Believers

WINNING

In the beginning, you will be given a Faith card. This will decide the contents of your heart — whether you are a True Believer or a Defector. True Believers earn tokens when there are a majority of successes in the Mission row, and Defectors earn tokens when there are a majority of failures in a row. Should the True Believers accrue more tokens, our glorious collection of like-minded people will prosper! Should the Defectors accrue more, there will likely be a tell-all docuseries about us.

SETUP

1) Separate the components and make sure you use this breakdown of Faith cards depending on how many people are playing:

5 players = 3 TRUE BELIEVERS, 2 DEFECTORS
6 players = 4 TRUE BELIEVERS, 2 DEFECTORS
7 players = 4 TRUE BELIEVERS, 3 DEFECTORS
8 players = 5 TRUE BELIEVERS, 3 DEFECTORS
9 players = 6 TRUE BELIEVERS, 3 DEFECTORS
10 players = 6 TRUE BELIEVERS, 4 DEFECTORS

2) Place Mission cards face down in the formation of a pyramid. 4 cards on row one, then 3 above it, 2 above that, and 1 at the peak.

3) Deal out 4 Virtue cards face down to each player.

4) Deal out the 1 Faith card face down to each player. IMPORTANT: Look at these secretly.

5) Deal out 1 Shame card face down to each player.

6) Separate all the Disciple cards that list their costs as 1. Shuffle. Deal out 1 of these to each player, face up. Then, shuffle the rest of the Disciples together and make 3 piles of Disciple cards, face up and visible to everyone.

7) Draw 3 Crisis of Faith cards and place them face up in a location accessible to everyone. IMPORTANT: make sure that all players can reach all 3 Crisis of Faith cards.

8) Finally, separate unique Virtues equal to the number of players and deal them out to each player — make sure one of them is “DEVOTION”. Whoever has Devotion is the first to be the Eye — give them the Tablet of the Eye and shuffle these Virtues back into the deck.

COMMENCE WITH
SILENT MEDITATION

All players bow your heads and shut your eyes. Deep breath in. Count to ten in your head as the Defectors secretly look up and know each other. All Defectors place your heads back down, deep breath out. All rise.

PLAYING THE GAME

All players bow your heads and shut your eyes. Deep breath in. Count to ten in your head as the Defectors secretly look up and know each other. All Defectors place your heads back down, deep breath out. All rise.

ROUNDS

A round is broken into two parts.

PART I: Call for Disciples
Everyone will get an opportunity to enlist (play) 1 Disciple if they wish, starting with the Eye. After the Eye enlists or passes, the opportunity moves to the player to their left and so on until everyone has had the chance to enlist.

This is also a time when you can play Shame cards. You play a Shame card by placing it face-up in another player’s area. If a player accumulates 3 Shame cards, they cannot be the Hand for the entirety of that row. Shame cards are returned and reset at the end of each row.

PART II: Going on the Mission
Whoever is the Eye must choose the Hand. They do this by handing the Tablet of the Eye and the Triform of the Hand to whomever they choose (as long as it’s not someone who was the Hand last round).

Then, the Eye may flip over the next Mission card. A mission card will say which Virtues it requires to be a success. Only 1 of those Virtues placed on top is needed for the mission to be successful.

The Hand now places 2 Virtue cards from the ones they have face down into the tablet and hands it back to the Eye.

The Eye keeps 1 of the Virtue cards for themself and the other they place face up on the Mission card.

If the mission is successful (meaning that Virtue satisfies 1 of the 2 requirements on that Mission card), the Virtue will be placed with the blue corner facing upward. If it was a failure (meaning the Virtue card does NOT match either of the 2 Virtues listed on the Mission card) then the red corner will be facing upward.

The Hand keeps the Triform of the Hand as a reminder to the group — indicating they cannot be chosen for a Mission next round.

Rounds continue like this, with the role of the Eye being passed to the next player, until the end of a row of Mission cards.

IMPORTANT: Begin the game at the bottom of the pyramid (the one with the most Mission cards) and move through the missions starting on the left side and moving to the right.

FAILING A MISSION

A failed mission means both the Eye and the Hand draw 1 additional Virtue
card from the deck.
If the entire row fails, ALL players draw 1 additional Virtue card.

END OF THE ROW:
EARNING TOKENS

Once you complete all the Missions in a given row of the pyramid, tally the amount of successes and failures. If the row has a majority of successes, mark it as a win for the cult (place a token blue-side up at the end of the row). Do the same with the opposite side of the token if the majority of Missions are failures.

If the row is a tie, deal one more Mission card and continue.If the row is ALL successes or ALL failures, mark the row with 2 tokens.

IMPORTANT: The final Mission card at the very top of the pyramid is worth 2 tokens.

END OF THE ROW:
CRISIS OF FAITH

Before starting the next row, all players bow their heads and close their eyes. The Defectors secretly open their eyes and select one Crisis of Faith card to place in front of another player. After doing so, one of them knocks 3 times in the center of the table. Upon hearing this, the group must count out loud backwards from 3 and then everyone opens their eyes.

Once all players have opened their eyes, whoever received the Crisis of Faith card must comply with whatever the card says.

BEGINNING OF THE ROW:
INDOCTRINATION

At the beginning of each row (except the first), starting with the player who will be the Eye and moving clockwise, players may select Disciples they wish to indoctrinate from the pool. You do this by discarding the number of Virtues written on the Disciple card and placing that Disciple face up in front of you. Each Disciple gives you a special ability!

IMPORTANT: Some Disciples are marked as Steadfast, meaning their ability happens immediately and is ongoing. All Disciples except Steadfast ones are discarded after use.

Disciples are in 3 piles, but you can only select the Disciples that are showing. This means that if someone enlists a Disciple on pile A, this frees the Disciple underneath it on pile A only. But you cannot go digging through the piles to find the Disciple you want — you are limited to only those showing in the 3 piles.

If you don't wish to indoctrinate any more Disciples, you announce "Pass" — once you've passed, you cannot participate in indoctrination. Continue the indoctrination phase until all have elected to Pass.

ENDING THE GAME

Once all the Missions have been played, tally up the tokens won by each team. Whoever has the most tokens wins.

IMPORTANT: It is possible to end the game early if one team sweeps 2 rows and 1 Mission (this would be a total of 4 points without the possibility of the other team sweeping a row — thus it would be impossible for the other team to win).

If the whole game ends in a tie, add one final Mission to the top and proceed. Winner takes all!

RULE
CLARIFICATIONS

CAN I SELECT A HAND WITH ONLY 1 OR EVEN 0 VIRTUE CARDS?
If you have only 1 Virtue card and you’re selected to be the Hand, place the only card you have in the Tablet of the Eye. If you have no Virtue cards left, you draw the top card of the Virtue deck and place it on the mission. This is very risky!

WHAT IF WE CAN’T TELL WHERE THE CRISIS OF FAITH CARD HAS BEEN PLACED?
Everyone closes their eyes and you repeat the process of the Crisis of Faith until there’s no ambiguity.

WE’RE RUNNING LOW ON VIRTUE CARDS — HOW DO WE GET MORE?
Virtue cards are drawn when a Mission fails, a row fails, or a Disciple permits you to acquire more. Use these means to get more. If all Virtue cards are acquired and there’s no more in the deck, shuffle the discard pile and use that as the draw pile.

WHAT IF I CAN TELL WHO MOVED THE CRISIS OF FAITH CARD?
Part of the challenge of the Crisis of Faith is moving the card without being detected. If a Defector has been found out because they ungracefully moved the card, that’s on them. Besides, just because you think you could tell who moved it, doesn’t mean people will believe you. A good bluff in the game can be to accuse someone else of moving the Crisis of Faith card.

I PLAYED A DISCIPLE BUT SOMEONE ELSE PLAYED ONE THAT CONTRADICTS MINE
Order of operations is important. After the Eye gets their opportunity to enlist a Disciple, the opportunity is continued to the Eye’s left and so on. If someone enacts a Disciple, that ability is realized and then if someone later in the queue has one that contradicts or steals the other player’s Disciple, that happens at that moment. The last Disciple to be played is the final say.

MY DISCIPLE’S ABILITY CONTRADICTS A CRISIS OF FAITH OR SHAMING
Disciples are the highest power in the game. If they allow you to do something that contradicts a Crisis of Faith card or a Shaming, you can ignore everything else and use the Disciple.