A NOCTURNE — progress update
A NOCTURNE — progress update
Here’s a look at how claims work in A Nocturne: modules, parts of the craft that have either been lost to time or can be installed when stolen from a faction. Also, an example of the module map (I still have yet to detail the modules themselves, but you get the idea). Let me know what you think!
A NOCTURNE — progress update #???
A NOCTURNE — progress update #???
AKA It’s a Blades hack, for real this time
After some genuinely sleepless nights, I decided to bite the bullet and just port over Blades’ core dice system to A Nocturne. To be honest, I’m not sure why I didn’t do this months ago. I’d been wrestling with my custom dice stuff for a while, and was realising that I was essentially reverse-engineering Blades’ dice mechanics in a way that was, at the end of the day, not particularly useful or meaningful for the game.
So, here’re the current range of actions in the game (this is screenshotted straight off the Killer playbook). Lemme know what you think. I’m currently messing with the naming of Operate, which is basically the techy “fix things, make machinery go” action. I’m also wondering if I couldn’t go further with the poetry layer, though I’m pretty happy with the suite of actions as-is for playtesting purposes.
So, yeah, a lesson for myself, since I’m guessing most of you guys already know this: be truthful with yourself about whether or not something is working, or worth being made to work! It’s kind of a massive relief to have done this, and reinvigorated and streamlined my hack (and hacking process) quite a bit.
My main group are playing The Prestige, a crew of assassins who’ve ended up on The Hive’s bad side.
My main group are playing The Prestige, a crew of assassins who’ve ended up on The Hive’s bad side. What’s ensued since the first exchanges have been a series of violent killings, including a massacre seemingly perpetrated by members of the Imperial Military in broad daylight (Brogan, the commander of the suspect squad, has just been broken out of prison by a mysterious group of smugglers looking for a bargaining chip), the burning-down of the Archaeological wing of Charterhall Uni, and culminating in the brutal stabbing of mercenary captain Karth Orris, his corpse left cooling on the cobbles of an obscure square deep in the tangle of the docks.
Now, The Hive are getting desperate, and they no longer have Karth’s mercenaries on tap due to enmity between Djera Maha and the mercenaries’ new commander Alma Critch. So, Djera and her remaining inner circle are sequestering themselves aboard a fortified train perpetually criss-crossing the city (think the Iron Council, but hyper-capitalist), and have decided to hire assassins to take out the assassins.
I’ve been introducing new factions as needed in my game, so I decided to have a little fun with this one. What with all the public killings and disguise-based misdirection The Prestige have been using, I decided to create a crew of assassins to be their match. Of course, I had to get creepy with it – enter The Waxmen, a nasty Tier II death cult devoted to The Thousand Faces, who perform their ritual killings almost exclusively in public, and wear horrible wax death masks with rearranged features. The image below is what they look like right now in terms of clocks.
TL;DR, introducing new or subsidiary factions as needed is super fun, you should try it sometime. Small ones work best, especially ones who are part of existing factions. Kath Orris’ mercenary company (I’ve called them The Frozen Dawn) have recently split off from the Hive to form their own Tier III, weak hold faction, for instance. It’s pretty sweet.
Also, feel free to use the Waxmen yourself. I might properly write them up at some point following the canon examples in the book.
A NOCTURNE – playbooks update #2
A NOCTURNE – playbooks update #2
Here’s the four playbooks I’ve got so far: The Broken, The Forgotten, The Killer, and The Outlaw. Yes, The Forgotten is meant to be as creepy as it seems, and I spent far too much time evilly cackling while writing it. Also, yes, if you look at some of the character creation options you’ll see that A Nocturne also secretly doubles as a cyberpunk mecha game. Shhh, don’t tell anyone!
https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B_sURh-eDnchZklMUDBKNlczcmM/view?usp=sharing
A NOCTURNE – update
A NOCTURNE – update
Here’s a sample playbook, The Killer. If you’ve read previous versions of A Nocturne, you’ll recognise some stuff. Hopefully, though, it’s flavourful enough without the rules knowledge. Should give you an idea what I’m doing with the game for the next version (i.e. drastically overhauling it). I’ve tried not to move too far away from Blades’ tried and true playbook design, just to aid comprehension. Some AW-isms present, ‘cos I can’t help it these days.
For now, if you want a taste, A Nocturne’s (soon to be defunct) 0.6 playest doc can be found here: https://thysane.itch.io/a-nocturne-play-test
https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B_sURh-eDnchaTRfWE5kMkRKMUU/view?usp=sharing
I need some input for the latest version of A NOCTURNE, and since it shares a lot of DNA with Blades (I consider it…
I need some input for the latest version of A NOCTURNE, and since it shares a lot of DNA with Blades (I consider it a kind of side-hack – it uses different dice, but still has pushing, stress, a crew-like shared sheet, etc.), this is probably the best place for it. I’m heavily reworking the playbooks, but I’ve only got 4 fleshed out so far and could use some general ideas for more.
To recap: in A NOCTURNE, the players are the crew of the spitter craft, an old and weird interstellar spacecraft. You only ever crew up on a spitter craft if you’ve left common society behind. Common society is the Panhuman Diaspora, the scattered worlds of our unevenly transhuman future. The idea of each playbook is that it not only suggests your capabilities, but also the reason why you left common society behind (or were forced to leave).
So far, I’ve got The Killer (driven out because they committed some violent act, or left so they could do their dark deeds without consequence – special abilities are all about violence and intimidation), The Forgotten (a blank, considered a non-person by regular society, or someone who’s willingly fallen through the cracks – special abilities are all about stealth and manipulating others’ perceptions), The Broken (a shattered individual, closer to machines than their fellow panhumans – special abilities are all about systems and technical stuff), and The Explorer (left of their own volition to seek out new worlds and new civilisations – sort of the Captain Kirk archetype – special abilities are all about taking fast and decisive action, exploration, and being an agent of change).
So essentially, what are some more cool or interesting reasons for someone leaving the Panhuman Diaspora behind and joining the wretched motley of a spitter crew?
My Blades group are planning to break Duskwall’s prisoner of the century out of Ironhook tonight, so I’m checking…
My Blades group are planning to break Duskwall’s prisoner of the century out of Ironhook tonight, so I’m checking out some uh, “touchstones.”
In which The Prestige incite chaos, as usual
In which The Prestige incite chaos, as usual
So, through some dastardly blackmailing and a none-more-goth mist-drenched midnight meeting in Ankhayat Park, The Prestige (my players’ crew of assassins and cleaners) managed to convince Milos Brogan, a jealous commander in the Imperial Military, to brutally murder industrialist Adric Strangford, who was being guarded by a squad under Brogan’s direct command (Strangford is an inner-circle member of the Hive, with whom our PCs are currently at war, so the Hive are pulling strings for extra protection).
Unfortunately, Brogan and his boys messed it up a bit, leading to a brutal slaughter out in the open, dubbed in the broadsheets as ‘The Turnbull Street Massacre’ (the result of some interesting fortune rolls). Some tabloid rags are also speculating that Brogan is the Brightstone Butcher, a serial killer The Prestige invented to cover their tracks. Now, there’s a huge investigation and court case going down in Duskwall, along with much ballyhoo and public outrage, not least because, as well as being a celebrated military man, Brogan is married to Lucella Rowan, the daughter of Elder Rowan, the patriarch of the Church of the Ecstasy of the Flesh.
And all this because The Prestige accidentally came across evidence of infidelity on Lucella Rowan’s part and decided to use it to their advantage, pointing Brogan at whoever they wanted by lying to him about who Lucella’s lover actually was (Lucella’s actual lover was one Branon Farros, a minor noble in the employ of the Hive whom the PCs knocked off a few sessions beforehand). They’ve got heat coming their way big time, even though (and somewhat because) they tried for the hands-off approach.
Goddamn, I love this game.
Blades of New Crobuzon – progress update #9: COMPLETE (for now)
Blades of New Crobuzon – progress update #9: COMPLETE (for now)
Yup, here’s v1.0 of Blades of New Crobuzon, all shiny and hot off the presses, ready for all y’all to get your grubby (digital) mitts all over it.
Future developments: I intend to write up a starting situation at some point (the arrangement of certain factions is already pointing me in one of two directions for that), and I also want to get some more factions in there (New Crobuzon’s big, so at the moment it feels a little empty still – however, I didn’t necessarily want to go inventing stuff whole cloth for this version).
As always, two page viewing is recommended!
https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B_sURh-eDnchdTk3SU9rSUdnRVE/view?usp=sharing
Blades of New Crobuzon – progress update #8
Blades of New Crobuzon – progress update #8
Some new art for the Thaumaturge. Apart from this, you can likely expect another rapid-fire update later tonight with the full v1.0 document! I’ve got some things I want to do for a future version (maybe some more factions, and certainly a starting situation), but the document linked from the next update is gonna be it for now. Good times!