Tony Demetriou – Blades in the Dark G+ Archives

How do PCs gain new items (or even better, fine items) for their list?

So, for example, the leech has “Bandolier of alchemicals (3)”

What if the Cutter wanted a bandoiler of alchemicals? How would they go about arranging that?

– If it’s a once-off, it could just be a downtime action to temporarily get that item. But what if they want to always have it? (say, a pyromaniac who carries vials of Greek Fire)

– It could be a flashback (“Flash back to me grabbing a bandoiler of Greek Fire”) – but then either they always have it with them, or there’s some skill roll and we need to explain why they forgot it this time.

– Would it be a long-term project, where the end result is they add it to their items list, and can then check it off as part of their load?

– Am I missing the obvious? At the end of the items list are two boxes, with no name next to that. Would they just fill in one of those boxes and say “I’ve got a bandoiler of greek fire (3) with me!”, same as they’d do for any other item on their list. And everyone would nod and say “Of course you do, you pyromaniac” because we know the PC carries that. (And they’d fill in two boxes of load if we were talking about a larger item)

On a related note, how would we handle characters “improving” items they already have. So we’ve got ways to create rituals and alchemicals and drugs and stuff. But what if, say, a leech wanted to take a drug and invent a “cleaner” version that didn’t have a side effect. Or a Lurk wanted to improve their Subterfuge Supplies into Fine Subterfuge Supplies?

I’m assuming that would just be a long term project, with the end result being we update the sheet, and those items now get potency for being “fine” or have fictional positioning from the improved effects? So upgrading a grenade and smoke grenade into a combined explosion-and-smoke grenade would be a long term project, and once it’s done you can just describe the explosion also creating smoke, which the players use for fictional positioning.

So the RP changes from “Throw a smoke grenade at those guards, and then the Lurk will make a break for it” into “Throw a grenade at those guards, and then the Lurk will make a break for it” – essentially the same, but the players can now injure the guards as part of throwing the grenade.

How does your group decide on Heists?

Do you have NPC contacts that approach the group and offer jobs, and the PCs say “yes” or “no”?

Do you have NPC contacts that the PCs can go to and ask “what jobs are on offer?”

Do your PCs work towards some plan (wealth, power, crew reputation) and create their own Heists?

So far in our game, our crew has mostly been deciding on heists for themselves – I’ve told them to look at what’s on the sheets as inspiration. So during the first plot (lampblacks vs red sashes) then they decided “Hey, let’s run a brothel” so when they were told to help the Lampblacks they said “Sure! We want to take a brothel away from the Red Sashes, and want your help holding it once we’ve got it” and used that conflict as a way to advance their own agenda.

Next, they wanted a fence, so I rolled randomly on the chart to figure out a heist involving a fence (He’s been fencing supernatural goods to one of Lord Scurlock’s rivals. Lord Scurlock wants that to stop) – so that gives them a few options, they could contact Scurlock and ask for a job taking out the fence. They could take out the fence and hope favour flows their way. But they decided to protect the fence, and earn him as an ally (and earn the “Fence” crew turf advantage)

So they talked to him, we RPed stuff, they investigated and whatnot, and convinced him to switch from fencing to clients directly, and instead to hold illegal auctions. That way he could still fence these illegal goods, and Scurlock and his rival can bid on them – whoever ends up with the goods, that’s not the Fence’s responsibility or fault. The hope being that Scurlock would no longer have a motivation to remove the fence, while allowing the fence to continue operating. So they’ve been organizing what will be necessary to conduct an illegal auction (find a way to advertise, find a venue. They’ve just arranged one of the auctioneers from the slave markets to be their auctioneer. They’re hoping to break into the house of an absent noble and hold the auction there, and make that a “signature” of their auctions – held at a different noble’s house each time)

All lots of fun, but as you can see, the “heist” evolves as the story progresses, and it’s heavily dependent on the downtime RP, NPC interactions, etc. – which probably explains why we have an issue with the “starting in the middle of the heist” mechanics, since that skips a lot of the fun stuff.

I’ve had an NPC at the slave markets tell the hound “Hey, if you’re ever looking for work, I’ve got a list of wanted people. If you can grab them, I can sell them as slaves and split the profit” so that there’s at least one opportunity for the player to say “give me a heist” – and something like that, I can see as much easier to “start in the middle of things”

I’m not complaining about how our games have been going – I’m satisfied so far, and having fun. But I was musing about whether the way our group decides on the heists might explain this disconnect.

Hi all

Hi all,

So, my group finished their first score, and I’ll tell you guys about it when I’m feeling less god awful with this cold.

It did bring up a two more questions, though.

1- How to handle alchemicals & the leech

2- How to handle downtime

So for number 1, I notice that a few of the sheets have alchemicals already available – the lurk has the silence potion, the cutter has the rage potion. Presumably that’s just something that those playbooks have ready access to, and they refill between scores.

The Leech, however, has a “bandolier” of alchemicals, with 3 doses. And has two of those. So presumably he can have 3 doses of any alchemical in the list? And the another 3 doses of that same or a different alchemical in the list? And it says he refills the bandolier during downtime.

OK – awesome. So he’s got a bunch of these things, that’s a great way to represent the scientist, medic, or tinkerer while out on a mission.

My question is how that overlaps with the “crafting an alchemical” – in the list of alchemicals there are clocks for crafting them, and the number of doses created. So it requires a clock with 4 slices to get 1 dose of a number of alchemicals or drugs. And some cost more. Why would a Leech ever craft them? You’d be using up two of your downtime actions just to get one dose, when you’re already getting 6 for free? Am I misunderstanding about being able to mark the bandolier equipment while on the mission to have those potions? Or is crafting this something that you just wouldn’t do?

For point 2, I’ll make another post soon 🙂

Question about Ghost Veil:

So the description of Ghost Veil says “Ghost Veil: You may shift partially into the ghost field, becoming shadowy and insubstantial for a moment. Take 1 stress when you shift, plus 1 stress for each extra feature: It lasts for a few minutes rather than a moment—you are invisible rather than shadowy—you may float through the air like a ghost—you may pass through solid objects.”

And we were wondering, if you use the basic 1 stress ghost veil and don’t pay for the extra features, what does it do?

It makes you become shadowy and insubstantial for a moment? How can that be used? It’s not enough to let you float up onto a balcony in that moment, or quickly step through a wall.

So is it just a special effect to spend stress and look creepy for a moment? Or is there an obvious use that we’re missing?

I’d presume it’d be used to get advantage on other rolls, such as spending the stress during a melee roll to change the risky roll into a controlled roll (and narrate their attacks passing through the insubstantial form) or something? Except even that is narrating “passing through solid objects”