How to play Dead Drop
A plain-language guide to the teams, daily choices, evidence, roles, and Cold War terms.
The 60-second version
Dead Drop is a hidden-role game for 6–10 friends, played for a few minutes each day.
- You secretly belong to the innocent Station, the mole team called the Ring, or occasionally play the neutral Defector.
- During each real day, you discuss suspects, queue one role ability, cast a public vote, and may send two private messages.
- At the daily deadline, the game resolves every ability and vote together, then publishes the results.
- The Station tries to burn every Ring mole. The Ring tries to survive until it controls the vote or reaches the final deadline.
You never need to be online when others are, not even at the deadline. Your latest saved Operation and vote are what count. If you save neither, the game uses No action and Abstain, so one absent player cannot stall the day.
The fiction, translated
The story plays out in a fictional Western intelligence office in 1961 Berlin. The screen talks like that office’s paperwork, but every themed term maps to a familiar game rule:
- The Station
- Both the Berlin intelligence office in the story and the innocent majority team. Station players hunt the hidden moles.
- The Ring
- The hidden team of Soviet moles inside the Station. Ring players know one another, share a private chat, and can try one team kill each day after Day 1.
- Officer
- A player. Every player gets a bird codename, such as OWL, when the game starts.
- Operation
- Your role ability. You choose its target during the day; it takes effect at the deadline.
- The Pouch
- The daily deadline and resolution. When the Pouch departs, the game resolves every queued Operation and vote.
- Morning Cable
- The public report after a Pouch. It records deaths, revealed factions, the final vote tally, and other public events.
- Tribunal
- The public vote to eliminate a suspect. A player the vote eliminates is recalled.
- Liquidated
- Killed by the Ring rather than by the public vote.
- Burned
- Eliminated for any reason. Burned players leave active play and join the dead-player chat, the Archive.
- Final Cable
- Your private will. If you are burned, the game publishes its current text with your death.
- Whisper
- A private one-to-one message. You may send two per day; everyone sees who exchanged a whisper, but only its participants see the text.
Teams and winning
Innocent majority
The Station
You know only your own role. Use public discussion, votes, role results, whisper traffic, and other players’ claims to find the moles.
You win when every Ring member has been burned.
Hidden mole team
The Ring
You know your fellow Ring members and their roles. You share a private Ring Channel and may coordinate one liquidation attempt per day after Day 1.
You win when living Ring members equal or outnumber the other living players, or when any Ring member survives the Day 10 Pouch.
Independent objective
The Defector
Appears only with 8 or 10 players. You are not a Ring member and do not know the moles.
You win personally by convincing the Tribunal to recall you. Your win does not end the main game.
What you do each day
One game day is one real day. There is no separate live “day phase” or “night phase.” Open the game when it suits you and work through these choices before the countdown reaches zero:
- Read what happened. The Cable tab shows the latest public Morning Cable. Your Dossier shows any private result produced by your role.
- Discuss and compare stories. Use the Station Floor for unlimited public chat. Ring members also have their hidden team chat.
- Queue your Operation. In Operations, choose the target for your role ability or choose No action. Change it as often as you like; only the final choice resolves.
- Cast a Tribunal vote. Votes are public and update live. Vote for any living player—including yourself—or Abstain, and change it before the deadline.
- Use whispers with care. Your Dossier lets you send two whispers per day. Their text is private, but the public Floor announces who whispered to whom.
- Keep your Final Cable current. Record suspicions or results in your will. It stays private unless you are burned, when the game publishes it with your faction.
- Let the deadline resolve. At the Pouch, the server works through roleblocks, protection, the Ring’s kill, information abilities, and the Tribunal vote. It then publishes the next Morning Cable and starts a new day.
Where things live
- Cable: public daily reports and previous reports.
- Floor: public chat and the live Tribunal tally.
- Dossier: your secret role, private results, Final Cable, whispers, and any interrogation.
- Operations: your role action, target, current submission, and deadline.
- Roster: everyone in the game and whether they are living or burned.
Voting, killing, and being burned
The public vote
At the Pouch, the Tribunal recalls the uniquely leading player only if they have at least ceil(living players / 3) votes. With 6 living players, that threshold is 2; with 7–9 it is 3; with 10 it is 4. A tie for first place recalls nobody. The tally records Abstain but never counts it toward first place.
Example: with 6 living players, 2 votes for OWL and 4 Abstain recalls OWL. OWL reached the threshold and is the unique player leader. Two votes for OWL and two for RAVEN recalls nobody because they tied.
The Ring’s kill
From Day 2 onward, the Ring’s order-holder may choose one non-Ring target and one living Ring performer. The performer gives up their normal Operation and visits the target. Detention, distraction, or protection can make the attempt fail. If the Ring files no valid order, no one dies.
After elimination
The game applies Tribunal recalls and successful liquidations together. The Morning Cable names each burned player, reveals their faction, and publishes their Final Cable; their exact role stays secret until the game ends. Burned players can read the living Floor but cannot sway play. They may talk in private with other burned players in the Archive.
Every role, in plain language
All roles are public knowledge, but your own role is secret. Every living player queues at most one Operation per day, and every role may choose No action.
Station role
Analyst
- What you choose
- Choose any living Officer. After the Pouch, you privately receive CLEAR or COMPROMISED.
- What to remember
- COMPROMISED usually means the Ring, but the Ringleader always reads CLEAR and a Forger can make an innocent target read COMPROMISED for one cycle. The Defector also reads CLEAR. A result is evidence, not proof.
Station role
Watcher
- What you choose
- Choose any living Officer. After the Pouch, you learn the codenames of everyone whose resolved Operation visited that target.
- What to remember
- You learn who arrived, not what they did. A visitor could be protecting, investigating, blocking, framing, or carrying out the Ring's kill. No visitors means nobody's effective Operation reached that target.
Station role
Shadow
- What you choose
- Choose another living Officer. After the Pouch, you learn which single Officer they visited, or that they stayed home.
- What to remember
- You learn the destination, not the purpose. A cancelled Operation, No action, or Lie low can all produce “stayed home.”
Station role
Safehouse Keeper
- What you choose
- Choose another living Officer. If the Ring tries to liquidate that target, the target survives.
- What to remember
- Shelter does not stop a Tribunal recall. You get a private note when your safehouse was needed; the target never learns who saved them.
Station role
Interrogator
- What you choose
- Choose another living Officer. Their Operation is cancelled, they are protected from liquidation, and a private chat opens between you after the Pouch.
- What to remember
- You cannot detain yourself or the same person on consecutive days. The chat remains open until the following Pouch, unless either participant is burned first.
Station role
Field Agent
- What you choose
- Choose any living Officer. After the Pouch, you learn how many whispers they sent and received during that day.
- What to remember
- You do not learn the messages or their counterparties. This measures private traffic; it does not reveal faction or intent.
Ring role
Ringleader
- What you choose
- Choose one living non-Ring target and one living Ring member to perform the kill. The chosen performer visits the target and gives up their normal Operation for that cycle.
- What to remember
- No liquidation occurs on Day 1. The Ringleader reads CLEAR to an Analyst. If the Ringleader dies, the earliest-joined surviving Ring member inherits the order ability and temporarily gives up their own role ability.
Ring role
Forger
- What you choose
- Choose any living Officer. If an Analyst investigates that target during the same cycle, the result is COMPROMISED regardless of their real faction.
- What to remember
- A Frame lasts one cycle and changes only the Analyst's reading. It does not change the target's faction, vote, or chance of dying. If you are named as the liquidation performer, the kill replaces your Frame.
Ring role
Honeytrap
- What you choose
- Choose another living Officer. Distract quietly cancels their queued role Operation before it resolves.
- What to remember
- The target is not notified. Distract does not cancel their vote, chat, whispers, or Final Cable. If you are named as the liquidation performer, the kill replaces your Distract.
Neutral role
Defector
- What you choose
- Choose a living Officer to place a fictional anonymous rumor about them in the Morning Cable, or choose Lie low to do nothing.
- What to remember
- Your personal goal is to get recalled by the Tribunal. A liquidation does not count. The game records your win but does not end the Station-versus-Ring contest, and your rumors are colour, not real evidence.
Which roles are in your game?
The exact set depends only on player count. There are no surprise roles outside this table.
| Players | Ring | Station | Neutral |
|---|---|---|---|
| 6 | Ringleader, Forger | Analyst, Safehouse Keeper, Field Agent ×2 | — |
| 7 | Ringleader, Forger | Analyst, Safehouse Keeper, Watcher, Field Agent ×2 | — |
| 8 | Ringleader, Forger | Analyst, Safehouse Keeper, Watcher, Field Agent ×2 | Defector |
| 9 | Ringleader, Forger, Honeytrap | Analyst, Safehouse Keeper, Watcher, Interrogator, Field Agent ×2 | — |
| 10 | Ringleader, Forger, Honeytrap | Analyst, Safehouse Keeper, Watcher, Interrogator, Shadow, Field Agent | Defector |
What happens at the deadline?
The order is public so you can reason about clashing abilities. Blocks happen before the actions they cancel; protection happens before the kill; the game reveals information only after visits and the kill settle.
- Lock submissions. The game uses the final saved Operations and votes. If the Ring named a separate performer, the liquidation replaces that player’s normal Operation.
- Detain. Detainees lose their Operation and gain protection from liquidation.
- Distract. Honeytrap targets lose their Operation and are not told.
- Frame. A Forger target now reads COMPROMISED to an Analyst this cycle.
- Shelter. The Safehouse Keeper’s protection takes hold.
- Attempt liquidation. The Ring performer visits the target; blocks or protection may stop the death.
- Produce private information. The game works out Analyst, Watcher, Shadow, and Field Agent results from what actually resolved.
- Add a Defector rumor. A queued rumor goes into the public report and carries no mechanical truth.
- Tally the Tribunal. The Tribunal recalls the unique leader only if they meet the vote threshold.
- Apply every death together. A player can be both recalled and liquidated on the same Pouch.
- Check victory. All Ring dead means a Station win; otherwise parity or the Day 10 timeout can give the Ring the win.
- Publish the Morning Cable. The game files public events, faction reveals, Final Cables, and the historical vote tally, then the next day begins if the game is not over.