opium laced with crematory ash.
• Why does that work?
o That’s easy. You want to see beyond the veil, you gotta take a little trip there yourself.
• What is the price and to whom do you pay it?
o The price? Well the door swings both ways right? You borrow some death. They borrow some life.
• Where did you learn this technique?
o I bought some shit off this guy once and it turns out he gave me some of his personal stash by mistake. Now I’m a regular buyer.
What do you think of having each player use different coloured dice so that when they Assist, it’s easy to identify…
What do you think of having each player use different coloured dice so that when they Assist, it’s easy to identify whether their help was a key element of the success/failure? No need for any mechanical changes – just another way of feeding the fiction…
I felt this table needed to exist. That probably says more about me than anything else.
I felt this table needed to exist. That probably says more about me than anything else.
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/16777AKjXNrnOlvpdyyXieWnCWSB4SBG9WCQi7Ub3HEI/edit?usp=sharing
A question about Plans:
A question about Plans:
I enter the tavern, and the other two put a bomb outside, detonate it and make a mess, so everyone goes out to see wht’s up or gets the hell away. While everyone is out, I slip in the rear room and take the swag…
This is infiltrate, for me, but my players call it deception.
Is it important to determine exactly WHAT type of plan is it? Who decides? And, if you chose deception, can you (sort of) switch mid plan and infiltrate?
I’d say yeah, you can start to deceive someone, and then put a knife in his eye if he starts to bother you.
What do you think the impact on BitD’s gameplay or tone would be if all the actions were replaced instead with Hard,…
What do you think the impact on BitD’s gameplay or tone would be if all the actions were replaced instead with Hard, Cool, Hot, Sharp, and Weird? (along with related mechanics like advancement, etc) Those could also serve as effect/resistance ratings and possibly replace crew effects.
The Back Pocket.
The Back Pocket.
Every game I run has one. That is a metaphorical space where I tuck away things I want to use in the game, ready to be pulled out when the time is right.
It can be concrete, like a table to roll on or a stack of note cards or a Word document with a column of stream-of-consciousness phrases. Maybe you have a folder on your computer with pictures, portraits, and documents, or maybe you have a Pintrest board. Or it can be something you keep in the back of your mind, if your mind is organized that way.
I learned a very important lesson. SOMEDAY will probably never come for your campaign. So, if there are things you want to use, jam them in as quickly as you can. Build the whole game around the coolest things you can think of doing in the setting with the characters.
That is related to another idea: if you do all the coolest things you can think of, you won’t run out–you will think of more cool things. There is no finite amount of coolness. It is more like a muscle; the more it is used, the stronger it gets, where if it is held in reserve too long it atrophies.
A third idea about the back pocket: participation is different than spectating. You can take the loose plot of your favorite movie and use it for inspiration to set up a situation in the game. You can repurpose characters as NPCs. Steal liberally from your favorite monsters, magic, and challenges.
The reason this is okay is because your players may have seen Predator, but that’s not the same as playing in a game where there is a Predator hunting in their city. The shift from audience to participant adds the necessary novelty.
We rely on formula to make things familiar enough to be enjoyable. We don’t want the exact same thing over and over, but we do like recognizable plot structures, ancient stories told in new ways, and interesting executions of basic well-explored themes.
In summary, fill up your back pocket! Be intentional about it. Collect and organize your ideas for stories, NPCs, cool places to show off in the game, excellent treasures, exciting challenges, and so on. Pull out your very favorite ones and get into them as quickly as you can–tomorrow may never come. And don’t be shy about stealing intellectual property for your game table; show off the best of why you like it, and use those booster rockets for your own cool execution.
The best part of the back pocket is you don’t have to force it. One of the brilliant parts of Blades in the Dark is it is very, very low prep. For the first little while, you don’t know what they’ll latch on to, which way they will go. What you CAN do is think up some people who might need help, and some jobs they might pull the crew into. You can put some general thought into scores you’d love to showcase for your players.
When you are on the spot and have to improvise in a hurry, you GET to showcase things from your back pocket, instead of being forced to make something up on the spot. Keep the prep low, and the inspiration high, and that’s the mix that will burn like rocket fuel and make Blades in the Dark soar.
Hi guys
Hi guys,
a couple questions about flashbacks.
There’s a Red Sash lock in the way.
the whisper says Flashback! I spent some time playing mah jong with One Old Sash, and he told me that they put spirits in their doors. (roll, roll, roll).
So, this is a spirit lock, and I can easily open it with my spirit key.
Can he do this? What can you exactly do in this case? Is is FATE style?
Etienne Navarre
I want to get into the tower.
I approach the two goons at the gate, invoke a FB and say “I’m of militay background: these two were once under my command, so I COMMAND them to let me in for the good old days. (roll, roll, roll)
Allright?
Etienne Navarre failed, and the guards attacked, but this is another story…
So, something I’ve noticed after a half dozen or so games:
So, something I’ve noticed after a half dozen or so games:
The “what’s the score/what’s the plan” design of a session is really helpful for GMs like me who struggle with “coming up with something interesting” for the players to engage with. It let’s thing jump to the action in a fun way that makes episodic play very accessible.
That said, I’ve also noticed that inter-character and NPC-PC drama tend to fall by by the wayside. While the AW “ensemble cast, shared space, shared hardships” design specifically targets this type of play, the “what’s the score” model has, in my experiences, pushed this mostly off the table. Out of all the sessions I’ve run, precisely zero have ended with someone checking off the “express your character’a flaws, obsessions, etc.” advancement option. Obviously, this isn’t bad, it’s just seems to be geared towards a different style of game.
So, that’s what I’ve seen in my games this far. I’m curious to hear if this experience has resonated with others, or if said character drama has grown out of the “what’s the score” design in your games.
Maybe this is obvious, but I had a thought about what a deal between two criminal organizations would go down like. …
Maybe this is obvious, but I had a thought about what a deal between two criminal organizations would go down like. Like a sale of some contraband for example.
Since both groups have no respect for the law, I think what allows these deals to happen functionally is a feeling of mutually assured destruction. Both groups come with enough firepower to ensure that the losses from a fight breaking out are greater than the potential gains of stealing the other party’s part of the deal.
The other way this could go down would be that the political damage between powerful criminal factions, and to your group’s reputation as a business partner creates enough pressure to keep the deal mostly on the level.
Either way it seems like a good thing to think about, as sort of a feeling to impress on the game about the kinds of situations these sorts of criminal organizations would get into.