Imperial College History Society
⚔️ Assassins' Game 2025 ⚔️

Pocket Rules
  1. Sign up: to participate, you need to join the History Society (it’s free!) and fill in the sign-up form to provide the data that will go into your Character Sheet.
  2. The Target: at the start of the game, you will receive the Character Sheet of your Target; this will contain the details of the person you have to assassinate.
    • Targets are assigned in a loop; for example, with 4 players: 1 hunts 2, 2 hunts 3, 3 hunts 4, and 4 hunts 1. When a player eliminates their Target, they inherit that Target’s Target. (If Player 1 eliminates Player 2, Player 1’s new target is Player 3).
    • Any Assassin hunting you is also a valid Target you can kill, if you find out who they are! Anyone on the Wanted List (see Other Rules below) is a valid Target too.
  3. Weapons: in your Character Sheet you will have been assigned a historical figure. We encourage you to perform your assassinations using a mock Weapon related to your character. Anything that is not clearly a Weapon must be labelled to indicate so. You don’t have to stick to a single weapon, so you can try different ones throughout the game! For example:
    • A “Roman Senator” could use a pen labelled “dagger” but also a bedsheet labelled “toga” (death by strangulation)!
    • A “WWII soldier” could use a nerf gun or a paper airplane labelled “kamikaze”.
    • Realistic-looking weaponry is strictly forbidden! Even toy guns can look real in the dark or on CCTV.
  4. Assassinating Targets: for a kill to be valid, the Weapon needs to hit the Target anywhere on the body but the head. Kills must happen in the SK campus, within the Game Area.
    • Kills are not allowed during lectures, labs, tutorials, workshops, fire alarms, or at times that could negatively affect the Target (e.g. during a meeting or medical emergency).
    • Kills must not bother bystanders in any way:
      • This includes any form of disruption to events organized by other societies.
      • Chases and footraces of any kind are only allowed outdoors (i.e. anywhere you see the sky above you). Please call a Timeout (see below) if you think this rule is being breached.
    • Out of Bounds areas (full list in Extended Rules): Bathrooms, Halls, Shuttle bus… Also all events by societies that request it (list HERE).
  5. Reporting Assassinations: when you assassinate a Target, report it to the Umpires at icassassinsgame@gmail.com. You must CC your Target into the email. We will then proceed to send you your next Target’s Character Sheet.
    • To be considered for the Best kill prize, please include a photo with you and your Weapon taken right after the kill and/or a fun/in-character description about what happened, which we'll also post on this website (using your in-game pseudonym)!
  6. Dying: if you’re killed, you're out of the Game! You may not tell anyone any information acquired during your play or while dead.
  7. End of the Game: The Game will end when only one player remains and will last up to 4 weeks. If there are multiple players alive at the end of the 4 week assassination period, the Game will be paused and remaining Active players will fight it out in a Grand Finale, a Battle Royale–style showdown where players will eliminate each other until only one remains. It will likely take place on Queen’s Lawn about a week after the main Game ends (details TBD).
  8. Game Area: See Game Map
  9. Other rules:
    • If you decide to leave the Game, please let an Umpire know ASAP.
    • If necessary, any Assassin may call "Timeout!" to immediately pause all local Game activity (making the area Out of Bounds), after which players may return to their initial positions or leave the surroundings. Timeouts are strictly for concerns regarding safety and security (e.g. use of a possibly dangerous weapons, Assassins activity may be concerning bystanders, vehicles passing nearby, etc) and must not be used to gain a tactical advantage.
    • Inactivity: players will be declared to be Inactive after a week has passed since their last kill (or since the start of the game). They can regain an Active status as soon as they make a kill.
      • If a player is Inactive, they may be contacted by an Umpire to check if they’re still playing the Game. If the player does not respond, their Character Sheet will go on the Wanted List.
    • Wanted List: players on it automatically become a valid Target for everyone in the game; anyone can kill them to farm extra kills (for Most kills prize).
    • Rule Violations: any player that performs minor violations of the Game’s rules may be added to the Wanted List at the Umpires discretion. Major violations will result in the immediate elimination of the offending player.
    • Skipping: during the game, if a player has had their Target for at least a week and their Target’s status is Inactive, then that player can request (by emailing the Umpires) to Skip their Target, thus receiving their Target’s Target.
      • In the scenario where Adam --> Beth --> Charlie --> Diana, if Beth becomes Inactive and Adam has had Beth as his Target for at least a week, then Adam can request to skip Beth, and will thus receive Charlie’s Character Sheet. Now, both Beth and Charlie will be valid Targets for Adam.
      • If Adam manages to eliminate Charlie before Beth does, then he will kill both Beth and Charlie in one go (and be assigned Diana next).
      • If Beth kills Charlie first, then her status goes back to Active and Adam goes back to targeting only Beth, and Beth will now go for Diana.
      • If instead, after Adam Skips Beth nothing happens, after another week has passed Adam can request to Skip Charlie too, and receive Diana’s Character Sheet, and so on.
      • ❗❗❗Skipping will only be available to players who have signed up to our sponsor Handshake using this link (only takes 60s)❗❗❗

All players are encouraged to read and familiarize themselves with the full ruleset. However, the Extended Rules is primarily meant to cover edge cases and to provide deeper explanations of each rule: anyone who has read the Pocket Rules and can exercise common sense should be fine without consulting the Extended Rules. Still, we recommend checking out at least the following sections:

  • Section 1.6 - Timeout
  • Section 1.7 - No Force Rule
  • Section 4.1 - Out of Bounds areas
  • Section 4.3 - No-Projectile zones
  • Section 4.4 - No-Chasing zones