Ithaca in the Cards: Second Expedition

Ithaca in the Cards: Second Expedition is a blackjack-driven story game for 2-5 players about doomed travelers on a perilous journey home, inspired by The Odyssey.

A game should take about 2-3 hours, and you will need a standard deck of playing cards, writing implements, and paper or index cards to play.

In Ithaca in the Cards: Second Expedition, you’ll make up characters who have gone on a shared quest and after the completion of the quest, must brave numerous perils on their journey home.

As you play, you’ll take turns narrating how Fate works against you by drawing cards to determine the Trials you face. Each character then narrates how they rely on an Asset, Aim, or Archetype to face these Trials, also drawing cards and comparing their running totals against the total for the Trial. If they fall short, they lose whatever they rely upon and if they lose too many, they die.

Characters also die if the total value of their cards exceeds 21, and the game ends when either everyone but one character dies, all characters die, or any character gets exactly 21. It’s quite likely that player characters will die on this journey, and even survivors will lose parts of themselves on the way. This is a game about tragedy, and what it means to persevere in search of a way home.