Hello, fellow Doskvolian. This, you should help me. I leave power! Good.

(Casslyn or Atelis, get off the internet and do your homework, and especially don't read the comments.)

Okay. So, I just started an after-school campaign with 2 teens, after two campaigns in D&D and Mausritter. They wanted a "Subnautica but also zombies" vibe so I picked Blades with the custom Drowners crew sheet (PWYW on itch.io). I also got Deep Cuts but have barely opened it. I've run Blades before, maybe 10 sessions. I feel like I didn't do it justice, and I'm always being "tossed around the trunk of the car" that the players stole. I love this setting and the mechanics seem so intuitive, but when I'm running it I just feel WAY out of my depth. Hence, this post. (FWIW I've run hundreds of D&D sessions, and also a bit of Mausritter, Degenesis, Fallout, Ten Candles.)

So, I just ran Session Zero with 2 players. Up to 2 more may join. Here's who they are:

• Professor Casslyn Crowl. Whisper, Akorosi, academic. Vice: Obligation to take care of her pet monster (nature to be determined) Fluffy. Knows that the Tidecallers (Deep Cuts faction that I mixed with the OG Gondoliers, as pretending to be good guys who actually want to bring about a second Great Deluge.)
• Atelis Ypervasi. Hound, Tycherosi, military. Unity War veteran (sellsword, played both sides), has mirrored irises. Vice: Faith. This kid came up on the spot with an insanely cool Forgotten God named "The Revealer" whose motto is "Pain feeds the soul, pleasure feeds the flesh" and hates free will and cognition. So the character is a sadomasochist who derives meaning from pain.

The crew is Drowners. Their allies are the Fog Hounds, enemies are Tidecallers. (I forgot their individual allies and enemies.) Instead of hunting grounds, they have things they're looking for in the Void Sea.

Of course, I want to tie these to the characters. But like... I feel so out of my depth. Session Zero left them so excited for the next one. The sessions I ran before I spent an embarrassing amount of time looking for stuff in the book (I only have PDFs), and often giving up and saying "let's just call it X". I feel like I need to know every single thing about the setting and rules to even begin to run a proper session (my gold standard is Jared Logan's Haunted City and yes I know these are paid actors and shouldn't be so hard on myself). I think Mausritter helped me get over my improv-phobia, but that takes place in a world I understand because I live in it. Also its rules are very simple. Blades' rules feel like they should be simple but they feel the opposite to me.

Is there something I'm missing other than "just read the book(s) and actually remember what it says". This feels like it should be a zero-prep game because PCs should be able to say "let's do X score" and you just cut to the action. But how do I do that without preparing literally everything?

I think I've said enough words. Thanks for reading if you did, and thanks for helping if you will.

Pain feeds the soul.

What are some mechanics you wish were or were not in blades in the dark? Or at least you think should be revisited. Do you have any criticisms of the setting? I'll start.

In my personal opinion, I don't like the retirement feature of blades. It feels so anticlimactic, especially for a game that's supposed to be so dramatic. I feel it also discourages the more bold and daring players from taking risks or using abilities to do something awesome. Obviously a lot of ttrpgs are the same way about punishing less tactical players, but this just feels like it doesn't belong. But maybe I'm wrong.

Anyway, opinions? Other observations?

The vigilantes have refused to lay down arms.

Hello everyone!

I'm the creator of FUEGO, a one-page RPG system for fast-paced adventures in any setting.

As a big fan of John Harper's games, I feel that FUEGO shares some of the fiction-first philosophy behind Blades in the Dark. The mechanics are quite different, though (so it's not really FitD), but the goal is similar: fast-paced, narrative-driven gameplay where fiction comes first.

I thought some people here might appreciate it, so here's the link, with plenty of free community copies available!

Link: https://marcos-dominguez.itch.io/fuego-ignition-edition

Feel free to share your thoughts, ask questions, or give it a try. I'd love to hear your feedback!

Just dumped all my house rules into Github. Feel free to just read, use, put into your own game etc.

Feedback and contributions very much welcome.

I love BitD rules, and their versatility across a variety of settings.

The main "flaw" I have found in the FitD games I've read is some... "laziness" about Vice and Trauma. Those mechanics are often left the same as in Blades, or just slightly re-skinned, even when the whole idea doesn't really fit with the genre.

Anyone knows / can recommend specific FitD games that have found novel and interesting ways to recast Vice and Trauma in a new way, fitting for genres where self-destructive behaviours would not work as well as in Blades?

Example to make my point clearer: Let's take Scum and Villainy: sure, I guess that a "rebel hero" could have an alcohol problem, and they definitely could have a religious thing with the Way/Force, or a "devotion towards people who need help" or something, but... is that really interesting enough to force every PC to have something like that? With Trauma, arguably it's even worse. "Play your character as a stole vehicle" is excellent advice for Blades, to support its "spiral down into hell" thing. But for a Star Wars-type campaign... should C3PO or Chewbacca really risk Trauma? Why? ^^

Let's say my first character ends up disappearing for a while (in jail maybe, or overindulged in a vice) so I make a new one.

Later when my first character comes back, is he healed? Stressed? Do I have two downtime activities per character or in total?

This is probably the wrong place, but I'm making a fitd game for my friends. Going all in and creating custom playbooks and crew sheets. I'm also trying to model the main attraction of the game, mecha, after the ships in scum and villainy.

The idea is that players are mecha gladiators. They fight in mechanical bloodsport for the pleasure of nobles and dignitaries. The players all operate one mech together.

Politicians bet on the bouts to solve political arguments, trade land, or just lose money. But this means that gladiators are an intrinsic part of political power in the game.

The mechanic I'm thinking of using would be for the players to gain access to higher ranking politicians as they progressively get better.

Basically there are four attributes instead of three. Each with three actions instead of four. Combat, Scout, Officer, and Comms. If you fill out the first row of you're attribute, let's say combat, then you are considered a teir one gladiator in combat. Fill the second row you become teir two. Now Politicians might come to you to represent them. Fill the third row and all of a sudden your being invited to political shindigs. And Fill the fourth somehow and you're the most known gladiator in that category in the entire galaxy. You might even meet the emperor.

Resistance is still a thing, don't worry. It just works slightly differently. The players get resistance dice when they complete an action that is risky or desperate and they don't resist the consequences. Each attribute has a slot that holds one of these dice. (Up to a max of 4). If you resist, you roll the dice and the outcome determines how many resist dice you lose. (1-3 no dice lost, but you fail to resist, 4-5 you lose one die and resist the consequence down a level, 6 you lose all dice but completely resist all consequences, multiple 6s you completely resist all consequences and lose no resist dice.)

Anyway, I want to add some sort of renown mechanic but this is the first idea to pop into my head. Any thoughts? Any better ideas? I'm open to all criticism.

Pretty new to the system, I am the GM and we just finished our third score. During this one the characters were attacked by a ghost. As part of the consequence of this interaction I told two of them to start a 4 clock on their character sheets called "ghost touched". I have no plan for what this is and am struggling for ideas. Wondering if any of you lovely lot can bark a few ideas at me to help get the creative juices flowing?

Bonjour esque quelqu'un a la version française des fiche perso de vampire,fantômes et coquille ?

Hello, I'm looking for an app or a website which would simplify solo journaling for blades in the dark.

The functionalities researched would be the ability to type text and insert easily game mechanics and dice rolls. It would also have separate threads with info on characters, factions, headquarters,...

When I'm playing ironsworn, I'm using the excellent pocketforge, and I was hoping to find something similar.

Any ideas ?

I have never played Blades in the Dark, but I look forward to GMing a campaign for my friends using Blades '68. I'm very interested in giving modern Doskvol a feel similar to Revachol in Disco Elysium, as well as capturing the overall mood of the video game.

I read Deep Cuts and found the changes intriguing and very cohesive, to the point where I think it's an all or nothing choice for me. My biggest concern with Deep Cuts is that it might make the game too smooth by anticipating every threat and making everything more predictable, which I fear could ruin the noir atmosphere. However, having never played the original rules either, what do you think?

Hi again everyone!

A while back I made a post asking everyone how they like to play Bazso Baz, and got a lot of very fun and interesting responses, so I thought I'd try something similar again! Last time was an NPC that is likely an early hook into Doskvol, but this time I thought I'd ask about a rather mysterious faction with a lot of variability, and yet still quite down to Earth on the power scale: The Wraiths!

I hope everyone gets a kick out of sharing their Wraiths and it gets the creative juices flowing where these phantom thieves are concerned ^^

I'm planning on running a short campaign of Blades in the Dark inspired by John Harper's Ghost Lines, with all of the players playing as Rail Jacks and dipping into the Rail Jacks situation from Deep Cuts. It'll be a side-story to the more traditional campaign I'm running in Blades.

I think there could be a lot of fun here. Scores will default to the shift working the lines, and downtime will be spent in cities between the shifts, but I'm wondering if anyone has any ideas for how to make this sing?

Hello yall im making my own city as im using bitd to match my story i have in my head, i want to a crime family of anthrapmorphic animals, (think zootopia) What steps do yall take when your making your own city (ive only playedf blades once, but im slwoly learning about it)

So I'm the only whisper at the table, and the master rightfully calls for resistance checks against fear every time I use compel to summon a ghost. This is fair, but it somehow discourages me from using it since it's always a hassle for my mates to deal with fear/resistance/stress costs. So I came up with a long-term project in order to tweak the soiritbane charm so that it always protect them from the fear of mu summoned echoes.

The question is: Are there valid alternatives I can not see/I am not aware of? How would you rule the "issue"?

Edit: for reference, that's the wording of "compel": "you are not supernaturally terrified by a ghost you summon or attempt to compel (though your allies may be)"

So, I've thought about having them explain why they're criminals and not just workers. Have them come up with something to chase, run from or overcome and actually letting each character have a purpose/life quest to fulfill like: buy and open a bar or shop (costs x coin), buy an expensive scapled train ticket out of Duskvol, etc. Once they do that, their character exits the game.

-what have you guys done to make it more "big story pertaining to characters"?

So my players have chosen to play as Bravos, while also wanting to make their MO being attacking a mark from the canals. The problem im running into is how do I run that alongside their limited hunting grounds which are mostly on land.

Basically just looking for advice

So I've run 1 session of Copperhead County and after their downtime this week I'm having trouble coming up with scores or even finalizing the scores that they'll encounter.

Whenever I come up with an idea I keep thinking on how 'realistic' or plausible this is since this a modern-day FITD game without fantastical elements. Also I am afraid that I would run out of future score ideas and risk all scores being similar like, rob this stash house, hijack this shipment, etc etc. I could take inspiration from GTA missions but they're too pulpy, and Copperhead County's rules punishes the crew for even attempting a GTA-style mission.

It also doesn't help that I'm not an American and have no personal experience with the American South, the game's setting. I also dont know how to describe American architectural styles and authentically portray an American city, unlike my previous non-FITD campaign set in my country.

What should I do? How do I come up with unique ideas for scores?

Thoughts are welcome. The background art is from the core book and Deep Cuts, and I believe it's all CC. (At least that's what the licence inside the pdf says. I'd credit the artists but apart from Maria Stashko I can't tell what's whose.)

Though it'd be interesting to repost and bring it to discussion here