Miasto Tańczącego Karpia
Miasto Tańczącego Karpia Rulebook
Table of Contents
Table of Contents
Game Overview
You take on the role of a visitor to the City of the Dancing Carp, on the eve of the great Festival of the Seven-Armed Orangutan. There is no single, continuous story — instead, the city holds more than 150 interconnected stories, adventures, and puzzles for you to discover in any order you like, by talking to the characters hidden throughout its illustrated streets and helping them with what they need.
This is a solo or shared "book-game": one or more players read together, decide together where to go, and place stickers together as the city's story unfolds and changes around them.
Game Components
- The illustrated book — you're holding it right now. Its pages show sprawling, densely illustrated scenes of the city, each one dotted with numbered characters, objects, and locations.
- City map — printed at the end of the illustrated book. It shows how the illustrated spreads connect to one another.
- Stickers — 272 stickers, on 7 sheets.
- "Podróżnik" (Traveler) — the companion book with text. Each numbered entry in the illustrated book corresponds to a numbered paragraph in the Traveler.
- Backpack — printed on the last pages of the Traveler, listing the items you can collect.
- Password list — printed on the inside of the Traveler's cover flaps, listing the passwords (keywords) you can earn.
- A pencil (not included) — you'll need it to mark off passwords on the password list and items in the backpack.
The password list and backpack can also be printed separately; the publisher makes them available at wydawnictwodwiesiostry.pl/miasto-karpia.
Two warnings are printed on the books themselves: the illustrated book's back cover warns "Do not read this book in order. Before you begin, read the instructions in the illustrated book. The game begins by finding a number in an illustration. Only once you've done that should you pick up the 'Traveler' and read the paragraph with that same number." The Traveler's own cover repeats: "Before you open this book, read the instructions in the illustrated book."
A margin note adds: don't be afraid to write in the margins — notes may turn out to be useful.
How to Play
1. Start with the illustrated book. You'll find numbers on it — these are references to the text. Choose any number on any illustration. The order doesn't matter.
2. Read the paragraph with the same number in the "Traveler." You'll find out what the character drawn next to the reference has to say. Try to help them and find what they need somewhere in the city.
3. Only place a sticker when the text tells you to. Each sticker fits perfectly into one specific place in an illustration.
That's it — that's enough to play. A few additional notes:
- Remember: never read a paragraph that no reference has pointed you to.
- Don't worry if you can't complete a task right away. Many of them require longer searches and visits to different places in the city. If you get stuck, work on a different puzzle instead. Talk to different characters, look carefully at later pages, and eventually you'll come across the missing pieces to stories you read earlier.
- If you feel unsure at the start, begin with the green references. The stories connected to them play out entirely within a single spread.
- Mark passwords you've earned on the password list, and items you've collected in the backpack, by checking off the corresponding boxes.
Additional Tips
The rules above are enough to play. If you're ever in doubt, these additional tips explain the finer points.
Reading the Traveler's Conditions
When a paragraph gives you an instruction with a condition, for example: "If you have the password Fen, read 117. If not, keep reading," check the password list to see whether you have the named password marked (here: Fen), or check the backpack to see whether you have the named item marked. If you do, go immediately to the indicated paragraph (here: 117). If you don't, finish reading the paragraph you're currently at.
When an instruction gives more than one condition, for example: "If you have the Resistant Vine in your backpack, read 337. If you have the password Plague Remedy, read 343. Otherwise keep reading," go to the paragraph named by the first condition you satisfy — even if you also satisfy a later one. (Here: if you have both the Resistant Vine and the Plague Remedy, you go to 337, not 343.)
The Password List
Next to each password on the list is a dotted line. You can write the number of the paragraph the password came from on that line — it will make it easier, later in the game, to remember which story the password is connected to.
The City Map
The city map is divided into rectangles. Each rectangle is one spread in the illustrated book, and the numbers printed on it are page numbers.
At the edges of every illustrated page you'll find arrows carrying numbers. To move to the neighboring part of the city, turn to the page number shown on the arrow.
Publication Details
"The Traveler" is part of the game "City of the Dancing Carp," meant to be used together with its other components: the illustrated book and the set of stickers.
© Copyright by Aleksandra and Daniel Mizielińscy, 2024. © Copyright for this edition by Wydawnictwo Dwie Siostry, Warszawa 2024. ISBN 978-83-8150-638-0, first edition. Editing and proofreading: Maciej Byliniak. Playtesting: Zofia Frankowska, Filip Jędrzejewski, Joanna Rzepecka.