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Center & Circle Playbook ... Walkthrough ... Game
Life~Meaning ... Consciousness ... Creating Consciousness ... Quantum Biology ... Orch-OR ... TAME ... Proteins

Overview

Players: 3–5 Play Time: 90–120 minutes Age: 14+

Life Builds Meaning is a three-Act tabletop game about survival, connection, and legacy. Players begin as fragile patterns competing for stability. Over time they form relationships, build shared systems, and ultimately face escalating crises together.

The game can end in collective success or collective collapse.

There is no single winner. The final score belongs to the group.

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Components

5 Pattern Boards
1 Civilization Board (double-sided; inactive in Act One)
40 Energy Cards
30 Entropy Cards (Act One)
25 Repair Cards
15 Block Cards
20 Social Entropy Cards (Act Two)
20 Crisis Cards (Act Three)
40 Coherence Tokens
25 Legacy Cards
15 Trust Fracture Markers
1 Entropy Track Marker

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Pattern Board

Each player tracks four attributes. If any attribute reaches 0, the player enters Fragmented State.

Tracks

Regulation

Represents stability and stress tolerance.

If Regulation ≥4: reduce incoming Entropy damage by 1.
If Regulation ≤1: take +1 damage from each Entropy event.

Prediction

Represents foresight and modeling.

If Prediction ≥4: look at the top Entropy/Crisis card before it resolves.
In Acts Two and Three, you may reveal that card to others.

Belonging

Represents social integration.

In Act Two: determines number of trades per turn.
In Act Three: each 2 Belonging converts 1 personal Coherence into 2 shared Coherence.

Purpose

Represents long-term orientation.

When you voluntarily sacrifice resources for group benefit, gain 1 Legacy Card if Purpose ≥3.
In Act Three, each Legacy card may be spent to prevent or reduce Crisis damage.

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Fragmented State

When any track reaches 0:

Reduce hand size by 1.
Entropy damage against you increases by 1.
You cannot gain Legacy Cards.

You may recover by raising the track above 0 through Repair.

No player is eliminated.

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Setup

Each player selects a Pattern Archetype.
All tracks begin at 3, except one chosen specialty track begins at 4.
Shuffle Act One deck (Energy, Repair, Block combined).
Place 5 Energy cards face-up in the Energy Market row.
Shuffle Entropy Deck separately.
Set Entropy Marker to 0.

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Act Structure

The game consists of three Acts:

Act One – Persist
Act Two – Connect
Act Three – Leave Something Behind

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Act One – Persist

Competitive survival phase.

Goal

Survive 6 Entropy Rounds.

Turn Structure

On your turn:

Draw 2 cards.
Play up to 3 cards.
Take 1 Energy card from the Market (optional).

Card Types

Energy Cards

Fuel actions. Cost: free to take from Market. Use to:

Increase a track (+1 Energy per increase).
Activate certain Repair cards.
Pay costs on advanced abilities.

Repair Cards

Restore 1–2 points to a track. Some may target another player.

Block Cards

Moderate disruption. Examples:

Reserve Market – Place marker on an Energy card. Only you may take it next turn.
Redirect Entropy – Move 1 damage from you to another player.
Lock Track – Target player cannot raise chosen track next turn.
Market Disruption – Shuffle Market row.

Block cards cannot destroy a player.

Entropy Cards

Resolved at end of round for all players. Examples:

Resource Loss – Each player discards 1 card.
Instability – All players lose 1 Regulation.
Drift – Lowest Prediction loses 2.

After each Entropy resolution, advance Entropy Track by 1.

End of Act One

When Entropy Track reaches 6:

Flip Civilization Board face-up.
Each player contributes 1 Coherence to shared pool.
Discard remaining Block cards from hands.
Begin Act Two.

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Act Two – Connect

Mixed cooperation and competition.

New Elements

Social Entropy Deck replaces Entropy Deck.
Civilization Board activates.
Trust Fracture markers introduced.

Civilization Board Tracks

Infrastructure
Knowledge
Social Cohesion
Stewardship

All begin at 2.

Turn Changes

Players may trade cards up to Belonging value per turn.

If a player breaks a declared trade agreement, place 1 Trust Fracture marker.

If Trust Fractures ≥5 at any time:

Increase all future Crisis damage by +1 in Act Three.

Social Entropy Examples

Alliance Strain – All players with Belonging ≤2 lose 1.
Institutional Decay – Infrastructure −1.
Polarization – If any betrayal occurred this round, Social Cohesion −2.

Collective Threshold

When total Civilization track sum reaches 12:

All personal Coherence tokens move to center.
Personal scoring ends.
Replace Social Entropy Deck with Crisis Deck.
Begin Act Three.

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Act Three – Leave Something Behind

Fully cooperative phase.

Structure

5 Crisis Rounds.

Each round:

Reveal 1 Crisis Card.
Players may play Legacy cards or contribute Coherence to mitigate damage.
Apply unresolved damage to Civilization Board.

Crisis Examples

System Collapse – Lose 2 Infrastructure and 1 Knowledge.
Cascading Failure – Reduce lowest Civilization track by 3.
Generational Drift – If Stewardship ≤2, lose game immediately.

Legacy Cards

Examples:

Sacrifice – Prevent all damage to one track.
Teach Forward – Restore 2 Knowledge.
Institution Builder – Raise Infrastructure by 2.
Reconciliation – Remove 2 Trust Fractures.

Legacy cards are public and single-use.

Conversion Rule

For every 2 Belonging: You may convert 1 personal Coherence into 2 shared Coherence.

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Victory and Collapse

After 5 Crisis Rounds:

If no Civilization track is at 0:

Collective Success.
Score equals total Civilization track sum.

If any Civilization track reaches 0:

Collective Collapse.
The system failed to stabilize.

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Example 3-Player Walkthrough

Act One

Anna focuses on Energy and raises Regulation to 5. Ben builds Prediction and peeks at Entropy cards. Clara hoards Energy but neglects Belonging.

Entropy Round 4 hits all players with −2 Regulation. Anna survives easily. Clara enters Fragmented State.

Act One ends at Entropy 6.

Act Two

Civilization Board activates.

Ben warns group of Social Entropy targeting Knowledge. Anna trades Energy to Clara to restore Belonging. Clara betrays one trade to gain advantage, adding 1 Trust Fracture.

Civilization reaches threshold of 12.

Act Three

Crisis 1: System Collapse. Anna spends Legacy Sacrifice. Ben converts Coherence using Belonging. Clara has no Legacy cards and contributes little.

Final Civilization sum = 14.

Collective Success.

Players reflect that Clara’s early hoarding limited her Act Three impact.

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Design Intent Summary

Act One asks: How much do I take? Act Two asks: How much do I trust? Act Three asks: Was it enough?

Early selfish strength can become late weakness. Early sacrifice can become structural resilience.

The system becomes the organism.

THE CORE IDEA Each player starts as a simple pattern trying to survive. Over three acts, the game moves from competitive survival to collaborative legacy. What you do early shapes what you can contribute later — and the final score belongs to everyone.

THE THREE ACTS Act One: Persist (Layers 1-4, competitive) You are a pattern fighting entropy. Players compete for Energy tokens, Stability cards, and Repair actions. The goal is to stay coherent while others drift. Players can block, undercut, and outmaneuver each other. Nobody shares. The act ends when every player has survived a set number of entropy events. Act Two: Connect (Layers 5-8, mixed) Nervous systems emerge. Players can now trade, form alliances, and share prediction cards — but betrayal is still possible. Social bonds are built on a shared board. Institutions start forming. The tension is trust: cooperating makes everyone stronger but exposes you to being undercut. The act ends when a collective coherence threshold is reached. Act Three: Leave Something Behind (Layers 9-10, fully collaborative) All players are now elders. Personal scoring stops. The group works together against the game itself — entropy events escalate, and the board must be stabilized for a next generation. Final score is collective: what did you build, what did you repair, what did you pass on?

KEY MECHANICS The Entropy Deck A shared deck of disruption cards that fires at the end of every round. Early cards are manageable. Later cards are brutal. Players who built resilience in Act One weather them better in Act Three. Coherence Tokens Your personal currency. Gained by surviving, connecting, and contributing. Lost by isolation, hoarding, and damage. In Act Three they become the group's shared resource. Legacy Cards Earned in Acts One and Two through specific actions — teaching another player, repairing a shared resource, sacrificing personal advantage for group benefit. These are played in Act Three to unlock the group's most powerful collaborative abilities. A player who never earned Legacy cards arrives at Act Three weak despite personal wealth. Pattern Boards Each player has a personal board tracking their pattern's health across four tracks: Regulation, Prediction, Belonging, and Purpose. All four must stay above zero to remain in the game. Neglecting any one track has cascading consequences.

THE STRATEGIC TENSION The game is designed around one central dilemma that shifts across acts:

Act One asks: how much do I take? Act Two asks: how much do I trust? Act Three asks: was it enough?

A player who hoarded in Act One arrives at Act Two with resources but no relationships. A player who trusted too early in Act Two may be exploited. But a player who never learned to trust cannot contribute meaningfully in Act Three — and Act Three is where the final score is determined.

Act One Card Structure Hand size: 5 cards Draw 2 cards per turn, play up to 3

The four card categories with moderate competitive feel: 1. Energy Cards (approximately 40 in deck) Fuel everything. You spend them to take actions, repair tracks, and buy stronger cards. Players compete to collect these from a shared market — first come, first served creates natural friction without direct attack. 2. Entropy Cards (approximately 30 in deck) Drawn automatically at end of each round from the shared entropy deck. Hit everyone but land harder on weaker patterns. Nobody plays these — they just happen to everyone. 3. Repair Cards (approximately 25 in deck) Restore your four pattern board tracks. Some are personal only. A few can repair another player's track — which becomes important in Act Two when cooperation starts mattering. 4. Block Cards (approximately 15 in deck) The moderate competitive layer. You can slow a player's resource collection, redirect an entropy card toward someone else, or temporarily lock one of their tracks. You cannot directly destroy another player's pattern.

Total Act One deck: approximately 110 cards

The Energy Market A row of 5 face-up Energy cards refreshes each round. On your turn you may take one card from the market. When a card is taken, the row slides left and a new card fills the right end from the deck. This means:

Players can see what others are eyeing Letting a good card sit invites someone else to take it Timing your pick becomes a strategic decision

To add moderate competition without direct attack, two market mechanics: Blocking a Card — Once per round a player can place a Block card on a market card, reserving it for their next turn. Other players can break the block but it costs them a card from their hand. Creates friction without destruction. Market Disruption — Some Block cards don't target players directly but instead shuffle the market row, ruining someone's planned pick. Annoying but not devastating. Fits the moderate tone perfectly.

This gives Act One a competitive feel that is about positioning and timing rather than direct attack — which also sets up Act Two nicely, because players who were rivals over the market now have to decide whether to trust each other.

Life~Meaning Game