A Game of Yuletide Horror

Serve the Claus family during a descent into yuletide bedlam. 

The Wassailing mashes together:

- The Edwardian estate drama of Downton Abbey

- The atmospheric horror of Mike Flanagan shows

- The festive antics of every Christmas movie you’ve ever seen

Quick to play with wild twists and turns, The Wassailing is a roleplaying game perfect for raucous holiday sessions.

A Harrowing New Holiday Tradition

Take on the roles of mortal servant staff to the immortal Claus family at the dawn of the 20th century … a time of upheaval across the world and, especially, on this wintery estate.

Your assembled staff will leverage its workplace skills to quell the Claus family’s troubles and —  perhaps more importantly — keep your jobs. 

These are no ordinary troubles though:

• Santa toys with a dark summoning to hasten his delivery capabilities • His spouse operates a secret slaughterhouse, packing magical meat • His brother rekindles an ancient war between humanity and elvendom • His children vie for prominence, merging their legendary exploits with yuletide myth

The game escalates these scenarios — and more — based on card draws and the staff’s own tribulations and politicking. With this frosty flurry of randomized elements, the game unfolds differently each time you play.

Could it become your group’s new holiday tradition? Quite possibly!

How Horror is It?

The Wassailing doesn’t push very far into the grotesque: if you’re comfortable with old-school monster movies, haunted-house TV shows, and general Halloween spookiness, you’ll probably be good. 

Inspirations

We made this improbable stew from iconic influences:

• Downton Abbey

• The Haunting series (Hill House, Bly Manor)

• American Horror Story

• Rankin/Bass Christmas specials

• Eastern European winter folklore

• So many holiday films …

The Cookies & Milk

With this first-ever public release of The Wassailing, we’ve set out all of this scrumptiousness to devour:

• Standalone game rules rooted in the 2023 Ennies award-winning Trophy RPG

• Modular character system that creates unique personas in a few quick choices

• Six unique NPC-driven scenarios built to escalate simultaneously

• A 20-room manor setting full of curious details and collaborative prompts

• Original woodblock illustrations for each of the game’s NPCs, printable as a card set

• Crisp and evocative graphic design, mingling vintage ephemera and modern structure