One Night Werewolf rules, explained simply

People look this game up as werewolf one night, One Night Werewolf, or the single word onenight. It is the same game: one secret role each, one night of looking and swapping, then one vote. Nobody is eliminated over a long evening. The whole table plays the whole round.

Setup

The host shares a code and picks the roles. The deck is the players plus three center cards. A calm first game is two Werewolves, a Seer, a Robber, a Troublemaker, and Villagers for whatever is left. The center is why a role can be in the game without belonging to a player. The how to play page shows that setup next to the night-order cards.

The night

Everyone closes their eyes. Roles are called in a fixed order: Doppelgänger, Werewolf, Minion, Mason, Seer, Apprentice Seer, Robber, Troublemaker, Drunk, then Insomniac. Your phone wakes you for the role you were dealt, not for a card you were swapped into later. The Seer looks before the Robber and Troublemaker move cards, so a true vision can be out of date by morning. That is the puzzle, not a mistake.

The vote

You talk, then everyone votes at once for someone else. The player with the most votes dies. A tie kills everyone who tied. If nobody has more than one vote, nobody dies. A Hunter who dies takes the player they voted for with them.

Who wins

• Village wins if at least one werewolf dies. If no player is a werewolf, because the wolves are all in the center, the village wins only when nobody dies.
• Werewolves, and the Minion, win if no werewolf dies and the Tanner lives.
• The Tanner wins by dying, and the wolves do not win that round.
• A Minion with no werewolf among the players wins if anyone else dies.

Each card's exact action is on the roles page. When you want to try the round instead of rereading it, host a game.