Royal clowns? Well, not quite. For The Queen has taken quite the journey since Jason first looked at it. It got itself a second edition, and moved from Evil Hat Productions to Darrington Press, true. From near the start, though, it offered an SRD and the Descended from the Queen moniker to allow others to use the mechanical framework, and as it turns out there a lot of games under that tent now. This time we’re dealing with a dark and supernatural version of the greatest show on earth, with Ringmaster from Pascal Godbout/Spotless Dice Games!

Aaron and his Cyberpunk RED character Tickles the Rockerboy Clown bears some responsibility for this game catching my eye in the first place, but Godbout deserves the real credit for picking an interesting premise. Something about spooky circuses is just compelling – I couldn’t help but be reminded of the Dark Carnival  option from Bluebeard’s Bride Book of Mirrors – and given how good For The Queen was, Ringmaster intrigued me.

Play begins with taking turns drawing the Instruction cards (there’s also one that has all of the different instruction steps on it, if you want to centralize explaining the rules or cut down on drawing time). Then, everyone takes a look at the Circus Cards and picks out one, two, or three of them that will act as inspiration for the circus that everyone is a member. The art for the Circus Cards is nothing particularly mind-blowing, but it’s generally good and pretty evocative, and notably all of it is sourced from Shutterstock (with proper credit, even). This makes Ringmaster an excellent example of how you don’t need to break a budget or sell your artistic soul to our new plagiarism machine overlords just to make your game look good.

As per usual, the lion handler’s share of the game is in the prompt cards. As with For the Queen, players take turns drawing prompts and then create details for them and answer any questions, including follow-up questions from other players. They can also offer the card to another player instead, and anyone can use the X-card on a card not just if it’s content is troubling but just to curate the experience of the game.

The prompt cards are fantastic at both building up an individual character and the overall setting. “What talent do you posses that is vital to the survival of the circus?” “The Ringmaster did something sinister to you so you would draw the crowds. What was it, and why do you love them anyway?” “Someone or something has been following the circus for days, The Ringmaster sent you to deal with this threat. Who did you take with you, and what went wrong?” “You were allowed to leave the circus for a day. What did you see that made you want to leave forever, and why did you come back anyway?”

Some prompts are somewhat related, but end up differing wildly in what kind of questions get asked. For one example, two cards talk about a new member joining the troupe with your exact skills, but one focuses on you being thrilled with this and asking if the newcomer is equally excited, and the other one dives into your similarities and why they concern you.

So, that covers the writing aspect of Ringmaster, which I led with because it’s what any Descended from the Queen game – or any game spinning off of a narrative-heavy, prompt-based SRD, really – is going to live or die on. A DftQ game doesn’t really have many mechanical problems to solve, but Ringmaster does make a few specific changes that I feel have a pretty big impact.

For The Queen comes to an end with the drawing of a single, specific card,  but Ringmaster makes it a bit more drawn out and variable. 6 out of the 46 prompt cards are marked with a little Crisis symbol, and each one has a pretty intense prompt like  “In every town that you visit, someone dies or disappears” or “You are a threat to the circus.” The game only enters its end phase after the third of these marked cards is drawn (or, admittedly, when everyone agrees it’s time, or if there are no prompt cards left due to play and X-carding).

That single card from For The Queen has a single event – the Queen is attacked, and what you do in response – but despite the wording on the box Ringmaster again puts more options on the table. Once the ending of the game has been triggered, the players draw from the Crisis Cards. There are four options, and only one of them has to do with “the local folks have discovered the true nature of the circus. They have come to destroy the Big Top – and all those within it.” The other options involve the menagerie escaping, the Ringmaster being found dead, and the troupe discovering the true destination of the circus. Most of these are also not binary prompts. For instance, finding the Ringmaster dead actually offers four different endings for a character to choose from: running away, nominating a new Ringmaster, claiming the title for yourself, and seeking revenge upon the killer.

You have a lot more variety here in both ending and options, and I like that a lot. I can see there being a slight disconnect if the Crisis Card that gets drawn doesn’t have anything to do with the marked prompt cards that were drawn earlier, though. For example, if you draw the marked card about finding out about the troupe’s secret destination, that lays some pretty solid groundwork for the destination-based Crisis, but not so much when it comes to the menagerie. Still, there’s clearly so much going on under the Big Top that even a Crisis from out of left field will probably land just fine.

Ringmaster has brought a solid new genre and strong writing to the Descended from the Queen line while also making a few mechanical changes that I think make getting to the ending of the game a bit more lively. It’s definitely worth the price of admission.

You can find digital versions of Ringmaster on itch.io, as well as Print-on-Demand and Roll20 versions on DriveThruRPG,. I got my physical copy at PAX East 2025’s IPR booth, although things must be going well because IPR lists the game as out of stock as of this writing. Speaking of going well, Ringmaster just received a CRIT Award nomination for Best GMless TTRPG!

As they say, the show must go on – but what will you choose when the last act is finished?