All over the world, in every land where people live in cities, people watch Slaughterball.
Slaughterball is the pinnacle of prowess sport in a world where life is cheap. Slaughterball superstars are afforded every luxury -- any food, any man, and any service money can buy. Surveys show that top players are respected by average children even more than beast-tamers and hierophants.
A Slaughterball match is played by two teams of four, on a field packed with unimaginable dangers. The slaughterball itself is a six inch sphere of iron covered with blades and spikes and starts near the middle of the field, sometimes plainly visible. Each team starts opposite the field from one another and the one who gets the ball off the field, through the opposing team’s entryway wins the match. The match ends in a bloodletting if no one has won thirty minutes after the start.
Matches between two grade-A teams typically draw thousands of spectators clenching cash and betting slips in their sweaty fists. Especially thrilling matches are talked about for decades and more people report being there than can fit in the stadium. Team rivalries are the subject of gossip and many a dime novel.

In this game, you and four friends will tell stories about the crazy situations a team of D-grade Slaughterball players get into while seeking fame and trying to stay alive. The stories depict three modes of operation in the players’ lives: traveling from city to city pursuing advantageous Slaughterball matches, trying to get by in strange cities that grind people to dust, and finally, playtime on the Slaughterball field.
One player is the referee, describing the world and acting for the majority of characters inhabiting that world. The other four players each play a single member of the team
The Team
The first thing to do is collectively decide on the details of the team. Pick one from each list and flesh out with interesting details:
❏	a brand new team, formed when other enterprises in the player’s lives went pear-shaped
❏	a team newly formed from the survivors of four teams annihilated in the arena
❏	an old and storied team once glorious, fallen on ignominy 
❏	a team of old hands, together for years, never grasping real success but managing to dodge the worst of tragedy
❏	something else

❏	the players are regular Janes - working-class women who chose the sport instead of whatever occupation their life was aimed at
❏	players are an organized team of some kind of weirdos: hobbits, lizard-lasses, men-folk or something even stranger
❏	second-string nobles obliged to play the game
❏	a team of slaves from the far north, “grandfathered in” before slavery was banned
❏	something else

❏	in for the long-haul, seeking a life of fame and adulation
❏	trying to get a big enough score together that you can retire in luxury, constantly beset by unexpected hardship
❏	trying to raise money to save your home village or clan from disaster
❏	Slaughterball is merely a means to some unrelated end like getting close to the queen or completing some fell ritual
❏	something else

The Players
Slaughterball players consist of five sets of information that describe them more or less fully. You may also want to develop pre-game history and take notes about the things that happen to your character. To create your Slaughterball player, you will select and write down their: Flag, Facets, Foibles, Flair and Fire.
Flag is the Slaughterball name a person plays under. It most typically bears little resemblance to a traditional name, though there are schools of tradition that incorporate elements of the player’s birth-name. Some of the popular players you may know from the tabloids are: Scarlet, Gert-Rude, Mumblejoy, and SixFeet. You can choose anything, but make it good.
The five Facets of a Slaughterball player describe the way the player can interact with the world. They are: strength, speed, smarts, stamina, and smile. For each of these, you’re going to choose a number and a description. One of them is going to be a  0. Two of them will be 1s. One will be a 3 and the last will be a 5. Assign them to your player’s Facets however you prefer. Then, each one also gets a descriptive word. What kind of strength does your player wield? How does her smile help? When your does speed come out? These descriptions will sometimes alter the way you resolve contests of intention.
All the best Slaughterball players have significant Foibles that cause them trouble. It’s one of the things fans love! Choose 1-3 of: particularly naive, addicted to recreational drugs, primadonna, gambling addict, show-off, driven contrarian, sybarite, glutton, party-hound, sex-addict, other… For each Foible you select, add a point to one of your Facets.
Your Flair is how you stand out. Your special talents, skills, styles, accomplishments, things, friends, you name it! These may reflect your role on the team or in society. They can be as concrete or as abstract as you want. Like with Foibles, choose 1-3 of them. For each, subtract one from one of your facets.
Slaughterball players have an inner Fire that drives and motivates them. Up above, we figured out what your team is about -- why it exists and so forth. Your Fire is specific to you. What nuance do you bring to the team because of your personal desires? On top of the team’s goal, are you here for the money, fame, acknowledgement, as an escape, or what?

The Play
The game you’re playing (not the game your players are playing) is played in three ordered segments: Travel, Rest, and The Big Game. Appropriate Slaughterball matches aren’t usually available one after another in the same place, so teams are always on the road, heading for their next big break. Once they get to their destination city, they have to deal with finding a place to stay, avoiding local trouble and getting some rest before their match. Finally, they actually play Slaughterball.
Travel
During the Travel segment, the players decide how distant they’re willing to go for the right match. They discuss the matter and come to whatever consensus, rating their travel-distance on a scale of one to six. A one means they want a match in the next city and a six means they’re willing to go anywhere in the world. 
The referee and players should build up a map of the world as they travel based on these numbers. Regions are detailed by short hops and continents by long ones. This is collaborative and informal -- have fun with it.
That travel-distance number is also the number of situations that will confront the players along the way. The Referee will semi-randomly generate problematic situations (highwaymen, bad weather, starving villages, getting lost, monsters, thieves, people in need of help, adoring fans, strange customs, travel delays, foreign discrimination, Foible-related encounters, schemes to rig their game, or whatever)
But that willingness to travel also represents how choosey the team can be in finding just the right game. The players get to assert a number of facts about the match equal to the number selected. These facts are subject to review of the group and are meant to constrain the referee’s setup of The Big Game, but not eliminate the challenge.
Rest
Once the players arrive in their destination city, they may acquire lodging, avoid local entanglements, reconnoiter their opposing team, practice for their match, carouse, etc. Each of these activities may affect their performance in The Big Game.
The Big Game
…
[Hey next designer, I wish I’d done something more substantial with this, but felt like it was pretty hard and didn’t really know where to go. Everything above this point is my writing and everything below is author number one’s. I sincerely hope that you find this a more promising jumping off point than I did and you’re able to do something amazing with it.]

The Big Game: a push your luck subsystem to resolve the event and dole out accolades & injuries. 
OFF THE FIELD 
Standard action tests. If they succeed, they gain something. If they fail, they take a condition. 
ON FIELD
Game Day has it’s own subsystem- combining skill rolls and choices. There’s an element of push your luck. This offers a showdown, with different game flow. You need d6s of several different colors and some arranging system. I suggest a Boggle tray (they have 4x, 5x, and 6x, sizes). Look in second hand stores. Alternately use leftover board game sprue. 
The GM puts together the opposing team’s challenge: d6’s in several Offense (Black), Defense (White), Opportunity (Yellow), Fight (Red). They roll and arrange those in the grid. These represent the opposing team’s strengths players have to deal with. Players get a minute to examine this and discuss (longer as they gain in experience). Then the countdown begins and players cannot communicate by speaking, drawing, or writing. They’re on the field and can only communicate via gestures 
In turn, each player takes an action. They may influence any die with an open side. They can:
∙	Shift a die’s value by 1 (no test)
∙	Reroll a die (no test)
∙	Swap positions of two orthogonally neighboring dice, as long as one has an open side. 
∙	Remove one die 
∙	Remove or reroll all orthogonally neighboring dice of the same color
∙	Remove or reroll all orthogonally neighboring dice of the same number
∙	Remove or reroll all orthogonally neighboring dice in a sequence (i.e. 2-3-4) of 3+ dice.
∙	Roll dice removed in an attempt to score. 
Actions require a skill test. Players can roll any stat for these. They must match or beat the value of the dice they’re affecting. If they fail, the opposing team can either a) make an immediate attempt to score, b) add +1 to their next attempt to score, or c) Inflict an injury. An injury affects the stat used and means the player may not roll on it for the rest of the half. The opposing team also gets a chance to take an action after all PCs have gone. At this time they may do one or both of the following (in any order):  
…try to Score or try to Injure
…and swap the color of any non-green die to another (roll the die); in this case they must also swap a second non-green die in for a green die (roll the die). 
To attempt to score, the player must have at least one opportunity die. They roll a number of dice equal to one of their Offense stats. They may also roll & spend any additional opportunity dice they have. If this number rolled beats the total showing on the remaining White Defense dice, they score a point. If it doubles that, they score two. After any scoring attempt, failure or success, the GM rerolls all Defense dice. If the scoring attempt succeeded, the GM may add either a White or Red die to the board in an open slot of their choice. 
When the GM attempts to score, it will be against the person who failed roll or a player of the PC’s choice (between turns). That player rolls dice equal to one of their Defense stats plus any opportunity dice they wish. If the value of the Black dice showing on the board beats that, the GM scores. If it doubles that, the GM scores 2 points. 
Attempts to injure work like scoring, but compare Red dice to the player’s roll. If the GM succeeds, the player has to take an injury on one of his play stats. 
Players may always spend team morale to add a die or reroll one. Every time the team’s morale hits zero, a player takes a Mental condition. 
Once all Opportunity dice have been spent, the game hits halftime. Reset the dice and play again. 
THE TEAM’S CREW
NPCs with special abilities, can gain or improve their crew: coach, medic, agent, roadie, etc. Each should have a set of Indulgences with ratings as well. 
RECOVERY
Players take injuries or conditions in the course of playing: mental and physical. Actual harm, well that they can easily take and have seen to by the team physiker. The other stuff’s harder. Curing that requires a Screw Up or Helping Someone Out. A screw up means they play out a scene just buying into one of their indulgences and raising the value associated with it. On the other hand, they can try to fix themselves or one of the NPCs. This should require rp and tests, but should either reduce the PCs indulgence # or make the NPC better. 
GROWTH
Play skills can be improved. Possibly a mechanic for feats outside of play. 
Fame
Money