wetwareproblem:

prokopetz:

I’ve discussed in the past how one of the functions of tabletop RPGs is to generate creative prompts, and how that’s a big part of the reason why games with character classes and spell lists and such tend to be so popular: build-anything systems are well and good in theory, but in practice a lot of gamers don’t want to build anything – they want a jumping-off point, and that hook can be game-mechanical just as easily as it can be narrative.

The reason I bring this up is because I’ve been reviewing my copy of Blades in the Dark, a game about playing as a criminal gang in a city where the sun never rises, and I’ve been reminded of one of my favourite class abilities in any game I’ve run so far. In BitD, in addition to the individual character playbooks, there are also playbooks for the entire crew – a sort of party-level “character class”. One of these playbooks is “Hawkers”, a gang of contraband-runners and vice-purveyors, who have the option of taking the following crew trait:

Ghost Market: Through arcane ritual or hard-won experience, you have discovered how to prepare your product for sale to ghosts. They do not pay in coin. What do they pay with?

That’s an entire campaign premise right there: you’re a gang that sells drugs to ghosts.

“There’s blood in you ghosts. You should do cocaine about it!”