It feels like you’ve never run Blades or any kind of a similar game…

I was both a player and a GM in a lot of FitD games, and its downtime is not just a D&D shopping session, it’s another phase of the game covered by the rules.

D&D-like shopping sessions, in contrast, are just table talk.

A shopping trip can kill half a session if it’s been a while.

Do you really have fun running a session like that? Me and my players would die of boredom.

I can make one case for people like that: if it’s a paid game. I can tolerate people like that because if I don’t get their emotional investment in the game, at least I got paid. Not that I would invite them to play another session, of course, because there are a lot of better people out there.

Our Sorcerer knew Wish, but the player knew better than to try something like wishing to get to the lowest level of Hell, because on the meta level they wanted to play through this adventure, not to cheese.

The biggest challenge during Tier 4 is still resource attrition. Let them use their big spells, but don’t let them rest. The best challenge you can give them at this point is to make a multi-session-spanning dungeon-like structure.

An example from my previous campaign: heroes needed to get to the lowest level of Hell, but they needed to transit through every one of them in process. Enemies were everywhere, and places for rest were virtually nonexisting. I think they had like 1 long rest in four months of play during T4, and it actually was hard for them.

When I did play 5e IRL, I used Ard sheets, tweaking them in Photoshop or Illustrator whenever needed.

Where is this jail cell? What’s the city name, vibe, etc?

That’s a bad question, because it draws blanks, not leaves them. Better questions would be:

• «Fighter, how big is the city? Is it more like a village, or something closer to a big, prosperous metropolis?»
• «Rogue, which known criminal is doing his time in some other part of this jail?»
• «Barbarian, you’ve been there quite a lot for your drunken fights, did you? Name one guard who’s here now, you know each other a little too well!»
• «Wizard, for what breakthrough the local magical academy is known?»
• «Cleric, which religion do they preach here?», and, optionally, «Which part of it you would never agree with?»

Don’t just ask «what’s the city vibe», get them something to build from!

Still, memes likes this one actually breed such GMs, because somehow they think it’s funny.

Most people just want to do cool shit.

There are THOUSANDS of other games, and most of them let you do cool shit instead of tracking resources. Just, you know, stop playing D&D.

As a DM, I cringed at this. Alright, you broke the game, overshadowed your martials and blew past the encounter your DM spent so much time carefully crafting. And your game session ended two hours earlier. Thanks everyone, see you next week I guess.

Shame about removed monsters. I personally used all these Arch-Devils, and Boreas basically became a father figure to a lot of PCs at my table.

I’ve looked for any PbtA games, but there seem to be none in the cyberpunk genre.

The Sprawl is Pondsmith cyberpunk in PbtA. It seems like it’s close to what you’re playing. The Veil is a japanese style cyberpunk, closer to Ghost in the Shell.

Seems like you’re confused, because we’re in the blades in the dark sub.

Involving your players in worldbuilding, even in games like D&D, is a fantastic way to engage them. Places they describe might not be relevant at all, but it lets them stay engaged in the game nevertheless. And also you can feature some of their creations later! AND you get to listen to them and not to do this work yourself! It’s a win-win situation.

Wicked Ones

Describe the place they are leaving. Ask them how do they feel about that. Then do a montage of their journeys (just a couple scenes) and ask someone to pitch in, like «Ranger, what’s totally unexpected grows here?», or «You see a small pillar of smoke, seems like there is a small village off the beaten path; Cleric, who do they praise here?». And after that you can tell them «…so, you’re here».