Blades in the Dark: Hacks and Add Ons – Page 109

Yesterday we uncovered another useful background to add! Entertainer.

That covers buskers, circuses, artists with patrons, tavern shows, seedy actor troupes, etc.

That brings the total recommended new backgrounds to three: military, whaler, and entertainer.

There is some reason for ongoing discussion of the technology of firearms in Duskwall.

There is some reason for ongoing discussion of the technology of firearms in Duskwall. Here is my suggestion, and also how it will work in my games.

https://fictivefantasies.wordpress.com/2015/04/25/blades-in-the-dark-guns/

https://fictivefantasies.wordpress.com/2015/04/25/blades-in-the-dark-guns

Hey, Everybody!

Brad Elliott here. I’m a former game designer in my own right – worked on such games like Unhallowed Metropolis and Weapons of the Gods and a few others – and have decided to make a gift of a complete set of Duskwall Maps to the community. While everything (mostly) is here from my own inspiration and game intentions, it is all reconfigurable to your own use – you don’t have to stay with the choices I’ve made for the glyphs and so forth… copy this set and make it your own! I ask that you leave the original set here for others to copy from, but do what you will with this, and may it help you with your Blades in the Dark games.

http://goo.gl/MKl7qm

I’m no Ryan Dunleavy or tony dowler but I’ll try my hand at maps as well.

I’m no Ryan Dunleavy or tony dowler but I’ll try my hand at maps as well. Blades Against Darkness is coming along nicely.

Text off frame:

The White Forest:

They say The White Forest is haunted. This is shit. The whole damn city is haunted. Every Godsdamned inch of it. But the forest is especially haunted. The rest of the city is haunted by ghosts. Some have a fraction of themselves left, but most are only actions and violence repeated over and over. A horrible moment you don’t want to get trapped in. The forest is different. It’s haunted by memories. Amidst the pale glowing fungus trees and luminescent spore clouds are ruins which are briefly, painfully, alive with what the city once was. Bustling markets, festivals, riots. The people are real and happy and do not know they have been dead for hundreds of years.

And then it’s gone and there is only broken stone and fungal creep. Some say the city slipped out of time when the disaster struck. Others say the white forest is all part of a massive fungus mind all connected and studying the ruins, absorbing them, remembering what was here before.

Personally, I subscribe to the latter. I’ve been there a couple of times. Found some good shit once I knocked the spores off. But I won’t go again. Not since I turned a corner and bumped into myself.

Let’s just say he wasn’t happy to see me.

Special thanks to National Brand engineering paper and my differential equations homework I’m avoiding.

What if you want to play Blades in the Dark, but don’t want to commit to a campaign?

What if you want to play Blades in the Dark, but don’t want to commit to a campaign? What if you want to be in one or more one-shot games?

Here is a two page rules mod for how to play a GANG instead of a CREW. I would like to know what you think! I plan to try it out on Saturday.

Players can choose a type of gang to play (which gives a single advantage, instead of having to choose a special ability.) They also choose what underboss to work for, which tips the GM off to what kind of missions they want to play. There is no long-term advancement for gangs, as they form and split and reform all the time; however, characters can gain reputation, which may help them start their own crew with the backing of the Crows! =)

https://fictivefantasies.files.wordpress.com/2011/07/gang-generation-4-22-153.pdf

So a month ago there was a request for a squeaky clean setting for Blades.

So a month ago there was a request for a squeaky clean setting for Blades. I suggested either a “toy escape” or “Robin Hood”. Ever since then I couldn’t get that out of my head and the result is a (partial) translation of Blades to Robin Hood. Any comments welcome 🙂 Provisionally called #TheMerryBand

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/11G8hpQKJXt0Pj5yCRAZWDqOfXynifFOCDb5SAovaSgI/edit?usp=sharing

I updated the Chosen mod. (This is for playing someone like Corvo from Dishonored in Blades in the Dark.)

https://fictivefantasies.files.wordpress.com/2011/07/being-chosen-in-blades-in-the-dark1.pdf

Since Xcom is apparently covered… … … whose volunteering to write up the X-Men playset? :P

Since Xcom is apparently covered… … … whose volunteering to write up the X-Men playset? 😛

I would like to see some reflection in the full rules about how best to handle missions outside the normal scope of…

I would like to see some reflection in the full rules about how best to handle missions outside the normal scope of a single crew acting.

Now that I can play online, I could see setting up more than one crew that all play in my Duskwall. Then I could see having an evening where this crew is going to play, and those from other crews might be hired on as mercenary help, or come along for the fun, or have aligning purposes.

It would be useful to have a side note about what to do about allies who might go along with a crew, and also what to do if there are people from multiple crews who band together to do a heist outside any of their crew purviews.

Or, if you had a couple crews with a couple members each, those four rogues could go on a heist with both crews.

I think a game this flexible wants to avoid a situation where people make a crew member just to play once, or can’t mix characters because they aren’t in the same crews. Still, there are issues of coin, hold, and so on that may need to be addressed. If you go on a heist without your crew, do you still get your crew special abilities? That sort of thing.

A final thought in that direction: what if you’ve got a crew with a loner type who wants to run off and do things in solo play sometimes? How does that interact with the crew sheet?

Just some thoughts.

I think there may be room for a third kind of activity.

I think there may be room for a third kind of activity. We have heists and downtime currently. I think it might be useful to codify “react” as an action that can be triggered by the GM or by an entanglement.

Heist is a proactive mission. Down time is what happens between those missions. I see “react” as coping with an attack on hold, coin, or crew members. Any decent crew is going to be making enemies. The inspectors especially, and other crews that have their ear to the ground and pick up on the crew’s activity may take an interest. They may attack, or shut down lucrative opportunities, or punish allies, or even raid the lair.

There is an example of this in the quick start, with someone maybe wanting to stab a character in her sleep, and what do you do? But that doesn’t fit in as a heist, and it’s a bit odd as down time; it would feel punitive, out of nowhere, I think.

I have represented “heat” to my players as being trouble not just with the law, but other factions. So a mechanic might tie into heat; the hotter things get, the more likely either a downtime reaction is triggered as an attack on the crew, its assets, and its allies; or as a full-blown reaction mission, where kidnapping or assassination or theft escalate to actually damage character and crew.

This plays into the grit of a game where you are pushing on people who are likely to push back. You don’t get to choose the point of engagement all the time; you devastate them by hitting their weak points, and surely they’ll respond in kind.

Just a thought.