Summary
One player tends bar. Other players enter one at a time as customers, each with a distinct character, problem, or emotional state. The bartender must adapt to each customer — matching energy, deflecting, philosophizing, or ignoring as their bartender character dictates. Customers can overlap, creating a full bar scene with competing needs. The game is less about plot and more about the bartender’s relationship management. Teaches listening, status play, and character consistency under varied circumstances.
Example
Bartender is a no-nonsense type. First customer enters in a full existential crisis. Bartender: “Whiskey?” Customer: “I don’t know who I am anymore.” Bartender: “Whiskey.” Second customer enters ecstatically in love. Bartender treats both with identical stoic efficiency. Third customer enters and they know the bartender personally — now the dynamic shifts.