The Arctic Village · 1723
Async Werewolf
A long-form, asynchronous game of deception. A village of settlers, a hidden pack of wolves, and a long winter to root them out — played out over days, not a single evening.
Werewolf is a game of deception and guile. At its most basic, there is a group of villagers and a hidden group of werewolves. The werewolves know each other's identities, and it is the villagers' job to rid their village of the lycan scourge.
The game is split into a day and a night phase. During the day, the whole village determines who to execute. During the night, the wolves determine who to kill. The villagers win if all the werewolves are killed; the wolves win if they outnumber the remaining humans. Werewolf is usually played as a party game, but it can be modified to be played asynchronously over a much longer time period.
The Rules
Goal
In Werewolf there are two teams — a set of villagers and a set of werewolves. The werewolves all know each other. The villagers are trying to kill all the werewolves, and the werewolves are trying to even the numbers. The first team to do so wins.
Village Team
The Village wins when all of its kill-capable enemies — not just the Wolf team's Pack Hunters — have been eliminated.
Wolf Team
The Wolves win when the number of Pack Hunters equals the remainder of the Village-allied population.
The Moderator
There is a moderator who assigns roles and keeps track of executions, actions, and win conditions.
Setup
On the first day, the Moderator emails each player with their role information and any other special information required — for example, if you’re a werewolf, the Moderator tells you who the other werewolves are.
The Game Cycle
The game is played over a three-day cycle. Each Day phase takes two real days, and each Night phase takes one full day. If you’re playing in an office setting, only M–F count.
Day
During the Day phase, players may communicate freely and everyone may vote on who to execute — by commenting on a wiki or via a messenger like Slack. Voting is decided by the people who actually vote: if only one person votes, that vote becomes law, so make sure that you vote. If you’d rather spare everyone, you may vote “No Execution.”
Night
During the Night phase, those players who are active at night send the Moderator the actions they’d like to take.
Communication
Most villagers are not active at night, which means they should not be talking to each other. Don’t discuss the game during the Night phases — that’s one reason they’re shorter, so you don’t have to wait as long to plot and scheme. And remember: Dead Men Tell No Tales. If you’re dead, you can’t talk with living players about the game.
Do not, under any circumstances, share private emails or texts from the Moderator — doing so is cheating and will result in a swift and painful death. The most obvious example would be sharing such an email to prove that you “really are the <insert role here>.” The honor system is load-bearing in several parts of this game, and this is one of them. Emails from the Moderator are PRIVATE. Please keep them that way.