Blades in the Dark G+ Archives

Ran my second session (first with the new draft, and first with this group), and I will post an AP tomorrow.

Things that were liked

Weirdness in general.

Playbooks as-written.

The new attribute/effect rules.

Things that were confusing

Had to cobble together some of the crew rules from this draft and the last one (edit: like reputation).

Had some slight difficulty with spotlight management.

Not sure what a “great effect” is in the new draft.

When someone is leading a group action, does everyone have to roll the same thing, or can they contribute with other roles? Or is that best interpreted as a series of setups?

Things that have not yet arisen

The new holdings rules.

The new harm rules.

Things I’m excited for

Setting up some faction clocks!

Plotting out the new leads my Whisper ended up with from overindulging his vice (going to weird parties with his buddy Skurlock).

I’v been reading the QS3 teamwork rules and it has struck me that I would only provide an assist if the on-point…

I’v been reading the QS3 teamwork rules and it has struck me that I would only provide an assist if the on-point character is unwilling to take stress and I have fewer than 2 dice in the relevant action. Otherwise, it would be preferable to declare a group action and get full use of my dice pool (vs. 1d in assist). Is this intentional? Am I missing something?

Something I really love about Blades is that I can look at generic fantasy city maps and just burst with ideas about…

Something I really love about Blades is that I can look at generic fantasy city maps and just burst with ideas about how it might be laid out, gang wise.

“Eldritch Paths / Black Stars Rising”

Some ideas collected for a Lovecraft themed Hack:

Crews i had first noted but than found it a bit to spread:

– Privat Investigators

– Gentlemen’s Club

– Faculty of Ancient Lore

– Bootlegger

– Industrial Enterprise

– Arcane Cult

– The Circle (Occult)

– The Syndicate (Crime)

– The Enterprise (Buisness)

– The Agency (Espionage)

I decided that this time, the player should NOT be investigators or old professors deveiling the cosmic horrors, BUT be the ones calling them down into the world. In this way, we have 4 types of organisations, which are all interested to gain power (Influence, money, arcane, etc), expand their crews and rival with others.

Classes:

– The Brute (Warrior/Cutter/Hired Muscle)

– The Maverick (Rogue/Hound/Trickster/Gambler/Booker)

– The Pariah (Occultist/Whisper)

– The Prodigy (demagoge/Socialit/Slide/Industrialist/Crimeboss)

– The Seeker (Scientice/Journalist)

– The Enforcer (Killer/Police/Soldier)

– The Rake (Flapper/Flaneur/Boheme)

– The Libertine (Artist/Dancer/Musician/Rebell/Student)

This classes should catch most of the diverse social stands which could be interesting in a ’30 era story. At least in my opinion.

What do you think of this? Could it work out?

Playing the powerhungry shady organisations that honest “Call of Cthulhu” gamer always try to dismantle 😛

A sneak peak at what I am doing at the moment.

A sneak peak at what I am doing at the moment. My taste goes more to the authentic look of 20th century Maps like those from the victorian era “Society for dispersion of usefull knowledge”.

I THINK THIS IS A SERIOUSLY GOOD IDEA.

I THINK THIS IS A SERIOUSLY GOOD IDEA. I have a thought about gangs and tier and such. A possible solution is “enterprises.”

What is the crew involved in? What income generators and vice dynamos answer to them? Everything they are involved in that generates money is an enterprise. When the enterprise runs smoothly, it generates funds and takes care of its own problems. When it doesn’t, then it’s problem solving time.

So instead of defining tier by how many PEOPLE are involved, instead it is based on the ENTERPRISES involved. Each enterprise is on a scale of 1-5. Tier 0 is up to 5, Tier 1 is 10, Tier 2 is 20, Tier 3 is 40, etc.

Now you’ve got “turf” measured by income potential. You have (ideally) self-sufficient enterprises kicking money back to the boss. And you’ve got gangs you use to trouble-shoot.

Now you can say that bookie business on Dulvin Street is a 2 enterprise. The bootleg whiskey business in Trevor Square is a 4 enterprise. So your crew has 6 enterprise, and if they can take over the brothel in Times Windfall they’ll get a 5 boost, putting them up to a Tier 1 concern with 11 enterprise.

Business is bad for an enterprise because of bluecoats–Trevor Square goes from 4 to 2, now you’re back down to 9, and risk losing a tier unless you can bolster your enterprise by dealing with the bluecoats, or pick up another one to keep the crew strong.

This seriously appeals to me. It solves the manpower problem, it solves the turf problem, and it keeps the focus squarely on the PCs where it should be.

Ran my first session last night and I was hoping for some feedback on how I handled actions and dice rolls.

Baszo Baz offered our PCs a job. He said “I want you to get something for me,” and handed them a blueprint of the Red Sash temple, making it clear the PCs should damn well be able to figure out what to do. None of them were willing to call him on it and, you know, actually ask what they were stealing. Instead they tried to puzzle it out based on the blueprint. Trying to do something that you could screw up sounded like a roll to me (although now I’m not so sure). I made it a four-segment clock.

Our Whisper rolls her Cipher and takes the Devil’s Bargain of having Baszo realize the gang aren’t as knowledgable as they pretend. She succeeds but only fills in 2 segments – and this success took forever as she failed her Controlled roll and then did a Risky roll and then did an effect roll. And there was still to be more rolling to puzzle the map out!

The gang’s defacto leader accepts to job even without them knowing fully what it is and takes the map back to HQ. At this point my GM instincts are saying “Just give it to them,” but we want to try this thing properly so she rolls Cipher and also takes a Devil’s Bargain of needing to tap a corrupt contact in the city planner’s office who can help interpret the blueprints but does not have the tightest lips. She rolls her effect and – thank gods – fills the clock.

Narratively, I liked that we introduced a new NPC and influenced Baszo’s perception of the PCs. But the rolling for this took forever. Is there a different way I should have handled this? Is it just a matter of having facility with the system? Thanks for your input!

I recall seeing a post that had the new Crew sheet with a second page for all of the factions, but cannot seem to…

I recall seeing a post that had the new Crew sheet with a second page for all of the factions, but cannot seem to find it. Does anyone know where that post might be?

Just came from testing the new rules with #theMalkavs

Just came from testing the new rules with #theMalkavs . Adapting the already advanced character took most of the session but we got to an score. There was a poor reception with the new playbooks, specially from the Lurk (she wants her Shadow armor back!), she says now it feels like she’s playing less Garret and more Assassin’s Creed. The new item list was poorly received too.

The session itself ran smoothly, and even though I was hesitant with executing the rules I think they worked great.

NOW QUESTIONS:

How do fine items work? We had them give away +1 effect level.

How do Ritual special ability work? for now I had the Whisper make a test against a clock to research and create supernatural effects.

How do quality and potency work We used for +1 effect level. If so, How do I measure a contact’s quality? Also: Do quality, potency and scale interact with each other or are treated independently? Meaning that if I have a PC with potency in beating guys up facing a gang with scale over him do both modifiers cancel each or only one affects in any given situation.

Crews have no more effects nor attributes How do I handle attacks to their lair and turf, and how do they use their gangs? It will be important once they start claiming territory.

Overall I liked the new rules. We didn’t get to use the harm, though.