The Premise

Summon the city of the Tattered King, one tile at a time! Use your cultists to control leylines, conduct rituals and influence the districts of Carcosa itself. If they displease you, you can sacrifice them to the dark waters of Lake Hali for the pleasure of the King.

Gameplay

Each player leads a Lovecraftian Cult. They take turns, their Prophet selects a tile representing a part of Carcosa and adds it to a ethereal landscape of ritual sites, leylines, towers and domes. Players can then deploy Cultists to control a leyline, conduct a ritual or influence the districts they have summoned.

But Carcosa is no normal city! Tiles must be stabilised with power drawn from leylines or they may be reshaped by other cults! New cultists may be recruited by performing the Forbidden Play at theatres you reveal! Watch as your cultists are driven mad by the power they desire! Imbue ritual stones, then expend them on game-changing spells! Sacrifice your Cultists to the horrific Avatars of the King!

The game ends when a Cult completes the Summoning of the King Himself or when enough of Carcosa has been summoned that it becomes a permanent feature of our Earth. Only one Cult can succeed in these insane tasks - but in Lovecraft’s mythos, can one truly call that winning?

Contents

Every copy of Carcosa includes the basic game and all the stretch goals achieved during the kickstarter - there is no difference between the retail and kickstarter editions.

This means that everyone buying Carcosa will get the full experience including two mini-expansions, five art cards, four unique chapter house cards, four custom prophet meeples, a box liner, solo rules and multilingual reference cards!

Rules

Full rules are included in the box for Carcosa, the mini-expansions Carcosa: The Stranger and Carcosa: The Thugs and the solo rules: Carcosa: The Investigators but if you need an electronic version for any reason, you can get them here:

English:

• Carcosa - Rules
• Carcosa - The Investigators (Expanded and Printer Friendly)
• Carcosa - The Conclave (Co-op rules / Printer Friendly)

Deutsche:

• Carcosa - Spielregeln (ink. Solo)

Design Diaries

In the following pages the designer discusses some of the key highlights that will make your visit to Carcosa a thing to remember!

• On the Recruitment of Cultists
  In which we discuss secondary goals that add richness to strategic games.
• On the Performance of Rituals
  In which we discuss building exciting moments without cheap tricks.
• On the Consequences of Wisdom
  In which we discuss building empathy with tiny wooden people.
• On the Realisation of Goals
  In which we discuss building texture and variety into victory conditions.