Lady Blackbird RPG: Has anyone tried this?

jabrams007

I was reading a very cool article over at Wired about this game. Apparently, it's free, can be played in 1-3 sessions, and is kind of a cross between a steampunk Star Wars and Firefly.

Here's the game's website if anyone is interested where you can download the free 15page pdf with everything you need. Looks very cool.

Has anyone tried this?

TheWhaleShark

It's made by the same dude what made Danger Patrol!, in case anyone else is wondering.

I've looked over it, but I haven't played it yet.

Xefas

Its been awhile, so I may be misremembering, but IIRC, it was fairly good with just a few bumps. For one, player versus player conflicts (be they verbal or otherwise) were weird and the rules didn't really discuss them. I seem to recall trying to run an argument between two players using the rules and it just didn't really work. I think we may have come up with a possible houserule (I know we at least discussed it), but it's still a black mark for the game, in my opinion. If the author wanted player conflict to be completely absent, a note to that effect would have been good.

And two, I distinctly remember the goblin character having a deal that was really annoying. Not like "in-character annoying" which I assume goblins are supposed to be, but actually annoying. He had something that gave him experience for making players (not characters) laugh. Which is fine in theory - stuff like Fanmail and Attaboys and such all work on the reward-for-meta-awesomeness paradigm. But, humor is kind of hard to force, and the tone of the game was on the more serious side, so I recall the goblin as being our Jar Jar Binks. I suppose YMMV on that one.

Other than that, it was a very nice one-shot. I enjoyed the Mouse Guard style "injury" mechanic. The Refreshment Scenes ended up resulting in some memorable occurrences. Probably wouldn't play it again unless I had a whole new set of people.

Anthony Heman

I think it's pretty cool what's managed within 16 pages.

okeefe

I played it once. It's very cool.

The GM's job is to request rolls and set the number of successes needed based on what the players want to do. The characters are immediately tossed into an interesting situation with many possible outcomes.

For one, player versus player conflicts (be they verbal or otherwise) were weird and the rules didn't really discuss them. I seem to recall trying to run an argument between two players using the rules and it just didn't really work.

I would just have both players build their dice pools and roll. Most successes wins. On a tie, neither gets their intent.

It sort of feels like a light version of Burning Wheel.

Xefas

I would just have both players build their dice pools and roll. Most successes wins. On a tie, neither gets their intent.

I think that's what we ended up deciding on doing after the initial attempt. But it's not in the rules. Running a pvp conflict by the rules of "Lady Blackbird" didn't really work. Running a pvp conflict by the rules of "Lady Blackbird + My Houserules" is different, but then that's a different game - one the OP didn't really ask for opinions about.

And, indeed, the lack of intraplayer conflict support may have been an intentional design choice to make a statement about the themes and tones the author wanted to include in their game. Personally, I think it would be a dumb statement to make, given the other things the game seems to be about, but you never know.