Nine Candles will run across Friday evening and Saturday daytime and evening. As the game takes place in the dark, we will be aiming to run late into the night on both evenings. We will confirm a full timetable closer to the event, but we expect things to officially finish running between 1am and 2am on both evenings. You will not need to stay up this late on either evening, however if you are thinking of heading to sleep earlier than this on Saturday evening, please let the Ref team know so we can help co-ordinate an ending for your character at a time that is preferable for you.

To allow for everyone to get a good rest, given the late evenings, the game won't time-in on Saturday morning till late morning. We will ensure breakfast is available throughout the morning so people can take as much time as they need to rest, especially before travelling home on Sunday.

During time in, players will be free to wander the player area, a couple of cabins and (weather permitting) small outside area. Over the course of this game, you will be presented with a concern - a feeling your character has that they need to go and contemplate something.

Out of character, Concerns will act like mini linears, short scenes that two characters will interact with. You may learn information, have to face Them, or simply take time to talk and reflect on your situation.

When your character is presented with a Concern, they will need to find someone to join them on the concern, and two other players to watch over them. The concern will list any relevant OOC information about the scene (e.g. if it is indoors or outdoors).

The person who is joining you on your concern must burn either a vice or virtue to do so. How much this vice or virtue is relevant to how they roleplay the scene, and what burning it means for your character, are entirely decisions for you, and you are welcome to roleplay around this as much as you feel appropriate. This means you will only be able to assist another character two concerns across the game.

When you leave to go on a concern, you must take one of the remaining fully lit Nine Candles with you, as a guiding light, transporting you to where you need to go.

The two players who are watching over you will be acting as NPCs for the concern. A ref will take them away and brief them, then return and bring the two characters who are going on the concern to do the scene.

When the scene is over, the players will be taken back, and possibly given a short debrief, before all four players return to the player area. The candle will lose some of its power, and become dim.

When all the candles have dimmed, you will be led in a ritual to restore power to the candles, by speaking truths into the world.

All the players will gather, and you may choose to burn either your brink or your moment to speak a truth, and relight a dimmed candle. The final dimmed candle is special, and all players should join in the truth “And We Are Alive”, using it's dwindling power to grant you protection from Them for just a little longer. Unlike the others, this final candle will die, and be put out permenantly. This means each round there will be one less candle, and consequently there will be one less concern happening between each round of truths.

Once the final candle has been extinguished, the light is no longer protecting you, and They will get in, and the remaining characters will be killed. Then the game will end.

Over the course of the game, you will have the chance to define two Truths. As with your Vices and Virtues, you can decide how much your Moment or Brink plays into the Truth you speak into the world. The Truths are a chance for you, out of character, to decide how the game plays out. You can make the situation better for your characters, or worse. The only thing you cannot define is anything about Them.

Truths are spoken aloud, such that other players can hear them. It is up to you how much your character remembers of the truths that are spoken. Perhaps they see a distinct premonition about what is to come. Maybe the ritual is but a hazy memory. The truths are not things spoken by characters in-game.

Example truths:

• We will find out where that radio signal was coming from.
• There will be a chance to save those people we met last night.
• I will get a chance to send a message to my family.
• The scratch on my arm is infected.

This is a game about the end of the world. This is a game about how your character dies. You have complete freedom over when your character dies, as long as they die by the end of the game. You character may face perils throughout the game. It is entirely at your OOC discretion whether they make a lucky escape, or whether that's the thing that finally kills them. Similarly you may decide if you become injurred over the course of the game.

The GMs will provide you with plenty of opportunities to die throughout the game, particularly throughout Saturday evening, but the final choice will be yours. When you die, you will be able to join the refs, playing additional NPCs for the remainder of the game.

We encourage you to pick a narratively appropriate time to die, and ideally pace things out - we don't want everyone heroically sacrificing themselves at 9pm on Saturday and having to end the game several hours earlier!