Semaphoria
| Semaphoria | |
|---|---|
| Designer: | Holly Gramazio |
| Year: | unknown |
| Players: | 10-28 |
| Stuff required: | Six flags, in three different colours, for example two black, two white, and two red. Slips of pre-written paper. Notepaper for the players. |
| Crew required: | One game-runner |
| Preparation: | Some |
| Time required: | 30 minutes |
| Place required: | A large room or a largeish space outdoors, ideally with two levels |
| Activities: | Deduction, listening, acting, teamwork. |
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- This writeup is under construction.
A game of silent, coded communication for two teams.
Preparation
Before the game, you need to prepare a list of messages for the teams to communicate, each on its own slip of paper. All of these messages will be types of behaviour, and the player with the flags will be trying to describe this behaviour to the rest of the team. Examples from previous games of Semaphoria are:
- [insert examples here]
You'll need to make [insert number here] slips per team.
Gameplay
Separate the players into two teams, and give each team three differently-coloured flags.
The object of the game is for each team to develop its own coded language, which can be communicated only through the movement of flags. The rest of the team can shout questions and ask for clarification, but the flag-holder can only wave flags in response. It's entirely up to the players how they create their language - whether they want to go for an alphabetic cypher, a coded series of abstract concepts, a simple way to give yes/no answers to questions from the team - but you should give both teams some examples of the sorts of things they'll be trying to communicate.
[ to be continued ]
Flickr gallery
<flickr size="m">ludocity%3Agame%3Dsemaphoria</flickr>
(These are the ten most recent Flickr photos of Semaphoria. To add your own, just add the "ludocity:game=semaphoria" tag to your Flickr photos.)
Play history
Semaphoria ran at Sandpit #8.
