18 Card RPG is a semi-cooperative storytelling card game in which players work together to tell a story while individually working to complete their characters' personal goals. Players will choose attributes and goals for their characters from a hand of cards and will then pick from one of two scenarios: "Lab of the Mad Wizard" or "Shopping with Humans."

On a player's turn, the other players pick one of the active character's attributes and one of her goals and narrate a scene of how that attribute gets the character into trouble while she pursues the goal. Then, the active player must describe the character's attempt to get out of that trouble and meet the selected goal using her other attribute.

For example, let's say your group is playing the scenario "Lab of the Mad Wizard." Your character has the attributes "Short term memory loss" and "Sarcasm" and the goals of "Needs to burn the place down (even just a little bit)" and "Wants to hurt the feelings of character on right." The other players might narrate a scene in which you completely forget where you are and what you are doing and then notice a book of matches on the table. You start playing with the matches, which draws the attention of a quivering tower of sentient slime who wants to swallow you and your pretty matches. Now you must narrate your character's effort to get out of this situation using her sarcasm while she tries to meet her goal of burning the place down. Can you manage to crack a sarcastic remark that gets you away from the monster while lighting fire to something?

More importantly, can you tell the tale convincingly enough that the other players will vote for your success? They will decide if your attempt was successful or not and whether or not your goal was met, and they will narrate the results accordingly.

Players WIN who manage to meet the goals of their characters before four rounds have passed, and they celebrate by narrating the fates of their characters freely. Players LOSE whose character's goals are not met before the end of four rounds, and they must narrate the deaths of their characters.

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