http://halfmeme.com/threeforged.html - Paul Czege 15127
In 30 Seconds
Village Council is a game about survival, politics, and keeping an Ace in the hole. Using some hand management with a deck of cards, players will take the role of both heroes and guildspeople of a village to grow it towards fame and fortune.
Village Council
There lies a quiet village on the brink of chaos, full of hard working salt of the earth peasants. Their lives of toil are made harder by the wild beasts, savage neighbors, and strange magics that plague them. Their one line of defense against the dark are the heroes. These stalwart men and women are beacons of hope, righting wrongs, completing daring quests, and most importantly bringing much needed trade and wealth to this beleaguered village. But it seems as if the heroes work is never done, almost as if the village seems to draw trouble and more adventurers with a will of its own. In the following game, players will explore the actions and motivations of a seemingly quaint fantasy village as it struggles to survive.
You will need some supplies...
* Dice, six-sided and ten sided for percentages
* A single deck of cards.
* Paper and pencil.
CREATE YOUR GUILDHOUSE AND CHOOSE YOUR HEROES...
Your guildhouse will be unique to you. The guilds of our tiny village are not limited to one type of character or class or occupation. These houses are bartering for bigger game. The guildhouse is run by the master or mistress of the house, namely you. The guildhouse is eternal so long as it has heroes to champion its cause. It is possible to recruit heroes, make heroes, and even strategically kill them off. Choose a name for your Guildhouse such as the WentWorth Manor, The Red Lace Brothel, or the Merchant's Hall.
Each Player will flesh out 3 heroes. These are the core starting heroes of the guildhouse and can have any occupation: Warrior, Barbarian, Thief, Scribe, Bartender, Town Cryer, etc. They should have a set of attributes that describe them, a set of skills that define them, and an item that they acquired that earned them the title of hero. The attribute will be a common core set of attributes that all heroes will have: body, mind, faith, and luck. Attributes have numbers associated with them that correspond to dice rolled in the event that a random resolution is required. Skills are a description of abilities that help define what a hero can do. These are tied to one of the attributes of the players choice. The item can be magical or crafted or both in its description. Crafted items will provide bonus pips on rolls, magical items will provide bonus dice on rolls. Items can be traded, lost, stolen, etc.
Milton Berle of the NBC Guild
Heroes:
1. Johnny Carson, Entertainer - Body 1, Mind 2, Faith 4, Luck 3; SKILLS - Read the Crowd {Mind}, Divert Attention {Luck} ; Has the Helm of the Great Karnak {Magical +1 die to Mind rolls}.
2. Ed Sullivan, StarMaker - Body 3, Mind 3, Faith, 3, Luck 1; SKILLS - Endow Character {Body}, Encouragement {Mind}; Has Holly the Singing Cricket {Crafted +3 pips to Luck Rolls}.
3. The Iron Chef, Cook - Body 5, Mind 2, Faith, 1, Luck 2; SKILLS - Cooking Resourcefulness {Mind}, Iron Stomach {Body}; Has the Skillet of Eternal Flame {Magical +1 die to Luck Rolls, Crafted +2 pips to cooking resourcefulness}
SEASONS, YEARS, ERAS: All in the Cards...
The game will play out like one that some may be familiar with, or may see similarities to from other games, I know it as Cinch or Setback. Someone should keep track of the rounds as they are played, as the cards will determine some of the events of the game. The Person with the winning bid gets influence over the season, and his or her partner will be able to modify the events according to the tricks taken. Those on the losing team will have some influence over the events but not as much. Once the events are set in motion. The roleplaying begins. As guild masters and as heroes, you will meet with each other as both masters and heroes. The Winner of the hand will act as GM for the season guiding the town through the perils and setting up some specific goals to accomplish and sending out heroes to accomplish the task.
It's a Cinch
Pick 4 players, or if you only have three you'll be dealing a ghost hand. To the 4 positions deal 7 cards and also deal 6 cards to a 5th hand. Someone will be dealing out the cards. The dealer will bid last. Starting to the left of the dealer each person will bid on the number of points they can take in the round, from 1 to 7. The person with the highest bid will win the bid and set the trump. When bidding it is important to consider that the winner of the bid will also get to pull the 5th hand into their hand when considering the trump suit.
The bid winner will look through their 13 cards and choose the suit that is trump and keep only six cards. Announce the trump for the other players. For the players that did not win the bid, when the trump is announced, keep those cards which match the trump and discard the rest. The dealer will then in a clockwise direction bring everyone's hand back up to 6 cards. As an example, if someone kept three trump cards, they will be dealt 3 cards from the rest of the deck to bring them back to 6. Someone may need all 6 cards on occasion. Once everyone else has 6 cards, The dealer will get to look through the remainder of the deck and keep all the trump plus any cards to bring the hand to 6 cards. If the dealer has more than 6 trump cards then they will have to discard non-point trump cards to bring the hand down to 6 cards. Rarely, someone will have all 7 point cards and have to discard a point card.
The winner of the bid goes first and play proceeds clockwise. A player must follow suit unless they do not have any cards in that suit. Then they can play anything. At any time a player can play trump instead of following suit if the trump was not led. The highest trump will take a hand or if trump was not played, the highest cards of the first led suit will win the hand. The winner of the hand will take the trick (4 cards) and play proceeds starting with the winner of the trick for 5 more rounds.
Cinching the Resources
What do you keep out of the resources you won in the Cinch Game? It depends. Which describes you?
Bid Winner + 1
Dealer + 1
Partner of the Bid Winner + 1
Round Winner + 1
Partner of the Round Winner + 1
Trick Taken + 1
For every item above you get to keep a card from those claimed during the game. The cards will be used as resources in the RPG session that follows to enact events or purchase influence.
But What are the Points in Cinch?!
In order from Highest to Lowest: Ace, Jack, Off Jack (wrong suit, right color), High Joker, Low Joker, Ten, 2
When playing the rounds, the 2 of the trump cannot be taken even if it would have been lost on a trick. Another way to say it, if you have the 2 of the trump suit, you do not lose it, it's a guaranteed point.
Suits and Values; Royalty and Jokers
Once you've played the hands out, and determined the cards that you will keep from the claimed tricks, you may start spending or using them. These cards are the currency for the events to follow. If the bidding team wins the bidder is the guild master for the round. If the opposing team is the winner, then of the two of them, the one with the highest trump is the guild master. The guild master should come up with a story or a goal for the village to accomplish. The trump of the hand will help determine the story.
Spades - Construction or Destruction. Spades indicate that the story will revolve around the construction of a new building in town, usually for the guild house of the guild master. Or perhaps an attack from outside sources that breaks apart a portion of the village, usually to one of the guild master's opponents.
Clubs - Monsters or Men. The Clubs indicate that the story will revolve around a roving band of monsters or men of some ilk that seek usually to bring misfortune to the village.
Diamonds - Treasure, Wealth, and Taxes. The diamonds as a trump means that money is involved. The story could focus on the treasure of a recently defeated band of monsters or it could mean a tax upon the other wealthy guild houses.
Hearts - Health and Sickness. The Hearts lend themselves to stories in which plague encroaches upon the village or zombies are rising outside at night. It may also mean that as the village expands and a new well is dug, the well offers unforeseen benefits.
Royalty - Each of the suits has its royalty. Jacks, Queens, and Kings, increasingly offer better benefits within their suit. They are ultimately modifiers for the main ideas.
Jokers - These two valued cards are labeled as the High Joker and the Low Joker. These more than others can affect the game from the outside. Jokers can be used to buy items and heroes. Jokers can be used to remove another card from a round or to change a story from bad to good or vice versa.
WHAT STORIES ARE WE TRYING TO TELL?
The stories will likely be a combination of trump making trick taking rpg butt kicking.
Adding Influence and Playing Cards in the RPG
As you are both, your heroes and the guildmaster, you must walk the line between running the village and being a part of it. If you are the guildmaster in charge of the story then your heroes are the NPCs of your story and the other players are their heroes with only minor influence from their guildmaster. As the Story teller you are going to be guiding the story in the direction of the Trump suit. A story told about the shape of the town, the moving of goods, the environment and its affect on the people, or the perils of living with or neat monsters. The Cards of the Story Teller are there to help drive the story and to serve as ways to influence the actions and rewards or the players.
As part of the responsibilities of the story teller you will be thinking about things such as
What are the surroundings of the village? What other groups occupy the neighboring areas?
What type of resources are available to the village? Do they have access to magic through a priest or healer? Is there a militia or watchman? Are the surrounding forest plentiful in healing mushrooms?
What is the outside world like? Is magic common? Are there strong centralized governments or more advanced regions?
How does the village survive? Are they predominantly farmers? Miners? A cross-roads for weary travelers?
Who lives in the village? Are there any notable or particularly skilled individuals?
What are common threats?(i.e. beasts, bandits, legendary creatures, nightmarish fiends, ghouls, ghosts, etc.)?
Players can attempt to change the events or the relative influence of their heroes with the cards that they have. For instance. If Zombies are creeping towards the village at night and one of the players sends a Hero out to fight the zombies, he may play a diamonds cards to gain some treasure from the event. The walking dead may have been buried with a valuable bit of jewelry which could be translated into gold for his or her guild. The story teller may elect to reward the idea by adding a kept diamond card to add to the treasure.
The Story teller is done being the story teller when everyone has run out of cards. The story teller may also choose to end the story before then. Players will have a change to use unspent cards in this manner.
Seasons into Eras
In a game of Cinch, The role of the dealer passes to the left and partners stay the same until a score of 21 is reached. Here it is the same. Except that between each round the role playing aspects are played out. Each round consists of a different season. It is up to the story teller each time to determine if their story will follow later in the cycle of seasons or if the new story will follow one year later. For instance, the first player may determine that the cycle of stories will begin in winter. The next story teller may move to the following winter a year later or may instead advance the history of the village only up to summer. Then the following story teller may move a year after that to the next summer.
When a score of 21 or greater has been reached, the final season of the era of that village is played out. The history of that village is finalized and the heroes immortalized in epic poems, statues, or the names of food dishes (The Iron Chef special Chili Con Carne). Partners may change or players may shift. The Village will enter a new era decades into the future, perhaps a hundred years have passed and so have the heroes. Time to start again.
Four Seasons, Four Suits
As stated above, the trump will influence the season. The story of the bid winner will follow the trump.
A Season of Spades
The story teller will put down any spades from 2 to 10. The total will indicate the strength of the new building that the story will revolve around. The cards that the story teller will hold back are any other suits and some trump. The Involvement of the Jack will indicate a knight or knave from the castle to help in the defense or construction of the village for the season. A queen will indicate a Sorceress who owes one of the town heroes a favor. She is a temporary hero who will only get involved in some aspects of defense but is more powerful. A king will indicate a visiting dignitary who brings with him some defense. And perhaps a trick or two. The story teller may add the low joker to the royalty to add a hero to their regiment instead. A High Joker by itself will add a hero.
Those opposed to the construction or simply wish to cause havoc in the town my expend their spades to support or in direct contrast to the story teller. Players may expend diamonds to aid their own heroes with gold or may link royalty to the expenditure to heavily tax or greatly reward the heroes. Hearts can be played to inflict sickness upon the workers or to summon clerics to the aid of heroes and workers. Clubs are played to bring creatures to the village. Monsters can also come in elite form as the royalty clubs evoke more danger to the construction and the town.
A Season of Clubs
The story teller will put down any clubs from 2 to 10. The cards represent the number of incursions into town. The monsters will all be the same and the choice of the story teller. Jack will indicate a hero of the monsters attacking the town with a group of lesser monsters. Queen will indicate a shaman or sorceress of the monster type setting up shop near the village. A King will indicate A powerful giant mutant of the monster type that will likely end in the death of a hero. The story teller can add a low joker to royalty in order to surely kill a hero. A High Joker will add a hero of the monster type to the arsenal of the story teller's guild.
Those opposed to the story teller's attack on the town may spend clubs to bolster their heroes with temporary bonus dice. Linking royalty to spent clubs will make new magical weapons against the monster type. Diamonds will bring greater treasure from the monsters or aid in the form of coin to hire heroes to help deal with the seasonal problem. Spades are used to construct decoys and walls. Jack Queens and Kings of spades will mean lasting fortification if it isn't destroyed.
A Season of Diamonds
The story teller will put down any diamonds from 2 to 10. The cards represent the gems being collected by his heroes from unknown sources. The mystery of the sources could be deciphered by the other players. A Jack indicates a tax collector on the other players. A portion of their gold will come to the story teller. A Queen indicates a con artist in town who ties up heroes of the opposing players and siphons off their money. A King indicates that a tax collector from the king has come to the village and is much harder to get rid of. The money collected by the kings tax collector goes towards a fund to help the village. It will go to the next story teller. A low Joker can double funds or collect half the take of a royalty card. A High Joker creates a hero after the season who comes with all the funds collected in the season.
Those opposed to the story teller and the loss of their hard earned money can spend diamonds to lessen the impact on their coffers. Linking Royalty to spent Diamonds creates reserves for the player that can be used to weather the season. Hearts can be used to establish churches that can take the donations instead of the tax collectors. Spades can be used to funnel money into other projects or to help establish heart built churches. Clubs are used to bring monsters to town that may rob or kill tax collectors and stress the economy.
A Season of Hearts
The story teller will put down any hearts from 2 to 10. The cards represent the amount of sickness in the season. A Jack indicates that a plague bearing zombie is there to bring sickness. It is mindless but strong. A Queen indicates an intelligent plague bearing undead is coming int he night to feast on the town. A King indicates that a Vampire has moved in. A Low joker attached to loyalty means that the invading creature can be transformed into one of the story teller's heroes. A High joker creates a hero resistant to plague or a cleric that can heal such sickness.
Those opposed to the story teller can save some of their heroes by spending points to counteract the illness that the story teller is spreading. Royalty increases the effectiveness of the healing or spreads the healing around with clerics. Diamonds can be used to purchase medicine. Clubs can be used to summon monsters that can divert the sickness because it affects them also. Spades can be used to contain or keep out the illness for a while.
INCOMPLETE
There are unanswered questions. The specifics of the game of cinch perhaps. Or maybe which cards to keep and what spending them means. How to make heroes, weapons, and distribute points. This is a Work in Progress. This is about the distribution of resources in an uneven manner. The shared responsibility of being story tellers in a shared story that spans time and should reach an ultimate conclusion. The distribution of resources involves a little bit of luck and a little bit of skill. The potential to throw a trick not only for game and point purposes, but also for the purposes of looking for resources. Knowing what trump you have but not wanting that story line to come up next for the village. Some of the finer points need to be discussed and explored. Some of them need to be written down to help the game become. Cinch is not the only game that can accomplish this. It's the one I know the best from nearly a hundred plays over the years at Christmas with the family. As gamers we all have different relationships with the tarot deck. I would invite anyone to look at the tarot card games in wikipedia, back to the game that utilizes the deck,Tarocco. This form of the game is now in your hands.