Welcome To Doskvol | City of Whispers: Part 1 | Blades in the Dark Actual Play
The first part of our new actual play - meet the crew as they step out into the streets of Doskvol
Watch as a full video episode on YouTube
Welcome to Doskvol, where the sun has been shattered and the city is shrouded in mist and soot. Giant lightning towers keep out the spirits of the dead as most of the people in the city struggle to makes ends meet.
While the nobles of the Imperium claim to run the city, the real power lies with the many gangs of Doskvol, different factions vying to seize control. Newest among them is a small group calling themselves The Haunts; 4 desperate scoundrels who have decided to make their own bid for power...
Cast:
C.L. Clark (author of The Unbroken and Fortune's Wake) as Vey Basran
David Goodman (author of A Reluctant Spy and Solitary Agents) as Weaver Dalmore
Claire Schultz (author of Even Your Bones Would Do) as Mara Keel
Rafael Torrubia (author of The Shipwright and The Shroudweaver) as Nev Twist
With Marco Rinaldi as Game Master
Chapters:
00:00 Welcome to Doskvol
01:57 Opening Credits
03:43 Intro and player intros
06:35 The story begins...
Narrative Damage is the TTRPG show that asks authors to put down their pens, pick up the dice and tell stories together. Check out our other actual plays in a variety of systems on the channel now, along with interviews with creators from the TTRPG world.
This work is based on Blades in the Dark (found at http://www.bladesinthedark.com/), product of One Seven Design, developed and authored by John Harper, and licensed for our use under the Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Unported license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/).
Music by Monument Studios.
Detailed maps of Doskvol used with permission of Tim Denee of Old Dog Games - buy them here
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Author/Cast Member
David Goodman is an award-winning, multi-genre Scottish author. His debut novel A RELUCTANT SPY won the 2025 McDermid Debut Award and Bloody Scotland Debut Prize and was optioned for television by Carnival Films. The sequel SOLITARY AGENTS was longlisted for the 2026 McIlvanney Prize.
His SF debut, SHARDS OF STARLIGHT, as David W. Goodman, is forthcoming in Autumn 2027 from Solaris. He also has several published short SF stories and novelettes.
Author/Cast Member
Claire Schultz is a writer, editor, and academic.
Her short fiction has been featured in literary journals including Coffin Bell, Crow & Cross Keys, and more, and has won the Hotel Commonwealth Emerging Writers Prize. She works primarily in the overlap of fantasy, horror, and literary fiction, and her debut adult novel, Even Your Bones Would Do, will be published by Berkley Books & Daphne Press in early 2027. As Claire Rose, her debut Young Adult novel, The Cove, will be published by Wednesday Books in spring 2026.
A central New Jersey native, she holds a BA in English Literature & Creative Writing from the University of Chicago, an MPhil Education (Critical Approaches to Children’s Literature) from the University of Cambridge, and is pursuing a PhD in English from the University of Edinburgh. Her academic research specializes in the intersection of literature, fantasy, and childhood play, from the Brontë juvenilia to Girl Games of the 1990s. As an editor, she has worked for Titan Books, a leading UK independent publisher.
Author/Cast Member
Rafael a writer of epic fantasy, poetry, history, and things in-between.
Their debut novel The Shipwright and the Shroudweaver is out now from Gollancz. They currently work part-time with the University of St. Andrews supporting postgraduate students, and also with the writing charity Open Book, delivering creative writing workshops to participants across Scotland.
They have won a number of awards for my writing and poetry, including Unpublished/Published Writer of the Year from the National Gallery of Scotland, the Deirdre Roberts Poetry Prize, and multiple shortlistings for the Bridport Prize.
Author/Cast Member
C.L. Clark, dubbed the "Patron Saint of Sword Lesbians" by Reactor Magazine, is a BFA award-winning editor and Ignyte award-winning author of several books, including The Unbroken (Magic of the Lost trilogy), Fate's Bane (a novella), and Ambessa: Chosen of the Wolf (an Arcane novel). They graduated from Indiana University’s creative writing MFA and were a 2012 Lambda Literary Fellow. They’ve been a personal trainer, an English teacher, and an editor, and are some combination thereof as they travel the world. When they’re not writing or working, they’re learning languages, reading about war and [post-]colonial history, or trying not to throw their kettlebells through the wall. Their work has appeared in various SFF venues, including Best American Science Fiction and Fantasy, Tor.com, Uncanny, and Beneath Ceaseless Skies.