A merchants' council of 5–10 passes decrees. Most councillors are loyal and want
sound trade. A secret cabal wants the rotten decrees through, and one of them, the
Quiet One, must never be handed the gavel once the rot sets in.
The cabal know each other and the Quiet One. A loyal councillor knows nobody, and there is
no way to prove what you are. Talking, and who you believe, is the whole game.
A round
The Speaker (the gavel passes round the table) names a Chair.
The council votes openly. Everyone votes in secret, then every vote is turned over at
once and stays on the record. More than half in favour and the pair sit.
The Speaker draws three decrees, buries one in secret and passes two to the Chair.
The Chair enacts one in secret and buries the other. Only the enacted decree is read out.
Either of them may say what they saw. Nothing proves a word of it.
Winning
Five sound decrees: the loyal councillors win.
Six rotten decrees: the cabal win.
Once three rotten decrees are up, a vote that puts the Quiet One in the Chair wins it
for the cabal on the spot.
Expel the Quiet One and the loyal councillors win.
Powers
Each rotten decree fills a place on the lower track, and some of those places hand the
Speaker a power, used at once:
Look at one councillor's
loyalty. Only you see the answer, and the Quiet One reads as an ordinary member of the cabal.
Hand the gavel to anyone:
they speak next, and then it carries on round as before.
Read the next three
decrees, in order, and put them back.
Expel a councillor. They
take no further part, and if they were the Quiet One, the council is saved.
Which places carry a power depends on the size of the council; the board shows them.
Deadlock
Vote a nomination down and the gavel passes on. Three failed votes in a row and the council
loses patience: the decree on top of the pile enacts itself, nobody gets a power, and everyone may
be nominated again.
The decrees
Six sound and eleven rotten, shuffled. When fewer than three are left, the buried ones are shuffled
back in. The board shows how many are left, never which.
Playing
This game is people only: there are no computer councillors. Tap ⋯ → Play
friends online and send the link to four to nine friends.
Tap a councillor to see what is known about them, or to choose them when it is your call.
⋯ → Game info has every vote and every decree so far.
Alone here? ⋯ → Tutorial walks you through a round.