scott slomiany – Blades in the Dark G+ Archives

One of the problems with solo playing Blades in the Dark is all of the options the GM can throw at you on a “…with…

One of the problems with solo playing Blades in the Dark is all of the options the GM can throw at you on a “…with complications” roll.

So, if you have an android device..

After you decide on the position and effect of your action, pick “controlled”, “risky”, or “desperate” from the bottom of the screen, and a random result card will be generated. The results for 1-3 and 4-5 will be a single “complication” that you can incorporate as if a GM selected selected it as the response.

If you don’t think that the response is applicable to the situation, you can select the grey box to get a new result.

The .apk is below if you want to download it to an android device.

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1ARM0PQfvziLj2K57N6g5l-6gkbvEeD1i/view?usp=sharing

I’ve been loosely daydreaming about converting Blades into something akin to a solo card game, and to do that I…

I’ve been loosely daydreaming about converting Blades into something akin to a solo card game, and to do that I think I would need to reduce the amount of actions from 12 to 8 to make things a bit more manageable.

Sooo.. I’ve been thinking about….

A) removing Command from the list, arguing that it could be considered to just be an “angry or imposing sway”.

B) Combining Prowl and Skirmish into Scramble ( from SaV )

C) Removing Survey, arguing that it’s just a “larger study”.

I am looking for other ideas regarding removals, substitutions or replacements that may be possible due to the overlap of the way that actions work. Any ideas?

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.

I don’t know if anyone wants or need this….but I’ve been hinting in our campaign that Duskvol has building an…

I don’t know if anyone wants or need this….but I’ve been hinting in our campaign that Duskvol has building an elevated train system for some time throughout the city. Well…it’s finally active! ( Mostly because I wanted some train heists in the city or some wacky train chase sequences like the car-chase-on-the-rails from Running Scared ).

Anyway, as envisioned, the traincars are double-deckers, with the comforts-of-home “high-society 1st class” passengers on the top, and the low-class riders on the bottom. This is done because the stations themselves are double decked…some stations prevent access of various society-tiers from each other ( well, mostly to prevent lower class riders from invading space in first class ).

This .pdf includes enlarged versions of the map broken in 4 quadrants, with and without the elevated railway. ( we’ve been used an enlarged map in our game ).

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1KqUCkwPYWVX0O7gUagx4uWHX6L56_k0F/view?usp=sharing

If anyone is interested, here are my cheat sheets that I’m using in my game.

If anyone is interested, here are my cheat sheets that I’m using in my game. It puts all of the important Action Roll stuff on one page and Downtime stuff on the other. The downtime page is designed to be used, in boardgame terms, as a worker placement mat to track who has done what. Sooooooo, everyone gets two pawns at the start of Downtime ( and can buy more pawns with Coin if needed ), and then they place the pawns on the action that they are running off to do.

I’m putting together a cheat sheet for Downtime…and I just want to make sure this is correct about spending coin…

I’m putting together a cheat sheet for Downtime…and I just want to make sure this is correct about spending coin after down time rolls.

Page 153 states:

“For any downtime activity, take +1d to the roll if a friend or contact helps you.

After the roll, you may spend coin after the roll to improve the result level.”

A) I’m guessing you can spend coin regardless if you get help…but the rules read like you can spend coin ONLY IF you get help.

“ANY downtime” doesn’t seem to make sense for the following:

B) Train doesn’t have a die roll, so I’m assuming you can’t improve it with Coin.

C) Indulge Vice dice has a dice roll that isn’t really a “traditional result level”. Can you spend Coin to adjust the outcome?

I’m curious, when playing the game, how stringent are people letting players call their action skill?

It seems like every session there’s a point where a player does something along these lines:

“I jump across the rooftops silently and jump on the guard when his back is turned.”

“ok, let’s roll for that. What skill are you using.”

“Uh, I have three dots under Consort. I’m doing that.”

“That’s not really a Consort.”

“Then why did you let me pick it?”

We keep reverting back to the GM (me) calling out a preferred Skill ( “that sounds like a skirmish to me”) with a logical player override if it makes sense (“I think I’m being a bit more finesse-y than skirmish-y”, “ok, fine, how are you being finesse-y about it” ), and things seem to flow a lot better.

Part of it might be because our background are much more boardgame than rpg, and therefore are more sticklers for following the rules to the letter.

Anyway, I was just wondering if people actually follow that rule to the letter, or if they play it with more negotiation.

Just curious.

Just curious…. How much do you feel that the Score selection should be played driven? We’re still running with training wheels at this point, and my plan was to offer two different opportunities from different ways and let the players pick one (or go of on a different tangent if they wish, say going for turf). I’m just wondering how much per-planning of scores happens by the GM when things start moving naturally.

So, instead of simply recapping what happened in our last ( first ) session, I’ve decided to hand out to the players…

So, instead of simply recapping what happened in our last ( first ) session, I’ve decided to hand out to the players little unreliable narrator newspaper headlines, plus throw in a few story prompts of what’s going on in the city.

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1RlxKQLPiZGYY7vwhQ5wczoRLjUKDnI_-/view?usp=sharing

Tag: scott slomiany