
- BGG rank
- BGG #6,210
- BGG rating
- 6.5
Fairytale Gloom
- 2–5 players
- 30–60 min
- Complexity 1.6/5
- 2015

Rules assistance for Gloom: Unquiet Dead
Plain-language explanations of turns, card effects and disputed situations, with official source references and saved question history.

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Answers come from the official rulebook, with the page to check.
Gloom: Unquiet Dead is an expansion for Gloom released in 2013 for 2–4 players, 60 minutes per game, and ages 13 and up. It was designed by Keith Baker and its main mechanics are Hand Management, Take That, and Storytelling.
Publisher Blurb: The Game of Inauspicious Incidents and Grave Consequences! In the Gloom card game, you make your eccentric family of misfits suffer the greatest tragedies possible before helping them pass on to the well-deserved respite of death. Just mix the 55 transparent cards in this set together with your copy of Gloom to add morbid new Modifiers, Events, and Untimely Deaths. Unquiet Dead also introduces Stories, Undead, and Timing Symbols. The families of Gloom have many skeletons in their closets. In Unquiet Dead, the spooks come out to play. Mad scientists can Reanimate Relatives or Invent Invisibility. Vampires and shape shifters can Terrorize the Townsfolk and Go Mad in the Moonlight. Will you Give Up the Ghost, or will you hold onto it? STORIES: These cards give your families even more to fight over. Whoever claims a story gains a special benefit ... but how long can you keep it? UNDEAD: There are seven special Modifiers that allow a Character to become a supernatural creature -- a vampire, mummy, ghost, ghoul, wereduck, invisible person, or haunted portrait. These Undead Characters are both living and dead; you can still play Modifiers and Events on them, but they also count toward your Family Value and toward ending the game. TIMING SYMBOLS: Card effects in Unquiet Dead have symbols to let you know whether a card has an Instant effect that occurs when the card is played from your hand; an Ongoing effect that lasts until it is covered by another card; or a Persistent effect that can last as long as the Character is still alive ... or Undead.
Gloom: Unquiet Dead supports 2–4 players according to the catalogue. This range comes from the publisher’s listed player count, so the game can be set up for any group size within it. Some setups, rules and scoring details may still vary by player count, so check your edition’s rulebook for the exact configuration.
The listed playing time for Gloom: Unquiet Dead is 60 minutes. This is the publisher’s estimate for a full game. The actual duration depends on the group, the player count and familiarity with the rules: first sessions usually run longer, while experienced groups often finish faster. Setup and teaching time are not included in this estimate.
The catalogue lists Gloom: Unquiet Dead for ages 13 and up. This is the publisher’s recommendation and reflects reading demands, rule complexity and small components rather than theme alone. Younger players can often join with help from an adult, so check the age guidance on your edition and consider your group’s experience with board games.
Gloom: Unquiet Dead has a complexity rating of 1.8 out of 5 from BoardGameGeek players, which makes it a light game. The rating reflects how much rules knowledge, planning and decision-making a typical game demands. Expect a longer first teach for heavier games, and use a preparation guide before game night.
Gloom: Unquiet Dead belongs to these categories: Card Game, Humor, and Expansion for Base-game. Its main mechanics are Hand Management, Take That, and Storytelling. Categories describe the theme and setting of a game, while mechanics describe what players actually do on their turns. Each mechanic links to a catalogue hub with similar games, which helps when you want something comparable.
The credited designers of Gloom: Unquiet Dead are: Keith Baker. These credits come from the published game data and name the people responsible for the game’s design, not its illustrators or publishers. Designer pages on MeepleRules collect other titles by the same designers, which helps when you enjoy a game and want to find similar ones.
The catalogue lists Gloom: Unquiet Dead as an expansion for Gloom. Expansions add new content, rules or scenarios to the base game and usually cannot be played on their own, so you need Gloom to use it. Check that your edition of Gloom is compatible, as some expansions were revised between editions.