From the introduction:
You are about to enter a savage and brutal world of dark sorcery, a world where the five Witch Kings of Abalahn slew the very gods and have reigned for a thousand years.
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Blood Red Sands is a role playing game, which means simply that during play you take on the role of characters in a fictional story. You will portray their personalities, declare and describe the actions they take, advocate for their best interests, and engage in dialog with other players who are portraying their own characters. You will do this within the constraints of the setting and by the end of play will have produced a story featuring the characters your group has been portraying.
Blood Red Sands is also a competitive role playing game. Much like when playing a board game, you will be playing to win. You may find allies among the characters of the other players for a time, but in the end there can be only one. You can win as a mighty hero surviving a series of harsh ordeals before finally confronting and defeating one of the Witch Kings. Or you can win as the Witch King having earned the right to face another player’s hero and crush his pathetic attempts to destroy you.
To enjoy playing Blood Red Sands you must be willing to play to win. You must enjoy making opportunistic alliances and expecting inevitable betrayals. Success will require learning how to push your fellow players’ buttons to gain their sympathy or goad them into rash action. When playing factions you will have to play multiple characters and switch among them during play. You will want to be comfortable with the notion that, other than your hero, all characters are essentially disposable pawns to use and discard on your way to victory. You will have to maintain an awareness of the status of the game as well as the current state of the fiction and embrace the idea of allowing the actions you choose for the latter to be informed by the former. Attacking another character because that character’s player is currently winning the game or because that player attacked you unexpectedly in a previous session (with completely different characters) is the right way to play Blood Red Sands. You will want to get good at providing in-character fictional justification for actions motivated by out-of-character events. Ultimately these justifications will provide a depth to the fiction that would be difficult to achieve with such short-lived characters.
Playing Blood Red Sands will require you to be aggressive. There is no game master or moderator to ensure spotlight time is shared equitably. All players begin on an equal footing, but during play the rules are entirely unforgiving of players who are not willing to engage. You should use your turn to relentlessly drive toward your goals and actively work to thwart your opponents. Seize opportunities when they present themselves, manipulate your opponents, and put them into painful situations where they have no good options. The spirit of Blood Red Sands is to crush your enemies, see them driven before you, and hear the lamentations of their women. Wall Flowers need not apply.
Dark. Savage. Brutal. These words should be your guide as you play the game. The world of Abalahn is stark, violent, and completely over the top. It’s a world of heavy metal album covers ruled by sorcerers whose foul magic is fueled by human souls. Legions of the soulless Unliving now exist in half-lives of servitude and torment. Beyond the alabaster towers of the White Princes, scattered settlements of people struggle to survive and remain free in the midst of a desolate wasteland defiled by eldritch magic. Plundered by self-styled warlords demanding tribute, enslaved by sorcerers seeking souls to burn, hunted by vicious creatures and foul beasts of every description, and buffeted by devastating soul storms, the people are desperate for a hero.
Can you rise up above the oppressed masses, survive in a world seeking your death at every turn, and summon the courage to confront an evil powerful enough to slay gods? If so, then you are metal enough to play Blood Red Sands.