Hark!

WICKIES
Wickies by Lari Assmuth, 2020

lari-assmuth.itch.io
twitter.com/LariAssmuth
lari@rocketsurgeongames.com
rocketsurgeongames.com

This work is based on The Wretched (found at http://loottheroom.itch.io/wretched), product

of Chris Bissette and Loot The Room, and licensed for our use under the Creative Commons
Attribution 3.0 Unported license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/).

THE WRETCHED™️ is a trademark of Chris Bissette. The Wretched and Alone logo is ©
Chris Bissette, and is used with permission.

IMAGES
Cover
Green Cape Lighthouse, plans, 1885 Signed: James Barnet, Stamped: Public Works, NSW,
Colonial Architect, amended at various times until 1959. Public Domain / Wikimedia Com-
mons
Tom Chalky

Title page
HAER RI,5-NESH,1- (sheet 9 of 12) - Block Island Southeast Light, Spring Street and
Mohegan Trail at Mohegan Bluffs, New Shoreham, Washington County, RI. This file comes
from the Historic American Buildings Survey (HABS), Historic American Engineering Re-
cord (HAER) or Historic American Landscapes Survey (HALS). These are programs of the
National Park Service established for the purpose of documenting historic places. Records
consist of measured drawings, archival photographs, and written reports. Public Domain /
Wikimedia Commons

Playing cards
Playing Cards series (N84) for Duke brand cigarettes, 1888. The Jefferson R. Burdick Col-
lection, Gift of Jefferson R. Burdick, Public Domain / Metropolitan Museum of Art.

Other images
Tom Chalky

Typefaces: Century Modern TT & Plantin MT Pro  

1. The keeper is responsible for the care and management of the light,
and for the station in general. He must enforce a careful ­attention to
duty on the part of his assistants; and the assistants are strictly enjoined
to render prompt obedience to his lawful ­orders.

instructions to light-keepers, july, 1881

united states light-house establishment

Hark, Triton, Hark!

Bellow, and bid our father, the sea king, rise up from the depths, full-
foul in his fury, black waves teeming with salt-foam, to smother
this young mouth with pungent slime...
... to choke ye, engorging yer organs till ye turn blue and bloated with
bilge and brine and can scream no more... only when he, crowned in
cockle shells with slithering tentacled tail and steaming beard, takes up
his fell, be-finnèd arm -– his coral-tined trident screeches banshee-like
in the tempest and runs you through the gullet, bursting ye, a bulging
bladder no more, but a blasted bloody film now -- a nothing for the
Harpies and the souls of dead sailors to peck and claw and feed upon,
only to be lapped up and swallowed by the infinite waters of the dread
emperor himself, forgotten to any man, to any time, forgotten to any god
or devil, forgotten even to the sea... for any stuff or part of Winslow, even
any scantling of your soul, is Winslow no more, but is now itself the sea.

thomas wake, the lighthouse (2019)

 WHO?
You are wickies, both of you, light-keepers employed by the United States
Light-House Establishment. Your job is to tend to a lighthouse far off the
coast, and make sure the light is lit every night.

There are two of you.

The Keeper is an old, salty dog, crusty but unbent. You are at times
jovial, high-spirited and full of laughs. Other times, you are authoritative,
strict and mean. Whatever mood you are in, you always know best, and on
this island your word is the law.
The Assistant is younger and inexperienced, but carries themselves
with a dash of pride. You have a checkered past that you don’t want to talk
about. You want the Keeper’s approval, but resent them for the power they
hold.
You have both been brought to this barren rock on a tender ship, to
serve your four-week stint before you are relieved.
You are neither of you strangers to hard work, but the days and nights
do take their toll. As the weeks go by, will you keep it together or will you
turn on each other? What lies beneath the waves? What strange power does
the lighthouse hold? What secrets do you keep from each other?

WHAT? WHAT? WHAT? WHAT?

Wickies is a game about cabin fever, shared isolation, psychological tor-
ment, repressed desire and losing your grip on what is and isn’t real.
It is a game where you push each others’ buttons until someone snaps.
The game will pit you against each other and force you into confronta-
tions. It is important to note that there is a distinction between the charac-
ters, who may come to hate each other, and the players, who should not.
There are no happy endings in this game, and the most you can hope
for is to survive this ordeal until the tender arrives with your relief.

This game is, of course, a homage to the film The Lighthouse by Robert
Eggers. It is based on the game The Wretched by Chris Bissette and the
framework for Wretched and Alone games as laid out by Matt Sanders
and Chris Bissette. It also draws inspiration from Wretched and Not So
Alone by Spencer Campbell and Adam Boyes, Light by James Chip and
D&D Incursion: The Lighthouse by Litza as well as from the United States
Light-House Establishment’s Instructions to Light-Keepers, July 1881.

6
 HOW?
To play, you’ll need a standard deck of cards with no jokers, a single
six-sided die, a tumbling block tower and a collection of 10 tokens. Sea-
shells or pebbles from the beach make perfect tokens, but you can use
whatever you have at hand.

The Keeper will also require writing materials and a notebook or some
paper. This represents the Keeper’s logbook.

The game will pit you against each other on a cursed rock, under extreme
pressure. Your only hope is that you can hold it together until the tender
arrives to relieve you. It is incredibly unlikely that this will happen.

SAFETY
These are the central and most important rules of the game. You are not
allowed to play Wickies if you do not follow these rules.

1. The players are more important than the game, always.

2. This game deals with isolation, psychological mind-games, pow-
er, ­violence, suicide and death. If you feel uncomfortable with these
themes, this may not be the game for you. If you are at all unsure, read
through the whole game to make sure you know what to expect.
3. Check in frequently with each other, take breaks and stop playing if at
any point you feel uncomfortable.You do not need to tell your co-­player
why. If you want to keep playing, say what, if anything, you need to
happen before continuing.
4. You can retcon anything or skip any prompt from the cards. Nothing
except these rules are set in stone.
5. If your co-player wants to stop playing or change something, you must
listen to them and respect their boundaries. The same goes for them.

7
 BEGIN
Set up the tumbling block tower as you normally would. If you haven’t
already, decide which one of you will be the Keeper and which one will
be the Assistant. The Keeper rolls a die and you take turns, beginning
with the Assistant, completing that many pulls from the tower, placing the
pulled blocks on top of the tower. The tower represents the control you
both have over yourselves and the situation.

It the tower falls at any point of the game, your stay on the island has de-
volved into chaos or horror, the end has come for you both, and it is tragic.

If you do not have a tumbling block tower, you can ignore any text that
instructs you to pull from it. This means you will meet your demise if all
four Kings are in play, so you have slightly less pressure on you but when
the end comes it will probably be even more spectacularly bad for you.

Shuffle the deck of cards and place them face down within easy reach. The
cards will represent tasks and events. If you wish to play a shorter game,
place the Ace of Hearts on top of the deck.

Introduce your characters to each other. The introductions should be

short, a name and short description is fine.

If a prompt for a card includes a question, the one drawing the card should
be the one to answer it. You can, however, always ask for input from your
co-player.

8
 THE DAY
The game is divided into days.
Each day consists of three phases: planning the day, tasks and the evening.

phase one: planning the day

• The Keeper rolls the die and draws that many cards from
the deck into their hand.
• The Keeper gives the Assistant cards from their hand. The
Keeper must keep at least one card for themselves, but if
the draw yields more than one card, they must give at least
one card to the Assistant.
• The Assistant draws one card from the deck, adding it to
their hand.

phase two: tasks

• Taking it in turns, lay down cards from your hand and
consult the Instructions to Light-Keepers. Read the corre-
sponding text out loud and follow the instructions given.
• Continue revealing cards and consulting the Instructions
until all tasks have been resolved, or something happens
to end the game.
• When all tasks for the day are resolved, the Assistant may
secretly choose one of the cards they played, and keep it
face-down in a separate Defiance pile. Discard the other
cards you have used, unless instructed otherwise.

phase three: evening

• Take a moment to quietly reflect on the day, or discuss the
tasks and events with your partner.
• The Keeper, in secret, writes down an observation about
the Assistant in their logbook.
• If the Assistant wants to, they can use cards from their De-
fiance pile to build a poker hand and challenge the Keep-
er. Consult the Defiance rules to see what effect their chal-
lenge has, then discard the cards used in this way, unless
instucted otherwise.

9
 INSTRUCTIONS
to

LIGHT-KEEPERS.
July, 1881

THE THE SEA

LIGHTHOUSE
Hearts represent the mys-
tical and sublime power of
the Lighthouse.
Diamonds represent the
sea, as a physical envi-
ronment, a mythological
force and a symbol of the
subconscious.

THE SECRETS
MUNDANE
Clubs represent the mun- Spades represent the se-
dane facets of life on the crets that you carry and
rock. Work, food, rations, guard.
the sound of the foghorn
and your companion with
all their human foibles.

10
 THE LIGHTHOUSE
The tender is coming for you, you
know it is. Even though you’re losing
your sense of time, it can’t be many
days off now, can it? Pull from the
tower. Do not discard this card –
instead, put it to one side and place
A
ten tokens on it. After each day, during
the evening, the Keeper rolls a die. On
a 6, remove a token from the card.
If you successfully remove all the
tokens from the card, the tender has
come for you. Both of you make a
final pull from the tower. If it still
stands, you gather your things and de-
part, leaving the light and the island
to the new Keeper and their Assistant.
When you watch the light flash you
2 often hum or sing a little song that
fits the time of the intervals perfectly.
What is it?
Walking up the stairs to the lighthouse
3
one day for some routine mainte-
nance, one of the stairs falls loose and
you sprain you ankle painfully. Pull
from the tower.
The two of you set out to paint the
4 lighthouse. It’s hard work, but you
manage to keep your spirits up with
jokes and a song.
There is a problem with the carriage
that the lens revolves on, and the lens
doesn’t turn smoothly. You’ve taken
off the rollers and cleaned them sev-
5 eral times, taking great care to put
them back correctly, but you still hear
a small click every time the lens re-
volves. You cannot for the life of you
figure out what is wrong. Pull from
the tower.
The light has started speaking to you
during the night. First you thought it
6 was just the wind, but now you swear
you can hear words and sentences when
the light is on. What does it say to you?
There’s a stain on the lens. No mat-
ter how much you polish the lens,
7 the stain always returns the next day.
Now you could swear it’s growing, and
you’ve started to see the image of a
face in the stain. Whose face is it? Pull
from the tower.
Seagulls flock in their hundreds to the
8 lighthouse, just sitting there silently on
the gallery deck and cupola.
Looking at the lighthouse is hypnot-
ic, and lately you have found yourself
9 more and more often being lost in
reverie while looking at it, forgetting
about your tasks and drifting out of
conversations. Pull from the tower.
One night during your watch you no-
10
tice that the light has gone out. How
long has it been out? How could you
have missed it? Whose fault is it? Both
of you pull from the tower.
You are halfway up the stairs to the
light when you see something moving
J up there, coming closer you recognise
it as a writhing tentacle and you recoil
back in horror. Pull from the tower.
The flashing light won’t let you sleep.
Q You see it even when you close your
eyes, blinking at you, beconing you.
Pull from the tower.
Do not discard this card. Place it
where you can see it on your side of
the table. If it’s not the fourth King,
stop reading here. If all four Kings
K are on the table, the game is over. In
that case, read the Dark fate of all the
Kings you have on your side.
Dark Fate: The Light
You make your way to the light and
stare directly into it. The light engulfs
you and sears through you, until you
are destroyed.
11
 THE MUNDANE
You check on the lobster pots you The drinking water tastes like death,

9
have in the water, and they are teem- and you find the cistern fouled, with
ing with fresh, fine lobsters. carcasses of dead sea-birds floating in

A You cook them up and enjoy a

feast fit for a king! Maybe a little grog
on the side to celebrate? The next time
the blackened water. Pull from the
tower.

that one of you has to draw from the When you go to prepare your meal
tower, you may choose not to.

It’s your turn to prepare food, but you

10 for tonight you find half of the rations
spoiled. Whose fault is it that they
have gone bad? Pull from the tower.

2 are growing so goddamned tired of

dried cod and potatoes. What meal are
you dreaming of right now?
A small disagreement over something
insignificant turns nasty, and you find

You have to clean the living compart-

ments. Scrubbing the floors and airing
J yourselves shouting and shoving each
other. Which one of you backs down,
and why? Whoever did not back down

3 out the bedclothes feels like a punish-

ment for something, and why does it
must pull from the tower.

seem like you’re always the one who A real fight breaks out. What provoked
has to do it? Pull from the tower.

You have taken to enjoying a drink or

Q it? Who threw the first punch, and
who threw the last one? Both of you
pull from the tower.

4 two in the evening just to relax. Ask

your companion if they also partake.
Do you do it openly or in secret?
You hate something that your com-
Do not discard this card. Place it
where you can see it on your side of
the table. If it’s not the fourth King,
stop reading here. If all four Kings

K
panion does. It might be a sound they are on the table, the game is over. In

5 make while eating, snoring, farting or

some other habit you find vile. Ask
them what it is, and say how it makes
you feel. Pull from the tower.
You have to fetch coal for the engine
that case, read the Dark fate of all the
Kings you have on your side.
Dark Fate: Murder
Something finally drives your com-
panion over the edge. What is it? How
do they attack and kill you? What do

6 that powers the foghorn. It’s dirty,

back-breaking work, and when you are
done you feel completely spent.
you say to them before you succumb
to your wounds?

The foghorn keeps you awake night

7 after night, and you have begun to de-
test its blasts. Pull from the tower.

It’s raining and the roof has started

8 leaking. You have to pull your oilskins

on and scramble to the roof to repair
it.

12
 THE SEA
Staring at the sea soothes you, and
you find a sense of solace in the fact
A
that you are alone out here with your
thoughts. If you have a King in play on
your side of the table, you may give it
to your companion instead.
Between your regular duties, you find
2 the time to put out with a small row-
boat and lay some nets in the hopes
that you can catch some fresh fish.
A storm hits the island and does not
let up. Whatever you do from now on,
3 you are soaked, sweating in your oil-
skins and cursing in the wind. Both of
you pull from the tower.
The rocks around the island are teem-
4 ing with sea creatures. Foul, disgust-
ing little things that scuttle around in a
panic whenever you come near.
You wake with a start, all covered in
5
sweat. You were dreaming of drown-
ing. What did you see rising to meet
you from the depths below? Pull
from the tower.
There’s a fog that rises from the sea,
6 and envelops you so you can barely see
your out-streched hand before you.
You swear you could see a ship out in
the distance for a brief moment, but
7 it disappeared behind a wave and now
there’s not a sign of it. You must have
been imagining things. Right? Pull
from the tower.
You find a crate that has blown to
shore against the rocks. Climbing out
8 on the slippery stones to retrieve it,
you find it contains several bottles of
whiskey! It must have fallen from a
passing ship.
There’s a seagull that has started fol-
lowing you around. Every task you do,
9 it’s standing in your way, silently star-
ing at you. One day, it starts pecking
at your hand or foot. What do you do?
Pull from the tower.
After one of your petty arguments
10
one of you curses the other, invoking
a terrible death in the black briny sea.
Which one of you was it who said the
curse? The one who was cursed must
pull from the tower.
You hear a melodic shrieking out
at sea. At first you think it’s just the
J
foghorn, but as you stare out over the
waves, you can swear you see a mer-
maid jumping like a fish. She looks at
you and she is the most beautiful and
horrific being you have ever seen. Pull
from the tower.
You are walking back to the cottage
from the lighthouse one evening when
Q
you see a body laying on the rocks.
Coming closer, you see it’s no hu-
man but a mermaid. Suddenly, she
opens her eyes and lets out a shriek
that chills you to your very bones. Pull
from the tower.
Do not discard this card. Place it
where you can see it on your side of
the table. If it’s not the fourth King,
K
stop reading here. If all four Kings
are on the table, the game is over. In
that case, read the Dark fate of all the
Kings you have on your side.
Dark Fate: The Harpies
You are beset by the creatures of the
sea or the souls of dead sailors. In
what form do they attack you and tear
you to shreds?
13
 SECRETS
You share a detail from your life be- There’s a small hole in the wall of

8
fore becoming a wickie. It can be the cottage, where your cots are. You
something about your family, what sometimes sneak a peak through it
you used to do for a living, where you while your companion is off duty. Ask

A used to live or where you grew up, for

example. Ask your companion how
they react.
them what you catch them doing.

You are haunted by the memory of

It feels good to share a part of
your life with someone. The next time
that one of you has to draw from the
9 a terrible sin or crime that you have
committed. What was it? Pull from
the tower.
tower, you may choose not to.
You find a dead body in the water and

10
There’s a small shed that stands apart it looks like someone from your past.
from the other buildings, and that Who was it? The body slowly slips into

2 smells of turpentine and seaweed. It’s

the only place you feel you can have
some privacy. What do you do when
the sea and disappears in the depths.
Pull from the tower.

J
you go there? The name that you say is yours isn’t
really, is it? Whose is it, and what is
You find a scrimshaw figurine of a mer- your real name? Pull from the tower.

3 maid hidden in your mattress. You hide

it away from the prying eyes of your
companion. Pull from the tower.
During the evening you let down your
guard and spill your beans about your

Your father was a strict and joyless
man, as quick to quote scripture as he
4 was to reaching for the belt. Nothing
you did was ever good enough for him.
Do you recall how you felt when you
learned that he had died?
At your previous job your boss was
Q darkest secret.You start to defend your
actions, but you can see in the eyes of
your companion that something has
changed in how they see you. Pull
from the tower.
Do not discard this card. Place it
where you can see it on your side of
the table. If it’s not the fourth King,

5 K
always putting you down, always giv-
ing you a hard time. What did you do
when at last you couldn’t take it any-
more. Pull from the tower.
A close moment between you leads
stop reading here. If all four Kings
are on the table, the game is over. In
that case, read the Dark fate of all the
Kings you have on your side.
Dark Fate: All is Lost
You can no longer live with the knowl-

6
to a hug that you both hold for a long edge of what you have done. You give
time. You hadn’t realised that you up and go willingly to your death.
missed the touch of another human
so much.

Have you ever been married or in a

committed relationship? Why was it so

7 easy for you to stay away from them

for so long when work demanded it?
Do you know where they are now?
Pull from the tower.

14
 DEFIANCE
The Assistant has a deck of their own called the Defiance deck, where
they can place one card per day after resolving the tasks. At the end of the
day, after the evening’s reflection and the Keeper has written in their log,
you may use as many cards from the defiance deck as you want to build
a poker hand and use that hand as a challenge to the Keeper’s authority.
Show the Keeper the hand, resolve the challenge and then discard the
cards you used.

PAIR
The next time you have to pull from the tower, you can decline to do so or
have the Keeper to draw instead.

TWO PAIR
If you have a King on your side of the table, give it to the Keeper to place
on their side of the table.

STRAIGHT
Next day, when the Keeper has drawn their hand of cards, they must give
you the hand and you get to distribute the cards among you as you wish.

FLUSH
You can read the Keeper’s log for one full minute.

THREE OF A KIND
You can read the Keepers log from beginning to end, and if you want, you
may destroy the pages they have written on. From now on, the Keeper
does not write down anything in their log.

FULL HOUSE
You can give the Keeper up to two Kings from your side of the table, to
keep on their side.

FOUR OF A KIND
Mutiny! From now on, you follow the rules for the Keeper, and they fol-
low the rules for the Assistant.

15
The game has ended. Take a deep breath. You are here, above water,
among the living. Take a moment to check in with each other.

If the tower fell, you have both lost any semblance of control. Chaos reigns
and you both meet any and all of the Dark Fates on the Kings that you
have on the table before you. Look at the Kings on your side of the table
and read the corresponding Dark Fates out loud. Use the Fates to spin a
yarn about how you came to meet your end.
If you have no Kings before you on the table when the tower falls, it’s
not any fate or cursed souls that spell your doom, but the collapse of the
social order leaves you wretched and alone on this god-forsaken rock and
the end comes for you not with a bang, but with a whimper.

If at any time, all four Kings are in play, the Dark Fates come true for both
of you in the same way as above. While it’s possible that you have held on
to a shred of order and decency, symbolized by the tower still standing, the
grim portents of fate come true for you nonetheless.
If you have no Kings on your side of the table, say a quiet prayer for
your poor companion. You survive the ordeal, and can describe how the
tender finds you, alone, when it comes for you.

If all tokens are removed from the Ace of Hearts, the tender has arrived.
You both embark, leaving the island and the lighthouse in the hands of
the next Keeper and their Assistant. May God have mercy on their souls.

16
Ye are not likely to be remembered.

17