Excerpts from Manual
"Rest – sit out your turn to sober up, removing one hangover token. The party carries on without you."
Rest is an action during the entertainment, not the morning after. On your turn you could stay in and drink with people to win their favour – or step outside, clear your head, and sit this one out.
It's a more honest version of "pass": even doing nothing is something the night asks of you. And the party does not wait.
Unexpected side quest: helping a class of schoolkids refine a board game they designed themselves — "Starians: Return Home", a warm game about emotions, set in space. (My wife teaches the class, so I was volunteered.)
Polishing it turned into a strange mirror. Fixing the rulebook, simplifying, spotting edges they hadn't, I saw how much my view of design has shifted in a year — mostly how much I've learned, and more usefully, how much I still haven't.
𝗧𝗵𝗲 𝗖𝗼𝗻𝗴𝗿𝗲𝘀𝘀 𝗗𝗮𝗻𝗰𝗲𝘀… 𝗯𝘂𝘁 𝗱𝗼𝗲𝘀 𝗻𝗼𝘁 𝗽𝗿𝗼𝗴𝗿𝗲𝘀𝘀.
Metternich's evening dilemma, Vienna 1814 — committee session or masked ball, both at 8 PM. Plot twist: both were politics.
From my Congress of Vienna board game design diary.
Iteration 3.5 of my Congress of Vienna board game made historical characters more grounded: each one is present in a specific location, and movement between locations is possible — rare, player-driven, but real.
I care a lot about this kind of thing. The Congress was a city-wide social machine, and I want the board to feel like one, not like a row of cards waiting to be drafted.
𝗘𝘅𝗰𝗲𝗿𝗽𝘁𝘀 𝗳𝗿𝗼𝗺 𝗠𝗮𝗻𝘂𝗮𝗹
"English Exit – end your participation in the entertainment and move to the front of the initiative track."
Leaving the ball early, no goodbyes, puts you first on the initiative track next round.
Every country renames it: in Polish you leave "po angielsku," the English say French leave, the French answer "filer à l'anglaise," and in parts of Germany it's a "einen polnischen Abgang machen." It circles back.
𝗩𝗶𝘀𝘂𝗮𝗹 𝗡𝗼𝘁𝗲 𝗳𝗿𝗼𝗺 𝘁𝗵𝗲 𝗣𝗮𝘀𝘁
Staircase of the Upper Belvedere, Rudolf von Alt, 1882.
Painted decades after the Congress, but the staircase itself is exactly the one guests climbed in 1814. Baroque theatre as architecture — sculpted ceilings, deliberate sightlines, a slow ascent designed to be watched. By the time you reached the top, half the room already knew who you were.
Wandering Pine