Life Behind Screens • 2018 rpg

Everyone plays a courtier with four stats:

Eligibility
Wit
Bitterness
Rank

Draw a card for each.

Name your character.

The goal is to gain and keep rank.

Every few years, a young noble debuts at court. One player draws a card (this is the noble's rank), and describes their name and achievements, and this year's festive contest (e.g. archery, poetry, feasting).

Successfully courting a noble gives a character +1 rank. Marrying them gives a player character their exact rank.

When the outcome of a character's action is disputed, or they are trying to court someone, their player draws a card. A result less than the appropriate attribute is a success. Rank decides ties.

Each character who wins/loses a contest gains/loses one point of the appropriate attribute.

At the end of each debut, all player player characters increase their Bitterness by 1 and decrease their Eligibility by 1. The declaration of the next debutante is done by the player on their left.