Boil Order — Municipal Water Utility Edition

Digital Download

Game Creator: Philippe Borremans / RiskComms FZCO

Estimated Time to Play: 90–120 minutes

Number of Players: 5–8 players plus a facilitator

Roles (8):

Director of Public Communications, General Manager, City Public Health Officer, Mayor's Representative, Chief Engineer, Legal Counsel (optional), Community Liaison (optional), State Regulator Contact (optional)

Game Description:

Boil Order is a tabletop crisis simulation built around a cyberattack on a municipal water treatment plant — and the 88-minute window of anomalous commands that may or may not have altered chlorination levels for a city of 410,000. Players don't get to wait for the lab result. The technical answer arrives on its own schedule, far slower than the news cycle, and the simulation forces a choice between two failure modes: warn too early and risk panic over water that turns out to be safe, or wait for certainty and risk becoming the utility that let a city drink unconfirmed water for half a day. The Public Health Officer's independent authority to issue her own advisory keeps the pressure real — if the utility doesn't act, someone else acts for it.

Features:

•      Externally-controlled uncertainty mechanic — the Contamination Uncertainty tracker moves on the engineering team's testing schedule, not the communicator's decisions; players must issue guidance before the technical answer exists, and the facilitator alone controls when — or whether — it resolves in their favor.

•      Dual-authority structural threat — the City Public Health Officer can issue an independent boil-water advisory at any point, stripping the utility of its own narrative if it hesitates too long.

•      A regulatory clock layered inside the crisis clock — a real six-hour mandatory reporting deadline (Round 2) runs underneath the 40-hour session clock, forcing a high-stakes decision before the table has its footing.

•      Equity-under-pressure design — 34% of the affected population's primary language isn't English, and every late or English-only communication decision costs trust that's modeled explicitly, not just implied.

•      Facilitator-driven escalation — a 10-round, 40-hour clock moving from the advisory decision itself, through impact and equity gaps, to whether the eventual all-clear is believed.

•      Four distinct endgame states — Managed but Damaged, Narrative Lock-In, Dr. Kwon's Advisory, or Trusted Under Pressure — with no outcome in which every objective is achieved.

•      Scalable — runs with 5 players doubling up on roles or a full 8-person table; the Director of Public Communications role should never be cut.

Game requires 1d6 and 1d10 (not included with digital download; free online dice rollers work).