Cthulhu: Death May Die

Combination and turn: Choose one episode and one Elder One, setting up their map, enemies and ritual requirements. Take up to three actions, repeating actions if desired; then draw Mythos, investigate or suffer enemy attacks, and resolve the end-of-turn sequence.

Actions: Run up to three spaces; enemies in each space you leave normally follow. Add personal Fire tokens equal to those in each burning space you leave. A normal attack targets one enemy in your space, dealing one wound per success; skills can change these restrictions.

Safety and discovery: A space without enemies is Safe. Rest there to heal three total stress and/or wounds, never sanity. Investigators sharing a space can trade Items and Companions, but not Conditions. After Mythos, a Safe investigator must draw Discovery if cards remain; otherwise enemies sharing the space attack the active investigator in the chosen order.

Dice and stress: An investigator’s check normally uses three standard dice plus applicable bonus dice; enemy attacks use their reference card’s pool. Take one stress to reroll one die, including dice rolled against you. Your bonus dice do not automatically apply to enemy attacks, Fire or other rolls against you unless an effect explicitly permits it.

Sanity and insanity: Resolve successes and associated effects before losing sanity from tentacles. Stop at the next Insanity Threshold and ignore excess sanity loss from that instance; activate insanity before improving one skill. Some thresholds permanently add bonus dice to eligible rolls. Rest never restores sanity.

Mythos and summoning: Resolve Mythos from top to bottom, skipping summons without an available matching figure. End-of-turn steps are ordinary effects, personal Fire, Mythos discard check, Elder One summoning, then stage end-of-turn effects. Three discarded cards with Summoning symbols advance the track and reshuffle Mythos. Reaching the first red space or disrupting the ritual that turn summons the Elder One during the summoning check.

Ritual and confrontation: Until the ritual is disrupted, even a summoned Elder One cannot be attacked or wounded. Afterwards defeat its stages in order. Excess damage does not carry into the next stage; previous stages’ ongoing abilities and attack dice remain active.

Shared ending and solo: Defeat the Final Stage to win together. Lose if any investigator dies or is consumed before summoning, everyone is eliminated after summoning, or progression reaches the eighth track space. Simultaneous victory takes precedence. Solo alternates two investigators. After summoning, survivors may continue after a death and the eliminated investigator’s later turns are skipped.