Blades in the Dark is a tabletop role-playing game about a crew of daring scoundrels seeking their fortunes on the haunted streets of an industrial-fantasy city. There are heists, chases, occult mysteries, dangerous bargains, bloody skirmishes, and, above all, riches to be had — if you’re bold enough to seize them.
You and your fledgling crew must thrive amidst the threats of rival gangs, powerful noble families, vengeful ghosts, the Bluecoats of the city watch, and the siren song of your scoundrel’s own vices. Will you rise to power in the criminal underworld? What are you willing to do to get to the top?
In this stand-alone game, you’ll find:
- Rules to create your scoundrel using the following character archetypes: the Cutter, the Hound, the Leech, the Lurk, the Slide, the Spider, or the Whisper.
- Rules to create your crew, built from types like Assassins, Bravos, a Cult, Hawkers, Shadows, or Smugglers.
- A robust core mechanic which puts the fiction first—the strength of a character’s position (desperate, risky, or controlled) matters just as much as the character’s ability scores.
- A lightning-fast mechanic for planning criminal operations to cut through the usual slog of planning at the game table.
- Rules for alchemical experiments, gadget tinkering, and weird occult powers—including rules for playing Ghosts and other strange beings.
- A setting guide to the haunted city of Doskvol, with all the maps, factions, NPCs, schemes, and opportunities you need to run an exciting sandbox game.
GAME INFORMATION
Number of players: 3-6
Age of players: 13+
Length: 2-6 hours
Type of Game: Roleplaying Game
Languages Available: English
Product Number: EHP0030
ISBN: 978-1-61317-132-5
Page Count: 336
Format: Hardcover black and white interior and Digital formats.
Availability: Check here
Game Designer: John Harper
The Blades in the Dark book mentions http://www.bladesinthedark.com. Is that website up?
Hi Matthew, it isn’t live yet, but for now we have all the downloads on thhttp://www.evilhat.com/home/wp-admin/edit-comments.php?p=18807#comments-forme http://www.evilhat.com/home/blades-in-the-dark-downloads/ page.
Hi Evil Hat. I live in the UK and I am prepared to pay you Hard Dollar to ship me several hard copies of Blades in the Dark. Seriously, I have read the reviews, downloaded the PDF and I haven’t been this excited about a game for years.
We have made some bad life choices recently in the UK. Don’t punish us with no-shipping-to-UK nonsense. We need this.
Drop me a mail – I am happy to pay shipping as required.
Ian as detailed on our webstore page you can use a forwarding service in the USA if you feel the need to order from the States. But if you’re after copies of the Standard Edition I’d still heartily recommend you place an order with a store in the UK that supplies from Esdevium. Esdevium has definitely placed orders for Blades standard.
Hi Fred, just as a brief update regarding UK stock, I just spoke to Esdevium to try and order some copies in for our store and they are unfortunately out of stock so it’ll be a case of hunting around the Uk stores until they get some more in off your good selves.
Adrian, thanks for the heads-up. I believe they’ve recently transitioned to a new buyer for us so they may be in a bit of a catch-up mode. Won’t be surprised if I see another order from them soon.
Thanks Fred – I think I’m sorted now.
Hey guys, I heard about your product on “The Terrible Warriors” Podcast. I live in the US, where might I find a hard copy of your lovely game?
Hi Adam, there’s a big green “BUY NOW” button at the top of this page, I’d start there. If you’d prefer not to order from us, you can place an order (if they don’t have it in stock) with your local specialty tabletop game store of choice as we’re distributed by half a dozen games distributors in the USA. It also shows up on Amazon. 🙂
Hey, folks, any thoughts on making some of the stretch goal supplements available on DriveThruRPG since it’s still taking time to work the bugs out on the website? I didn’t hear about this game until well after the Kickstarter ended, and I’d really love to get my hand on that Blades of Jhereg supplement (since I’ve wanted this game to be in existence and that milieu in particular since I read the first two books back in ’84). LOVE the game by the way — it may have surpassed 7th Sea as my all-time favorite game system.
Hi John, all the stretch goal material will be distributed by the creators. We’ll also have a link for Kickstarter Backers to get their free copies, but at most we’ll have a list of links to the various goals. We’re working on the website now and hope to have it up soon.
Thanks, Sean — will there be a way to contact those creators on that website?
I don’t think there will be contact links, but there will be links to all of the sites where they are posting their content.
Wow. I need this. I too some how missed the Kickstarter. I have to read my emails more carefully! Well, I’ve subscribed to the newsletter for sure now, and ordered it to boot. A quick glance at the character sheets leads me to believe it’s fate based, so even if I don’t run it as is, I’m sure I can get sixty dollars worth of value out of it for my D&D games. I’m almost salivating while the pdf downloads.
Try Leisure Games for a hard print copy in the UK. https://leisuregames.com/search?q=blades+in+the+dark
They did have them in stock at £25. Much better than the parasites on Amazon asking over £50 for them.
Not sure how I missed the comment from October, but: Blades is its own system. Not Fate based. The Kickstarter was run by John Harper several years before Evil Hat got into the picture. 🙂
Y’ALL!!! THE AVAILABILITY LINK OPENS A SALES DATA SHEET!!!
It sure does. Column D indicates availability of each product. Therefore… link working as intended.
Hi, I live in Belgium and would love to order this game. Thing is, I can’t seem to find a place to order it from without paying crazy import costs. I read something above that Esdevium, now Asmodee, used to manage European orders for BitD but I can’t find anything about order BitD on their website anymore. Is there any other EU source where I can buy a physical copy of BitD from?
I don’t think Esdevium sells direct to consumers, they a distributor; they sell to retailers who sell to consumers. So you’d need to contact your local game store of choice and ask them to order it for you (product code EHP0030). That said, they might need to place a restock order, which takes time to traverse the Atlantic and reach them.
Will there be any official or unofficial Blades in the Dark at GenCon this year? I didn’t see any in the event catalog.
Hi DMMD, I’d stop by Games on Demand. For the last couple years there has usually been several GMs running it there. More deets here: https://www.indiegamesondemand.org/