A Day With The Assassins’ Guild

Ever wondered what it feels like to deliver a fatal blow with a rolled up newspaper? To poison an arch enemy with a marmite mixer in their May week Pimm’s? Or to infiltrate King’s College and cause bloodied mayhem armed with fairy dust alone? No, we can’t honestly say that we’ve been having these kinds of thoughts either but it’s good to know that if there are any budding psychopaths in our midst, the Assassins Guild provides an outlet for their carnage so we can all sleep safely tonight. Of course you don’t have to be the next Hannibal Lecter to join the Guild, assault by rotten banana just sounds like old school fun! And now this can be achieved without a trip to the college dean or local penitentiary. 

The aim of the May week game, unlike the more spycatcher-esque Michaelmas and Lent term games is all out comic terrorism. Every player has to give their address so they can be hunted down and the aim is to ‘kill’ as many of the other players as possible in the week using the most imaginative methods. At first we were alarmed by the thought of giving out addresses but the Assassins’ website clearly states, ‘If you believe there is a real life psychopath trying to kill you, explain to the Umpire and you will be excused’– that gets rid of all your worries then! More points are awarded for killing the most respected players, so you can’t simply pick on the same Bambi-eyed fresher every day. The game offers the chance to qualify with an MA or PhD, that is ‘Master Assassin’ or ‘Paranoia hardened Death-master’ but you have to be one hardcore hitman to be awarded either of these. 

So what exactly makes a good assassin? There are two ways to play the game and each requires different shades of evil. You can do it the Al Capone way, all guns blazing, true sadism with a super soaker XP 310. On the other hand, you could take the stealth approach, being innovative with weaponry and lulling your victim into a false sense of security. We would suggest that this is the approach taken in this week’s game by a player named ‘the Duke’ who got into bed with ‘Pollux Castlerock’ and ‘Chandler mews’, both of whom died of shock…we can only speculate about the exact happenings but think it is perhaps better to live in blissful ignorance! Of course, having a good if somewhat eccentric sense of humour is the most important trait of an assassin. This is reflected in the novelty items that have been used as weapons by participants over the years. From the sublime to the ridiculous to the…mini vacuum cleaner as a soul sucker; leek; trident; killer toy octopuses and perhaps our all time favourite…plastic dinosaurs coated in Vaseline and inserted into the keyholes of unsuspecting victims. Although there is no definitive right way of being a successful assassin, we can certainly tell you what is the wrong way…a certain incident at 11.03am on Suicide Sunday involving a player ‘shooting himself in his own arse’ and thus justifying the name ‘Suicide Sunday’ on a whole new level!