Final 3 Con 2026 happened this weekend, at the end of April, and I had the privilege to attend and host and play many, many games of Clocktower, and other games, and got to meet friends from all over the world. Started by Habby of CTBOTC as a tradition a few years ago, lots of folks are drafting up their experience of the con all over Discord servers and everywhere else, and I thought that would make a great blog post, so here we go:
THURSDAY
Pickup game in the lobby, Extension Cord
Story-told by Alexis (from Kinky Clocktower), I immediately pulled the only demon on the script, No Dashii, on my very first game of the con. I had a Scarlet Woman and a Poisoner as my minions, right next to me, as we form a mini Typhon-line, extending my poison to the Monk and the Cannibal next to my two minions. This game also had a mini Ryan Typhon-line, as three of them were sitting next to each other, one being my Scarlet Woman, and the other two a Monk and a Dreamer. I managed to Barber-swap the Pixie-confirmed Mathematician out of play early luckily, as they would have detected me killing the poisoned Cannibal who ate a Ravenkeeper and seen my minion’s Oracle bluff correctly. We rode to victory with a final 3 of the Monk Ryan that was told he’s the Marionette by the SW-Ryan, myself, and the SW-Ryan who got executed instead. I bluffed an Empath 0 most of the game as I thought that was quite funny with both minions starting next to me.
Second Extension Cord lobby game, following the first one with more or less the same players
Immediate No Dashii pull again. This time I have my friend Ben the Boomdandy bluffing Investigator, and Dreamer Ryan from the previous game as I think the Poisoner? I bluffed Puzzlemaster in a game that also contained a Recluse, a Mutant and a Damsel, so we ended up with an impossible 4 outsider claim that sucked up most of the air. Luckily for me, my Poisoner had identified the Damsel who was bluffing Cannibal quite early so we ended the game with a Damsel win, probably much later than we should have.
Final game of the Thursday night is Sushi Buffet, Story-told by Nash of Chill Clocktower and creator of Flesh and Bone through his phone via the Grim Bits Draft Buffet app (linked above). If you don’t know what Sushi Buffet is, you get 3 options to pick your own character, and the ones you don’t pick are removed from the draft. We only had base 3 characters as options with Pit-Hag and Philosopher banned. I pulled Oracle, Innkeeper and Minstrel as options, if I remember correctly, and chose Oracle. I got one night of Oracle 0 and then died to a Witch the next day. It became quite obvious that my friend Andrew was the Cerenovus through an Investigator ping on him, from my friend Ben that I mentioned earlier, and we had a Chef 1, promptly double tapping Ser Capelli (formerly TPI stream Sunday host, and from Off Meta), who unbelievably chose Zombuul, and winning the game.
FRIDAY
Third game of Extension Cord, first scheduled Friday game
This was my one ticket for a special guest, Mr. Ben Burns himself, and he pulled Extension Cord as his script of choice to run, making it my most played script of the con. Finally pulled a good token instead of my usual No Dashii pull, this time the Dreamer. I have dreamed the Boomdandy claiming Artist as the Mathematician/Boomdandy, immediately getting into a conflict. Thankfully, since I dreamed of them as the Boomdandy, we don’t have to execute them anytime soon. My neighbor is Malashaan of CTBOTC, who is the Oracle, and the partner of Reznora, the Gnome, who was of course her amigo. We had a poisoned Investigator through a Marionette Empath, and a Pixie Investigator, with a Fisherman advice of “You should only work with one of the Investigators”. I have also correctly identified the Pixie with my dreams, and dreamed of the Scarlet Woman as a Mutant, which was not her claim even after death. I think the Pixie-Investigator info has also identified the Scarlet Woman, who we killed. There was also an actual Mutant in game who came out post-death to the Gnome, if I remember correctly. We eventually identified the No Dashii poisoning the Investigator, with a Mathematician bluff, impossibly claiming a 3 on night 1. I felt bad that evil got quite unlucky with me dreaming the demon’s bluff on a minion and identifying them through a meta call, but proud of myself for having a fairly clean solve with the help of the earlier Fish advice.
Trouble Brewing, pickup game
I got pulled into a pickup TB game with Alanna and Austin (from Confirmed Good), Garrett from TPI team, and Emily Flippen of Survivor fame, me playing as the good Scapegoat. The Librarian who has seen the Saint nominated Emily the Virgin on day 1, giving us an early confirmation chain. There is also an Undertaker-Washerwoman confirmation chain happening where Noor the Undertaker has died early but the WW has been trying to keep the role swap going. I end up saving the Soldier who was also Slayer-shot by my neighbor, who turned out to be the Drunk! I believe Alanna was the Spy and Austin was the Baron, with Garrett as the Fortune Teller in between them with a Red Herring on the Soldier. We ended up attempting to kill the Scarlet Woman, claiming Chef, who was star-passed by the Imp claiming an Empath 0 on him, and the evil team rises up to tie on final 5. We kill the Scarlet Woman turned Imp the next day and win the game.
Dusk in the House of the Damned, second scheduled Friday game
I wanted to get at least one Emma (from Grim Scenarios) game this con, and she had scheduled her favorite script to run, Dusk, so of course I ended up getting a ticket for it. Dusk is a script by Shade that attempts to create the vibe of the upcoming BOTC expansion, Midnight in the House of the Damned, with existing characters. As a big Heretic fan, I am also quite fond of Dusk, so I was expecting nothing short of extraordinary from this game. I end up pulling the Choirboy token, which I was quite happy about. I love friendship characters on this script, like Huntsman/Damsel and King/Choirboy. Knowing there is a King in the game on its own is quite powerful. My King turns out to be my neighbor, Kohava, from the con leadership! My other neighbor is Capelli who is the Fisherman with the advice to get the trust of his other neighbor, Sophia, the Drunk Village Idiot, whose information has the potential to wreck havoc. There is also a Pixie Fisherman who gains the ability and gets the advice “The Damsel lives”. I ended up dying night 2 and gaining the trust of most of the town, including the Damsel who is bluffing Village Idiot. Christine the Poppy Grower, who has claimed Goblin day 1, ends up getting drunk by the Wizard Wish, who wished to learn the evil team. Emma hints this by calling Christine’s Goblin claim as a “Drunk claim” instead. King learns about the Pixie and then the Imp, which was helpful since most of us believed it was a Lil Monsta game. There is a Huntsman double claim between Gordon (creator of High Seas of Mutiny homebrew) the Scarlet Woman, who got executed day 1, and Andrew (from Cult of the Clocktower) the actual Huntsman, who picked the King as the Damsel. I panic about this, thinking Gordon is the Heretic, so I encourage town to lift Sabenite the Imp from the block, who has been claiming General who got a suspicious “Good” after my death. We had killed the Harpy who has killed the Magician, and the Wizard, in addition to the Scarlet Woman by that point, so Sabenite star-passes into the void, thinking there is a Heretic, and good wins the game.
Red Stick, Blue Stick, third scheduled Friday game, first as ST
This was a game I story-told with Navean (of CTBOTC), and first one of mine to host for the con. This was an 11 player game, so we built a bag with starting Ojo, Pit-Hag and Godfather +1, adding a Recluse and a Mutant. Navean was wearing eyeball earrings, giving the town a little hint of the demon type, if they knew to look for hints. The entire evil team decided to bluff Village Idiot, which was a bluff, and pretty fun. Mia, the Gambler died gambling Mullibok (also of CTBOTC), our Godfather, as the Village Idiot night 2, which lead to his execution on day 2. Pit-Hag tried to make a Recluse which was already in play, and the Ojo immediately killed the Fortune Teller who had a Yes on their Red Herring on night 1. Our General had learned Evil on Night 1 due to the potential of Pit-Hag being able to create a Mezepheles and the Godfather adding an Outsider, which went towards good after the execution of the Godfather. Our Cannibal had gone hungry for one day, and then gained a poisoned Village Idiot ability due to eating the Godfather. Our Pit-Hag then successfully turned the Ojo into a Lleech who promptly hosted the Farmer. After the execution of the Chef, who had gotten a 0, our Cannibal got a 1 due to the Recluse registering as evil next to our newly created Lleech. The Pit-Hag made the General into a Klutz, and the Lleech killed them. They thankfully picked Bruce the Mutant who has been claiming a few different roles but has settled into Soldier. The town now executes and discovers the Lleech, who then kills the Cannibal. Pit-Hag makes the Mutant into a Tinker, giving them an upgrade. They correctly meta that the Pit-Hag didn’t change the character of the host, and that the Recluse registered as evil and cannot be the host. They execute the last host candidate, the Farmer, and win the game.
Trouble in Whoville, fourth scheduled Friday game, second as ST
Big, 15-player game of Whoville, the Hermit release script that I wrote, and I am Storytelling by myself. Yippie! I knew this was going to be a challenge, but what I didn’t expect was to make an immediate error on the bag build. Accidentally put 2 minions instead of 3 and had to wake and swap the Lycanthrope out and tell them they are a Goblin now. Whoops! I guess they get a little bit of an extra bluff as an apology for turning them evil. They have to claim Goblin to win with their ability anyways, which will sort of nullify any bluff they were doing beforehand, so no harm, no foul.
We start with a No Dashii, Scarlet Woman, Goblin and Cerenovus as the evil team, with a Hermit and a Mutant for Outsiders. No Dashii is poisoning their immediate neighbors, the Farmer and the Town Crier. Cerenovus makes the Librarian, who has seen the Mutant, mad as the Oracle. The Artist asks their question right away, which was “Is there a Demon or a Goblin between these 6 players?”, on their side of the grim, the answer to which was Yes – the Goblin was there but not the Demon. Before the nominations, the Librarian breaks madness and is promptly executed. Cerenovus makes themselves mad as the Balloonist the next night. The Demon kills the spent Artist. Cannibal gains the Librarian ability and sees the same information pointing at the Mutant. Our Chef who got a 0 gets executed, giving the Cannibal a 1 where the Hermit registers as evil with the Recluse ability. Our demon kills the Empath, which leads to the execution on the Cerenovus next day from consistent 1s and a double claim with the actual Balloonist. Our No Dashii decides to “scar-pass” (kill themselves to pass to the Scarlet Woman), sobering up the Farmer and the Town Crier who had gotten a poisoned No on the Scarlet Woman formerly.
The Cannibal gets executed and the new demon kills the now-sober Farmer, who passes to the Mutant. Our Hermit who has been in a double claim with the Mayor this whole time decides to break it in the middle of nominations, promptly getting executed and giving the evil team a Hatter swap. The Demon becomes the Imp, and the Goblin becomes the Scarlet Woman. The Demon then kills the Balloonist who has gotten great info so far, including our original No Dashii who has been claiming Oracle against other Townsfolk claims. The Demon, who has been claiming Fortune Teller, gets executed, passing to the formerly Goblin now Scarlet Woman. Our final Demon attempts to kill the Mayor, who has never been targeted this game. After heavy deliberation, I bounce to the Town Crier, leaving the Mayor, the Imp and the former Mutant, now Farmer as our Final 3. With a very close vote among discussions of a potential Mayor win, the town executes the last evil player, the Demon, and wins the game.
Squall of Cthulhu, fifth scheduled Friday game, back to player
This was a CTBOTC & Hard Claim blended game, with a Storm Caught Lunatic on script. I pull the Village Idiot token and get a read as evil on Lynn, who has a reputation for pulling evil a lot on Hard Claim, who turns out to be the Vizier! The most useless VI info of all time. I talk to Bruce who at first claims to be another VI, and then immediately pivots to Lunatic-Ojo. Mullibok is a Knight with a ping on his neighbors (skipping the Vizier) who could be the No Dashii, including our Lunatic. There is an Empath 1 between Julian the Noble and Bryant the Lycanthope, which turns out to be the Noble registering as evil, as they are the Faux Paw for the Lycanthrope. Our Vizier pushes on the Noble who would have been executed anyways and I die night 2, officially making me the most useless Village Idiot of all time. Turns out I was killed by the Lycan, who got Golem-punched by Malashaan due to Empath 1. The Demon kills the Empath, and the Vizier pushes on the Balloonist. Mullibok smells that Mia, who has been claiming Politician this whole game, isn’t up to any good, and we execute them without giving the Vizier any other chance to push on anyone, and win the game! Turned out Mia was the No Dashii poisoning both myself and the other Village Idiot.
To be continued…
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