Before it all goes dark…
Before it all goes dark…
One group I’m in is scheduling our next Scum & Villainy session & I ran across this possibly helpful table tonight:
http://www.cold-moon.com/StarWars/gm/Random/random_cargoes_d666.htm
I’m excited about all the BitD stuff that is either in late development and/or dropping soon. I sense a Blades renaissance coming on.
Happy Friday, scoundrels!
http://www.cold-moon.com/StarWars/gm/Random/random_cargoes_d666.htm
The Blades in the Dark game we began in July wrapped up last night.
The Blades in the Dark game we began in July wrapped up last night. I am a little melancholy about it. It feels nice to have had a good long run. It’s a rare case for me, both as a GM to be able to see a long game through to a reasonable stopping point & to have four players willing to commit to such an extended game without it unraveling for one reason or another along the way.
“The Brimstone Imps” took a bit of a turn in their final caper. Some in the crew were of a revolutionary bent & the crew had taken some jobs making ties with Skovlander resistance factions within the city of Doskvol. In their last score, however, they determined to steal the “spectre helm” from the radio room of the HIS Swiftsure, an Imperial turret ship which the Grinders gang had themselves stolen & were refitting for a Skov guerrilla mission across the sea at Lockport.
Some in the crew decided on this course for its daring, some for coin & some to prevent the Grinders from undertaking what may have been a suicidal venture, as likely to harm the cause of Doskvol Skovs as help it.
The crew’s Leech, Basran, was killed during the score, sacrificing himself to save his rival Stazia whom he was in love with despite his best interests.
Complications, events & dice conspired to require the crew needing to leave via “Basran’s Elevator.” Even without Basran, there were now five of them wanting exodus & the elevator’s basket could safely lift and transport but four souls. Any left behind were likely to be possessed or worse by encroaching deathlands ghosts.
With the search lights of the Imperial coast guard below closing fast, the crew elected the desperate route of risking all to leave none behind. The crew’s mastermind Cimres, donned the spectre helm & allowed Basran’s beneficent spirit to possess him, guiding him as pilot and scientist. The winds carried them towards Doskvol’s lightning barrier but they were now too low!
They had one final chance to lose ballast in the form of a crewmate, trusted contact or the rival Basran sacrificed his life for. If they did not, nothing but a “6” would suffice to prevent all of their deaths on the barrier. They again choose “all or none.” Surely some final effort or artifice on Basran’s part would carry them over the top?
Basran’s ghost made the slow portentous roll:
“1”…
“1”…
“6!!!” YES!!!
The balloon and remaining crew landed hard but safely in the mire pits of the Dunslough district. The balloon, aflame, was lost but the crew returned safely to their hidden railcar lair in Coalridge.
I hope to see the Brimstone Imps again someday, but if fates prevent, such stories we are left with!
Stealth plans and The Engagement Roll
Stealth plans and The Engagement Roll
“Don’t make the engagement roll and then describe the PCs approaching the
target.” (p128)
The Billhooks have sent their man to pick up their monthly take from Sgt. Velk’s fighting pits in Dunslough. The crew’s Lurk is going to sneak up on the Billhook bag man and switch his bag (the one with the pit’s profits) with an identical-looking one with counterfeit coin. It’s another Stealth plan by a shadows crew. All I know for sure is that the engagement roll was “Desperate.”
I’ve handled their Stealth plans in different ways but I’m never entirely satisfied with the results. I’m supposed to open the Score cutting straight to the action and the main thing I can think of for Stealth plans is… PC(s) approaching the target. And in the case of a Desperate engagement, they’re maybe 3/4 of the way towards having their “sneak mode” blown, because someone’s watching the situation pretty closely.
How have you variously handled opening engagements in Stealth plans?
So the Grinders got their warship.
So the Grinders got their warship. I’m thinking they took it at sea (it was surprisingly easy… I wonder if someone just let them commandeer it?).
Anyway, the warship’s been refit and provisioned at the old North Port just outside the lightning barrier. Now they just need to get the crew aboard and off to Lockport. Logistical & tactical necessity requires this be done all at once rather than the piecemeal preparations that have been done up to this point. More than a three-hundred tasty souls, through the deathlands, aboard and off into the ink before the port authorities know what’s what.
The Grinders are going to ask the crew for help with this dilemma. It’s a good time for it because the city is pretty chaotic right now.
How do your rogues get in and out of the city? How do you get a large number out in short order? Are there ways to circumvent the barrier without endangering Doskvol? What have you seen along these lines?
The Weekly Squid
The Weekly Squid
For my current game. An “Anti-Skov Refugee Fervor” clock filled & rest is some of the denouement from the crew’s actions as well as a hint towards a future opportunity. I kept the meta down this time out and left it more generic in case anyone else would like to use The Weekly Squid as a seed for their own Blades session.
https://drive.google.com/open?id=0B156JfVtecqDRkdjVEJuQVNxWWs
The Word on the Street
The Word on the Street
is that the ministry of transport is taking control of the gondoliers…
Why might that be?
The Weekly Squid
The Weekly Squid
Inspired by Apocalypse World‘s love letters & not yet having time to put together a proper AP, I came up with some meta fun for my game in the rough form of a one-page “newspaper.”
I hope to make improvements and continue with it in between each session. I started to write it like a proper Victorian newspaper & realized I’d be significantly less likely to continue the project if I had to worry about stylistic choices & historical research.
The intent is to document for the players some of the fallout from their actions each session, throw a bit of fictional meat on the bones of some of the clocks they’re aware of, and hint at other clocks they might investigate – provide some starting places for gather information next time out.
A more ambitious project might be to create generic “authentic” Doskvol newspapers or leaflets as a format for generating scores on an ongoing basis. Something like the newspapers for the Sherlock Holmes Consulting Detective Game, but instead of combing its pages for clues to a mystery, your rogues would look through it for score opportunities and pick up setting information along the way.
The presence of the Ink Rakes and the setting of Doskvol generally feels like ripe territory to employ newspapers to provide score opportunities, rumors, information and laud (be fans of) the hardscrabble scoundrels of “The Dusk.”
If you do something similar for your game, I’d love to hear about it.
https://drive.google.com/open?id=0B156JfVtecqDY0lLSDhDNjJWYnM
With no sun or moon a black balloon would be near impossible to spot in the sky, provided some alternative to a…
With no sun or moon a black balloon would be near impossible to spot in the sky, provided some alternative to a flame burner could be developed. The rule book mentions that leviathan oil is prized for its steady clear flame. Maybe there is a fuel that burns black as shadow?
One of the players wants to build (& learn to pilot) such a wonder. It might make for a daring getaway someday.
I wonder what dangers inhabit the smoke clogged air above Doskvol? What kinds of things might you play around with if you had a ballooning crew in your game?
Mo Money, Mo Problems
Mo Money, Mo Problems
I’ve read quite a few Baszo Baz score APs now & I don’t think I’ve yet seen one where our scoundrels have had to contend with the fact that 12 Coin is 12 Load.
That alone might be enough of a difficulty depending on the fictional circumstance (e.g. the rogues have to get the stash out past a really formidable and attentive security detail), but an interesting complication for a heist might be a case where the loot has a 1.5 or even 2-1 Load-to-Coin ratio. Like maybe the loot has to be taken out both surreptitiously and in stages, clocks ticking down all the while. Totally an old school D&D style setup but w/o a Tenser’s Floating Disk spell. 😉
Espionage Scores
Espionage Scores
Our new game’s Shadows crew lairs in an abandoned rail car in Coalridge, but they’re daring and so have paid off The Hive for an Espionage Hunting Grounds near Gaddoc Rail Station at the southern end of the commercial district of Nightmarket. As long as they’re willing to share information with The Hive from time to time and don’t run into any conflicts-of-interest (ha!), they should be able to keep & grow it.
They’ll keep their eyes on the manifests and transport of goods to and from the railways into the city and keep their ears listening in the pubs and other commercial enterprises in Nightmarket. They hope to opportunistically barter their info to provide scores to other factions they want to ingratiate themselves with, as well as provide themselves with scores that are as sure a thing as possible on the streets of Doskvol. I think they said something about targeting some insurance companies at one point. Some day they’d like to have the metal to even attempt a train job themselves.
Anyway, the book has a few Shadows opportunities that could be construed as setups for “espionage” Scores, but I want more. The crew is made up of two lowborn characters – an Akorosi ex-leviathan hunter Hound & a Crow’s Foot Strathmill orphanage pickpocket Lurk, and two highborn characters – a Skov/Akorosi noble bastard Leech with Skov resistance movement connections he doesn’t want (Vice obligation) & a Tycherosi fallen house exiled noble & libertine Spider.
Targets and plots aside, I’m sort of noodling out how to distinguish Gathering Information actions against something that might be construed as an Espionage Score. They’re going to be Gathering Information to get Scores that are about gathering information. Maybe the only difference is one of scale and how many rolls / clocks there are between them and what they want? One more scale / shift beyond that they’ll also be looking at some Long Term Projects that are about finding Score information and the ideal markets for the Score information they find.
Lots to think about. Thoughts? Help?