I am torn. It literally looks like the RPG I've wanted to receive ever since I've finished Thief: The Dark Project and wanted to run a medieval gangland campaign. On the other hand, I am unsure if the core of the mechanic'll fit...but the (criminal)empire building, while storygame'y, looks nice, and I myself usually prefer those a bit meta mechanics that simplify things in terms of domain play, to the beasts of Harn Manor and the like.

So, if I accept or even embrace the meta board game elements (I have actually flirted with such systems when it came to domain management for games in RuneQuest either way), what are the other mechanical pitfalls? Are any particular mechanics or skills overpowered? What's the size of the PDF? Bite sized, 200 - 300 pages, or a 600 pages modern titan like Shadowrun 5e (I swear, I love that game as a player, but I'd sooner poke an eye out than run it).

The Blades pdf (out tomorrow) should be around 320 pages but they are digest sized IIRC. The quickstart is much, much, less.

Having now run two sessions, my initial impressions are that the rules, combined with the default setting, definitely work very well to create a complex web of intrigues, alliances and enemies with minimal effort required by the GM. It's probably not doing anything that a GM skilled and experienced in this area couldn't do themselves, but it does make it easy for a competent GM who hasn't already mastered that specific skillset.

Pretty much everything the Crew does is going to piss someone off, and if they don't want enemies, enemies everywhere, they also need to work to make friends, play one faction off against the other etc ...

The Entanglements are a useful way of reminding the GM to play up the consequences of previous decisions and relationships. They can be treated as short mechanical diversions, but are far more useful as starting points for actual roleplaying scenes (and potentially longer threads), requiring the group to deal with (or ignore, at their peril) the fallout from job X while they are in process of trying to set up job Y.

Quote from: Rincewind1;943114So, if I accept or even embrace the meta board game elements (I have actually flirted with such systems when it came to domain management for games in RuneQuest either way), what are the other mechanical pitfalls? Are any particular mechanics or skills overpowered?

The way the system is set up, it's pretty much impossible for any skill to be objectively more powerful than any other. Some skills ("Actions") may be a little be easier to leverage by dint of being slightly broader in scope, but not so much that it causes any real problems. If there is a imbalance somewhere, the place it could be is in the Special Abilities, but I think you'd have to be fairly incompetent to make one that's wildly imbalanced. There are some clear imbalances between Crew types (although not particularly egregious ones), but since the group is only playing one Crew type in any given game, there is no particular need for them to be tightly balanced one against the other. If you want to play Hawkers, the fact that Bravos start with three upgrades while you only have two is irrelevant, because Bravos aren't as good at being Hawkers as Hawkers are.

The one genuine mechanical issue I've seen raised is that getting Action ratings to four dice is somewhat overpowered. The Scum and Villainy hack limits Action ratings to 3 dice for this reason. The release version of Blades dealt with this by significantly increasing the cost to unlock the option of 4-dot Actions but this, of course, only pushes the issue back rather than resolving it.

Another minor issue is that the game is built and balanced to be ideal for 3 - 4 players. With less than this, the group Stress pool becomes quite small, and the lack of scope in Actions across the group means that more stress may have to be spent covering for situations where the PCs lack the requisite talents to perform at their best. Larger groups have the issue of the large stress pool potentially making things easy, and also issues with spotlight time. In my experience so far, Blades is definitely a game best played slowly, and any given player can easily take 5 - 10 minutes, and sometimes more, doing their thing, while others are less directly involved. This time is generally interesting, and can involve multiple cliff-hangers and "how the fuck will they get out of this, now," but with larger groups, waiting for other players to do their thing may end up getting a bit tedious for some.

As a GM, the biggest challenge is the need to constantly improvise complications. These are what drive the game and a central part of what makes it actually fun, but it's often not immediately obvious what a suitable complication will be (assuming that you want something that is both interesting and believable). So far, the feedback is that I'm doing a good job (one of my players has advised that waiting to find out, "what's he going to throw at us now" is one of his favourite parts of the game), but it's definitely a challenge.

One big plus for the game by the general preferred standards of the RPG Site is that it is genuinely built and pushed to be a zero-prep game. I haven't run a really open, sandboxy game in a long time, but Blades has been pure sandbox, I-as-GM-have-no-fucking-clue-what-is-going-to-happen-before-the-session-or-even-what-will-be-happening-five-minutes-from-now.

This looks very promising. I've been tinkering with amalgamating something from TSR AD&D Complete Handbook Thieves, Birthright, and Stars Without Number (factions chapter). If I can keep most of this as off-scene (behind the GM screen) processing this would be golden. If I can process its value in under 5 minutes (under 1 minute, best!) it'd be platinum. There is something to be said for an abstracted system unknown to players to manage faction relations.

Keep talking, I'd like more examples and see how the subsystem can be pulled in different directions.

Quote from: Opaopajr;950940This looks very promising. I've been tinkering with amalgamating something from TSR AD&D Complete Handbook Thieves, Birthright, and Stars Without Number (factions chapter). If I can keep most of this as off-scene (behind the GM screen) processing this would be golden. If I can process its value in under 5 minutes (under 1 minute, best!) it'd be platinum. There is something to be said for an abstracted system unknown to players to manage faction relations.

Keep talking, I'd like more examples and see how the subsystem can be pulled in different directions.

There's really not much to it.

You have a rating with each Faction that is from +3 to -3. When you do shit that is likely to make a faction like you or dislike you more, your status with them changes. The game is set up so that almost everything you do is going to piss someone off by treading on their turf.

For example, each Crew has a claims map, that shows particular claims that they can potentially take. This is an abstract map, and doesn't represent the physical relationship of one claim to the other, but following the paths to linked claims from ones already taken is the standard process. Jumping to a non-linked location on the map means the GM ups the difficulty. Taking a claim that isn't even on your Crew's Claims map means jumping up the difficulty ye another notch. Taking Claims is one way to improve your resources. But every Claim is already held by someone else, and taking a claim means taking it off that someone else.

For other Scores, you're always going to be manipulating, killing, tricking, upsetting or stealing from one faction or another, or from somebody a faction considers one of their own. So again, everything you do is likely to damage your status with someone.

To a significant extent, the fact that the system works is really down to the lengthy list of interesting Factions that are detailed, more than the Faction system itself. Actually managing the progress of the individual factions, their relationships with each other, or the effect PC actions have on their strength and objectives, is pretty much left up to GM fiat/common sense. I assume that SWN has a system at least vaguely similar to Godbound, and the Faction system in Godbound is significantly more detailed and mechanically involved than Blades.

I think the Faction system in Blades works, but I don't think it has anything particularly valuable to say about system design, other than "Interesting factions are good, and a good Faction system requires that the PCs be forced to engage with it rather than mostly doing their own isolated thing that doesn't affect the wider world."

Similarly, the Entanglements are not really anything other than very simple, random adventure seeds linked to mission blowback. They serve as a reminder to the GM that actions have consequences, and the PCs don't just get to move from one score to the next without dealing with any repercussions.

Regarding the Crew itself, there are a lot of different avenues for advancement.

As mentioned, you can take Claims.

You can also increase your Tier by gaining Rep. Tier determines your base-line resources, equipment quality and the degree to which other factions will tend to take you seriously.

Crew XP is used to "level up" the crew, which allows you to either take a crew special ability, or two physical upgrades (a better lair, a gang of thugs, higher quality weapons, training facilities, etc ...).

Beyond that, there are, of course, any particular objectives the crew decides to work towards themselves (control the drug market, overthrow the government, take over another Faction, eliminate a Faction, control a city district etc ...).

Edit: Summary: I really like this game, so far, but I would not recommend buying it just because you need ideas for a Faction system. If you want a reasonably rules-light game (that still has a bit of mechanical heft) for minimal- or no-prep gaming focusing on criminal enterprises in a Victorian-era fantasy setting, it's well worth a look. And apparently Scum and Villainy is a pretty good hack for playing space scoundrels along the lines of Firefly.

If you (as in general "you", not talking to anyone in particular) don't know the game and have a bit of time at your hands, i highly recommend watching some of the actual plays on youtube. There is one here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QNzpg-qdZ0g&list=PL-oTJHKXHicTtCC4rgmFSfZSSQsZmENAz .
John himself is the GM and i think the crew has good chemistry. John has another AP on his own youtube channel but i like the one on RollPlay better (which is not to say that the other is bad, btw!).
It really helped me to get an easy way in, so to speak, without having to read all the 300+ pages first.

Quote from: Sable Wyvern;950896The one genuine mechanical issue I've seen raised is that getting Action ratings to four dice is somewhat overpowered. The Scum and Villainy hack limits Action ratings to 3 dice for this reason. The release version of Blades dealt with this by significantly increasing the cost to unlock the option of 4-dot Actions but this, of course, only pushes the issue back rather than resolving it.

Care to elaborate on that? I don't see the big problem, to be honest. Success chances (aka having at least on 4 or higher in your pool) are pretty good as soon as you hit 2 dice in your pool anyway. The difference between 3 and 4 dice is minimal, imo. And as said, it's pretty hard to get to 4 dice. You're pretty badass if you have a rating of 4, so it's ok if that shows a bit.

Quote from: Anglachel;950963Care to elaborate on that? I don't see the big problem, to be honest. Success chances (aka having at least on 4 or higher in your pool) are pretty good as soon as you hit 2 dice in your pool anyway. The difference between 3 and 4 dice is minimal, imo. And as said, it's pretty hard to get to 4 dice. You're pretty badass if you have a rating of 4, so it's ok if that shows a bit.

Well, it's the opinion of Stras, who's probably played as much Blades as anyone, including John. I tend to assume they've got a reasonably good idea what they're talking about.

Getting to four isn't going to be hard at all, as long as you're willing to spend two sets of crew upgrades on it. One to two sessions is all it takes to upgrade an Action rating, it's just a matter of whether or not the group wants to put their Crew upgrades towards unlocking Mastery.

I just whipped up some quick numbers (with some rounding errors left in).

Three Dice
Fail: 12.5%
Success + Complication: 46%
Success: 35%
Crit: 7.5%

Four Dice
Fail: 6%
Success + Complication: 42%
Success: 39%
Crit: 13%

Five Dice
Fail: 3%
Success + Complication: 37%
Success: 40%
Crit: 20%

Six Dice
Fail: 1.5%
Success + Complication: 31%
Success: 40%
Crit: 27%

Each die step halves your chance of outright failure, which makes a massive difference, and gives you a very hefty increase in crit chance as well (close to doubling).

Four, five and six dice are all pretty safe bets. I can certainly see how making it easy to get to those upper levels may end up making the game too easy overall. The game relies on partial success to be reasonably common, and crits really should be rare. Still, I am comforted to see that even with six dice, the chance of a partial success is still 31%, although I'm not happy to see that a crit is nearly as likely.

I've run two sessions, so I'm not claiming that it's something I've seen actually cause problems in the game. It's something I plan to keep an eye out for and, if I do decide to do something about it, I'm leaning towards limiting the number of fours a character can have, rather than saying they can't have them. It is definitely something that I think bears mentioning if someone asks "What are the possible mechanical and/or game balance pitfalls".

As to Rollplay Blades, I watched the first session and a bit of the second, even though watching other people RPing holds absolutely no interest for me, simply because I knew that Blades was quite different to anything I've run before. I have no doubt that what I saw played a significant part in helping me get my game off to such a good start.

Thanks for the reply.

I only did a rough estimate of the probabilities but i see i was pretty close in that estimation. I see where you and i differ - i was talking solely about character capabilities which range from 0 to 4 dice. I know you can get bonus-dice but i was not counting those for my analysis of OP or not. I do think the probabilities you have calculated for 4 dice are pretty reasonable for a maxed out character in any given action. So as said, i see no problem with rating 4.
I do get that Blades itself as a game might suffer if too many characters have a 4 rating in more than one action rating. As it kind of cuts out the whole bonus-die thing if your character is so good at things he almost never needs it.
I still think one or two ratings at 4 would not be a problem overall...because, as a player, it is also nice to know that for some of your actions, you are not dependent on help and/or taking stress. But as always YMMV etc. .

And again, from my point of view, i do not think that getting a 4 is easy. But i guess that is very much a matter of how you define "easy to get". Two crew upgrades and several XPs to boost the stat up to 4 is nothing to sneeze at, imo. You can buy a lot of other helpful stuff with those kind of XPs/Crew upgrades.

Anyway, this is, as almost always, YMMV and matter of taste, i guess.
And what i said is just based on cold numbers (and as said, on my preferences concerning character skill without any help/gimmicks), i do not have extensive play-experience with Blades.

As for watching other people roleplay...i guess you and i differ a lot there
Especially if the presentation and the players are good (aka good production values in the videos and interesting stories and characters), i almost prefer watching to playing...i know sounds weird. But i guess i am a bit burned out on face-to-face roleplay lately. I should probably take a break.
But yes, watching a bit of Blades certainly helps understand it better...so i recommend it to everyone (especially if you are a "so far traditional-gamer only" kind of person ^^ ).

So, I'm running three games of Blades and have gotten a pretty solid grasp of everything. Some seriously awesome shit has gone down and there's something about the setting and system that hits that sweetest of spots for me. Coming up with complications can be a stumbling block, but more often than not they're obvious. I like the "meta-storyness" to it a lot, so the occasional narrative snag is a thing I can deal with. I'll only get better at it as time goes on, as I did with pretty much every other game I've played.

I haven't noticed anything broken in the dice pools, but nobody's gotten to three, let alone four. I doubt it'll be an issue as the PCs will probably only have a couple fours in their strongest things, which is fine.

If anyone wants to swap ideas, plays throughs, etc. I'm all for it!

What would scores for a Hawkers crew look like? All other crew types scores seem obvious but I'm having a hard time figuring out this one.

Perhaps deliveries in dangerous circumstances? But should a full crew be really necessary for an operation like that? Hmmm...

Quote from: Itachi;955565What would scores for a Hawkers crew look like? All other crew types scores seem obvious but I'm having a hard time figuring out this one.

Perhaps deliveries in dangerous circumstances? But should a full crew be really necessary for an operation like that? Hmmm...

So far my crew has done the following:

Session 1: A senior member of the tenement block that makes up their initial sales territory asked them to deal with a member of Ulf's crew that had mistreated a prostitute working out of the tenement. The crew agreed, in order to help establish themselves as good guys to the locals, and also to ensure it was known that they run the place.

Session 2: They had a social engagement with the proprietor of a gambling den who is also a mid-level drug dealer. They talked him into taking their package (Turf/Sales Territory acquisition). However, as he was previously being supplied by the Hive, he wanted them to prove they're up to competing with such a powerful organisation. To show their moxy, they broke into a Hive warehouse and stole some shit.

Session 3: The crew knows that they are going to need contacts to assist them in getting stuff into the city, especially when their plans to develop a new, mystical drug start coming to fruition. They decided to speak to the Rail Jacks and start building up some goodwill. The Railjacks got them to sneak into the house of a minor noble and inscribe a rune in one of the upstairs rooms. They stole some shit while there.

Session 4: Hasn't happened yet. They will most likely be running a social event for the community in their primary sales territory, to continue to establish themselves. A quieter, easier score will sit well, as two of three characters are busy recuperating from injuries.

In future, there will, of course, be more scores to acquire Claims. The group has a decent initial supply of product, but their expectation is that they will need an interim supply between the initial one running out and their own drug labs getting up and running. Doing the latter will require a lot of work, acquiring the exotic ingredients they require, the actual premises where the work will be done, etc ... And as they are forced to work with other Factions, they will get drawn into the disputes those factions are involved in, just like any crew will.

Quote from: Itachi;955565What would scores for a Hawkers crew look like? All other crew types scores seem obvious but I'm having a hard time figuring out this one.

Perhaps deliveries in dangerous circumstances? But should a full crew be really necessary for an operation like that? Hmmm...

It depends on the product/service I'd say. In a game I'm running they're gun-runners who are expanding into prostitution as a cover of sorts to trade in secrets. There are great tables under each crew type which provide example scores. Did that help?

I like the idea, but it sounds way too focused for my table.

Thanks for the replies, guys. I find the more basic crews (Bravos, Shadows and Assassins) fit better the game core premise.

About Scores, do you use actual floor plans to help players visualize the area, or just verbally describe them as suggested by the book? I feel my group would like it better if they could visualize it.

Showing an actual floor plan is probably going to cause problems with players going all tactical rather than the one roll and it's done approach to scenes that runs through most PbtA style games. Having run Blades for most of last year I would say that it really needs to have players who are on board with the game style. You can make it all about the tactics and play it like a regular RPG but that wastes a lot of the good things about playing to find out what happens which is the usual theme of a PbtA game.