Why Your Murder Mystery PDF Is Cut to Your Group Size

Every kit is sold in three tiers: $39 for 6 to 8 players, $49 for 9 to 10, $59 for 11 to 12. You pick one at checkout, pay by card through Stripe, and within seconds a PDF built for that tier is emailed to you. Nothing is shipped, and the file is not editable, so the tier you chose is the tier you hold. The tier is not a license for a number of people; one purchase covers the whole group whatever the count inside the range. It is a description of the cast. A 6 to 8 file contains the character sheets, clues and host guide for a table of six, seven or eight. A 9 to 10 file contains more characters and the clues that go with them. An 11 to 12 file contains the full cast. So the first decision is a headcount, and it should be a real one: confirmed guests, not maybes. Count the host too if the host intends to play a suspect. If the number lands on a boundary, eight or ten, the count itself decides the tier, and the later sections explain what to do if it moves after you have bought.

Open the host guide and find the section called Adapting the game to your number of players. It lists a core cast of six roles that are always handed out, whatever your count. Then it says which roles join at eight players, which join at ten, and which join at twelve. The arithmetic follows from that. Seven players means the core six plus one of the two roles added at eight; the other added role is not handed out. Nine means the eight-player cast plus one of the two added at ten. Eleven means the ten-player cast plus one of the two added at twelve. There is no pairing rule and no need for an even number; the worked example for an odd table is in printable murder mystery for 7 players. Which added role to hand out at an odd count is the host's choice. Look at the two candidates, look at your guests, and give the sheet to the person it suits. The kit does not force a choice, because the story holds either way, for the reason the next section explains.

Two roles never leave the cast, at any count in any tier: the murderer and the key witness. Both belong to the core cast of six, which is how the guide can promise they are always present. The person who did it is always at the table, and the person whose evidence matters most is always at the table. That is the guarantee that makes the tier system safe. A host adjusting from eight to seven the day before cannot accidentally remove the culprit, because the roles left out are always drawn from the added ones, never from the core. The same rule protects the evening if the count drops after the sheets are sent: the culprit's role is reassigned to another guest rather than removed, and the story stands. It also explains why the culprit's sheet is written the way it is, telling the player what happened and what to admit or deflect. Because the role is always present, the sheet has to work in the hands of whichever guest ends up holding it, on a table of six or of twelve. What every sheet contains is listed on the printable murder mystery kit page.

A role that is not handed out does not vanish from the scenario. It stays in the story as a guest who is present but not played, and when a clue mentions that character, the host answers briefly on their behalf. The plot was written with the whole cast in it, so the unplayed roles still have a place at the dinner and, sometimes, a mention in a document. In practice this takes the host about a sentence per occurrence. A player asks where the absent character was at ten o'clock; the host, as narrator, answers briefly and moves on. The table learns quickly which characters are played and which are spoken for, and nobody has to pretend the unplayed guest is invisible. That is also why the tier matters. Inside a tier the host is speaking for at most two absent roles. A file built for twelve used at a table of six would leave the host answering for half the cast, which is a different evening and a worse one. Keeping the file matched to the tier keeps that burden small, and the guide's adaptation section tells you exactly which roles you are speaking for at your count.

The three prices, $39, $49 and $59, track the size of the cast. Each tier adds characters, and each character is a sheet with an identity, objectives, secrets and reveals round by round, plus the clues that involve them and the adjustments to the host guide. More people at the table means more writing in the file, and the price follows the writing rather than the number of guests. Per head, the tiers stay close. $39 at eight players is under $5 each; $49 at ten is under $5; $59 at twelve is under $5. At the bottom of each tier the price per head is a little higher, $6.50 at six, but the file is the same one the eight-player table receives, with the same core cast and the two added roles held in reserve. One purchase covers the group. There is no per-player fee, no account and no subscription, and the file stays yours afterward. The tier is chosen once, and the only reason to think about it again is a change in the headcount, which is the subject of the next section.

Inside the tier, nothing. A file for 6 to 8 handles six, seven or eight through the adaptation section, and a drop from eight to seven the day before means one added role is not handed out. The practical triage for late changes, including a guest who cancels after the sheets went out, is in murder mystery flexible guest count. Across a tier boundary, write to us. If you bought the 6 to 8 file and two more people confirmed, so that you now have ten, send an email to contact@murdertoorder.com with the address you ordered with, the name of the kit and the new count, and it will be sorted out from there. Do the same if the count fell below your tier. Do not try to stretch a file across a boundary by inventing a character; the cast was written as a whole, and an invented role has no clues, no reveals and no place in the solution. Write early. The PDF is generated in seconds, but a host printing the night before does not want to be waiting on an email, and the sooner the count is settled, the sooner the sheets can go out to the right number of people.

It sounds simpler to sell one PDF containing every role for every size and let the host pick. It would be worse on three counts. Waste first. A host with six guests would print, sort and then discard the sheets and clues for six characters who are not coming, and would pay for a file twice the size of the one they need. Spoilers second. A host who has to sort the full cast reads every sheet in the process, and the more secrets the host carries beyond the solution, the harder it is to answer for a non-player character without giving something away. Confusion third. Clues written for a twelve-player table refer to characters a six-player table has never heard of, and the host ends up explaining absences all evening instead of running rounds. A file cut to the tier avoids all three: the host prints what the table needs, reads only what the guide requires, and speaks for at most two absent roles. The file is still yours to reprint for another private group at the same size, as the license allows and as reprinting a murder mystery kit for another group explains. Every scenario on the murder mystery kits page is sold the same way: pick the tier that matches your table, and the file arrives built for it.