S u c c u b u s : t h e R e b o r n & P a r t y P o k e r R P G © 2 0 1 3 M a k e B e l i e v e G a m e s , A l l R i g h t R e s e r v e d .

8-90 Players(for every 10

players you need a deck of

Succubus Cards)

30-120minutes

game play(or play overa weekend

as a side event)

Age 13+

A Game by MARK REiN•HAGEN

OvERviEwThis is a party game designed to turn a dull get-together into an exciting high-stakes game of social poker. This gamerequires a “Dealer” who is not a player and is familiar with the rules, which is you. The Dealer will read the rule script(text in purple) over the course of the game. The players are Vampires who are members of four great Syndics (teams)represented by the four card suits.

The basic rule that the players need know is that the game is played by convincing, or coercing, other players to trade cardswith them in order to get the best Poker hand. They need to work together as a team to succeed. Players may trick and lie,bribe and outwit the other players. Each card has hidden symbols, which are used in game play in a variety of ways.

There are three acts; at the end of each act will be a Captains table, where the leaders of each team play a hand ofpoker. The Captain is the player from each team with the highest card of their suit.

COMPONENTS

• 56 Succubus Cards – A deck of playing cards, each card inscribed with hidden symbols and each face card picturing a Vampire Character.

• Succubus Chips – Poker chips in four colors/suits • Rules Pamphlet – what you are reading now • Player Reference Poster – How to play• Poker Hand Poster – Ranking the poker hands• Character Sheets – 16 total, 4 pages

Act One – Trading.

Players trade cards with others players.

Act Two – Challenges.

Players can force other players into a challenge

by giving them a Chip. Players can still trade

with anyone.

Act Three – Team Play.

Players can Challenge anyone, but can

only trade cards with their own team.

This game requires a Dealer: YOUTo enthrall you must be a showman; enthusiastic, crafty and little bit impatient. You need one deck of Succubus playing cards for every ten players.

S u c c u b u s : t h e R e b o r n & P a r t y P o k e r R P G © 2 0 1 3 M a k e B e l i e v e G a m e s , A l l R i g h t R e s e r v e d .

• Prepare: Before the players arrive, organize your space:• Arrange the table you are going to use as the CaptainsTable, with five chairs.

• Find a bag or hat to hold the Succubus chips. • Set out the Succubus Chips in four piles on the CaptainsTable.

• Put up the Player Reference Poster in a prominent place. • Pick out some sort of fun or funny prize or trophy for

the winning Captain, and team, and place them on the table.

• ORGANizE: After all the players have arrived get every-one’s attention and announce to them: “welcome toSuccubus Party Poker RPG. in this game you will betrading these playing cards with each other inorder to get the best poker hand.”

“These Chips determine which team you are on.”Now give each player one of the Succubus Chips, dis-tribute them as evenly as possible between the colorsso each team is of nearly equal size. It is fun to haveeach player draw a chip out of a hat or bag. Rearrangeplayers and teams if necessary to get the right mix.

“Now organize yourselves into Teams.” Once theplayers have organized themselves based on theirChips, introduce each team: “in this corner we haveThe Beautiful: HEARTS. in this corner we have TheOutlaws: CLUBS. in this corner we have The Forlorn:SPADES. in this corner we have The Elite: DiAMONDS.”You can describe the character and theme of eachteam in more detail if you wish.

Point out the Player Reference and Poker Hand posters thatyou have put on the wall. Make it clear that you are theDealer not a player and are available to adjudicate the rules.

• DEAL: Now you deal out all the cards, 5 cards per player,keep the extras as “Dealer Cards”. Make sure you shuf-fle your deck(s) with all four Jokers included, you needone deck per ten players.

Next announce that: “For the next few minutes you willtrade cards with other players. You can bribe, trick andlie but you can’t steal. Try to get the highest card ofyour suit so you can join the prestigious Captain’sTable. You must always have five cards in your hand.Jokers are not wild, but if you manage to trade one toanother player, you can take a random card from their

• GAME PHASES •

hand instead of the one offered. LET’S RUMBLE!”

• ACT ONE: Now the first act begins, it should last no morethan a minute per player. In this act players can only tradecards with one another. There are no ironclad rules on howthey do this except both parties must be willing to trade,and each player must always have 5 cards. Trade cards canbe face up or face down, and players can try to slip in an-other card than the one that they promised. Once bothplayers have their new card in hand then the trade is final.

You may need to go around and gently encourageplayers to interact with one another. You should makeperiodic announcements such as, “Only 3 minutesleft!” heighten the trading frenzy.

Your job is to keep things moving along. Once thingsseem to be slowing down, even a bit, announce theCaptains Table: “Time for Captains Table – the playerwith the highest card in your suit is your Captain. ifthere is a tie, the best poker hand wins.” If no oneon a team has any cards from their own suit, tell themthan none of them can go to the Captains table.”

“Captains, please sit down. Let’s play some Poker.”Now evenly distribute 1-3 Succubus Chips to eachCaptain, if you have the chips, give each of them 3. “These Chips are yours, place one in the middle ofthe table as the Ante. You can bet with your chipsor ones you beg or borrow from other players.”

“Captains please pick two cards from your hand toreveal, and slide them forward.” Once all the playershave done so, say, “Okay let’s see them. if you don’twant to fold, you need to throw in another chip.”Have the player with the best go first, then go clockwisearound the table. “Now reveal two more cards, andagain if you don’t want to fold you need to again bida chip.” After they have all done so, say, “Now revealyour final card.” The Captain with the best hand (whodid not fold) is the winner. In the event of a tie, the Cap-tains stand up, and another member of each tied teamsits down, and the new Captains compare their hands.

“Congratulations to the winner. Now everyone canspend chips to trade cards with me. Everyone hasa max of five cards.” For the rest of the game playerscan give you a Chip and one of their cards and get arandom card from your Dealer hand.

S u c c u b u s : t h e R e b o r n & P a r t y P o k e r R P G © 2 0 1 3 M a k e B e l i e v e G a m e s , A l l R i g h t R e s e r v e d .

If you have enough chips left, give each player one oreven two extra.

• ACT TwO: Once you finish the first Captain’s Table youmove on to the Second Act, announce: “The SecondAct adds in Challenges, which are forced trades. Youcan Challenge any player at any time but you mustgive them a Chip. Both players choose a card to putat risk. You play ROCK, PAPER, SCiSSORS, BOMB

using the symbols on those two cards. The winnergets to decide whether or not to trade or not. Bombbeats Rock and paper. Scissors beats Bomb. Highcard breaks ties. You can still trade cards like you didin Act One.” A player can attempt to beg or bribe some-one not to challenge them, but once a player has beenoffered a chip the challenge must be taken.

“if both players play bomb they have to immediatelyshuffle their hands together and draw a random handof 5 cards. if you win a challenge using a Joker Cardyou may pick a random card from the other playershand rather than the card they put at risk. if you needa chip come challenge me!” Now give the playersaround 1-2 minutes per player to do challenges. You willbe very busy explaining rules, adjudicating challengesand trading dealer cards and doing dealer challenges.

If a player has no chips let them Challenge you, if theywin, they get a chip, if you lose you trade cards. “Time for the second Captain’s table! Captainsplease sit down.” – REPEAT CAPTAiNS TABLE. Inthe unlikely event you don’t have 4 Succubus Chipsforce players with 3 or more chips to spend them to tradecards with you, or give to a teammate to do the same.

• ACT THREE: Once the Captains table is over announce:“Now, we have the final Act you can challenge anyone,but may trade cards only with your teammates.But hurry, this is the shortest Act. Then we willhave the final Captains table, where the Captainwith the best Poker hand wins the game for histeam.” Give the players no more than 3 – 5 minutes, tocomplete this last act – make sure it’s a mad dash tovictory.

Now you organize the Final Captain’s table, “Captainsplease sit down.” each Captain simply presents theirhand one by one. The Captain with the best handwins, if it’s a tie the Captains stand up and anotherplayer from each tied team chosen by the Captain sitsdown, becomes a new Captain and compares hands.Give some sort of booty prize or trophy to the winningCaptain, and give all the members of the winningCaptain’s Syndic a treat such as candy or a shot. Takea photo and then take your trophy back, unless youselected a trophy that you are comfortable withletting them keep.

• CHALLENGE: Play Rock, Paper, Scissors, Bomb using the cardyou are putting at risk, the other player will do the same. Scissorsbeat Bomb, Bomb beats everything else. If there is a tie, highcard wins, if it is still a tie the challenge is a draw and over. • THE BiG BANG: If both players play BOMB, then they mustshuffle their two hands together and deal them back out toeach other randomly back.• DEALER CHALLENGE: If a player has no chips they canChallenge the dealer. If they win, the Dealer will give them achip, if they lose, they must trade the risk cards. • DEALER TRADE: If you want a random card from the Dealer,you must give them a card and pay them a Chip. Dealerquickly shuffles their card and trades the player one. • JOKER TRADE: If you manage to trade a Joker with anotherplayer (by switching out cards at the last minute) or you playa Joker in a Challenge and win, then you may choose to picka card at random from their hand rather than accepting thecard that they traded or risked.

• CORE RULES •

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SPADEFLASH

S u c c u b u s : t h e R e b o r n & P a r t y P o k e r R P G © 2 0 1 3 M a k e B e l i e v e G a m e s , A l l R i g h t R e s e r v e d .

• CHARACTER SHEET: Give each player one of the 16 CharacterSheets. This tells them their Team power as their Character power. Thiswill add a new dimension to your game, but is betterreserved for experienced players. • FiNDiNG YOURSELF: If a player acquires the cardpictured on the front of their Character Sheet, they candemand the other player use a card of their own suit, ifthat player has it, in the Challenge. In order to use thispower they must reveal this card and their Character Sheet. • QUESTS: Tear a photo or picture from a magazine intofour pieces. At the end of a Captain’s table show theplayers one of the four pieces, and explain that the firstplayer to collect the other 3 pieces and bring them to yougets to examine 5 Dealer cards and can pick and trade forany one of them. Tell them all of the pieces are fully visible,they don’t have to move anything. • FLASH CARD: Players must display the highest card they have oftheir teams suit when asked.

• SHADOw SYMBOLS: If a player can make a shadow circle (they have4 Shadow symbols of the same type) they can “mug the dealer”... and

examine 5 Dealers cards and pick and trade for any oneof them. They must give the Dealer one of their ShadowCircle cards in return. • BEGGARS CHALLENGE: If players are hoarding chips(for instance one team has more than 8 chips) or you, asthe Dealer, has no chips, institute the beggars challenge.Players can force a challenge with another player whohas 3 or more chips. If they win they get a chip, if the otherplayer wins they can take any card from the challengershand. • SOCiAL CHALLENGE: You may wish to allow playersto engage in short social challenges that they both agreetoo, such as a duel of wits, riddles, jokes, puns, acting,

bravado, or bets. Generally, a neutral player is appointed the judge anddecides the winner. Winner gets to pick a random card from the otherplayers hand and decide whether or not to trade for that card.

• ADvANCED RULES •

R• LivE ACTiON RPG •While Poker Party is not what you would call a “serious Live Ac-tion” roleplaying game, it would not require much in order to useit in a LARP. Dealers can make use of these cards in a Live Actionsetting adding depth and complexity to a scenario. They can addfurther spice things up by writing plot points on various cards,“Secret Letter” or “Blood of an ancient” and tell various playersthat it is vital for them to locate and obtain that particular card.These cards can also be used as a recruiting technique, you invitepeople over for a casual party game and if they enjoy it you caninvite them to create a full Vampire character for a Mind’s EyeTheatre LARP game (a series of games also created by this designer).Find out more at: www.white-wolf.com

This is the kind of game that will inevitably inspire a numberof variants. we encourage players and dealers to be creativeand invent and experiment with their own rules. Also you cancreate whole new card games that can be played with theseunique playing cards. You can post your ideas on our website:Makebelievegames.com

God kills without restraint or regret, and so do we.When I leave this endless night and blighted earth Then at last shall I know the same bloody kiss granted you now, I love all of it, I love nothing.

R• SUiTS OF THE SUCCUBi •

DiAMONDS – Marquisi – The Elite – Diamondsrepresent the Marquisi, the Paramount ones.

HEARTS – Copeadora – The Beautiful – Hearts arethe symbol of the Copeadora, the arrogant ones.

CLUBS – Bas-Bazouk – The Outlaws – Clubs areemblematic of the Bas-Bazouk, the savage ones.

SPADES – Profugos – The Forlorn – Spades arethe sigil of the Profugos, the forgotten ones.

TEAM POwERS: Give each player one of the 16 Character Sheets.This tells them their Team power as their Character power. This willadd a new dimension to your game, but is better reserved forexperienced players.

• THE OUTLAwS – BOMB – The Bas-Bazok win all ties between twoBombs, no need to shuffle unless one or both of you played a face card.

• THE ELiTE – PAPER – The Marquisi win all ties between two Paper. • THE FORLORN – ROCK – The Profugos win all ties between two Rocks.• THE BEAUTiFUL – SCiSSORS – The Copeadora win all ties between

two Scissors

CHARACTER POwERS: To use a Character power a player must pos-sess a card from their own Suit, and need to give the target one of theirTeam Chips (a Chip in the Teams color).

• PSYCHO – If you do a Challenge using one your Team’s Chips youboth must play with a random card picked sight unseen by youropponent.

• MASTERMiND – If you give one of your Team’s Chip to a player theymust show you all five of their cards. “Here is a chip, show me yourcards.”

• ANCiENT – Give one of your Team’s Chip to a player who has justwon a Challenge against you in order to replay it, you both must usea different card.

• BODYGUARD – After another player has been Challenge, you givethe challenger one of your Team’s Chip and step-in and do theChallenge for defender.