The Loom: System Reference Document

1. Playbook-Based Mechanics: The game's structure is driven by the capabilities and limitations outlined in these two types of playbooks, which provide a framework for gameplay.
2. Diceless Play: The outcomes and story progress from player choices, negotiation, and the interplay between Character and Domain Playbooks.
3. Collaborative Storytelling: Players share responsibilities for building the world and advancing the story, with no single Game Master to guide or dictate the narrative.
4. Thematic Contrasts: Character Playbooks and their associated Domain Playbooks offer contrasting perspectives, creating dynamic narrative tension.
5. Abstraction of Concepts: Language in the Loom is intended to be simultaneously interpretable as literal and as metaphorical. A big part of the game is thinking laterally about the way moves are written and enacted, and abstracting moves to gain surprising and unexpected flexibility in a scene.

Playbook Structure

Each playbook should begin with a short description in the following format:

The [Name] is a Character/Domain of [inherent value 1] and [inherent value 2]. They/it draw(s) their/its power from [source of strength 1] and [source of strength 2].

Example: The Lawbringer is a character of principles and structure. They draw their power from the status quo and all that comes with it.

Example 2: The Lighthouse is a place of hope and warning. It draws its power from blind trust and its historic precedent.

This introductory sentence helps establish the core themes and influences of the playbook, providing a clear foundation for its role in the narrative. It keeps playbooks consistent and clear while serving as a quick reference point for tone and content during play. The beginning of the playbook lays solid groundwork, but also serves as a set of tonal and thematic touchstones that players can refer back to over time.

Character Playbooks

A Character Playbook represents an individual character within the story. Each character helps drive storytelling for each player and for the group, serving as a core mechanism for shaping the narrative. Each Character Playbook defines:

• What the character can always do: Exactly 7 actions they can take freely at any time.
• What the character can do once per session: Exactly 6 limited-use actions that provide significant narrative weight or impact.
• What the character can never do: Exactly 6 immutable restrictions that define the character’s thematic, physical, moral, and narrative limitations.

Example: The Lawbringer

• Always: Welcome someone into the community, demonstrate expertise without pretension, grin and bear it, [plus four more…].
• Once per Session: Break a law they enforce, admit they were wrong, catch a small detail everyone else missed, [plus three more…].
• Never: Atone for the sins of the past, leave the island, [plus four more…].

Domain Playbooks

Domain Playbooks represent narrative or environmental elements of the setting. Each Domain Playbook defines:

• What the domain always is: 6 fundamental truths about this part of the world. These truths reflect the Domain's consistent presence and influence.
• What the domain can be once per session: 5 temporary characteristics or influences it can manifest, adding flexibility and dynamism to the Domain.
• What the domain never is: 5 absolute boundaries for its narrative role, ensuring it remains thematically unique and grounded.

Example: The Lighthouse

• Always: Tall, visible, bright, a beacon, [plus two more…].
• Once per Session: An early warning of danger, utterly blinding, [plus three more…].
• Never: Nearby, home, [plus three more…].

Setup

1. Playbook Pairing: Each Character Playbook is paired with a specific Domain Playbook, and vice versa: all Playbooks are paired off. This creates a dynamic interplay between individual characters and the broader narrative, thematic, and environmental elements of the world. The pairing system ensures thematic and narrative balance and contrast, and the Domains offer a shared canvas for collaborative storytelling. A player using a Character Playbook cannot directly use its associated Domain Playbook. See the “Example Interplay” section and the Appendices for more information about how Playbook pairing works.
2. Shared Domain Control: Domain Playbooks are shared among all players other than the player who is using the associated Character Playbook. Players take turns embodying or narrating Domain influence on the story. Because Domains are both literal and abstract, any Domain can be present in any scene, and players can invoke them for any duration in a scene, no matter how long or short.

Scene Creation

• Who Sets the Scene?: Players take turns establishing scenes. A scene may focus on a Character Playbook, a Domain Playbook, or the interaction between the two. Once the scene’s focus has been established, players may bring Domains and Characters in and out of the scene at will.
• Collaborative Worldbuilding: Players use the moves and traits of the Domain Playbook to flesh out the environment or introduce complications.

Resolving Actions

• Moves Framework: Players describe their actions using the "always," "once per session," and "never" moves in their Playbooks in any combination or order. Outcomes are negotiated collaboratively.
• Narrative Constraints: Moves marked as "never" are absolute and cannot be overridden, even through collaboration.

• The player controlling The Lawbringer cannot use the Lighthouse Domain Playbook. Instead, the other players narrate and embody the Lighthouse during scenes involving The Lawbringer.
• If the player acting as the Lawbringer overlooks a crucial detail, one of the other players might use the Lighthouse to signal danger ("Once per Session").
• The Lawbringer’s inability to leave the island ("Never") contrasts the Lighthouse’s inability to be nearby, leaving both in isolation in comparison to each other. The player acting as the Lighthouse in a scene might leverage this contrast in order to taunt the Lawbringer with something bright and beautiful but impossibly far away, inviting tension into the scene and narrative as the Lawbringer has to look for assistance from other characters.
• The player acting as the Lawbringer might invite the Lighthouse into a scene in order to attempt to blind someone to the truth, or to shine light on something new, but it is always up to the other players to control the Lighthouse and decide how it enters the scene (literally or metaphorically), how it acts (directly or indirectly), and how long the Domain remains present.

Character Playbooks

1. Theme: Define the character’s core identity and archetypal role in the story.
2. Always Moves: Focus on actions that reflect the character’s strengths and personality. Each character gets 7 Always moves. The seventh move should involve making space for the associated Domain to make a move. 
3. Once-per-Session Moves: Include impactful actions that emphasize the character’s narrative impact in powerful, assertive ways. Each character gets 6 Once-per-Session moves. The sixth move should involve forcibly bringing the associated Domain into a scene it was not in before. 
4. Never Moves: Establish thematic boundaries that ground the character in specific conflicts or flaws. Each character gets 6 Never moves. The sixth move should involve disregarding the associated Domain. 

Domain Playbooks

1. Theme: Identify the setting element’s narrative function (for example, a place of refuge, a source of danger).
2. Always Traits: Highlight immutable characteristics that define the domain. Each Domain gets 6 Always traits.
3. Once-per-Session Traits: Add flexible elements to create variety and surprise. Each Domain gets 5 Once-per-Session traits.
4. Never Traits: Create limitations that prevent the domain from overshadowing the narrative. Each Domain gets 5 Never traits.

If you adhere to the terms of this license, you are free to write, publish, design, and promote free or commercial material built upon the Loom System or declaring compatibility with it without the express or explicit permission of Clawhammer Games or David Gales. Art and text from any official Clawhammer products Spun on the Loom are not to be reproduced, reused, or translated without express permission. The mechanics and game rules of the Loom System may be reused freely. Your product cannot use the Clawhammer logo or brand without express permission. You are not allowed to claim or give the impression that your product is an officially licensed Clawhammer product or is endorsed by David Gales/Sylvan Lawrence unless we’ve made specific arrangements with you.

Products reusing or adapting the mechanics and game rules of the Loom system shall not include the work of generative AI nor serve as a platform for the generation, distribution, or publication of Non-Fungible Tokens ("NFTs"). You may not use the Loom system to publish content that directs hate towards protected groups.

Clawhammer Games takes no responsibility for your product and claims no ownership of it, and takes no responsibility for legal claims against your product. Any legal disputes, controversies or claims related to this license shall be governed by and construed in accordance with the laws of the United States of America and be settled by a US court. Any product reusing the mechanics and game rules of the Loom system must include the language “Spun on the Loom” on the title page of the rulebook in a manner easily visible to readers. 

The following text must be included in the legal text, somewhere visible in the publication, and on the website or storefront where you promote the product:

“[The name of this work] is an independent production by [Author or Publisher]; it is not affiliated with Clawhammer Games or David Gales. [The name of this work] is published via the Loom Third Party License.”

This copyright text must be legibly included somewhere in the product and on the storefront:

“The Loom System is copyright David Gales.”

The Lawbringer

The Lawbringer is a character of principles and structure. They draw their power from the status quo and all that comes with it.

The Lawbringer can always…

1. Welcome someone into the community
2. Laugh automatically and without conviction
3. Demonstrate their expertise without pretension
4. Grin and bear it
5. Get in way over their head
6. Be a leader, however poorly
7. Follow the path the Lighthouse illuminates

Once per session, The Lawbringer can…

1. Break a law they enforce
2. Bring the full weight of the law down upon another
3. Admit they were wrong, and apologize in full
4. Introduce someone to a different moral perspective
5. Catch a small detail everyone else missed
6. Invite the Lighthouse into a scene

The Lawbringer can never…

1. Atone for the sins of the past
2. Compromise on their morals
3. Make good on their promises in full
4. Empathize with those they oppose
5. Leave the island
6. Ignore the Lighthouse’s looming presence

The Lighthouse

The Lighthouse is a place of hope and warning. It draws its power from blind trust and its historic precedent.

The Lighthouse is always…

1. Tall
2. Visible
3. Bright
4. A beacon
5. Trustworthy
6. Stoic

Once per session, The Lighthouse can be…

1. An early warning of danger
2. Guidance through the dark
3. Utterly blinding
4. Irrefutable
5. Somewhere else

The Lighthouse is never…

1. Nearby
2. Indirect
3. Powered off
4. Operated
5. Home

The Bouncer

The Bouncer is a character of blunt force trauma and rage. They get their power from truth and direction, but they are always at risk of losing control and everything else in their life along with it.

The Bouncer can always…

1. Strike first, hard
2. Clock someone with relative accuracy
3. Improvise partial cover
4. Hurt someone unintentionally
5. Completely miss the point
6. Take the most direct route to their destination
7. Listen to The Thrum

Once per session, the Bouncer can…

1. Hurt someone intentionally, and make it last
2. Shield someone from harm, and take it on themselves
3. Barge through a seemingly insurmountable obstacle
4. Capture the essence of a moment in perfect clarity
5. Show true emotional vulnerability
6. Invite The Thrum into a scene

The Bouncer can never…

1. Forget a face
2. Allow someone get the best of them
3. Swallow their pride
4. Back down
5. Forget a mistake they have made
6. Ignore The Thrum

The Thrum

The Thrum is a domain of whispers and shouts. It draws its power from its inherent plurality and its cacophonous silence, both made manifest through the thousands of voices speaking at once.

The Thrum is always…

1. Taking two steps forward
2. Looking one step back
3. Both cryptic and accessible
4. Spreading lies
5. Telling truths
6. Waiting for just the right person to come along

Once per session, The Thrum can be…

1. Channeled through a specific person
2. Felt clearly, and therefore understood
3. Unbearably noisy
4. Unbearably quiet
5. All too familiar

The Thrum is never…

1. Empirical
2. Provable
3. Harmless
4. Individual
5. Intentional