The Amber Tapestry. A low social footprint RPG. Requirements: One sheet of paper - containing the tapestry. A bunch of little cards to write notes on. A pen. For ease of play and to spark ideas, a bunch of cards could be created ahead of time. Note that just by changing the stats a bit you can easily recreate these rules for a different genre. Setting. Anything you like. I'm presuming for this example is a kind of mix between Amber and Exalted. The only important thing is that the PCs are bigger than life, not usually in agreement, but rarely actually killing each other. There should also be a big air of myth about things - you're retelling old legends, with all of the inconsistencies they hold. Setup. The sheet of paper may be retained between sessions - if you don't have it, start a new on. If you have more than one, just treat them as a larger single tapestry. One player is nominated as the holder of the tapestry. Abbreviated as "GM". The other players choose, or create, their characters. Players have ten points to spread between their attributes: "Ass kicking kung fu" (Physical) "Silver tongue of the Thief" (Social) "Arcane might of the Sorceror" (Mental) "A hero's Injdominable Will" (Endurance) (It would be nice to auction the attributes, but this takes too long to bother with) These correspond to fighting, doing magic, doing talking and keeping going even when you get your ass kicked, your magic smote or your deciet uncovered. The Opening. The game opens with the ritualistic exchange: GM: "What tale is told at this time?" Each player in turn then answers in the form: Player: "The tale of [Character name] and [item, character or event]" Each player gets a notecard with that [item, character or event] written on it - worth one point. (This will be explained later in the rules.) If you're continuing a game then some of the things may be things already existing in the tapestry. Since these cards are known, and are special, they should be held face up in front of you. Other cards are kept hidden. The GM then adds these things to the tapestry, connects them together in some way that seems pleasing to him, thinks up a name for the session and announces it. GM: "Ah yes, it is the time of the [whatever] and the heroes" The GM then takes the first turn, and the game is on. Turns. As your action, you may do one of three things: 1. Add a new thing to the tapestry. As a complete non-sequitare you name the thing, describe it, and if anyone asks why you speak of this thing (and they should) you simply smile and say that "it will become clear". Take a card for the thing. Indicate any other player to take the next turn, who may choose whether to follow this new thing, or the old thread, as they prefer. 2. Connect something already in the web into the current action. Draw a line, explain why it is involved, and take the card for that thing. Whoever held that card previously now takes a turn. If that thing was the last of the things named at the beginning of the game, or it's getting late, then this is the very last turn. 3. Describe what your character (or if the GM, what the universe at large or the evil guy or whatever) DID in that situation. If you're opposing someone this will initiate a challenge - and if so, you should indicate CLEARLY who is to take it on, since it becomes their turn. If you're just doing things to the scenery or NPCs then contol passes to the GM, who shouldn't usually treat it as a challenge (though they may) If unopposed, take a card for this new event added to the thread. Otherwise see 'challnges' below. 4. Notice a seeming contradiction in the tapestry (how could he die there, when he was trapped in this castle?) - this works like challenges below, except you are throwing it open to anyone who wishes to try and answer you - and you will get the card for their answer. (Although they will get control.) 5. Remove a card from play. Simply explain to the player who you think has that card in what manner it is countered (by its destruction, theft, or just because now that it has been revealed it is of no further use) and remove it. The owning player ditches it, and takes control. If you had the wrong player, however, a new event (along th lines of "how did he get ahold of it?") is added to the tapestry, for someone to later link in. For dramatic reasons, you can't remove the starting cards this way. When it's NOT your action, you can interrupt to point out a logical inconsitency, or a contradiction that has been introduced. ("But wasn't the Black Sparrow dead?" "Why did he not use the sword of tears?") The player you've interrupted can respond in one of three ways: a. "That is a story for another time." They then hand the interrupting player one of their cards (it doesn't have to be anything to do with the current action, nor should they show it to the other players) The interruption is denied and they keep control. b. "You tell it, then." The interrupting player gets control, and has to explain the inconsistency they have highlighted - however implausibly. If their explanation is found plausible by the players as a whole then they are given a new card for this connection and it is their turn. Otherwise they must give a card to the GM and the interrupted player resumes. c. They may attempt to explain it themselves, as above. If their explanation is not accepted then the interrupting player gets control. Challenges / Contests. A contest is resolved quite simply. Each player may, at any time, pledge support on either side of the argument, adding in their rank in the obviously connected statistic. They should describe doing so as well as they can. The GM (or, more likely, popular acclaim) should give 1-3 bonus points for particularly good dscriptions. (As per Exalted stunting) Each player with a card connected to the action (or which they can hastily explain as being so) can reveal it for a bonus point. (This explanation can be interrupted as normal...) If the sides are tied, then both lose a point from their endurance. Losing all your endurance retires your character from the session, though the player can continue playing. A challenge always adds a new event to the web (linking the things that it was about.) The winner of the contest gets the card for the event. The last turn. The last turn must initiate a challenge - one which is the culmination of the story. The challenge is susceptable to player veto - if it is not generally approved as being climactic enough then the players may elect to continue for a few more turns, or to move directly to another challenge which is hailed as superior. If all else fails "And then the dak lord revealed himself and commenced the slaughter" is a good standby. This challenge may not be interrupted in the usual way. Instead, interruptions of inconsistency are upheld by a simple majority player vote with GM veto. Cards interrupted in this way should be removed, rather than given to the interrupter. Players should attempt to use up all of their cards in this final conflict - since they will not be retaining them for the next game - and thus much of the manuevering of the game should be (if the players are, for some reason, attempting to be tactical rather than just naming conflicts that seem ironic or funny) attempting to set up the tapestry so that all the events items and characters lead to this final conflict. In other words, the players build their own climax. The GM has a card for every item on the web that no-one else has claimed. (For the first ever game, this will obviously be no cards) Each player may use any desired statistic in the conflict, though they have to say how it applies. Players may oppose each other, or team up. The winner of the conflict gets to narrate the conclusion (or, if they prefer, state the facts and have some more loquacious person do it) and should set up a classical ending that ties in the chosen starting elements. Ending with "And that was how [thing] [thing] ... and [thing] [chosen ending]." The game is over. Congratulate each other on particularly inspired performances and roll up the tapestry. There we go. Fairly gamist - it's a balanced-sum game, which makes it easy to win if everyone co-operates. But why would they do that? And they sure won't trust th winner next time... Zero prep. Some retained state between games (the tapestry, and shared memory of what is 'reasonable') without any power creep or penalisation of new players. "Why wasn't he present?" can itself be an event in the game. No randomness - though it's easy to add if you really like it. Too much complexity - but most of it you can just ignore in the heat of the moment and wing the challenges. What's it lacking? I'll write up an example later. TODO: Sort out the rules, I think there's too many. TODO: And then playtest it and write down the results! First thing - the stats. That came straight out of fight-of-dragons and, really, there's no good reason for it. Strip that out. The basic intersting mechanic is the linking of old-things to new-things.