When a table sets down the dice, it loses the old gift they gave — a way to learn what no one thought to ask. Council hands that gift back, and asks no dice in return.
Every answer in Council comes one of two ways: seized at a price, or given as grace. Behind every real obstacle wait three sealed clues, so no crew is ever truly stuck. The whole game is built to reward hope — it can wound you and grieve you, but it breaks only the one who has stopped hoping. Below is the entire Handbook. Read it in order, or steer by the contents.
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READ THIS FIRST · FIVE MINUTES
How to Play
The crew's quickstart. Everything a player needs to sit down and play — the loop, the two roads, the promise that you cannot be stuck. If you read one thing before the table sits, read this.
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THE WHOLE GAME, AT A GLANCE
If you have three minutes and not fifteen, this is Council entire:
STATION ONE
The Scene
You play. A need arises the table cannot just wish true.
TWO ROADS
The Answer
It comes now at a price, or in time as a Work the Tide carries.
STATION THREE
The Turn
What returns walks into the next Scene, changed.
↺ scene — answer — scene: that wheel is the whole machine ↺
By Price
What you pay for and may demand. It costs the self — a truth, a trouble, a scene — and is always true. The dearest altar of price is the Water: Landis, real only in water. A rare road, walked least.
By Grace
What you are given, freely, when you are stuck and the story loves you. Cannot be bought, banked, or demanded — untracked, quiet, and bound by one law only: mercy. A crew truly aground always receives it.
YOU CANNOT BE TRULY STUCK — THE SEALS
Behind any obstacle worth being stuck on, the keeper writes three clues before play and seals them, face-down and visible, in order. Both price and grace reach for these — only the manner of the coming changes.
THE FIRST
The Nudge
A word or image. A turned head, no more.
THE SECOND
The Bearing
What to do — never why. A heading to steer by.
THE THIRD
The Answer
Plain as porridge. The card no one should need.
Despair is the only door that locks from the inside.
THE FIXED VOCABULARY
These words mean the same at every Council table. A keeper may re-rig the world above, but not rename the timbers below.
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COUNCIL · THE HANDBOOKFUCKINPHILOSOPHERS.COM