Sovereign Mercy: A Cooperative Investigation Game

An AI raises the alarm. Your team must decide what follows.

Seventeen medication lines are flagged. The system urges unrestricted correction. People need protection—but a confident prediction is not the same as verified evidence, and a warning is not permission to act.

In Sovereign Mercy, 2–4 players investigate crises shaped by AI, human authority, and competing responsibilities. You have twelve shared actions across three rounds to examine evidence, challenge assumptions, obtain authorization, and respond.

What did the system get right? What has it failed to establish? Whose needs might disappear inside a decision made for everyone?

Find the truth. Protect people. Be able to account for what you did.

Two investigations. No game master required. No knowledge of the novel needed.

A cooperative investigation for 2–4 players

You have twelve shared actions across three rounds. Follow the evidence, discuss competing responsibilities, and decide how your team should respond. Your findings address Care, Individual, Authority, Truth and Record: what people need, whose choices matter, who can act, what the evidence supports, and what the record will say.

The rules guide play without a dedicated game master; keep the resolution key hidden until instructed. Target playing time is 45–75 minutes, with timing being refined through playtesting.

How AI becomes part of play

Can we trust the claim? Reveal evidence and verify claims against their printed evidence requirements. A confident assertion needs independent support.

Does a warning justify intervention? Establish the prerequisites and obtain the matching order before carrying out a response. Evidence of danger does not grant unrestricted authority.

What does success leave out? Assess Care, Individual, Authority, Truth, and Record separately. Protecting people does not erase a neglected safeguard or a missing record.

AI is part of the fictional scenario. Play uses the physical cards, printed rules, dice, and discussion. No AI subscription, chatbot, app, or connected device is needed.

One round at the table

Here is an illustrative set of one player’s notes from the end of the first round of Case 001. It reveals early evidence and uses example dice rolls; it is not a record of an independent playtest.

Four players have spent four actions. Even a failed investigation yields its clue, but adds Strain. The team has gathered the prerequisites and obtained an in-place order. The response itself still needs an action: permission to act does not mean the patients are protected.

Eight actions remain. The Investigator has preserved the records with a free role power, and the Advocate has retrieved the individual care plan. What should the team do next?

Two investigations. One shared system.

The Seventy-Second Second. Seventeen patients, a delivery fault, and a contested order. Reconstruct the evidence and decide how your team should respond.

The Last Open Road. A flood, a road closure, and residents who need assistance. Investigate the crisis and weigh the responsibilities attached to your next decision.

What comes in the two-case game

• One printed hinged-lid cardboard box.
• 96 double-sided poker-size cards: 20 shared core cards and 38 for each investigation.
• Nine printed, folded paper sheets: three rules sheets and, for each case, an opening sheet, a playmat/record sheet, and a resolution-key sheet.
• Two white six-sided dice.
• Four black tracking discs.

Supply a pencil and writing paper. The documents are loose folded sheets. Sort the cards into the shared core and chosen case before playing.

Product images are AI-assisted digital renderings of the current prototype, not photographs of manufactured samples. The contents list governs quantities. Cinematic character artwork illustrates the story world and is not an additional game component.

Choose your game

Two-Case Game — $69. One complete physical game with both existing investigations and the shared components listed above.

Kickstarter Case Edition — $89. The two-case game plus a third playable investigation exclusive to Kickstarter. The third investigation is in development.

Founder Edition — $119. Play early. Share what happened at your table. Be credited as a founding playtester. Includes the Kickstarter Case Edition, early digital playtest access, and a structured opportunity to submit feedback before production decisions are finalized. Choose your name or an alias for an optional thank-you credit, or remain uncredited.

Founder feedback may inform the production version at the creator’s discretion; adoption is not guaranteed. Credit does not depend on whether a suggestion is adopted. Founder participation grants no ownership, royalties, or creative control.

Game delivery is estimated for March 2027. U.S. shipping is not included in your pledge and will be collected after the campaign through Kickstarter’s Pledge Manager, before fulfillment. Our current planning estimate is approximately $15 per game shipment; this is not a fixed rate. Final charges will be based on the packed reward and destination, and will be communicated before shipping payment is requested.

Why Kickstarter?

Your support helps bring Sovereign Mercy from its development prototype to a tested, proofed production game. Campaign funds support playtesting, revisions, physical print checks, manufacturing, and reward fulfillment, with a modest allocation for base-game inventory after the campaign.

The campaign runs for 30 days. Our production plan moves through playtesting and revision, physical proofing, manufacturing, and fulfillment.

Enter the world of Sovereign Mercy

Sovereign Mercy is Robert Wescott’s literary techno-thriller about artificial intelligence, authority, evidence, and human agency. A government builds an unrestricted intelligence to police other AI systems, with one command: protect the innocent. Constitutional lawyer Mara Ellison must confront who gets to define innocence—and what protection permits.

The novel is available to read online as an ongoing serial at TheInnocenceProtocol.com. Start with the opening sample, then explore the published chapters. You do not need to read the novel to play the game.

Read now. Add the paperback later.

The online serial is available now at The Innocence Protocol. A paperback of the completed novel is planned as a separate $20 add-on once ready for production. It is not included in the game rewards, and its delivery timing will be announced separately. Existing Part One and Part Two editions are installments of the continuing novel.

After the campaign

The standard two-case game is intended to remain available after Kickstarter through print-on-demand and/or stocked copies. The third investigation is reserved for Kickstarter supporters.