If you’re looking to play Blades in the Dark online, the first thing you’ll need to decide is which virtual tabletop, or VTT, to use. Fortunately, you have a number of options to help you immerse your players in the haunted city of Doskvol and bedevil their scoundrels with all manner of ghosts, demons, horrors from beyond the veil, and of course, those meddling bluecoats.
Foundry VTT
Foundry is a sophisticated platform for virtual play. Users who prefer it love its high level of customizability, smart interface, and active community of developers and fans. Players can purchase the Foundry VTT software for a one-time payment, then download or purchase add-ons with game modules, like this one for Blades. Only one player, usually the GM, needs to own Foundry; the rest can join on a local or remote network. The version of Blades in the Dark you can play on Foundry is unofficial, produced by community member Dez384, but it’s still remarkably robust—and free to install, provided you already have access to Foundry.
Foundry’s BitD module has fully integrated character sheets for player characters and their crew, plus descriptions for items, factions, and abilities. Its dice roller is fully automated, including reminder text for the outcomes of rolls based on PCs’ position and effect. The tools for clocks are a little kludged, but completely functional, and in general the quality-of-life tools for running Blades smoothly are all in effect. It even includes optional rules from the recently released rules expansion for Blades, Deep Cuts!
Because it’s community-made, it’s reliant on the continued support and maintenance of volunteers to remain up-to-date, but thus far has changed hands at least once without incident. Visually, it’s simple but functional, and relies on the user to spice it up with maps and visual aids. Foundry definitely has a learning curve, and it might be overwhelming to less technologically-savvy players, but the reward of a fully-customizable game interface holds a lot of promise to a GM who’s willing to put in the work to master the platform.
One More Multiverse
One More Multiverse is a relatively recent addition to the VTT scene, with stylish pixel-art graphics and a vast library of assets for creating customized characters and NPCs, building scenes, monsters, and set pieces, and decorating maps with items, lighting, and visual effects. One More Multiverse is semi-subscription-based, with a lean free version and a Patreon for premium access. The Blades in the Dark module for OMM is available as a one-time purchase.
The module includes access to OMM’s bespoke art for Blades, full of ghosts, demons, electroplasmic effects, haunted manors, soot-choked streets, and dark canals, plus character options so players can express themselves with their scoundrels’ looks. It also includes perfectly serviceable character sheets, virtual dice rollers, rules references, and clocks to smooth play, but its strong suit is without a doubt the aesthetic. Many of its assets are appealingly animated, and the look altogether does a great job of evoking the haunted streets of Doskvol.
Unfortunately, its greatest strength is also its greatest weakness. The specificity of the art assets allows players to experience a visually stunning interpretation of the setting, but complicates a key feature of Blades in the Dark: flexibility. Blades is fervently “anti-canon,” and intentionally leaves a lot of white space for players and GMs to put their own spin on what it looks like and how things work. While building out a fully realized map of the heist location is visually impressive, it makes things like flashbacks and retroactive continuity—both key to Blades’ gameplay—a lot more difficult to incorporate. Not to mention building set pieces is a lot of effort! Blades in the Dark sings best, in my opinion, as a low-prep, highly collaborative game that keeps a light touch on the shared fiction to best allow it to adapt to the input of its players. I can imagine a use case for One More Multiverse that builds out Doskvol and the targets and locations of scores during play, but that demands a lot of extra effort and platform mastery from the GM.
Roll20
Roll20, as one of the hobby’s longest-running VTTs, has a lot going for it: a large user base, established developers, and a large library of modules and conversions, not the least of which is its officially-supported platform for Blades in the Dark, Haunts of Doskvol. Roll20 is free to play with optional subscriptions, and GMs can purchase the rules compendium for Blades in the Dark and Haunts of Doskvol separately or in a bundle, in case you already have the rules in print or through Roll20’s partnership with DriveThruRPG. Only one player needs to own the module.
Haunts of Doskvol is remarkably user-friendly, with fully-automated character and crew sheets which are laid out in a familiar way for those who’ve played Blades in pen-and-paper. The module includes tokens, a few maps of Doskvol, backdrops for each district, functional clocks, and labels for every faction in the book. A free add-on of token markers allows you to use these to track faction status and tier as well. The dice roller is simple and useful, and a delightful number of labels on the sheets double as buttons to automatically roll for things that come up regularly in play, like resistance and engagement rolls. Roll20’s selection of available music also particularly help to pump up the atmosphere.
While the module alone gives you nearly everything you need to play, with provided quick reference sheets, there are some missing pieces you’ll have to fill in with either the rules compendium or your own set of rules. It’s visually simple, but dark and evocative enough, with the maps most players will need. It trades some customizability for ease of use; as nice as the faction labels are, you can’t edit them or create new factions in the same style. It also doesn’t yet have support for Deep Cuts, but the character sheets do have customization options that would make it possible for a determined GM.
The Verdict
The Roll20 VTT for Blades in the Dark, Haunts of Doskvol, strikes in my opinion the best balance between usability and customization, aesthetic and flexibility. Foundry’s module is robust and sophisticated, but visually spare and complex to get under the hood. One More Multiverse is gorgeously rendered, but goes a bit against the spirit of Blades’ playstyle, and puts aesthetics ahead of intuitive gameplay in some cases.
Haunts of Doskvol is officially supported, has an awesome character sheet, and is by far the most plug-and-play of the options. It’s here to do its job and get out of the way of players’ imaginations, and when I run Blades (which I often do), it’s my first choice.
It’s worth noting that none of your options here are bad by any means; I encourage you to play the field and draw your own conclusions! And most of all, enjoy your time in Doskvol playing Blades in the Dark!
Sean Foer is a game designer, editor, writer, video creator and professional GM.
