The Game Moves
This story was made using the solo RPG Caveat Emptor, by Exeunt Press. The following is a list of the card draws and rolls taken during play that resulted in the transcribed narrative:
| Customer Card | Item Card | Curse type | Sold? |
|---|---|---|---|
| 3 Diamonds | K | I | No |
| Q Hearts | 6 | II | Yes |
| A Diamonds | 3 | III | No |
| K Hearts | Q | I | Yes |
| A Heats | J | III | No |
| >>Close<< | |||
| J Diamonds | A | I | Yes |
| 10 Diamonds | 8 | II | No |
| 7 Diamonds | 2 | III | Yes |
| 5 Diamonds | 10 | I | Yes |
| J Hearts | 7 | II | Yes |
| >>Failure<< |
Final Thoughts
A relatively simple game, Caveat Emptor has a lovely aesthetic and game-play hook. Playing the devil who twists mortal’s wishes and desires with cursed trinkets is a staple of old tales and legends. Simple doesn’t mean easy, however, and rolling a 5+ on 3d6 happened less often than on a 2d6 for this game. A statistical outlier, sure, but it made for an interesting dynamic. I felt the same confusion Ohog did when what should have been an easier sell turned out poorly, and a tricky roll turned out well.
One thing that kept happening was when I drew a character card followed by three item cards that I couldn’t find any connection to. A perfect example is my last draw: Albrecht Bluome wishes to explore distant lands, and I drew the Book of Alchemy, a Journal that captures and enhances thoughts, and a Silver Mirror that showed the true nature of anyone reflected in it. How could I sell any of these items to Albrecht? What did any of them have to do with travel or foreign lands?
Certainly, someone could sell elixirs to fund their traveling, but they could do that with anything. The ideal with a cursed item is making it be an item they’ll want to use in spite of its cursed nature. Someone who desired travel might willingly trade years of their life to keep using a magic teleporting map, or sacrifice a cherished memory to be able to speak a new language they hear.
That was really what became the impetus for the ending. Because I had failed four sales already, there was no way I could succeed; there weren’t enough customers left in the deck, so I/Ohog gave up. As I realized I wasn’t going to make it, Ohog realized there was no reason to keep playing the game. They closed their shop and took Day 3 off to do whatever they wanted to do.
Of course, I could have written out the successful sales, and given Albrecht a journal that translated languages by printing their thoughts, but poorly, like a clumsy google-translate; or detailed the elixirs that would allow him to speak languages, travel through the air, or make him appear native, all while bankrupting him and forcing him to be a pauper wherever he traveled; but once Ohog had given up, the theme was clear. If you know you aren’t going to win, you’re free to quit. You don’t have to play.
So, naturally, this became a story about capitalism, patriarchy, and the oppression of common mortal and devil alike. Ideology, like life, finds a way.