Unofficial Blades in the Dark Smuggler Score Pack
A downloadable game
The Hour of Smoke's just tolled and it's time to get the cargo rolling, Smuggler. The payday's secure, the route's planned, and all that stands between you and a juicy payday is...well, Doskvol.
This collection of one-page scores for Blades in the Dark offers five ready-to-run Smuggler-focused scenarios with patrons, paydays, and problems aplenty. Suggested clocks are included, so all you need to run an explosive transport score, a thrilling chase, or a tense exploration of the haunted streets of Doskvol is about ten minutes, some d6's, and a crew of Smugglers hungry for the next score.
This PDF includes:
- The Hour of Smoke: Engage in a little smoke and mirrors as you play bait and switch. You just have to keep them all looking your way while the real cargo comes in. Simple? Sure.
- On the Hook: Time to prove your mastery by smuggling contraband into or out of Ironhook prison. Think fast and move faster unless you want to hang around permanently.
- The Other Guys: It's dog eat dog and there's no honor among thieves. Your competition's gotten sloppy, and you have a golden opportunity to clean up all the way to the bank.
- Strange Avenues: Brave the weirdest portions of the Ghost Field as you move strange cargo through Doskvol's hidden history. Just make sure that you don't end up being history.
- The Last Train Out of Doskvol: Poor Wick's really stepped in it, and he's willing to do anything to get clear of the Dusk. Problem is that you can't trust anyone when you're smuggling Doskvol's most wanted.
This work is based on Blades in the Dark (found at http://www.bladesinthedark.com/), product of One Seven Design, developed and authored by John Harper, and licensed for our use under the Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Unported license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/)
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Hi!
Your scores are wonderful, thank you for sharing them!
I'm motivated to craft some myself: would you mind sharing the template you used, pretty please? 🙏
Best regards
i'm new to blades, how am i supposed to use this. is there a breakdown of each of these parts? ie. whats 'the problem'? and what is the heist exactly?
Hey there and welcome to Blades! These scores are meant to establish framing fiction. Whatever you do, don't think of these Scores like a module. Unlike more traditional GM-led games, Blades happens as a conversation at the table, kind of like a writer's room. If you prep, the game will fight you. So this is a starting point.
This is the establishing shot. You've got a paragraph telling you about the job, then a list of possible Patrons who might be approaching you to do this job. There's a wrinkle, or Problem, that stands in the way of you just waltzing in and making it happen. There's a Payday which is the reward that you can expect at the end of the Score. Down at the bottom are some example clocks that you can throw in when the Score's in progress to ratchet up the tension.
Basically you can mix and match any of these elements and go. You can work through it like a checklist at the table with your Crew, asking which bit they think is most interesting for each heading.
As far as what the Heist is, there aren't any here. Blades in the Dark is largely pitched as a "Heist" game, but not every game plays out like Ocean's Eleven. Theft and Infiltration's only a very narrow piece of what the game does. These are Smuggler's Scores, largely dealing with getting from here to there discreetly or against all odds. The "Heist" is more a matter of having prepared for the obstacles, flashing back to putting things in motion before danger or suspicion reared. We still plan in reverse, but it's not to have someone holding the door for us or clipping the red wire just as the camera turns.
Hoo-boy, that ended up longer than I wanted it to be, but hopefully something in there was helpful. If you've got one that's throwing you for a loop or you want to talk through one together, I'd be happy to walk you through how I use these at the table.
My group just had a session 0 last week and they chose to play smugglers, so this will help a ton. Thank you so much for making this and for making it free, too!
Just as a heads up, I believe there's a typo on the last eight-part clock on the "Strange Avenues" score: "DThe tide's coming in...".
Thanks again.
Glad to be of service! Thanks so much for downloading.
Good eye, too. We'll squash that typo gremlin.