A downloadable Core Rulebook

Buy Now$15.99 USD or more

Parselings is a modern Deck building RPG about using collaborative word magic and discovering your place in it. The game takes place in a world like our own, but with one major difference – to some, words have literal power. Parsecytes, swarms of ravenous ink-like parasitic organisms, have emerged into the world causing irreversible changes to society and our ecosystem. 

When a Parsecyte invades a human host, it forms a symbiosis with them, together becoming an entity known as a Parseling. At a glance, Parselings are indiscernible from most other humans except for the labels on their skin and the ink mixed into their blood. When brought together in groups, these individuals become greater than the sum of their parts. The infected hosts can use their tattoos to form phrases and sculpt the world to their desires. This power has come to be known as a Parse.

You will play as one of these beings. Struggling to strike a balance between appeasing the Parsecyte within, and proving you are a complex human being who cannot only be defined by a few careless words. This is both a curse and a blessing, but with the others that share your affliction, the world is your oyster. 

Purchase now in order to experience this unique game or download the teaser PDF below to get a better idea of how it plays.


Nominal City, or The Wellspring of Infection as it later came to be known, began as a dark metropolis. The weak and watery sunlight shone feebly through the gray sky for only several hours of the day, before the smothering dusk fell upon the tall cluster of buildings. We now know it as the ground zero of the parseling phenomenon, the very soil fertile with meaning and words. In the germination stage of the infection, the stench of paranoia and hushed whispers filled the air. I suppose it was only fitting that in such a place every thought and the stray word became enriched with such intensity of significance. Perhaps the most distinctive thing about Nominal City is that large areas of the city were torn from their roots and rose into the air where they have been ever since. The catastrophe of this created many victims and refugees still clustered within the city, to which the rest reacted poorly to. The memory of this event remains a stain in the collective psyche of the people.

 The old city encircled by a new wall, sits quarantined on a peninsula away from the rest of the mainland. Underneath in the craters and shadows, it smells like a dense forest of tall gray buildings with faded and peeling pastel paints. Posters are layered over each other like rings of wood in a tree. Replace the forest animals with people rugged up in their thick coats and scarves becoming anonymous figures. There’s a feeling of oppression in the concrete, the enclosing wall bordering the entirety of Nominal City and the nearby mountain range, the fall of the government, and the rise of large private corporations to take over public interests. It doesn’t help that there’s a new movement, spoken of only in quiet corners. Something that might be a threat. 

Parselings, have you heard of them?

A Deck of Cards For Each Player

In the Choice System, each player controls a single character and a deck constructed out of a set of regular playing cards. The cards you choose will represent your character’s health and mentality. The larger the deck, the more options, and health they have, while in comparison with fewer cards, the more limited their actions are.

You will need to make some hard decisions when constructing your deck because of one simple reason: Parselings are not gods, nor are they omnipotent. They will need others to help do what they themselves cannot. As the game progresses your deck can change and twist as your character progresses through different scenarios.

A Set of Dice For Your Game Master

Though predominantly a deck-building game, you will still need a set of dice to be shared by your group. When sitting down to play the game, only the GM will actually need these dice. While many NPC actions could be replicated with cards, it is faster for the GM to use dice on lesser challenges.

  • A small pool of d6s (six-sided dice) to represent the small enemies and obstacles in the campaign.
  • A single d10 (ten-sided dice), d12 (twelve-sided dice), and d20 (twenty-sided dice) to help decide the words a Parseling can use.

Your Imagination

As a roleplaying game, stories are at the heart of these systems and the rules offer a systematic way of translating actions into a format that everyone else agrees upon. We are utilizing our imagination to fuel the game, putting our time and our effort to create our own fun and a story we would want to listen to. For players, this means you’ll need to be able to describe your character and what they want to do. For the GM, you’ll need to create an adventure with your players in a way that everyone enjoys.

Parselings is a game where you get to tell any story that you can imagine.   


Whether you are undertaking a devious deal or enacting a daring distraction, the circumstances are never the same for any two people. Governing the mechanical side of the game, the Choice System is built to embody the individuality of your own character, to represent how you want to play. By choosing your cards it’s more than just a gamble, your choices are will change fate. 

Each card in your deck tells a story about your character. You’ll know what it feels like to step into their shoes, watching the odds change with every card you spend and every move you make. Whatever happens in your story, the choice is yours.



By uniting we stand, by dividing you will fall.

If the Choice System is the gears directing the fate of your characters, Parses are the heart and soul of the game. The Parse System is where your imagination and will to co-operate with others truly matters. Parsing is the supernatural phenomena or magic that is carried out by two or more Parselings with a simple touch and uttering a small string of words. Through using this power to redefine the world, you’ll be able to achieve amazing feats that would be otherwise impossible.

A Parseling’s words are determined by their perceived role in the world. These come from anywhere – from strangers, friends, and even from the Parseling themselves. All players are involved in the process of determining the potential words each character may possess. Dice are used to mix things up and represent the haphazard nature of the Parsecyte they've bonded.

Do what you will with your gifts, but ask yourselves, how will your words define you?

StatusReleased
CategoryPhysical game
Rating
Rated 5.0 out of 5 stars
(10 total ratings)
AuthorSmunchy Games
GenreRole Playing
TagsSci-fi, Tabletop role-playing game

Purchase

Buy Now$15.99 USD or more

In order to download this Core Rulebook you must purchase it at or above the minimum price of $15.99 USD. You will get access to the following files:

Parselings Rulebook v1.3.pdf 16 MB

Download demo

Download
Teaser.pdf 63 MB

Comments

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Where can I find a separate PDF of the character sheet if such a thing even exists? 

hey folks - are there any more physical copies likely to be happening soon?

Our new Parselings Nominal City setting book is live on IndieGoGo!
https://www.indiegogo.com/projects/parselings-nominal-city/x/28628391#/

Parselings is an RPG that uses an innovate deckbuilding mechanic. You play as people infected by symbiotes that form tattoos on your skin to give you superpowers. This game is beautifully laid out and has fantastic artwork.

Hey there!

I love the game and the mechanics surrounding it but I have a bit of a mechanical question that comes from sorta confusing wording.

So for the Pidgin Trait Tree, the Trait Complementary says that at Point 2 your Lingua gains an additional dice to a total of 4 dice and at Point 4 your Lingua gains another dice for a total of 5 dice. So does this mean that when you get the Complementary Trait your Lingua immediately gains an additional dice since you already got the Point 2 Trait Reciprocal and then get another additional dice when you get the Point 4 Trait Synonymous, or do you immediately get two additional dice because you spent 4 points in the Trick Tree?

Thanks!

(+1)

Hi there Werby,

Thank you for enjoying the game, the Pidgin is one of my favourite little pieces in the game.  We've been looking at this trick to clear up some points in clarity for the next update. 

To answer your question, the dice distribution should be as follows. 

Point 2: The lingua has 3 dice on creation. 
Point 3: The lingua should have 4 dice (it gains an additional dice for this point of the trick tree)

Point 4: The lingua now has 5 dice and has the additional abilities from synonymous. 

Hope this clears things up.

Join our discord if you get the chance, we'd love to hear about your adventures so far.  The link should be on the inside cover of the book :)

If not, good luck on your game

I love how creative this book is with its mechanics and how it approaches character development in a more fluid fashion. This is definitely something I'm going to plan a session for with my playgroup.

Also, I really dig the illustrations. :)

Thank you Przewal! :) - We appreciate the compliment and kind words!

If you end up enjoying the gameplay and world, our first Parselings setting book, Nominal City, is coming to IndieGoGo and launching on April 12th! You can signup here at the link below to get notified when we launch :) 

https://www.indiegogo.com/projects/parselings-nominal-city/coming_soon/x/2862839...

(+5)

I feel like being a racist or a sexist shouldn't be put into the same category of "Personality Quirks" as ADHD or OCD, since I think being a bigot is more of a problem to the target of their discrimination.

(1 edit) (+3)(-2)

Hi there Pizza :)


You’re absolutely right - and because of this, we are updating the PDF and have sent stickers to those who purchased the physical copy of the book. It is embarrassing that after many passes of sensitivity readers, editors, and dev/design that this slipped through. 

We also addressed this on the Kickstarter in a previous update a few months ago :) - you can read more about the update here https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/smunchygames/parselings/posts/3293434

The description mentions a teaser PDF but there doesn't seem to be one available?

Hi Aaron! Thank you for pointing this out to us. We've now updated the Parselings Core Rulebook itch.io page to include the teaser demo download.