Tabletop Roleplaying Games
Scum and Villainy
Scum and Villainy is a space opera tabletop roleplaying game about a crew of outlaws getting by on a ship under the Galactic Hegemony, written by Stras Acimovic and John LeBoeuf-Little. It is a stand-alone game based on the Blades in the Dark system, using the Forged in the Dark engine, and its setting draws on Star Wars, Firefly and Cowboy Bebop. Evil Hat Productions published the hardcover edition on 2 August 2018, produced in partnership with Off Guard Games, the studio behind the original. The Evil Hat book runs to 368 pages in black and white. A 2018 Gnome Stew review recommended it for players who want narrative play with enough rules to support a story arc.
The system is a Forged in the Dark game built on Blades in the Dark, and it is the space version of that heist game.
Description
Players take on a ship's crew in the Procyon Sector, a region of four star systems with factions grouped as Hegemony, Weirdness and Criminal. Their jobs involve dealing with syndicates, noble families, aliens and mystics, and exploring ruins. The Game Master (GM) runs the jobs and the crew's progress from a struggling outfit to a well-known one. The Way, an energy field, underpins the rules for artifacts.
The game asks a table to improvise and to commit to a plan late. Jobs start in the middle of the action through an engagement roll, so a group does not spend a session planning. The ship has its own sheet and upgrades, and the crew's rise through the sector is part of the game. It suits groups who like heists, found-family crews and a space setting without a fixed plot.