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I dunno that I would wait to start a game at this point. The core rules aren't likely to change -- most of what's being worked on are setting details.
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Aug 8, 2016 22:00
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What do you want to see out of the health system? It seems to me that the whole point of it is that anything that actually hurts you should be Bad -- your actual health pool is your Stress.
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Aug 16, 2016 01:07
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I guess nothing about that actually seems complicated to me. Every consequence in Blades uses the same mechanic: take the effect or roll to resist. The only thing special about harm is the three levels and Recovery. Rolling to resist is the weirdest mechanic in Blades, but it pays off in how important it is to the fiction. The idea that your characters are such badasses they can resist the negative effects of almost anything except what it does to their sanity.
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Aug 16, 2016 01:18
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Ominous Jazz posted:Finally got to do our first heist today, but uh things didn't turn out so good for my crimeboys. 75% of the boners were on their side but I have a couple questions. Consequences -- the Bluecoats arrive after X ticks of this box. Difficult obstacles -- the master swordsman won't be defeated with just one skirmish roll. Objectives -- you've cleaned out the lockbox, but the Red Sashes boss told you not to bother coming back with a pittance. Basically, if it doesn't make sense for something to be resolved with a single roll, make a clock for it. quote:How do I encourage my players to flashback more? I know right? I just try and keep it in their head -- when we talk about background scenes in downtime I bring up moments that would make good fodder for flashbacks, when we approach the planning stage I remind them not to over-plan because of flashbacks, when they ask something like "is there a good escape route from this room?" I say there might be, but with a flashback there definitely would be
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Oct 24, 2016 06:10
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I like the new system a lot, but feel it should move from crew's tier = base # of dice to difference between crew's tier and target's tier = base # of dice. It makes sense that a brand new crew would always be in desperate positions, but that's because everyone else is so much stronger than them!
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Nov 24, 2016 01:21
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Comrade Gorbash posted:What you're describing is a more complicated method to achieve functionally nearly identical results. ... no? A tier 3 crew going up against a tier 5 target shouldn't be rolling three dice. It's only identical for new crews, which will always be starting at zero dice because everyone is bigger than them.
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Nov 24, 2016 21:46
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Kai Tave posted:Am I wrong or weren't there supposed to he a couple of additional crew types, Grifters and Vigilantes? Vigilantes is relegated to a weird part in the "hacking the game" chapter along with a link to a website that doesn't work and Grifters are nowhere to be seen. Did these get spun off into supplements? I have a few answers for this.
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Feb 1, 2017 00:23
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Honestly I have a lot of lying NPCs and at least 70% of the time a player asks "is he lying to me?" I immediately say yes. It's just more interesting that way. Even if I'm going to force a roll, in PbtA it usually just takes a roll of 7+ on Read a Person, which is not automatic but often close to it. Lies just aren't that interesting. Why someone is lying and what they're hiding is a lot more interesting, and the skill doesn't reveal that.
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Feb 5, 2017 08:45
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Level 1 and 2 Harm only apply to fictionally appropriate skills. Source is 2nd paragraph on pg. 31. It should be pretty easy to treat a 2/3 harm down to 1/2 in one phase of downtime, or all the way down to zero if you're flush with cash. -1D is a harsh penalty but (a) it's only appropriate skills and (b) these are fuckin' scoundrels; they don't stay home just because of a measly broken arm.
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Feb 9, 2017 05:13
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Demon_Corsair posted:Next dumb question. For the showdown on the docks example of play, is that just a free play set of rolls, or should that be considered a score? I would interpret that example as being either players handling an Entanglement rolled up by the GM, or just free play. Again this is an example where it depends on how harsh you want the game to be -- if you go to downtime and do payoffs for every short bit like this, your players will get richer and push to their goals much faster; if you don't and throw these at your players every session, they might start to feel like they're running on a treadmill. I could definitely see at a minimum awarding rep for a scene like this, especially since it emphasized their lack of hold as the cause.
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Feb 9, 2017 22:36
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QuantumNinja posted:Based on the discussion here and my brief skimming of the current digital release, it seems like this game landed right in the middle of mediocrity, which I consider a real shame. For a game that promises good, clean heist adventures, it's got a health system more complicated than FATE, editing like Shadowrun (see: "health penalties are explained in the 2nd paragraph on page 31"), and a bunch of character moves that feel like they started out as PC custom moves and moved into the playbooks. The heist clock and crew mechanisms are neat, though, and the setting is fun enough. Overall, though, the game overall definitely feels lacking in polish and grace compared to other work in this style (high-profile indy storygaming, I mean). nah actually it's good
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Feb 16, 2017 01:44
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That sentence and variations on it appear nowhere in the PDF so 
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Feb 16, 2017 02:14
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I'm 13 sessions into my own campaign, which actually started on v6 and it's been super solid. The kind of janky things were rules on the outskirts, like the Engagement roll and gang Tier/Hold, which has been cleaned up in v8. We largely avoided the harsh Harm recovery rules by not being a particularly violent crew, which meant I only caused L3 Harm results (usually resisted down to 1/2 with armor and rolls) a few times over that period.
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Feb 16, 2017 20:37
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Nuns with Guns posted:I'm glad that you can reference how consistently you're disappointed in the game for the past year, but you're still complaining about the delivery date even if you're going "We waited an extra year... and for this!" *sweeping gestures exaggerated for a hyperbolic, joking effect* This isn't the final draft -- it hasn't gone to print yet and it's still open to proofreading.
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Feb 17, 2017 09:50
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Demon_Corsair posted:One thing I learned after a night of character creation. Picking which factions your crew has relationships is a pretty big burden for new players. It's an odd part, but I think it's reasonable to ask your players to read through the short form of the faction descriptions (which I think is still only one or two pages) and choose them based on that, then ask them to tell you why they have that relationship -- whether that means describing a job they did for or against them or something more abstract is up to them. If your players can't invest enough to read a couple pages before you start (which is fine; different groups work different ways) I would run a couple sessions before you ask them to pick faction associations, maybe set them well in the past, give them various hooks based on the factions YOU (or the GM) find interesting, and then pick relationships based on that.
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Feb 23, 2017 06:58
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Golden Bee posted:I mean, it'd be fine if it was six factions on a page. But there are DOZENS of one page summaries and you're asking a lot to have each player turn each faction around in their head, weigh it against what they (and the party) have made, and then declare it their sworn enemy. Page 283-284 summarizes all the factions on one page.
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Feb 23, 2017 22:26
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neonchameleon posted:Are many people hacking Blades in the Dark? Because Blades on the Borderlands will simply not get out of my head until I write it. (And as The Old School Job in Cortex+ said "What is a dungeon crawl but a poorly-planned heist") oh my yes
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Mar 22, 2017 03:01
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rumble in the bunghole posted:Would it be broken to start as one of the dead playbooks? Broken? Nah. You'll have more base skills then the rest of the group, but in exchange you'll have more severe downsides. Make sure it's alright with the GM and other players but it shouldn't warp the game.
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Mar 23, 2017 03:10
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bewilderment posted:I'm not seeing that as a print+pdf combo though, which is ideally what I'd like. If I couldn't get a combo I'd probably just get a PDF. As That Old Tree said, once the book is actually out there'll be a Print+PDF combo on DTRPG.
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Apr 16, 2017 18:13
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Maxwell Lord posted:I've been playing a lot of the Saints Row series lately and I'm wondering how good a system this might be for a modern "street gangs take over the city" game. It's apparently easy to reskin, that I get, but I'm also wondering just how the acquiring and expanding territory/influence part of the game works in addition to the heists. Also to what extent does it favor being legit sneaky and clever over blowing up half the city with rocket launchers. I'm not saying it has to be great at the latter but the option should be there. There's a crew type called "Bravos" -- they break poo poo. Expanding territory and influence is also a built-in element of the game, so if that's how your crew is oriented it absolutely supports it. Generally you take territory by executing heists.
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Apr 20, 2017 00:06
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Yeah for sure. I was just using "heist" the way I think Maxwell Lord was, which is to describe the core gameplay loop. Regardless of whether it's a heist, an all-out attack, a large drug sale, a smuggling operation, or whatever else, it's supported by the core loop of the game.
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Apr 20, 2017 00:47
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Demon_Corsair posted:Not sure what I was doing wrong but I felt with the planning phase I was basically just telling the players how the heist was going to kick off. You can do anything in a flashback. Hiring someone would likely be a sway or consort, with consequences based around extra costs. The difference between doing it in a flashback vs downtime is that downtime is waaaay safer. You can't suffer consequences for downtime actions, just varying levels of result.
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Apr 21, 2017 06:17
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I don't put any limits on it. Gathering info either costs downtime actions, or has consequences to failure (and partial successes). A info-seeking roll that sparks a chain of events that end up launching the heist sounds like a great session to me. They only get to make safe Gather Info rolls by spending downtime actions on it*. Anything else can have consequences, which are the meat of Blades. *whether you play those out or just make rolls and provide info is entirely up to you.
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May 20, 2017 05:58
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Kai Tave posted:I don't want to add to anyone's anxiety but I added my physical copy through Backerkit and got it like a couple few weeks ago, so if you're concerned you might want to drop John Harper a line. You're actually better off contacting Sean Nittner, as Evil Hat is handling distribution.
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May 20, 2017 08:03
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Serf posted:I live in the States and haven't seen hide nor hair of my copy yet. Looking forward to it after hearing all this good stuff though. The special editions should all be shipped out in the US by 6/9. Most people who've already gotten theirs are in Canada, where they started shipping sooner. (Stupid lucky Canadians.) The reason they're not sending out tracking numbers until they've all shipped is because Alliance won't send them tracking numbers until they've all shipped. Blame Alliance -- everyone else does.
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Jun 6, 2017 18:57
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Iceclaw posted:Is there a way for a filthy euro to purchase this without being murdered by the shipping fees? This is from a while ago but seems likely to still be true.
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Jun 7, 2017 21:53
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Clearly we will have to buy copies of the standard edition to carry around so the special edition can stay undamaged. (I'm honestly considering doing this.)
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Jun 8, 2017 21:08
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Covok posted:Read some people on Reddit thinking, since Cortex+ licensing deal is such utter poo poo, that Blades might be the new hot-child for hacks and spin-offs. Like PBTA or Fate. Anyone here with more familiarity seeing that in the pipeline? Oh yeah. There are already a ton of hacks in the work and the buzz on Blades is hotter than any indie game I've seen in a long time.
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Jun 8, 2017 22:03
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Evil Mastermind posted:I like to think of those as "walkin' around copies". Which one?
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Jun 10, 2017 19:00
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The raw sheets are in the SRD.
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Jan 1, 2018 19:43
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BetterWeirdthanDead posted:I had a second player intenionally max out stress and take a trauma last night. In our very first session our Cutter maxed himself out pushing to punch a Spirit Warden in the face. "I'm going to take Vicious." Yeah, no poo poo.
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Mar 6, 2018 02:24
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I credit the game design a lot. You look at a lot of the trauma conditions and a lot of players will go, "but... I already am this" and it's like... yeah, I know. And then the main effect of trauma is that you generate more XP when you do the dumb poo poo you were already going to do, and of course players jump on it.
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Mar 7, 2018 21:08
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Demon_Corsair posted:Finally got a game going again and a few things came up I'm not sure how to handle. Investigation should be Gather Information rolls, which can't fail. They just get less complete information on a lower roll. quote:The other thing is playbooks specific consumable items. Does a lurks silence potion get refreshed automatically after every score or does it need to be replaced or recreated like a player made item would be? Refreshed automatically unless there's a specific thing that it would be interesting to force them to repair/rebuy/hunt down, like a signature weapon. In general downtime is going to feel cramped enough without having to replace every little thing you use. quote:Does anyone have any tips on how to play a spider other then always be flash backing? They seem like a very tricky character to play. I've been failing hard at introducing ways to use the ghost contract ability. What's wrong with always flashbacking? :P
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Sep 22, 2018 18:42
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Demon_Corsair posted:Since I'm still struggling, what would you do if your players were trying to find a way to sneak into a building, and rolled a 1 looking for ways in? I'd give them the obvious entry points and maybe one that's a little sneakier but still not very good. Mechanically if they rolled that and still decided sneaking was going to be their approach, they would get the -1D engagement penalty for "Is the target strongest against this approach, or do they have particular defenses or special preparations." edit: Glazius' response is a lot better for handling the fiction, but still the same basic idea. quote:Nothing at all. ABF is the advice I've given so far. Good, good. The Spider is a little weird because unlike the other playbooks their XP triggers don't map to Actions (conspiracy can map to Consort, but it's less obvious) but the trade-off is that they can map to just about any action as long as it starts with, "ah hah, I planned for this exact eventuality."
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Sep 22, 2018 19:32
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Demon_Corsair posted:I guess I was looking at it the wrong way. I was trying to figure out how to speed up the part where the players got the plan detail to get into the score. Sounds like everyone else plays that out a bit longer. It's a stylistic choice. My players don't go wild with planning (if they did I would cut them off) but they do enjoy some legwork, so we use Gather Information to figure out how much and what they learn and they use that to choose their approach. If you want to skip all that you can kind of just do that -- make your very first rolls be action rolls with consequences that push them right into the poo poo and use flashbacks to figure out anything you missed.
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Sep 23, 2018 07:31
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Lord_Hambrose posted:Friends at the Table played it for their Merielda arc. It got me into the game in a big way. Marielda is a good arc but it's an unusual example of Blades because they are so bad at it. There are two on YouTube run by John Harper: RollPlay: Blades, which is solid, and Bloodletters, which is great, but starts early in the development of the game so the rules don't coalesce until a few episodes in.
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Dec 4, 2018 20:25
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spectralent posted:I'm curious how you mean? That, yeah. It results in them very frequently taking actions that they have 0 or 1 in, and (unsurprisingly) failing. Couple that with Austin taking a pretty hardline approach to consequences in Blades (multiple consequences on risky rolls, in particular) them being bad at resisting, and also getting the resisting rule wrong (it's 6-1D6 stress not 1D6) and I've talked to people whose only experience with Blades is Marielda express that they don't like Blades because it's too brutal. It's ridiculous. Marielda was a good arc but if it's your only touchpoint for Blades you're gonna have a real weird view of it.
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Dec 5, 2018 22:39
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Kestral posted:Seconding John Harper's games in a big way. Bloodletters is fantastic. They also show two drastically different ways that Blades can be played. Bloodletters is very loosey-goosey, rarely uses clocks in missions, and the plot is based entirely on what the PCs want to do and how the world reacts to that. RollPlay: Blades is tighter, uses clocks for just about every mission, and has a laid out set of goals from nearly the beginning.
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Dec 5, 2018 22:44
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That's sweet. I found The Veil to be... quite bad, so I skipped the HtP KS when it came up. Blades is definitely a better canvas for the kind of design he was trying to do anyways.
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May 2, 2019 20:14
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It's Doskvol, not Duskwall.
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May 4, 2020 00:42
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