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Siivola posted:I'm about to run Scum & Villainy for my D&D group. Anything I should keep in mind for the first session that’s not spelled out in the book? Don't let them pick the smuggler ship unless they also have a very firm idea of what their character's goals are; it's such a pain to come up with continous jobs.
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Jan 22, 2021 10:43
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Siivola posted:I'm about to run Scum & Villainy for my D&D group. Anything I should keep in mind for the first session that’s not spelled out in the book? Be ready to step in during planning phases, or any time it seems like the players are trying to negotiate or otherwise avoid a risk/dice roll. Remind them they can't plan away externalities, and stuff like the engagement roll or success and failures on dice determine those things. Also, inaction is an action if you get the sort of players who catch on to "Wait, if npcs only react to our moves, if we never take moves we can't be attacked/tracked/whatever" Combat is another one of those situations where d&d players can get a little bogged down. Try and have a few early instances where a player might act or make multiple actions in a row because it makes narrative sense -or where dice repercussions affect another character and then cut to that player's turn, to help highlight the flow of combat being so different than something more structured.
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Jan 22, 2021 19:55
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I have another question: If a leech knows an alchemical recipe (either due to having the Alchemy special ability or completing a long-term project), does this then become a part of their bandolier and automatically refills during downtime? Or will they have to spend downtime actions on making a new batch each time one dose is spent? The latter option seems overly restrictive to me. An item created by an Artificer would have no such restrictions after all.
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Jan 24, 2021 09:28
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That's something you come up with on a per alchemical basis. It's one of the drawbacks they suggest iirc.
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Jan 24, 2021 11:59
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WhiskeyWhiskers posted:That's something you come up with on a per alchemical basis. It's one of the drawbacks they suggest iirc. Yeah, all alchemicals have the drawback "Consumable" and that's fine. I read that as that the character has a limited supply on every mission and has to keep checking bandolier slots if they want to use more. If the character is not a leech, they only have what they acquired beforehand or through a flashback. No problems so far. The question arises when you have a character with a bandolier. Now this bandolier automatically refills every downtime, as long as you have a reasonable access to a workshop or supplier. Some of these items can go up to quality level 4. If I spend time inventing a quality level 2 alchemical agent, it would to me make sense that this too automatically refills. Downtime actions are very valuable and it does not make sense to me that you'd have to both spend down time actions to invent and to refill when you have the bandolier ability. A closer reading of the rules on page 71 seems to support this: "When you employ an alchemical or bomb from a bandolier, choose one from the list at right (or one of your custom-made formulas). (...) During downtime, you automatically refill your bandoliers, so long as you have reasonable access to a supplier or workshop." To me, this means that custom-made formulas go in the bandolier and bandoliers automatically refill during downtime.
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Jan 24, 2021 14:53
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For my season finale I am looking to do a bit of talking and then a bit of fighting. With the talking I figure it will be almost like a season recap with a lot of the key players showing up and potentially causing issues or helping out during proceedings. Since it's going to be a lot of RP talking to sway people and things like that I was considering using hidden rolls and not revealing the results of those rolls until it becomes relevant. Maybe give a wink and a nudge about how it might have gone down depending on the sort of person they're interacting with but making sure that there's no "Well we rolled a crit so the bluecoats we owe a favour will at least stay out of things when it kicks off". I'm using Roll20 so my plan is to give each character a portrait that they can move around and have a table with something like "Will oppose, Will remain neutral, Will Help" or something along those lines and let the players move them around as they see fit whilst I keep the "real" tally hidden from them. This will mean I'll need quite a few branching ideas but I can mostly make it like a TellTale game where it's a lot of variety that leads back to a very similar point in the end. I've never really done a talking heist before so if anybody has any hints or tips I'm all ears, I'm also a bit worried my hidden rolls thing has some glaring issue I'm not really seeing so if anyone has advice with that too I'd be happy to hear it.
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Jan 24, 2021 15:09
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Freudian slippers posted:Yeah, all alchemicals have the drawback "Consumable" and that's fine. I read that as that the character has a limited supply on every mission and has to keep checking bandolier slots if they want to use more. If the character is not a leech, they only have what they acquired beforehand or through a flashback. No problems so far. Yeah, but keep in mind if you let your players invent something dramatically different in scope or power you don't have to follow that. Like in a game I'm in the leech invented the street drug the sale and distribution of which formed a key season plot for us. It made sense narratively to say we occasionally had to dedicate downtime or heists to securing our supply lines vs "sorry, the rules say the leech auto refills their bandolier every session, and the GM said a dose was worth a coin, so now the leech is passively making us cash every time they choose their loadout" This is very much a game where you're expected to make rulings that 'feel right' and keep the story going. Sometimes that'll even mean being inconsistent in your rulings. Just make sure you're being a fan of the characters, and the players are having fun and you'll do fine if your calls are about keeping the story interesting.
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Jan 24, 2021 20:10
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Redundant posted:For my season finale I am looking to do a bit of talking and then a bit of fighting. With the talking I figure it will be almost like a season recap with a lot of the key players showing up and potentially causing issues or helping out during proceedings. Since it's going to be a lot of RP talking to sway people and things like that I was considering using hidden rolls and not revealing the results of those rolls until it becomes relevant. Maybe give a wink and a nudge about how it might have gone down depending on the sort of person they're interacting with but making sure that there's no "Well we rolled a crit so the bluecoats we owe a favour will at least stay out of things when it kicks off". How does your group in general feel about hidden rolls? The only thing I can say that can get specifically weird with blades in not showing the results of player moves and skills is how do you handle abilities that specifically are reactive -or for that matter things like resisting consequences? May I suggest open rolling and keeping that general "on your side, nuetral, against you" thing, visible but then also have some hidden clocks, so they don't know how far along they are in swaying someone? Also let the players know up front failures or complications will be much more abstracted in that montage. So no rolling straight 2's doesn't mean Sally is against you, it might mean Bob betrays you, or Steve is unable to deliver on his promise -even though they rolled straight 6's. But the blades group I play with also specifically works really well in leaning into narratives where they as players know something but their characters don't. I have other groups where yeah I need to play things close to my chest because if they ever see rhey rolled badly on a gather info or spot check they will know to ignore anything I tell them -even when I'm explicitly clear I'm not giving faulty information on bad checks, but instead make other narrative complications pop up.
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Jan 24, 2021 20:46
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Coolness Averted posted:Yeah, but keep in mind if you let your players invent something dramatically different in scope or power you don't have to follow that. Like in a game I'm in the leech invented the street drug the sale and distribution of which formed a key season plot for us. It made sense narratively to say we occasionally had to dedicate downtime or heists to securing our supply lines vs "sorry, the rules say the leech auto refills their bandolier every session, and the GM said a dose was worth a coin, so now the leech is passively making us cash every time they choose their loadout" Good point, thanks!
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Jan 24, 2021 21:47
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I've been eyeing Wicked Ones which is...quote:WICKED ONES is a Forged in the Dark tabletop RPG about a group of fantasy monsters building a dungeon, launching raids on the surface to gather a hoard, and pursuing your nefarious master plan. https://www.drivethrurpg.com/product/338480/Wicked-Ones?src=hottest Anyone have opinions on it?
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Jan 25, 2021 09:52
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Helical Nightmares posted:I've been eyeing Wicked Ones which is... Ran two sessions of it; the rulebook is Very much disorganized while being Very Good.
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Jan 25, 2021 10:19
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I made a thread for Wicked Ones here! Short answer - the book is pretty disorganized and is accidentally missing something, but the game itself owns. My players have really gotten into being assholes (our deep dwarf turned a dead ent into a sled to haul their loot back, the elf had a Darth Vader robot hand), and the dungeon drawing is a fun time that helps people get invested in their shared project. The game additionally comes with a TON of stuff to help you run it over online tabletop software which is really handy, and the devs are active and reachable on their discord channel.
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Jan 25, 2021 10:44
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Coolness Averted posted:That seems pretty fun, but I also love minigames with stuff like clocks and visual abstractions in RPGs. Using rolls from one character to impact the actions of another is a great idea and encourages them to talk to people they shouldn't be able to sway or who are already known allies. Like a "You robbed Bill, burned his house down and killed his dog so he isn't going to help you, but Ben really hates him too so now he's on your side because he heard you talking smack" opens up a lot of options.
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Jan 25, 2021 22:44
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Hey, any good resources for making maps for Beam Saber? I have no graphic design skill nor any idea where to start. I would like to avoid Paint.
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Jan 29, 2021 10:31
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Any ideas how to keep the Lurk's "Ghost Veil" from being too overpowered for a gang of Shadows? Had a score end with the Lurk using it (and pushing himself to last for a few minutes and pushing more to be invisible) and basically noclipping into the basement to steal the forged ledger they were looking for. I tried to add an obstacle with a captive ghost in the basement asking the Lurk to free him, and then yelling for the guards when the Lurk wouldn't, but it ended with the Lurk running away with the evidence, and the rest of the gang stood outside and waited (they tried to help distract the guards at the end when the ghost started yelling). Need some ideas for obstacles so it's not just the Lurk going invis and noclipping around..
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Jan 30, 2021 01:21
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lummawks posted:Any ideas how to keep the Lurk's "Ghost Veil" from being too overpowered for a gang of Shadows? Had a score end with the Lurk using it (and pushing himself to last for a few minutes and pushing more to be invisible) and basically noclipping into the basement to steal the forged ledger they were looking for. I tried to add an obstacle with a captive ghost in the basement asking the Lurk to free him, and then yelling for the guards when the Lurk wouldn't, but it ended with the Lurk running away with the evidence, and the rest of the gang stood outside and waited (they tried to help distract the guards at the end when the ghost started yelling). Need some ideas for obstacles so it's not just the Lurk going invis and noclipping around.. You could set up scores that can't be solved by the one player grabbing stuff. Also maybe check in with the group and just flat out say "Hey, I don't really like plans that just turn this into to Lurk's show, you can make that move your signature, but as a warning, I'm going to focus on what happens to the rest of the crew and have stuff (like say the investigators or thugs that come knocking because the rest of the crew is outside hanging around whenever these cat burglaries happen) and/or have some ghost field tech traps and security become the rage as this kind of burglary takes off. So you cut to "The alarm sounds and electroplasmic energy surrounds the vault. <other player> you hear this, what do you do?" The power lets you slip through walls, not ignore hazards.
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Jan 30, 2021 03:24
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Good desperate complication can be that they get stuck in the ghost field. Need to find an open ghost door on the other side (or have the whisper open one with a ghost key and go in after them.) Just generally start awakening really bad arcane poo poo, start escalating any of those entanglements involving ghosts and demons that they roll.
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Jan 30, 2021 05:13
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Thanks for the tips, was thinking something along the lines of the ghost field, maybe they draw the notice of some ghosts or other arcane badness. in another group we are starting up who wants to play a vampire. I am totally down for having a vampire in the crew and what it may bring, but since this crew is completely new I'm worried the character might be a bit too powerful for a starter character in a crew that is just starting out. Maybe that she plays a baby vampire, or as a Ghost, or a Ghost that has just started possessing a body long term and doesn't have all vampire powers yet?
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Jan 30, 2021 20:15
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lummawks posted:Thanks for the tips, was thinking something along the lines of the ghost field, maybe they draw the notice of some ghosts or other arcane badness. Blades isn't really a game that suffers too much from player power imbalance. Even having players join later with fresh characters (or replacing dead ones) works well enough. That said, ghosts, hulls, and vampires have always struck me as more "advanced" rather than "stronger" character types, especially if someone starts as them vs using them to keep a dead character around. There's more moving parts and restrictions on the character they might not 'get' the gravity of before they've figured out the base game and setting. I actually would suggest "Hey, why don't we start you with another playbook and plan on them dying and becoming a vampire" or like you said say "Yes, we can say you're a vampire, but so fresh your character may not realize it" then at an appropriate story beat once they've learned the basics of play let them swap playbooks. I'd lean more towards the former, since if they see how downtime and healing works, or how trauma, harm and stress they might see "Wow, so I risk every few sessions getting KO'd in a way that completely eats my next 1-3 downtime actions" or avoids potential envy from seeing how much quicker other players get new toys, and seeing the abilities they get inflicts still more penalties and restrictions. Like I'd personally approach it by giving a character a weird vice based on stealing life-force, have a background element of some amnesia or a traumatic near death experience, once they've got the ruels down give them the option of swapping to the vampire or ghost playbook with the reveal the near death experience wasn't exactly "near death" edit: I just realized I assumed that player was new to blades just because it's a new game. If they know what they're signing up for and you're comfortable with it go for it. Just be ready to bring the spirit warden hammer down, they're specifically choosing a high risk/high reward character. Coolness Averted fucked around with this message at 23:52 on Jan 30, 2021 |
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Jan 30, 2021 23:50
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Coolness Averted posted:Blades isn't really a game that suffers too much from player power imbalance. Even having players join later with fresh characters (or replacing dead ones) works well enough. That said, ghosts, hulls, and vampires have always struck me as more "advanced" rather than "stronger" character types, especially if someone starts as them vs using them to keep a dead character around. There's more moving parts and restrictions on the character they might not 'get' the gravity of before they've figured out the base game and setting. Also the more we talked about vampires and how they're seen by the populace and Spirit Wardens, we both got more and more pumped about the character. Especially since she decided the fact that the character is a vampire would be a secret the other PCs didn't know (new crew, kinda like telling someone in 1600s New England "oh btw I'm a witch"), and I got even more psyched about the possibilites and complications that may bring.
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Jan 31, 2021 01:43
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Quick question folks, but has anyone "relocated" blades? By which I mean keeping the mechanics the same but having the setting move from the darkness of Duskvol into another setting? I am not sure if I want to try, but I have had a few ideas about making something and was wondering if there were any examples? Mostly I just keep finding ones where the mechanics have been radically altered instead.
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Feb 3, 2021 10:59
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If you backed the Kickstarter, the special edition PDF contains a city guide to U'duasha, which is located in the not-Middle-East but is much smaller than Duskwall. I don't know of any other city guides like that that have been produced, since the setting is really more Harper's personal setting rather than anything else. If you want to keep the basic Blades mechanics and just transpose the whole thing to a city you wrote up yourself, you need to remember a few facts about Duskwall which are actually critical parts of the way the game works on a mechanical level: - the world outside the city walls is a blasted hellscape, which means you can't just run out of town after something bad happens; you have to lay low in the city itself, where you're always within reach of your enemies. It's impossible not to poo poo where you eat, in general. - Duskwall is old and crowded; every inch of available space has already been claimed by someone. Combined with the above it means that you can't get things without taking them from someone else and making enemies in the process. This drives conflict between factions. - concurrent with the above, resources are limited and the infrastructure of the city and its people is easy to disrupt. There are also barriers to introducing new people and new things into the city. - spirit bells, deathseeker crows and ghosts mean that killing people is very suboptimal and you can't just shank someone to silence them. It's harder to remove human obstacles and foes will either stick around for a long time or make your lives hard even when they're dead. - the ghost field exists and can be interacted with; there are a lot of mechanical elements that do this. If you want to transpose the game to a different city but not change anything about how the mechanics work, you'll need to make sure your setting also forces players to compete for very limited resources with other factions, with very limited ability to dodge the consequences of their actions (and that you have a ghost field equivalent that works similarly so you don't need to rewrite the Whisper and other supernatural moves). For example, you could copy-paste Blades to a sci-fi setting by setting it on a space station - this would cover the isolation and limited resources and space aspects. You would then need to find a reason why killing people isn't just the most expedient solution to every problem (because the station is scoured daily by maintenance bots, and the body will always turn up in fairly short order) and a substitute for the ghost field (there's an omnipresent cyberspace layer and people are regularly digitally backed up, but it's impossible to re-instantiate those backups in physical bodies; dead people are supposed to get sent to a digital afterlife so they're not running on the same mainframe that runs the actual station).
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Feb 3, 2021 11:58
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Lemon-Lime posted:If you want to keep the basic Blades mechanics and just transpose the whole thing to a city you wrote up yourself, you need to remember a few facts about Duskwall which are actually critical parts of the way the game works on a mechanical level: This is very interesting, I'd like to show the few solutions that I have thought of to these thus far: -Just not have an end to the city. The option to run and hide doesn't really apply as much when the state is all around and people can communicate across long distances. Also, does this need to be hard and fast as a rule? Could you just make it so that the cost of running is much much worse than staying and fighting? The loss of what you've built up and all that? - That's fine, the current plan was to already have a bunch of factions already set up as powerbrokers. To ask a slightly deeper question though, is there any recent game that doesn't have there be a huge amount of things to interact with first alongside your own attempts to create something new? Other than dungeon crawlers I don't know if I've ever been in a game that doesn't have some level of this. - I think the thinness of resources is something I need to look at more. - To steal a more "gamey" option just having the police able to contact the other side/ cast "speak with dead" would be a useful option to fall back on. - I had a look at the Whispers moves and the only one that requires a ghost field is "Compel", which can be rewritten to any weird demon thingamajig fairly simply (hopefully). Are there all that many other character or wider options? (leaving aside the Hull, ghost and vamp play books for obvious reasons) Have "attune" just being the generalised "magic sense" does seem possible as well.
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Feb 3, 2021 12:33
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Lemon-Lime posted:If you want to keep the basic Blades mechanics and just transpose the whole thing to a city you wrote up yourself, you need to remember a few facts about Duskwall which are actually critical parts of the way the game works on a mechanical level: I would argue the criticalness of some of these. These are setting justifications on a meta level to reinforce mechanics. The game doesn't really work if the players decide to be roving adventurers(a default in many other RPGs- DND or Apocalypse world inspired), so the setting reinforces that being a roving adventurer won't work. If you've got player buy in that they are interested in being located in a single spot and doing heists and defending territory, then the game works perfectly well in any fantasy world city. The classes, gang types and abilities are all mostly generic for the genre. Except for the ghost stuff. That all needs a rework.
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Feb 3, 2021 13:47
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Yeah not even Blades holds entirely to those pillars it uses. Perfectly possible in-setting to catch a train or stowaway on a ship to another city for instance. Never seen a group do it to escape heat/wanted levels though. Think there's also a Skovland setting hack that's been released as well as the Iruvian one. WhiskeyWhiskers fucked around with this message at 13:52 on Feb 3, 2021 |
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Feb 3, 2021 13:50
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Undead Hippo posted:Except for the ghost stuff. That all needs a rework. This is one of the big things I really dislike about the setting. I know a lot of people like the idea, but I find the whole "all the time ghosts" thing just not my style.
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Feb 3, 2021 14:03
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Josef bugman posted:This is one of the big things I really dislike about the setting. I know a lot of people like the idea, but I find the whole "all the time ghosts" thing just not my style. I'm doing a campaign set in a homebrew city and we've downplayed the ghost angle in favor of an "arcane" field. I'm with you- the emphasis on ghosts just doesn't work for me either.
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Feb 3, 2021 14:24
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Midgetskydiver posted:I'm doing a campaign set in a homebrew city and we've downplayed the ghost angle in favor of an "arcane" field. I'm with you- the emphasis on ghosts just doesn't work for me either. Thank you! This is also a great idea and I am probably going to steal it. How has it worked so far for you? See general "arcane" stuff seems to me so much more interesting because it is so much more easily customisable.
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Feb 3, 2021 14:31
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Josef bugman posted:Thank you! This is also a great idea and I am probably going to steal it. How has it worked so far for you? IMO, this will work but only with the right group of players. Making magic a nebulous, narrative plot device rather than a 30 page list of Recipes for Breaking the Game can be a lot of fun for some people, but not others. My group is having a blast with it and the one "wizard" character is more of a semi-sane hobo shaman than a stereotypical mage. He took the Tempest Special Ability and basically when he tries to use magic, I go with "yes, but" and assign a number of stress I feel matches what he's trying to do. The bigger, more overt of an effect, the higher the number. It's worked great for us. E: also, I did a lot of work prior to the first session writing up summaries of the factions. I think this is a must-do if you're looking to replace the Duskvol setting with your own. Draw up a city map, notate where the districts are, describe the districts and give them flavor and rankings for things like wealth and criminal influence. Describe the major political, religious, and criminal factions as well. In my settings, I created 6 noble houses and 7 criminal factions, as well as a few faiths and cults. Then devise a chart that shows what the existing relationships already are when the campaign begins. Which Houses hates the thieves guild? Which gang is sanctioned by the Church as long as they target heretical cults? Etc etc It can be a lot of work but with Blades, once everything is set up, there is an emergent narrative that will come about as your players make choices about who to target and who to seek alliances with. It's mostly front-loaded which I very much prefer to the usual workload of coming up with entire adventures every time. FLIPADELPHIA fucked around with this message at 18:20 on Feb 3, 2021 |
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Feb 3, 2021 17:49
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Midgetskydiver posted:I'm doing a campaign set in a homebrew city and we've downplayed the ghost angle in favor of an "arcane" field. I'm with you- the emphasis on ghosts just doesn't work for me either. I'd be cautious that if you genericize magic too much, then it becomes an everything button. All the narrative baggage and potential supernatural risks of attune help keep usage of the power in check. If magic isn't stigmatized, and doesn't have serious consequences(beyond those of a normal action roll, like potentially losing control) then it's pretty easy for the magic character to respond to almost anything with "I use magic to(insert plausible spell), rolling my best stat for this action again" and for that to fit quite well with the narrative. An easy fix is probably just to make magic illegal, except to members of a specific group that the PC magic user explicitly isn't in. That immediately means they either have to be cautious when to use it, or draw unwanted attention from the only dudes who can legally do magic out in the open.
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Feb 3, 2021 18:25
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The approach I've used is that I attach stress to it and also Heat, if the display is overt or witnessed. We've played maybe 10 sessions and it hasn't become an issue for us. But much of that has to do with the type of players you have.
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Feb 3, 2021 18:44
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Josef bugman posted:Quick question folks, but has anyone "relocated" blades? I thought there were a lot of spin-offs of the Blades system? Band of Blades for instance, Wicked Ones? Scum and Villainy? Hold up here we go: https://www.reddit.com/r/bladesinthedark/comments/d9u8fa/list_of_all_forged_in_the_dark_based_games/
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Feb 3, 2021 20:14
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Kumo posted:I thought there were a lot of spin-offs of the Blades system? Oh there are! The conflict resolution system remains the same through all of them. It's just that I don't have an issue with the actual classes or abilities or other sections of "Blades" just mainly ghost lore and things around that. I do like some of the spin-offs, but I'd just like to relocate the majority of Blades as a book, as opposed to starting fresh.
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Feb 3, 2021 20:34
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Just treat the Ghost Field like the 40k Warp - Is it Ghosts? Is it Arcane energy that happens to reflect reality? Is it Old Gods toying with mortals and laughing as they pull your strings by presenting images of people you knew? Who cares - It’s bad. (Also, it’s all three, surprise!)
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Feb 3, 2021 22:16
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Anybody have opinions on Beam Saber?
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Feb 4, 2021 00:09
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Deeply unimpressed by what was released during development and didn't keep up with it further. Barely worked as a game with huge glaring oversights in design, from intent to implementation. If they rescued it from being fundamentally flawed good on them. Just play LANCER if you want mechs with narrative noncombat mechanics, there's no game that does narrative combat for mechs well.
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Feb 4, 2021 00:23
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PerniciousKnid posted:Anybody have opinions on Beam Saber? It's brilliant and does everything I wish Lancer did, but better IMHO since I'm not a tactical combat fan. Very easy to turn into Ace Combat.
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Feb 4, 2021 00:55
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I need a tiebreaker opinion I guess.HerpicleOmnicron5 posted:Very easy to turn into Ace Combat. What does Ace Combat mean in this context?
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Feb 4, 2021 02:09
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PerniciousKnid posted:I need a tiebreaker opinion I guess. Ace Combat is a video game series about jet fighter pilots.
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Feb 4, 2021 02:27
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PerniciousKnid posted:What does Ace Combat mean in this context? Basically, it's a game series where the narrative arc is always the same: Start as a relative nobody in a losing war, do badass poo poo on the frontlines through operations of increasing size, scope and danger while facing a rival squadron at key points and oh, the enemy has ridiculous superweapons. It ends with the player character/squadron being hailed as indestructible gods of the battlefield who changed the course of history, at least until the next game. Beam Saber does this through the standard Forged in the Dark ruleset expanding not just the actual narrative power of the player characters but through their rep and relations with other units. Rivals can be declared at any time by the players, and they're more dangerous and also plot immune until players expend "Drive" clocks, which is basically like, wiping these guys out is, in this moment, more important than my goddamn life goals. Beam Saber is also not constrained by just being mechs. You can have people in fighter jets or as a loving biker gang, the vehicle side of things is very flexible. I'm running a game now where the players have - An intel/recon van, a diplomatic limo, a halftrack weapons carrier, a motorbike with psychically controlled arms and a centaur mech with a beam lance that can transform into a giant knight. Mission parameters can let each one have more or less screen time on a per session basis, and the more admin characters can do a lot via flashbacks and other cool poo poo. Honestly, if I can find the players, I might run something in the style of Legend of Galactic Heroes in the system. Like any Forged in the Dark system though, if the GM or the players aren't invested in the spirit of the game, they'll fall off of it quite easily. Scum & Villainy is very easy to get into for example, because it's Star Wars. Blades is also fairly good, since it's just small scale kinda medieval cutthroat poo poo. Stuff like Band of Blades or Beam Saber feel a lot more reliant on knowledge of relevant touchstones and clear communication of expectations from the start. Narrative combat in general needs a decent base of knowledge and flexibility for interesting situations, and that's doubly true for more combat centric games and even more so for vehicular combat.
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Feb 4, 2021 04:14
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