Okay! Welcome everyone to your first (or in many cases) second ongoing game of Blades in the Dark. I'll link several Blades resources via the Campaign tab and I'll (eventually) get around to cutting up a few sections of the PDF to display for those who don't have the book.
For my own reference, could you please let me know if you do or do not own or otherwise have access to the current version?
Also, please begin working on putting together an alias for the game. If you have your character stored on an external server like Google Docs, please link to that page in your alias. Kiradia, Dreg, and Warforged already know a good format to use and I'll link to the format Warforged put together in the other game for the header information.
Finally, we have to start putting together our crew! I'll edit this post in a short period with some information regarding that.
Kiradia has helpfully put together the new 8.1 crew information here
As mentioned, please use this as the alias for your sheets:
Race - Playbook: Cutter | *ooc*Stress: 0/9*/ooc* | Trauma: None | *ooc*Level 1 Harm: None/None*/ooc* | Level 2 Harm: None/None | *ooc*Level 3 Harm: None*/ooc* | Coin: 0 | *ooc*Stash: 0*/ooc*
In terms of Crew Type, the only one who I didn't see put a list was Dreg.
Tallying your votes we end up with:
Bravos 3
Hawkers 2
Assassins 4
Cultists 1
Shadows 2
So, unless Dreg votes for Bravos and not Assassins, the group looks to be leaning toward assassins!
Alright, Vlaire is ready to go. I really do wish I could convince everyone to play Cultists because I think they are an underappreciated aspect of the setting but I do understand the allure of playing cool badass assassins.
Cultists are neat and I am intrigued in maybe eventually falling into that kind of lifestyle maybe? I have just really adored the gangland idea and want to do that really badly.
I'm excited for Assassins though, same with Bravos possibly.
EDIT: Good call on adding Stash to the end of the code. I forgot about that.
DOUBLE EDIT: Also, feel free to put up the argument for it Vlaire. There is no reason why not to and the more I think about it, the more I realize I can still get that "gangland" feel and be a Cult.
That and I like to spoil my DMs when they're in games with me :P
As long as people are interested in worshipping The lord of veiled intimidation, Arkath, I would totally support the cult thing.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
Ok, here goes.
So, there's an interesting history behind the Shattered Isles and the Cataclysm that befell the ancient lands that Duskwall inhabits. The Cataclysm closed the Gates of Death, the sun was shattered and volcanoes and earthquakes destroyed most of the southern lands leaving the Shattered Isles shifted and magically held together near each other. The moon looms closer and closer with each passing year and ghosts, demons, and vampires infest our cities and make the Deathlands a place that deserves its name. Humans have adapted to these changes as we always do and now the study of all these mystical forces (Spectrology, Rituals, Alchemy, and Spark-craft) gives humans the ability to interact with the strange and terrible forces that have infested our broken world. There are powers out there with hidden agendas and tomes of knowledge long lost to the Imperium just waiting for those with the will to reach out and make that power their own.
That's what makes me interested in telling a story about the Cults. Us interacting with the terrible and horrifying for whatever reason draws us individually into the promise of power.
As for your... stipulation, Vrog... to be honest, with the differences between Tycherosi and Akorosi (not to mention the other races and their cultures) its very unlikely that we'd all be worshiping under some unified heading or understanding of whatever Forgotten God we end up picking. But that's ok! Different interpretations and sects of a cult can be interesting too. Its something to discuss and a Forgotten God can have many interpretations.
So, that's my elevator pitch.
Smiles could potentially be a member or a driving force within a cult, though I definitely see him having more of a "business relationship" than as an actual true and honest worshiper. The Forgotten God has power, has needs, and will give power to have those needs met. It is a bit unorthodox and a little strange, sure, but no more than the tastes of decadent nobles right?
I also know that I'm -very- interested in the less occult of things, I like the idea of gang wars and territory being taken. I adored Gangs of New York, Dishonored, things like that. I really like the supernatural and the occult aspects of the setting, I just don't know if I'm interested in having them dominate the majority of the game play that being a Cult would do.
Indeed, part of creating a Cult is creating the Forgotten God together. What kind of entity are they, what kind of aspects do they represent, so that could lead to Arkath being changed or manipulated somewhat into something a little different. At least we'd have something to base it on and work on. Like Vlaire said, different sects and stuff can be interested.
I think I'm still interested in Assassins or Bravos, whichever one we choose, but I am interested in having the occult be an active thing we deal with/get involved with.
|
Sorry, sorry, sorry everyone. Sorry for not posting sooner. Anyways!
My crew choices are as follows:
1. Cult
2. Smugglers
3. Shadows
I, too, would like to play a Cult campaign, and I got excited when all of the Weird characters started pouring in, cause I thought that's where we were headed. I really want to explore the supernatural aspect of the setting, plus the cult playbooks' abilities are so coooooool.
Anyways, I bookmarked the page and things should calm down IRL for me soon, so I'll post more actively from now on, I promise.
Edit: I'm away from my computer right now, but I'll have a fancy portrait and Race entry and everything by tonight.
I've got the books on PDF and I have the latest version as well.
Sorry I wasn't clearer, my last post was mostly tongue-in-cheek. I have no problems helping a cult of a forgotten god, as maybe a part of a priest exchange program?
Feel free to drop a dot-type post in the Gameplay thread so you can easily have this listed in your campaigns.
With Dreg's votes the vote totals stand as:
Bravos 3
Hawkers 2
Assassins 4
Cultists 2
Shadows 3
Smugglers 1
So assassins it is! I'm going to work on one of those google survey things that Kiradia did..that was neat.
As previously stated here is the google survey. Please fill it out, I assumed you were still going to go with assassins but opened it up for one final vote.
Playbook: Cutter | | Trauma: None | | Level 2 Harm: None/None | | Coin: 0 |
I'm against working for a cult, they tend not to make good money but as long as I'm making money I don't care.
So should we be talking about what options we want to pick for our crew?
BTW, I don't have the book yet, but I've ordered a phyiscal copy, so I will once it gets here.
I was hoping to wait for the results to appear of how many voted for what, then we could talk about it some.
I voted for our reputation to be Strange. Kind of a compromise of not being a cult since there are members who would really like it. I can even see Smiles approving of it because "people get scared of what they don't understand."
As for a location, I decided on an abandoned old house down the end of the road in Six Towers. I thought that'd be quite a bit of fun, the group holed up in the old, strange house. I'd also be for an underground grotto perhaps in the Docks.
For our hunting grounds, I was thinking Silkshore. There is a very strong Venice feeling there and it is the source of all the brothels, artists, casinos, and other dens of pleasure. Would be fun to be killers there.
As for upgrades, I decided on Secured & a workshop. Quarters was a close runner-up for sure.
I also went with Exeter as our contact because having a Spirit Warden contacting a Strange group of Assassins to do jobs has quite the odd and delicious tone to it.
For our specialty, I was thinking the tried and true Murder for what we do. Gives us a real clean-cut purpose, we just do it strangely is all.
So, submitted my survey responses. Obviously I'd like to play the Cultists but Assassins was one of my other choices so I've got ideas for that as well.
For initial Rep I picked Brutal. I like the idea of having a reputation for being savage hired killers. It puts us squarely into the morally gray area of assassinations and sets a tone for not being messed with. Other reps that would interest me would be Professional or Strange.
I picked Silkshore for both lair and hunting ground. I picked this mostly because I think it'd be interesting to be the boogeymen of Silkshore, we kill here and we live here so we have easy tabs on everything that goes on in Silkshore. As for what kind of lair, I also picked the abandoned old house. Imagining an old run down house, the gaslight signs long since burned out and sitting decrepit at the end of the lane. Believed to be cursed and haunted.
Crew upgrades, I picked Assassin's Rigging and Hidden. Assassin's Rigging helps out a lot with carrying all the gear we might need to get the job done and Hidden helps ensure our lair stays away from prying eyes.
Contact, I went with Lydra, the deal broker. I think a deal broker would help us out with finding a wide clientele to help us be "known" among those who need our services.
Favorite Operation? Murder, cold, simple, ready to send a message if you've got the coin to pay for it.
Responses are in!
We have: Strange Assassins living in a small, abandoned house at the end of a dark lane in Silkshore. You specialize in Murder working again out of Silkshore. The first crew upgrade is Hidden Lair and the second is..also Hidden Lair. So! You'll need to figure out/agree on a second crew upgrade.
Your point of contact will be Lydra,a deal broker. She acts as a middle-woman to multiple people including criminal groups and nobles alike. Her sources always remain anonymous but, likewise, she's never betrayed a crew.
Alrighty, as for our second crew upgrade then I agree with is Assassin's Rigging. Having more inventory space is fantastic, especially when that space can be dedicated to more murdering.
We also need to decide on our special ability as a group of starting Assassins. I think that Deadly would be the best one. It gives us that additional action point to put into one of three of our most useful skills; Hunt, Prowl, and Skirmish.
So what ideas do people have for us being "Strange". What is it that we've adopted that makes people look at us oddly and with discomfort?
I vote for assassins rigging as well.
As far as strange goes, for my part into that reputation, there could be rumors about me being a ghost, especially if someone saw me walk through walls.
I'm for using...unusual methods of killing. Like using a swarm of terrible spiders that eat a man whole. Arcane rituals, weird methods, things like that.
|
|
Agreed. Sometimes someone's expecting an attack from conventional assassins. That's when you call the unconventional assassins.
As for the second crew upgrade, my vote is on Quality weapons. A bit boring, as far as weapons go, but since we know we'll be using weapons on nearly every score, it'll give us an edge on attack rolls against other tier 0 opponents, and put us on equal footing with tier 1 and 2 opponents.
For serious consideration should also be Crow's Veil. As a special ability, its usefulness is more about letting us work without drawing attention rather than making us better at the job. Keeping the death-seeker crows from announcing our every kill can also create a lot of fictional confusion that helps us get away.
My vote also goes to Assassin's Rigging.
Strange killers is interesting, helps form what kind of Ritual Vlaire will know, also need to get working on that, but I need some input from you DMRaven. I'll make a separate post for that.
Crow's Veil is also in line with the "Strange" methods. A group that can kill without being noticed is quite the power. We'd have to consider how we came across that ability and what ritual we do to take it.
The ability that one of our guys can phase through walls helps too. It'll be pretty interesting to see how we apply the "Strange" idea when we make our plans and such.
I really embrace the whole "Do what is fun, not always what is best" mentality. So I'll usually go with whatever works best.
As an aside, I think with our Crew's veteran advances, we should grab stuff either from Bravos or Cult to help with our dangerous but weird reputation.
I would vote Ghost Echoes from Shadows for a veteran advance. Being able to interact with the shadow "Duskwall" would make for interesting stories imo.
|
|
For the Special Ability, I think we should go with Crow's Veil or Emberdeath. One is good for lowering the attention we get from the spirit wardens, which is a serious concern since most of the jobs we take will involve killing people, while the other lets anyone in the crew take a few stress to instantly kill someone and destroy their soul with their minds. Why this would be cool to take should be self-evident.
I haven't said much, but I have been reading.
Crow's Veil does sound pretty strange.
Alright, for your second crew upgrade you have:
1 for quality weapons
1 for Crow's Veil or Emberdeath
3 for Assassin's Rigging
How do you all see being connected to one another?
Who started the crew and how did you get all brought together?
Your crew starts with 2 coin 0 Rep and Strong hold.
Factions
Lord Scurlock purchased and offered the assassin's rigging to Vlaire as a gift for the new crew.
+1 status with Lord Scurlock. You may instead choose to spend 1 Coin to repay him and get 2 status
However, your crew screwed over the Lampblacks when you got your hidden lair. One of you heard from a friend (Jeren, the Bluecoat Archivist, Smiles' friend) that there was an abandoned lamp lighter's guild half-buried and long forgotten under some buildings. The lampblacks heard about it and, even though they have no idea where the actual building is, they are pissed someone's in something that was once there's.
-2 Status with Lampblacks. You can spend 1 coin to mollify them
The Gray Cloaks claim a racket over business and run many of the brothels in Silkshore. They are concerned about rumors your group is going to start murdering people there.
You can Pay them Off, giving them 1 coin in exchange for room to work.
You can pay them 2 coins as a show of respect and gain +1 status
Or you can keep your money and take -1 status.
Lydra has, fortunately, good contacts with the Bluecoats. She pays a few of them to keep their eyes away from her clients.
+1 Status with Bluecoats
Unfortunately, recently she's taken a number of heists dealing with members of the Church of the Ecstasy of the Flesh. The Church somehow found out and they've begun keeping tabs on who she hires.
-1 Status with the Church.
Idea: Lord Scurlock is one of the most powerful, influencial, and well-connected men in all of Duskwall. By himself, he is equivilent in power to a Tier III gang. Since he's already given us the Assassin's Rigging, maybe behind the scenes he's nudging us together. Not in any direct manner, but dropping names, setting up meetings through proxies and when the time is right, Vlaire is told to contact each member of the crew to finally bring it all together for some purpose only Lord Scurlock knows and from there the entire web starts to twine together.
Smiles (Cutter): Vlaire has offered to help bring down The Billhooks if he helps her bring down her own enemies.
Shadow (Lurk): Dunno... not a lot to go on for connections. Maybe hired by Lord Scurlock directly for a purpose even Vlaire isn't made aware of?
Bell (Lurk): Has told Bell that she can quiet the nightmares if he works with her.
Crooked (Cutter): Crooked likes money and has a desire for revenge. Vlaire has offered her help and tells him she knows others who can help too... for a bit of quid pro quo.
Just some initial ideas.
For the coin and status, I suggest we give 1 coin to the Lampblacks and 1 coin to The Gray Cloaks. The Gray Cloaks don't need to worry about our activites... yet and the Lampblacks can stand to forget a bit more about the abandoned house.
I go where the lord of creatures-under-your-bed commands.
Seriously though, I think we should consider getting 2 status with Scurlock and then paying off either the Greycloaks or the Lampblacks, but not both. Having someone not like us will give us a good motivating factor.
As for who started the gang and whatnot, I think that I should probably be the newest member. Roslyn Kellis could be a friend of Scurlock's, who mentioned me in passing as being new to the city and asking if he had any work for someone with a particular set of skills.
He then (through intermediaries) introduced me to your group.
@DMRaven - Crow's Veil and Emberdeath aren't upgrades, they're Special Abilities. We get one Special Ability and two Upgrades. I'm putting my vote in for Crow's Veil and then Deadly.
I am 100% for giving a coin to Scurlock and ensuring he is a friend of ours that way. I haven't had much contact with him in any of the games I'm running and he is a very interesting character.
As for what to do with our other coin. I think paying off the Gray Cloaks would be best. They can be very helpful and useful later on and having a neutral basis gives us space to work with them. I personally like having an enemy of the Lampblacks, they can bring it on. :D
As for ideas, I have the feeling that rather than Vlaire finding Smiles, Smiles finds Vlaire. He isn't a Cutter, he is just a fairly violent Spider. He meets her because he found out she has been gathering people for some reason and offers his connections, resources, and skills.
EDIT: I fully corrected Smiles's profile now. I used the template from the other game and didn't fully change it.
@DMRaven - Crow's Veil and Emberdeath aren't upgrades, they're Special Abilities. We get one Special Ability and two Upgrades. I'm putting my vote in for Crow's Veil and then Deadly.
I keep getting the two confused. Thank you!
So Crow's Veil looks like it has at least 3 votes. I'll make up a crew sheet in the vein of Kiradia's (I mean, she's already done all the work for me!) sometime tonight..or at least in the next couple of days.
Playbook: Cutter | | Trauma: None | | Level 2 Harm: None/None | | Coin: 0 |
I'm an old military man, I've had plenty of time to meet a lot of people so the ideas that someone got me together with a bunch of people but work.
I don't know why you think I'm out for revenge against someone when I don't have anyone to get revenge against. And I say we spend one coin on the Lampblacks simply because I don't want to start out with a -2.
Ya'll are tied atm. Bell will break the tie. Atm you have two votes for +1 coin Lampblacks, +1 coin Grey Coats and two votes for +1 coin Lord Scurlock and +1 coin Grey Cloaks.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
Okay! so all of your decisions are made as a group. I should have a crew sheet and stuffs done by sometime tomorrow. Maybe today. Probably tomorrow.
Ok, for Vlaire to be finished, we need to come up with a Ritual DMRaven. There are 3 questions that need answers to create a ritual so here goes.
Ritual Questions
1. GM asks: “What does the ritual do and how is it weird?” Player answers.
Sweet Life: The ritual makes the victims blood completely irresistible to any vampires in the area and detectable from far away. Its weird because Vlaire becomes connected to the victim and feels every pain they do as they die.
2. Player asks: “What must I do to perform the ritual, and what is its price?” GM answers. A ritual takes at least one downtime activity to perform and inflicts stress on the caster according to its magnitude. If performance of the ritual is dangerous or troublesome in some way, it requires an action roll (usually Attune). A ritual may also have additional costs, such as a sacrifce, rare item, the start of a dire progress clock, etc.
3. GM asks: “What new belief or fear does knowledge of this ritual and its attendant occult forces instill in you?” Player answers.
Vlaire's fear is that a vampire may discover the connection one day and seek her out.
That's quite the ritual..let's see. I'll say that will the ritual requires a sample from the target, the ashes of something (animal or otherwise) recently killed, and six black candles made by Vlaire. A circle made from the ashes and secured at various points by the candles is needed, so an area. This is what takes the full downtime action.
The ritual will cost 4 stress (duration: a day, range: several blocks away) but she can choose to increase the duration by spending additional stress, force: powerful).
Acquiring a target's blood could be as simple as a single roll (for a random, low level thug) or require a heist or long-term project clock (for more important and defended people).
I spent a lot of time going over possible stuff to pick for the ritual. Its been difficult coming up with stuff that doesn't overpower the narrative (like teleportation) or makes the game super boring like a ritual that casts Phantasmal Killer and makes assassinating people easy mode or copying something else that the game already does without rituals.
I know the ritual is still powerful since its practically an impossible to trace killing, but the setup required and the outcome does make it fit the strange descriptor and makes it very useful for any quiet assassinations that we might need to do, along with being a great distraction or way to flush out tougher targets and get them into a place we can kill them.
Finally, what is your crew's name?
I vote for the Silkshore Stalkers.
Also, Dreg, could you put Bell's information in your profile?
Additionally, Vrog & Bell both chose Faith but I do not see a vice purveyor for either?
For Shadow, I'd suggest some sort of dark, cultist type individual. An old man living in a decrepit shack, an old temple, or on a boat.
For Bell..that's a bit harder. Possibly a new-agey type shop owner who peddles new religions, charms to ward off spirits, that sort of thing.
I think I will keep things simple and say my vice purveyor is Lady Kellis, who hosts rituals at her home which she frequently invites me to.
Since Kellis is already both a Friend and a Rival to another, I think it'd be best if you had another as your vice purveyor. There are some rolls that call for your vice purveyor getting in trouble and it'd be removing the use of a rival to have her get locked up.
Character and crew sheets are completed. link is here and also at the top under the game description.
I'm thinking something like....The Black Glove Society. I don't know why my brain is wrapped around "glove" but I like the "Society" part at the end.
Gotcha. I'll come up with something else then.
In the alias, although now that there are custom crewsheets up on my Drive, really only your background and details are important. If I want to drop some character-related things here and there, I'd like to be able to easily access your backgrounds.
Also The Game is On!
I know you're still working on a name but..I wanted to get started.
I don't have access to the PDF's at the moment. I can copy the different approaches once I get back for you, Vrog.
If anyone does have their pdf handy I'd very much appreciate it if you could copy that bit for him. I believe at the beginning of the Heists section there's a table of 5-7 or so different basic approaches you can take.
Off the top of my head, I recall you have:
Stealth - doing everything all sneaky and sly
Conflict(?) Essentially running in and busting in the front door.
Charm - using a slide to engage.
I believe each approach is for your engagement roll mainly and what you do from then flows off of it. For example, you could use a charm plan to seduce the leviathan hunter to your chosen grounds (this is what Claret was referring to) and then make use of subtlety or the arcane or what have you to take him out.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
When making Gather Information checks, try to ask specific questions. What kind of rumors are there about Klein? Is there anything suspicious about his ship? Is he guarded all the time?
Things like that.
That said, enjoying this game so far! It's...really odd to be running a game without the level of detail and work I usually structure for a Pathfinder-style game.