Best Number of Players for Blackstone Fortress?

[grailkeeper]

I have blackstone fortress and am about to start a campaign. Am I better off with 5 players with one (probably me) being dm or is the game better with 4 players and no gm?

[Doctor Perils]

I've yet to play with a GM, but if you're open to playing like that I'd probably recommend it. While the dice-based "AI" mechanic works ok, it does lead to some pretty stupid situations, and it can feel like the PCs snowball fairly fast.

 

While you _can_ houserule NPCs into being more aggressive/dangerous, that could lead to the opposite problem where the PCs are just getting punished all the time. A GM can sort of modulate the difficulty at his discretion, which should hopefully keep the players engaged with the game

[Kythnos]

I have blackstone fortress and am about to start a campaign. Am I better off with 5 players with one (probably me) being dm or is the game better with 4 players and no gm?

Well, that depends. If you play the game master according to the rules, which is to say with nearly no control over his minions, I would advise against a fifth player. If you were to houserule the game to give the gm some additional liberties, I would say that you could improve on the game experience for everyone.

[Mandragola]

Ive been playing it with just two of us. We each run two characters. I find this works best actually, not exactly because it’s the best way to play blackstone fortress, but because it’s a situation in which it makes sense to play BSF at all.

 

Basically if there are more people than that then I think it makes sense to play dnd or some other true rpg, not BSF. It doesn’t look like much fun to DM BSF so I’d definitely stop at 4 players. But the game takes absolutely ages to resolve, so it doesn’t really work for when you’ve got a couple of friends round for a board game evening - you’ll leave things unfinished and unsatisfactory.

 

YMMV though of course. BSF could potentially make a good intro to RPGs for people who haven’t played them before.

Edited November 14, 2019 by Mandragola

[Sparika]

I've juste completed Hammerhal with two friends last week-end. I was playing as the game master and I did not have much control on the minions. Usually, a group would spawn then be be decimated by the players, then I would nbe able to fight back with the few survivors. For the player though it was quite more fun. In comparison, Silver Tower was more fun because we were two players cooperating to fight the game.

 

I don't know the exact differences between WQ and BSF, but if I was to play it, I would try 2 to 4 players like in silver tower. For Hammerhal it was not possible due to how the quests are presented.

[killersquid]

My girlfriend and I played through the game together and had a blast. I wouldn't want to play with 5 though, as the player controlling the bad guys will probably not have as much fun. There is not really much for the npc player to do.

[Dosjetka]

If you use the "Hostile Threat Detected" rules in May's White Dwarf, your fifth player will have much more to do when controlling the enemy models.

[duz_]

From just getting enough people to play regularly 2 actually works quite well and goes quicker

 

My group regularly had 3 of 4 attend and went well too

[JeffJedi]

I had the most fun with 3 to 4 but a few games with 2 were fast.

[Noserenda]

We had fun with 4, played with 5 a bit and it was boring for that player, though the WD rules might fix that.