17th of April 2026
Over easter weekend I had the opportunity to play Seven Part Pact, a game in development by Jay Dragon. This is a fascinating, intricate mess of a game and I had a blast playing it. I thought I would take the opportunity this week to vaguely get out my thoughts about the game.
Inspired by works like Earthsea and The Old Kingdom (or Abhorsen), Seven Part Pact follows the Seven Wizards of Isha - lonely and isolated men who govern and keep intact the different domains of the pact.
We played with a smaller group, missing the Necromancer (tasked with keeping the dead where they should be), the Faustian (tasked with keeping the Devil in check), and the Warlock (tasked with handling the king and politics of Isha). I played as the Sage (tasked with ensuring players encounter their destinies, and pushing for prophecies to come true), and was accompanied by the Sorceror (tasked with upkeeping and controlling the laws of magic), the Mariner (tasked with managing trade and seas of Isha), and the Hierophant (tasked with upkeeping the churches and religion of Isha).
We had a bit of a slow start to the game, as difficulties interpreting and understanding some initial rules kept us from kicking off when we originally intended. Fortunately some consultation with the playtesting server for the game enlightened us and set us on the right track. However, I suspect that rules complications and clarifications are going to occur in a game like this anytime people play for the first time - each of us had our own board, rules, and gameplay to be aware of. A game of this magnitude is just inevitably going to have rules clarifications and mistakes from first-time players.
The size of the game felt like both a pro and a con of Seven Part Pact. The asymmetric board games meant that it felt like we were playing very different games, and pushed us toward very different goals from one another, which often aligned but sometimes did not. This occasionally played well into the role-play, where two Wizards disagreed on a path of action to take, or even better, took independently opposed paths. However, I also couldn't help but feel like the asymmetric game elements also got in the way of the role-play. There is a lot to keep track of, with each player holding a 50-70 page rulebook for their Wizard and associated domain, making it easy to get sucked into focusing on just the "board game" aspect of the system. Fires feel like they need fighting constantly but resolving them was quick and did not require much role-play. However, the role-play, when it was there, felt excellent. The in-depth world-building that had occurred across several hours meant that it was easy to jump into the world and position of the characters when we were in it. But it felt like for every 10 minutes of role-play, there was 50 minutes of thinking and upkeep in between. Part of this may have been playing it for the first time and rules difficulties though, yet another reason I would love to give the game another shot (ideally with a full cadre of Wizards).
The game also has some fascinating world building - particularly when it comes to exploring gender. The rulebook strictly states that all the Wizards must be men - women don't practice magic. The rules of the pact (written in the appendix) also explicitly state: "Each wizard shall remain a man of sound mind and body", and the Warlock player has rules regarding how "Masculinity is performed and asserted through violence". When creating your character however, every Wizard has the possibility of being... "less than a man" in the eyes of the pact. Jay Dragon has done a fantastic job of this throughout the rulebook - creating tensions within the systems and hypocrisies in each and every character choice that the players almost have to address in some manner. Seven Part Pact is of itself an excellent critique of toxic masculinity, and I believe that essays could be written about just this aspect in particular.
Finally there's the magic system, which I absolutely loved. All the wizards have access to all the spells of the Grimoire, and casting them is basically guaranteed to occur, provided certain conditions are met. However, the effects of the spell vary based on a dice roll, with several different possible effects, and the more powerful and more dangerous of these are reliant on a higher roll of the dice. You roll larger dice depending on the import of the spell, with big epic spells having access to all possible outcomes, both good and bad. Each wizard also manipulates the likelihood that their respective sigil is rolled, meaning that although they all have access to the same magic, there is a higher likelihood that the outcome is flavoured to match the particular Wizard, such as the Necromancer casting spells of decay and rot.
Seven Part Pact is the kind of game that calls to you well after it has finished. I have questions about the other Wizards and the possibilities that hide within its esoteric rules. This is exactly the kind of fascinating game that is extremely difficult to organize. Finding 6 friends that are prepared to carve out the time to learn both the general rules, in addition to their own rulebook - let alone the time it takes to play the game (we played for close to 20 hours, and only played about 6 or so rounds in that time) - is a very tough ask. But it is also exactly the kind of game that it is worth taking that time for, because there is so much to explore and discover within its twisting pages.
