Mysterium (Portuguese)

Description

In the 1920s, Mr. MacDowell, a gifted astrologer, immediately detected a supernatural being upon entering his new home in Scotland. He gathered together eminent mediums of his time for an extraordinary séance, and they had seven hours to establish contact with the ghost and investigate any clues it might provide to unravel an ancient mystery.

Unable to speak, the amnesiac ghost communicates with the mediums through visions, which are represented in the game by illustrated cards. The mediums must decipher the images to help the ghost remember how he was murdered: Who committed the crime? Where did it happen? What weapon caused the death? The more the mediums cooperate and guess correctly, the easier it will be to catch the right culprit.

In Mysterium, a reworking of the game system present in Tajemnicze Domostwo, one player assumes the role of a ghost while all the others represent a medium. To solve the crime, the ghost must first summon (with the help of the mediums) all the suspects present on the night of the murder. Several cards for the suspect, location, and murder weapon are placed on the table, and the ghost randomly assigns one of each of them in secret to a medium.

Each hour (i.e. game turn), the ghost hands one or more face-up vision cards to each medium, bringing their hand up to seven each time they share vision cards. These vision cards present dreamlike images to the mediums, and each medium must first deduce which suspect matches the vision cards they received. After the ghost hands the cards to the final medium, a two-minute countdown begins. After a medium places their token on a suspect, they may also place clairvoyance tokens on the guesses made by other mediums to show whether they agree or disagree with those guesses.

After the timer runs out, the ghost tells each psychic whether or not their guesses were correct. The psychics who guessed correctly go on to guess the crime scene (and then the murder weapon), while the psychics who didn't guess correctly keep their vision cards and receive new ones the following hour, corresponding to the same suspect. Once the psychic has guessed the suspect, the scene, and the weapon correctly, they move their token to the epilogue board and receive one clairvoyance point for each hour remaining on the clock. They can also use their remaining clairvoyance tokens to score additional points.

If one or more mediums fail to identify the suspect, the correct location, and the correct weapon before the end of the seventh hour, the ghost has failed and dissipates, leaving the mystery unsolved. If, however, all succeed, then the ghost has recovered enough memory to identify the culprit.

The mediums then group their suspect, location, and weapon cards on the table and place a number next to each group. The ghost then selects a group, places the corresponding culprit number face down on the epilogue board, chooses three vision cards—one for the suspect, one for the location, and one for the weapon—and shuffles these cards. Players who have achieved low clairvoyance points turn over a vision card at random and then vote secretly on which suspect they think is guilty; players with the most points turn over a second vision card and vote; then those with the most points turn over the final card and vote.

If the majority of psychics have identified the correct suspect, with ties being broken by the vote of the most clairvoyant psychic, then the killer has been identified and the ghost can now rest in peace. If not, well, perhaps you can try again...