Grand Guignol 2E

Description

Grand Guignol gives us crooked alleys and foggy squares, charged touches and words left unsaid, lavish parties and faceless crowds, bloody hands and dangerous smiles, and always the darkness without and within asking ‘What lurks in the secret corners of your heart?’. In Grand Guignol we play as citizens of London in all its sprawling late-Victorian glory. Crowds pour in from the countryside as the Industrial Revolution shreds their livelihoods, while the factories bring nature and time themselves under imperial control. Predators consort with the powerful and prey upon the poor, while ancient powers stir and fell voices whisper temptation from the shadows. Amongst it all we monsters and queers hold each other close, slay our demons, and live our lives. We flirt and feud, tremble and embrace, and hurt and heal one another as we cling together in the margins of this hostile world. Our lives are shadow and mist—beautiful and ephemeral, impossible to tame. What secret histories might we write in dark streets where the gaslights don’t reach, in those corners of our tender hearts that neither God nor science has caged? Grand Guignol is a game for 3-5 players that can be played for 1 session or for 12. It uses the Belonging Outside Belonging system, invented by Avery Alder and Benjamin Rosenbaum for their paired games Dream Askew & Dream Apart. This system is a diceless, GMless engine. Characters take flawed or vulnerable action that highlights their struggle with society's inhibiting expectations, and are rewarded with tokens that fuel transformative, transgressive action where the characters embrace compassion, courage, defiance, or insight. They also gain tokens by playing into other character's lures, thematic interactions that centre each archetype's strengths and troubles. Players also control setting elements, portraying grand forces of London (capitalism, modernity, monstrosity, the massed population) that push and pull on the character's lives and choosing when to bring them forward and how they act upon the story. In Grand Guignol, each player chooses a Gothic archetype to play, such as the haunted Gate, the scandalous Patron, or the maverick Scholar. Together you'll discover your own vision of London—revealing its hidden queer enclaves, uncovering the dark forces that loom over it, exploring the troubled lives of its citizens, and chronicling the occasions that may bring your characters together or drive them apart. What secret histories will you write on dark streets where the gaslights don't reach, in those corners of your tender hearts that neither God nor science has caged? If you want a physical copy of Grand Guignol, you can buy one over on Warehouse23 here. Grand Guignol was featured on Tabletop Book Club. Luke was interviewed about Grand Guignol (and its sister game, Harvest, and Belonging Outside Belonging design) on the Yes Indie'd podcast. Luke was interviewed about Grand Guignol (and Harvest, and the history of Australian convention roleplaying) by Craig Shipman of the Third Floor Wars podcast. The defining choices this game will ask you to make offer answers that express the cruelty of London. They reflect poverty, injustice, violence, judgement, manipulation, and vilification, and do not shy away from the failings of institutions like the church, the law, the scientific and medical establishments, the workplace, and the family. Neither do they shy away from discussion of sex work, blasphemy, romantic and sexual intimacy, intoxicating substances, homelessness, and mortality and terminal illness. You need not always—or indeed, ever—choose these answers, but if their presence on the page will distress you or you find no interest in any of them then Grand Guignol may not be the game for you.

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