Gyre & Gamble in the Wabe
I’ve been trying for a long time to run a very special game called Trouble And Also Violets, but it’s advanced. It requires players to have experience with both TB and S&V and be pretty comfortable with the overall game, because it’s not a great environment for learning S&V for the first time, to say the least. The game has its own Bootlegger rules as well, so if I also have to go over non-Drunk drunkenness, multiple Demons, and madness in addition, it’s too much. We had a couple new players, so this night was not the night for it.
Still, we had some nice big games, hilarity ensued, good won every game, and I learned something interesting.
Trouble Brewing - 12-player + 4 Travellers - good won.
One of the more interesting turns, I thought, was having an alive Undertaker right after a day with 2 executions due to the Butcher. I believe the 2 executions in this case were the Soldier and the Drunk (Fortune Teller). I hadn’t read the full almanac entry on Undertaker in a long while, so I had to make a rules call: Should the Undertaker see both characters of the executed players from that day, only the most recent one, or is there another option? I closely read the Undertaker description: “Each night*, you learn which character died by execution today.” Now, it doesn’t say “characters”, but it also doesn’t say “most recently” or “a/one character who died” or anything else that serves to limit them to just 1 token. And at this point, my policy as ST kicks in: I’m not gonna consult a rulebook/wiki/almanac while people are sleeping and probably getting bored - that will just take too long, while often failing to turn up the “correct” answer anyhow, assuming one even exists. I’m going to do my best with the accessible materials to come up with a fair ruling. If I’m wrong, oh well - it’s just a game, and players will still have fun! In this case, I showed both character tokens to the Undertaker, which did reveal a lot of juicy info. But it’s not the intended behavior - the almanac entry actually does spell it out in clear terms; the ST can choose either token to show; showing both is not really within their discretion. I learn from every game, but I do believe everyone had fun in this one.
Trouble Brewing - 14-player + 1 Traveller - good won.
A short game with a hilarious outcome. Day 1, the Recluse outed herself, self-nommed, and begged to be executed, but we ended up hanging the Butler instead; they had both been in the Investigator ping of Scarlet Woman. Day 2, the Recluse managed to get on the block with another self-nom, and we nearly executed her, but the traveling Judge decided it was time to go. He used his once-per-game ability to convict the next player nominated, who turned out to be the Imp. Game over!
Bad Moon Rising - 13-player - good won.
The most remarkable thing in this game was absolutely what the Gambler did. She lived after successfully gambling (sober & healthy each time, BTW) the Chambermaid, the Grandmother, the Minstrel, and the Po. On the final night, the Po charged because there were 2 Townsfolk left alive, except there weren’t because the Gambler intentionally died by gambling herself as the Sailor. The proc’ed Fool went on to nom the Demon in Final 4 for another good team victory.