Blades in the Dark: Discussion – Page 43 – Blades in the Dark G+ Archives

Voted ‘New Kid on The Table Top’ in this year’s GROGGIES

Originally shared by Chris Hart (Dirk the Dice)

The thrills and spills from a year in Armchair Adventuring.

Download Episode Intro: This is break fro the usual format, we are looking back at some of the experiences that we have had over the year. Thanks to Phil the Dice Mechanic for his review Groggies Pt 1: The year in games mastering – some of the highs and…

http://armchairadventurerblog.com/2017/12/16/episode-17-review-of-2017-in-rpgs/

“Ghost Recon” (sort of) in Blades!

Bound in Darkness with an Arcane Obelisk…a Lurk with Expertise (Prowl)…Synchronized…a Hound with a bird as their hunting pet as well as Mind Link.

“The bird soars over the courtyard as its master uses its eyes to Survey the area, noticing guard movements, patches of concealment and other useful bits of information. The crew Prowls across the courtyard, their minds and motions as one through dark magics…”

This kind of synergy is dope! The Hound telepathically informing the crew about what he sees through his bird’s eyes, the free use of Bound in Darkness from the Arcane Obelisk, the Lurk not being drained of Stress when leading group actions and others roll poorly, the criticals that occur as a group, the normally clumsy Spider drawing on the Lurk’s Prowl 3 to quietly dispatch a guard…it’s all so damn cool! The crew feels like a group of Spec Ops magical ninjas and I love it. 😀

How Do You Design Scores?

How Do You Design Scores?

This one’s for fellow BitD GM’s. How do you go about designing the scores your players go on? Make it up on the fly? If so, how? What’s your thought process?

Do you prep? How/ what do you prep, what do you leave for the table? Do you draw maps?

Mule and the fiction of being conspicuous.

A thread on the good and bad of heavy armor got me to look at the Mule ability again.

“Your load limits are higher. Light: 5. Normal: 7. Heavy: 8.This ability is great if you want to wear heavy armor and pack a heavy weapon without attracting lots of attention. Since your exact gear is determined on-the-fly during an operation, having more load also gives you more options to get creative with when dealing with problems during a score.”

I’m looking for ideas and advice as to how heavy armor and a heavy weapon wouldn’t attract a lot of attention simply because you can carry more. I totally get that you’re less inhibited by the weights, however I’m tripped up on the fiction of being less conspicuous.

I’m looking for opinions regarding mayhem during downtime free play.

I’ve been running free play pretty much as do what you want and explore the world, and see what the world has been reacting to various events that have been happening in the world, typically chain-reacted from crew actions. Because of this, the crew keeps getting into risky situations which require die rolls that naturally spiral out of control into chaos.

For example, last night we had some players “simply reporting in” to their Dimmer Sister contact, which ended up with them escaping an interrogation by firebombing their storefront and burning her alive.

I guess I’m wondering if Downtime Free Play should be relatively safe? Or should harm-causing, stress-spending actions be a common thing, even if, unlike a score, the original intent of that kind of wackiness was never intended by the players.

https://www.treehugger.com/green-architecture/mycotecture-mushroom-bricks-philip-ross.html

What do people consider challenges?

Every playbook has an xp tracker about “addressing a challenge” with something appropriate to the class. Violence or coercion for the Cutter, calculation or conspiracy for the Spider, etc.

Action roles seem obvious.

But what about gather information? What if my Cutter beats up a few people to get information out of them?

What about downtime activities? If my Cutter scares some people or beats them into submission to stay quiet and reduce hit, is that a challenge?

We had a player at the table make the argument that things like gather information and downtime activities don’t have any real stakes. You can’t really fail per se. Which does make sense.

On the other hand, it’s still adding to the narrative. If my Cutter is always going around beating people up for information or whatever maybe word gets around and it makes my life difficult in some way. Who knows. Seems like either way it’s playing to the Cutter’s nature.

So I’m curious what other people think.

Ran my first game of Blades as a GM last night, and it went really well!

Ran my first game of Blades as a GM last night, and it went really well! The players all dug it, and after two years of running d20 games for them, getting to play a game which invites and rewards cinematic scene framing and narrative elasticity thrilled me to no end. The other players were new to the system and “fiction-first” gaming in general, but they were already playing like naturals – thanks in large part, I think, to John Harper’s clear and compulsively readable rulebook, which two of them read and grokked without much trouble despite firm trad backgrounds. Taken simply as an introductory text for “fiction-first”/“indie”/“story” gaming, I think Blades is just about peerless.

I did come away with a couple of questions for you fine folks:

1. If the fiction demands it, do you think it’s okay for a character to have two vices? One of the PCs gives to charity out of guilt for the murders she commits (the crew type is Assassins), but she’s also a zealous believer in her dark gods who sacrifices people to them in service to the goal of bringing back the sun (at least, that’s what she thinks will happen).

Both of these fit the bill as vices, I think, and both exert an equal amount of influence on her life. I was thinking she could choose one of the two as her “active” vice at the beginning of every downtime phase, with the other one not counting until she chooses it in the next phase. Struggling with either or both would count toward end-of-session xp where applicable, but only to the usual maximum of 2 xp. I realize this makes being cut off from one’s vice a little less onerous, but I’m okay with that in exchange for the ability to make her life more complicated.

Does that sound workable to y’all? Any other issues you can foresee?

2. What are some good generic consequences for 1-3 and 4-5 rolls during social scores?

Thanks in advance for any help you can provide!

About the make my first BITD campaign. Here is the synopsis, what do you think?

The king is dead- long live the king!

The Crimson King- the last of The Seven- leader to the Circle of the Flame- has been killed- far below the city in his catacombs. No rival gangs have stepped forward to claim the assassination as their own. The Circle of Flame is feared through out the city- who would dare attack them?

This cult boss had his fair share of secrets-but his underground fortress was impregnable. Blue coats have sealed off the area and the Spirit Wardens are investigating.

Rumour has it the Wraiths are at work tonight. The mysterious crew of masked thieves are ruthless and cunning- untold riches lie in his vaults- but who will be first to reach them?

To make matters worse the worst electrical storm ever to be seen in Duskvol is only days away. Can you solve the mystery of the Crimson king?

Category: Blades in the Dark: Discussion