dark beast, dark name

DARK BEAST, DARK NAME

Made for Game Chef 2012

Ingredients: Coyote(The city being the Latin name for Coyote),  Doctor(a main character), Lantern(A plot device), Mimic(see below).

Last Chance being that the plot can only be fresh the first time!





A game for 3 Players and a GM.





Step One: Players, write down a secret fact about yourself, embarrassing or fascinating ridiculous or mundane that NO ONE else knows about. This is your treasure, these are the stakes, over the course of play you will try to guard it but it also means you could lose it so WATCH OUT.









Decide between you and your fellow players which Character/suit you will be:








____________ Jarry(You will be the Jack suit)









____________ Quatermass(You will be the Queen suit)









____________ Kinski(You will be the King suit)














Each player is dealt 3 cards from the deck. This is your Clarity, your mind can only withstand being probed by the Lantern for so long before it gives out.









Each Player gets:




1 sheet like this with instructions.




2 3x5 Index Cards, one for sketching the visage of the beast, one for it's name.




1 Pen with working ink.




1 table of Numbers, features and letters with which to define the Dark Beast.









2 Draw Two Spiky Horns and add Two X's to the Dark Name




3 Draw A Gaping Mouth and add a YS to the Dark Name




4 Draw a Tongue Emerging From A Mouth and add a CH to the Dark Name




5 Draw The Eye of a Cat and add Two O's to the Dark Name




6 Drawn Tufts Of Mangey Fur and add a UR to the Dark Name




7 Draw Misshapen Lumps and add an A to the Dark Name




8 Draw Whiskers and add Two S's to the Dark Name




9 Draw A Mouth With Fangs and add a UTH to the Dark Name




10 Draw An Angry Eye and add a KR to the Dark Name









J-Q-K Remove One Defense Or If You Have No Defense TELL YOUR SECRET (You are now out of Play)









GM Patter:
Hello My Dear Travellers, my friends from long ago, I know that you have made an arduous journey to get here but I assure you your toil is worth it and indeed needed. There is a foul creature run amok in our fair city of Canis Latrans, and he has a truly evil nature, you have all battled him under different names, you may know him by Dybbuk, Tolor the Raksasha, Shrouded Mehror, but he is The Dark Beast one in the same.


... Why, I can almost hear you ask, Why did I choose you? Well, my wizened old friends, I think you each may know our foe all too well, we've battled him back across ages. But... it's that knowledge that just might be the key. You see, I  think I might've found the final trick to stamping him out once and for all, with my final invention, the summation of all my knowledge, the Phyrric Lantern it delves into our darkest memories, into those hidden reccesses of our minds where his image might cower and his name might lurk. Pooling our memories I hope might flush him out into the open and with those weapons we might defeat him.






The Following to be craftily and carefully explained to the players by the GM:








Setup and Play go like this:









0.) GM Reads this and spoils him/herself rotten, procures candle(plus matches/lighter/fire), playing cards, pens, table, index cards, prints out three of the intstructions page, and does general prep.









1.) GM gives opening patter(also explaining play), hands out marked index cards, pens, and instructions.









1.01.) Players write a Personal Secret on back of unmarked index card(on reverse side they will fill in the letters for Naming The Beast). These are the Stakes.









2.) GM places Candle in middle of Table and Lights Candle.









3.) GM Separates suits Ace, Jack, Queen, King from deck, making a single pile of Numbered Cards and a single pile of trump cards. Both piles are then shuffled and cut.









4.) GM Deals 3 Numbered Cards face down to each player(this is their defense or Clarity).




4.1) The GM then flips over the top card from the Numbered Pile, revealing a numbered card from 2 to 10.


5.) The players look at their table and try to recall The Beast in their minds, then on the marked index card they sketch the features of The Beast corresponding to the value on the card(Horns, mouth, teeth, etc…) connecting these features to the markings and lines already on the card. They also write the letters from the table on the unmarked index card.


5.1.) If a player can make a same color pair from this card then he/she gets to keep the card as another point of Clarity. (Jack has 7 of Clubs, he can match 7 of Spade, but not 7 of Diamonds or 7 of Hearts)

6.) The GM then flips over the top card from the Trump Pile, this denotes who takes damage or becomes fatigued from the Lantern(Candle). Jack, Queen, King are the players/characters they are playing(each corresponding to their characters names Jack/Jarry, Queen/Quatermass, King/Kinski). Whichever card is drawn corresponding to that single player, and the spotlight is now on them. They are to role-play! During their first round of fatigue, a poignant memory of last time they saw the Doctor. During their second a recollection of their encounter with the Beast they once fought with the Doctor. During their third they are to describe their suspicion at the Lantern and the dawning fear they are feeling that something is just not right!
If one player has been almost taxed by the luck of the draw then another player can be allowed to bail him out, sacrificing a point of Clarity.


6.1.) If an Ace is drawn the doctor must take it and then follow a similar role-play scenario, first welcoming them to his abode and describing some of the strange goings on, talking about the past or the monster they are after, all in all trying to convince them of the importance of their mission, then during the second round with a hint of greater desperation and sadness he attempts to cajole them, to trust in him with their power(at this point he can even ask for some of their defense/Clarity points to increase his strength, he then just takes their Numbered Card as his own and places the Ace that was just drawn at the bottom of the deck). The Third Round of the Doctor's/GM is the rough one, for if he has exhausted most of his allies and has been playing his part rather well, the players now come to see that he is perhaps possessed by The Beast or is IN FACT being Mimicked by him. The GM is on his last legs and he(probably) is no longer able to cajole cards from the players during his turn. Things should get ugly. For the next round an Ace is drawn is the Monster's/GM's defeat.


These rounds (4.1 to 6.1) continue until either the players or the GM is drained of Clarity. In other words once 4 Jacks, 4 Queens, 4 Kings are drawn(i.e. GM wins), or All 4 Aces have been drawn(i.e. Players win)

Suggested Motivations/ideas For GM/Doctor and Player rounds.
A.) You must help me on with this quest! or Remember the By-Gone Days?
B.) You must lend me some of your power to defeat this evil!
C.) You fools, you are only destroying yourselves by not giving me your strength!
Final Draw - X. Secret! I am the demon, The Dark Beast, I have taken the lifeless body of your friend and used it as blank, to blank, blank. To trick you, you shall never get me!

Quiet thoughts of Vargus Jarry
A.) Flashback to youth, dusty motes in old home, remembering your age.
B.) Contemplating motes of dust, feeling ill and woozy. Remembering the Doctor.
C.) Remembers now, doesn't trust the doctor anymore, feels light headed, like his mind and body are floating away.
Final Draw - X. Personal Secret Revealed!

Quiet thoughts of Christine Quatermass
A,) Thoughts of Strength and Love, and your old life with the Doctor.
B.)Vague Memories of a Flame which was said to take the should of it's victims.
C.) Frightened by this Lantern/Candle, wrongly convinced that one of her fellow players and not the GM is behind this.
Final draw - X. personal Secret revealed!

Quiet thoughts of Wygand Kinski

A.) Things about monsters and why he has fought them.
B.)Vauge Recollections of the last time he saw the Doctor!
C.) How you fear for your very soul!
Final Draw - X. Personal Secret Revealed!

Win scenario for the GM

Holding the crude sketch over the amber light, the distant moaning of three spirits could almost be heard, flames licked around the curling edges of his visage, and his name had gone unuttered. The Dark Beast had done great work, once again beating the humans at their own game, cards! He had their secrets and their souls! Ha, what a laugh, he could cheat every time and still get away with it, the city was his and with another set of heroes down for the count their stood nothing in his way, he would make them all his.


Win scenario for the Players

The Lantern Flame flickered and went out, the doctor, whose behavior had become utterly peculiar during the ritual lay on the floor writhing and desiccated, who knows what deal he had made with the flesh eater who had stolen his body, or if he had really ever been the doctor, their friend?

 If all 4 Aces Have Been Revealed Then The Ritual is over, ASSEMBLE THE IMAGE AND SPEAK HIS TRUE NAME!

 Optional win scenario: if any of the players blows out the candle on the table then the GM must scream and admit defeat, his Pyrric Lantern destroyed and his mind obliterated!