I'm Sure You're All Wondering Why I've Gathered You Here This Evening
A downloadable tabletop rpg
It is a dark and stormy night
You’ve just arrived in an impossibly large mansion on an otherwise deserted island. You were sent a mysterious invitation with no return address.
Enormous doors open before you. You step inside, surprised to see you are one of 12 invitees. The door shuts then locks loudly behind you.
The butler speaks,
"I’m Sure You’re All Wondering Why I’ve Gathered You Here This Evening.
While I’m sure we are all still mourning the deceased’s passing, there is some good news!
You are entitled to the deed to this very mansion along with the private island it rests upon and of course, the vast fortune that goes along with it.
That entitlement, however, is conditional upon your being the sole surviving guest in this mansion at dawn.
The house is filled with secret passageways, traps, weapons, and 11 other people that stand to gain from your death.
Good luck!"
What is "I'm Sure..."?
I’m Sure You’re All Wondering Why I’ve Gathered You Here This Evening is a Tabletop Roleplaying game for 2-6 players in which you will assume the role of one of 12 guests invited to The Deceased’s insidious game. The game usually lasts 2-3 hours.
Using a standard deck of playing cards, you’ll build the mansion, flesh out the remaining guests, and find out a bit about yourself.
The Butler
One player will take on the role of The Butler to be the Player Guests' guide to the mansion.
The book also includes rules to play without a Butler if your group all wants in on the action!
Secret Cards
Each player receives a secret card to help fill in some details about their character. The number of the card tells you how close you are to The Deceased while the suit gives you access to special actions during the evening
The Passage of Time
Quickly now! At Dawn, the game is over. If there is more than one guest alive in the mansion at 7am, The Deceased’s game is null and void. BUT if only one remains, they will inherit vast riches. Regardless of the game's outcome, players will craft epilogues for all the characters. If you completed your secret card's goal, you may even influence some of your fellow players' outcomes!
Deceased playbooks.
The book includes 9 pre-made Deceased playbooks to add variety to your games. Guest authors for these playbooks include:
- Nathan Blades (The Queer Cyberpunk's Guide to Tabletop RPGs)
- Victoria Rogers (The Broadswords)
- Alan Gerding (Tuesday Knight Games)
- Riley Hopkins (Linksmith Games)
- Greg Leatherman (Glitter Hearts)
- Lee Terrill (Very Random Encounters)
- Matt Baume (Queens of Adventure)
- Oscar "Ozz" Ruso (Shadowcasters Network)
Media coverage
Tuesday Knight Playcast
Gameosity:
Jess’s Fave Five Kickstarters of the Week 2/12/21
Dicebreaker:
Murder your way to a mansion deed in this Cluedo-inspired tabletop RPG
Yes Indie'd:
Ultimate Teamup:
Actual Play
The creators
- Written by Logan Jenkins
- Illustrated by Jon Turner
Purchase
In order to download this tabletop rpg you must purchase it at or above the minimum price of $10 USD. You will get access to the following files:
Comments
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I'd like to play this virtually with my friends. What was the system you used for the playthrough that's linked here? I didn't see any reference to it. Are there more options for building this virtually? Thanks!
I used a standard deck of cards in Roll20
I discovered this game though a bundle and was immediately reminded of Kill Dr. Lucky, which my group used to play quite often a while ago. I knew I had to try it with my group.
I played it now twice and in both instances we took longer than the suggested time frame. Not sure if this is because English is our second language, but with explaining the rules and everything it might take longer. Especially if the group drafts out a deceased together.
I have a few suggestions when you want to play this. In the helpful charts file the sheet about the reactions is missing, it would be helpful to have it in there for the players as well.
For explaining the rules and the special abbilities I recommend for the butler to explain a bit of the specialities before the game even starts, so that players can have a look at the goals and even and odds before they have a secret card in hand. This might be something only for groups where English is a second language, but it helps a bit to understand actions that are a bit tricky.
Some things that were a bit unclear for us was in the investigate action if you could discover a secret passage to another room which would let you skip the normal movement. As a butler I voted for yes but we did not use it in the end.
The other thing that was a bit unclear was if you could manipulate an NPG to murder certain persons and if they count towards your goal. I voted again for yes, and chose these persons for victims of time passing and told how the NPG got rid of them.
I would like to hear how other groups used the manipulate action, because this was one we struggled a bit with to enact.
Overall I think my group would play it again as it was quite funny and we had some fun with the mansion of SuJean.
The online group I played with decided it is not something they would play again, but we had fun while playing it as well.
thank you very much for the suggestions! These clarifications are definitely things I’d want to include in a 2nd edition, if I ever make one. Your instincts as a Butler (to let the secret passage stand, and to let NPGs murder other NPGs via Manipulate) are how I’d rule it as well. The rules are all squishy since it’s an RPG, so the Butler should feel free to do whatever seems to work for the table. Thanks for playing!!
I'm not sure I understand how Clubs Odd "Murder someone who you have proof is directly related to The Deceased" is different from Diamonds Even "Murder someone who is very close to The Deceased (10,J, Q, or K)"?
very close could be a lover or friend. Directly related means blood relative.
thanks for the clarification!
If this game looks even the slightest bit interesting to you, pick it up - there's far more to it than meets the eye. It's not quite a board game, not quite a deduction game, not quite a storytelling RPG.. instead it's a crazy mix of all of those put together.
The rules are actually incredibly simple - everyone has the same list of basic actions, and no weapon is more powerful than any other. But the more you play, the more you see the deeper strategy behind everything. Your Secret card gives you special moves, yes, but it also influences your character's personality and relationship to others.. but it ALSO is something you want to keep hidden at first, because if someone else guesses your card, they get a bonus.
Which means that there's a Clue-like vibe to the game, where the cards that have been revealed provide a hint to what cards your opponents may be hiding..
And on top of EVERYTHING else is the superb roleplaying aspect, where you're encouraged to embrace the dark humor, bad puns, and the flamboyant, larger-than-life personalities of the genre.
OH, and did I mention that even after your character dies you influence the game as a ghost, wandering the mansion and spooking others.. and perhaps more?
AND the game even comes with suggestions on how to hack it into other settings, with multiple "Deceased playbooks" that describe different locations to kill and be killed in, some with special, interesting rules!
It's like the silliness and dark humor of the Clue movie with the secrets of Knifes Out meshed with the grandiosity of Vincent Price. It's absolutely amazing and I highly recommend it!
I've been eyeing this game for a while, with its use of playing cards to model the mansion where the characters are, and its mix between board game and role playing game... Indeed, there is probably not so much role-playing in this crazy party during which characters will kill each other, in order to be the last one to get the inheritance, by collecting as many objects as possible in order to happily murder the other guests and protect themselves from their assaults. It looks like a really fun game, probably easily playable with non-role players, and I'd like to take it out sometime!
Is there anywhere I can get a print copy of this game?
Yes! Shop.vre.show!
a friend introduced this game to me yesterday and served as our butler and we had an absolutely lovely time! there's a lot of opportunity for flavor with this game and it's fun and easy to really dive into it and expand the narrative together. sometimes it was easy to let the mild strategic components (especially in collection) get in the way of the fiction, but i'm not sure how i would fix that—it may just be a matter of having the group be more willing to "lose," as it were. this game was a delight either way though, definitely something i'll be playing again!