Lady Blackbird

Posted by Mark on Jun 2, 2011 in Lady Blackbird, Reviews & Culture |

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Lady Blackbird is a free (Creative Commons Attribution Non-Commercial Share Alike 3.0) game by John Harper, which tells a single story. The characters are pre-made, and have a specific task in mind:

Lady Blackbird is on the run from an arranged marriage to Count Carlowe. She hired a smuggler skyship, The Owl, to take her from her palace on the Imperial world of Ilysium to the far reaches of the Remnants, so she could be with her once secret lover, the pirate king Uriah Flint.

However—Just before reaching the halfway point of Haven, The Owl was pursued and captured by the Imperial cruiser Hand of Sorrow, under charges of flying a false flag.

Even now Lady Blackbird, her bodyguard, and the crew of The Owl are detained in the brig, while the commander of the cruiser, Captain Hollas, runs the smuggler ship’s registry over the wireless. It’s only a matter of time before they discover the outstanding warrants and learn that The Owl is owned by none other than the infamous outcast Cyrus Vance.

How will lady Blackbird and the others escape the Hand of Sorrow?

What dangers lie in their path?

Will they be able to find the secret lair of the pirate king? if they do, will Uriah Flint accept Lady Blackbird as his bride? By the time they get there, will she want him to?

And that’s where the game begins.

The rules are shockingly simple, and use a dice pool mechanic. Each character sheet for the five PCs has the complete rules mechanics on it, as well as special rules governing the characters.

One of my favorite elements to the game is the Keys. Each character has a few Keys, which are something about the character that is a detriment to them. Lady Blackbird herself has, for example, the Key of the Paragon: As a noble, you’re a cut above the common man. Hit your key when you demonstrate your superiority or when your noble traits overcome a problem. Buyoff: Disown your noble heritage.

By being haughty and stuck-up, she gets benefits for RPing. The Buyoff is an opportunity for her to gain two advances, the equivalent of ten XPs.

There are conditions attached to everyone’s characters as well: Injured, Trapped, etc. None of these have mechanical implications in the game, other than to encourage the GM and players to play up those traits.

The game itself doesn’t give any further adventure past what you see up above. Instead, it has a couple small encounters listed, and just lets you run from there.

The game setting is a steam-punk/sci-fi/fantasy world, which has to be read to be grokked (it’s only a single page long, so easy reading).

Also, there’s a lot of information that can allow you to create your own characters, but no rules for the actual creation. It’s not a game for power-gamers, so having players pick-and-choose elements for their own characters could work really well.

You really need to get out there and give this game a look.

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7 Comments

Rhetorical Gamer

Jun 2, 2011 at 9:34 am

Not to be negative (we all like different things, right) but when I stumbled on this I read it, passed it around a little, and my group and I didn’t really get the hype.

It’s a scenario sketch. With some pre-gens. That uses a simple system (which is mostly inferred, not actually explicit).

I likened it to one of those one room LARPS run in a game slot at a con. You spend the first hour of play wondering who everyone is and trying to pretend you have a connection, followed by three hours of desperately trying to “accomplish a goal.” Usually an unsatisfying experience all the way around.

I don’t know — I just don’t get the hype.