Characters / Inscryption

All spoilers are unmarked. You Have Been Warned!

Protagonists

Luke Carder

"Hey there, card gamers, I'm The Lucky Carder!"

The Player and real-world protagonist. The host of the online show "The Lucky Carder," he finds some map coordinates written on cards he bought at a garage sale, leading to a buried floppy disc that contains a video game adaption of the card game Inscryption. He decides to record himself playing it but finds himself thrown into a world of secrets and danger.

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• Boom, Headshot!: What happens to him when GameFuna decides he knows too much.
• Curiosity Killed the Cast: He's given lots of clues and even some outright warnings that continuing to play and investigate the game will end badly for him, but he doesn't stop. Sure enough, he's killed at the end to protect GameFuna's secrets.
• Dark and Troubled Past: Relatively anyway. After facing the Archivist in act 3, you can find photos from Luke's computer hidden around the map. They reveal that he had a sister who tragically died, and that he began doing his "Lucky Carder" show as a way to cope with her death.
• Dead-Hand Shot: After Amanda the GameFuna representative blasts his face apart and the camera falls, this is all we see along with a giant blood pool. No twitching or struggling to stay alive.
• Dead Man Writing: Invoked with his confession cam when he hears someone sneaking around late at night. As Luke's phone is in another room, he makes a recording for someone to use if he dies.
• Dropped a Bridge on Him: Is unceremoniously killed at the end of the game.
• Fatal Flaw: Curiosity. Throughout the game, it is made clear that Luke is dealing with forces, in terms of both the supernatural and the mundane, that are far beyond him. The safest thing Luke could have done is simply stop playing the game and turn it back over to GameFuna, an option that was presented to him at the very beginning. His insistence on uncovering the secrets of Inscryption, in spite of the increasingly obvious danger he's in, is what ultimately nearly drives him insane and gets him killed.
• Foreshadowing: During Act 3, all of your cards are presented as floppy discs being rewritten and edited by P03 as you travel through its campaign. To free up space on your side of the playing field, you use the hammer that is on the game table to manually destroy the card. After being forced to witness the OLD_DATA, Luke panics and attempts to destroy the floppy disc containing Inscryption with a hammer, just like in the game.
• Genre Blindness: After discovering an obscure, surreal game which appears to hold a dark secret, what does Luke do? Why, contact the same video game company that created this game of course! By the time he realizes that they have no interest in helping him whatsoever and attempts to go public with his findings, they have already gotten fed up with him and he is killed by them to cover up their tracks. Then again, going by real world logic, contacting the video game developer was arguably the most sensible action he could take — he just didn't realize he was in a psychological horror game with mystery elements and that it wasn't the in-game characters who were the real threat but the company that created them (and whatever OLD_DATA is) in the first place.
• Gory Discretion Shot: Amanda blows his head wide open at the end of the game to keep the secrets of her company and the OLD_DATA safe, but all we see is the camera's POV and a rapidly spreading pool of blood.
• Idiot Ball: He just opens the door for the secret agent sent to kill him, after previously using a large amount of caution when talking to her and making a video where he says he expects he might get killed.
• Ironic Name: In spite of his online show being named "The Lucky Carder", the few videos we see of him opening card packs don't paint a very lucky image of himself at all, with him only acquiring a single rare card which didn't have much value anyway. And given what happens to him by the end of the game, the name becomes even more ironic.
• Killed Mid-Sentence: "I told you-" (BLAM)
• No Good Deed Goes Unpunished: After Inscryption's deletion, he attempts to bring the secret behind the "OLD_DATA" to life and the content GameFuna hid in it. He gets shot in the head in his own home for his trouble.
• Non-Action Guy: He might be a pretty skilled card player with some tech-savvy knowledge who can beat the in-game characters of Inscryption through his card game abilities, but in "real life", he's an Unlucky Everydude who is both incapable of fighting and unwilling to do so, given how the moment GameFuna comes after him, he hides from them and avoids direct contact as much as possible. When he is finally confronted by Amanda in the ending, he dies without even having the possibility to run or fight back. Not that she gave him a chance.
• Precision F-Strike: Ends several videos with a completely justified "What the fuck?" When hearing someone sneak around his house at night, he says "Fuck this." These go uncensored, while P03's swearing in-game is.
• Punny Name: Alongside Ironic Name above, his online show is a pun on his full name, "Luke Carder", and the word "Lucky" in place of the first name. Also, "Carder" is both a normal surname and a word used to designate a person who deals with card information and data.
• Shirtless Scene: Isn't wearing a shirt when filming his late-night video. Justified: He was awoken when he heard noises and likely sleeps shirtless.
• Undignified Death: He furiously answers the door when he realizes that Amanda has returned for the game. He doesn't get out more than "I told you-" before Amanda rudely interrupts him by casually splattering his blood and brains all over his own floor without so much as a "hello" before coldly walking over him immediately after pulling the trigger to get what she came here for. End of recording.
• Unlucky Everydude: He's a normal card game reviewer and pack opener who went into a scavenger hunt after receiving a bunch of coordinates in one of the packs he bought in a garage sale and ended up biting much more than he can swallow.
• Wrong Genre Savvy: He fails to understand the kind of story he's in, only coming close as his paranoia over GameFuna mounts and he thinks Amanda is going to try and kill him. By the end of the game he's backslid and seems to think that she's simply just going to pester him for the game until he caves, having mistakenly begun to think of her as a Harmless Villain. She's not.

The Challenger(s)

The in-universe protagonist of Inscryption, a person who wishes to defeat and replace one of the four Scrybes. In Act 1, they are imprisoned by Leshy in his cabin, and must win his game if they hope to escape. Losing challengers are killed and turned into death cards, then replaced by a new challenger. In Act 2, they are returned to the normal game and must traverse the world to defeat the four Scrybes and their subordinates. Finally, Act 3 sees them imprisoned by P03 and forced to play his game.

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• Ambiguous Gender: The challenger is referred to with singular they pronouns, presumably to allow players of any gender to project themselves into them. In translations of the game in languages that use gendered nouns, the challenger is instead referred to as whatever gender their player model is flagged as, with five masculine options and three feminine ones.
• Eye Scream: After gaining access to the knife item in Act 1, the Challenger can use it as a one-time chunk of damage to literally tip the scale towards victory. However, they do this by gouging out their right eye and placing it on the scale, complete with a lack of any vision on the right portion of the screen. Leshy immediately gives them a replacement if they win the round, however.
• Featureless Protagonist: Only their arms are seen in the first-person segments, and while they do get one of several sprites in Act 2, they are still not developed beyond being someone who wants to replace one of the four Scrybes. This is intentional, as the characters are revealed to not be speaking to the challenger, but to Luke Carder himself. As the challenger is nothing more than a blank slate for the player (Luke in this case) to project onto, the Scrybes do not see them as a real person. Hence why Leshy believes it is okay for him to torment and kill challengers just to provide a fun experience for the player — he knows that he is not actually harming a real person, and he shows no ill-will, either.
• Forced Transformation: Any challenger who loses in Act 1 is turned into a death card.
• Heroic Mime: They speak no words throughout the game whatsoever.
• Rogue Protagonist: In a sense — each challenger who loses is turned into a death card by Leshy, and in the second phase of his fight, he can potentially unleash some of these same cards against the current challenger. He can also use some death cards for other people.
• The Tooth Hurts: Early in the progression of Act 1, Leshy will give the Challenger a pair of pliers, which will give the player a single extra point of damage when used. However, as damage in the Act 1 portion of the game is represented by golden teeth on a scale, the Challenger literally digs into their mouth and yanks out a tooth for the scale, complete with a high-pitched tone implying that it is, indeed, VERY painful.

The Game Master and his Talking Cards

General

The Scrybes

Clockwise from the top-left: Grimora, Leshy, Magnificus and P03

The collective main antagonists of the game. The Scrybes are the masters of Inscryption, with each having their own domain of cards that they rule over. Whatever harmony there once was between them has long since gone, as each Scrybe faces off with the others for complete control over their world. In Act 1, Leshy has attained complete control of the game and has turned the other three into cards — Stoat, Stinkbug, and Stunted Wolf. In Act 2, they are freed and serve as the main bosses of the four areas. In Act 3, P03 has become the new game master, but the other three are still out there.

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• Affably Evil: Aside from P03, the Scrybes are generally quite cordial towards Luke despite their ambitions, and during the climax they each give him a warm handshake as a final show of respect (or in Magnificus' case, try to do so).
• Alas, Poor Villain: Despite all the terrible things they all do, their slow death by deletion is treated in a very tragic light, with each of them playing a last card game with you just to have some fun and being dismayed when they are unable to finish it. The only exception is P03, who is a Jerkass and gets quickly killed by decapitation (and even then, he survives).
  • Special mention to Leshy's demise, when the rustic cabin atmosphere of the first act returns at the end of the game, it's much more nostalgic than terrifying, especially now that the player is given context as to how the game works.
• Big Bad Ensemble: At first, it seems that the Game Master is the sole villain as the one running the titular Deadly Game and killing you if you lose. But Leshy is just one of the four Scrybes — the other three being Grimora, Magnificus, and P03 — and all of them are competing with each other to gain control of the game and carry out their nefarious agendas, with Leshy and P03 getting the most focus.
• Corrupted Character Copy: They are meant to parallel the Gym Leaders and Elite Four from the Pokémon franchise, as boss characters who each have mastery over a certain type of Mon and must be defeated in your journey To Be a Master. In particular, they most closely resemble the four Grand Masters from Pokémon Trading Card Game, who have the same purpose. But while the Pokémon characters are Hero Antagonists who only want to test your skills and are friendly otherwise, the Scrybes are the power-hungry villains who do not want to be replaced and spend the story competing with each other to hijack the game and prevent that from happening.
• The Dog Was the Mastermind: The three talking cards — Stoat, Stinkbug, and Stunted Wolf — who aid you in escaping from the Game Master and seem to be nothing but his helpless victims are revealed in Act 2 to be his fellow Scrybes who were using you to break free from their Forced Transformation only so they could carry out their own plans against each other.
• Elite Four: The four Scrybes are the masters of the titular card game, each having dominion over one of the four card types (Beasts, Undead, Magickal, and Technology), and in Act 2 are the main bosses the challenger must defeat To Be a Master. Though unlike the Pokémon Elite Four by which they are inspired, you fight each in a separate location akin to Gym Leaders, and the "champion" is simply whichever Scrybe you decide to replace after beating them all once. They're also the Big Bad Ensemble competing for control of the game world.
• Evil Versus Evil: None of the Scrybes in the game are terribly good people, with Leshy holding you captive as a Killer Game Master and the Stoat/P03, in particular, somewhat of a standout Jerkass among your allies. They a bunch of ambitious infighting figures, with Leshy having turned his allies into cards, P03 taking things over after, and Grimora not hesitating to wipe all of them from existence. Magnificus doesn't do anything to screw over the player, but the abuse he heaps upon his students makes him just as malicious as the rest of the Scrybes.
• Forced Transformation: The talking cards were Leshy's equals before he took pictures of them, turning them into cards. But on top of being turned into cards, their images were morphed into animals. As you continue to play, they slowly begin to revert back into their old forms (though still remaining cards). Stoat is P03, a TV Head Robot, Stinkbug is the Necromancer Grimora, and Stunted Wolf is a Wizard Classic and Plant Person. Also, at the end of Act 1, the challenger gets to turn Leshy himself into a card as well.
  Stunted Wolf: How has it been?
  Stoat: It has been quite bad. I am trapped in the body of a stoat in the paper of a card.
• Gambit Pileup: The entire game is the result of the Scrybes trying to outmaneuver each other, with each one scoring at least one big victory throughout the story.
• Post-Final Boss: After P03 is dealt with and Grimora decides to delete the game itself, the three remaining Scrybes each challenge the player to a card match as the world ends… which are each unfortunately cut short when their files are removed. It is pretty much impossible to lose to any of them. Magnificus doesn't even get the chance to shake your hand farewell.
• Reality Warper: Whichever of the four Scrybes obtains the OLD_DATA becomes this, allowing them to take control of the game world and become the new game master. Leshy, for example, seems to have shades of this, especially in the final boss. One moment you are staring down at the map and suddenly you are the piece on the map.
• Theme Naming: The cards which the three Scrybes are turned into each begin with an "S" and a "T."
• Treacherous Advisor: The three talking cards — Stoat, Stinkbug and Stunted Wolf — aid you in Act 1 against their captor by giving you advice on how to play your cards and hinting on how to solve the puzzles. Come Act 2, and it turns out they were using you to get rid of Leshy so they could control the game themselves, with Stoat/P03 showing no gratitude for you saving him.
• Two Aliases, One Character: The four Scrybes are formally introduced in Act 2, and it is not until you beat Leshy that it is revealed the other three were the talking cards from Act 1 — Stoat, Stinkbug, and Stunted Wolf.
• Walking Spoiler: It's flat-out impossible to talk about this game's story without bringing up the fact that the Stoat, the Stinkbug, and the Stunted Wolf are Scrybes and the Game Master's equals. These four have many, many twists tied to them that change one's perspective of the story, to the point where knowing what they look like or what their names are both constitute a spoiler.

The Game Master

Leshy, Scrybe of Beasts

"Sacrifices must be made."

^{Click here to get a better look at him.} 
"You found yourself standing before your ultimate match: Leshy, Scrybe of Beasts."

The shadowy figure that is keeping the challenger in his cabin, forcing them to play his game. When they fully lose, it means their death by his mysterious camera and a new player to take their place at the table. He is actually the Scrybe of Beasts, who took over the game from his fellow Scrybes and turned them into cards with his camera. His goal is to keep playing with the challenger forever and ever.

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• A Dog Named "Dog": A leshy in Slavic folklore is a forest spirit who resembles a man and sometimes abducts people. Which is exactly what Leshy is, meaning he is possibly an actual leshy.
• Adaptational Nice Guy: In the Sacrifices Must Be Made prototype demo, he was downright sadistic, forcing a starving person into a card game in order to eat something. If they beat him, he'll force them to either sacrifice themselves to their equally starving child, or eat the child as a sacrifice. In the actual game, he's an Anti-Villain who plays against the protagonist for much less sadistic reasons than that.
• Affably Evil: At times. He traps people's souls in cards, including his own colleagues, sure, but it's shown that he does care about being an accommodating host and putting on a fun, entertaining game. He gave the Woodcarver a much bigger role to play than she did originally, allows you to solve puzzles in his cabin, and even kept the Scrybes on as a presence in his game when he didn't need to. After beating him in Act 2, he will express some regret for his actions against P03, stating he believes that life as a beast card is noble, even one as lowly as a Stoat.
• All Your Powers Combined: In the finale of his game, he uses the gimmicks of the Prospector, Angler, and Trader in the first two rounds.
• Anti-Villain: Type II and III. Despite his scary role as the first main villain, Leshy's awareness of the game he's in and his own Blue-and-Orange Morality prevents him from being truly irredeemable. Sure, his games may have mechanics of removing eyes and teeth, and anyone who loses gets their soul turned into a card, but it's not like he's hurting "real" people, only programs that are replaced without consequence after every Game Over. He may have usurped power over his fellow Scrybes, but that was just to maintain a status quo that threatened the plans of two of them (P03 wanted to spread Inscryption to the internet, and Grimora wanted to destroy everything on the disc — including herself). In the end, much of the scary woodland atmosphere in Act 1 is just that, atmosphere to keep the player invested and the game running. He had no grand evil schemes; he just wanted to enjoy sharing a fun roleplaying experience with the player, nothing more.
• Arc Villain: He turns out NOT to be the Big Bad of the entire game, merely the first chapter.
• The Beastmaster: Most of his cards are based around animals both realistic and abstract. It comes with the job description as the Scrybe of Beasts.
• Blue-and-Orange Morality: Tracking out his morality is rather tricky, due to the fact that he seems to be aware of his status as a video game character. He plays a game that encourages the player character to rip out teeth or their own eyes, but he also seems to be aware of the fact that he's not doing it to a "real" person. Towards the end of the first act, he seems confused and outraged at the idea that the player would genuinely want to lift a hand against him: after all, from his perspective, all he did was put on a good show that didn't actually harm anyone. With regards to the other Scrybes he turned into cards, he does express some dismay that they couldn't find joy in the simple, noble life of an animal.
• By the Lights of Their Eyes: Most of the time, the only features you can make out are his eyes. The rest of his face is cloaked in darkness. Until his boss fight.
• Dark Is Evil/Dark Is Not Evil: Leshy's atmosphere is unambiguously shadowy and he spends much of Act 1 concealed in darkness, but his moral ambiguity leaves the question of whether he's truly evil up in the air.
• Deadpan Snarker: Shows a minor shade of this when he stops the Limoncello from ramming into his table during the Royal fight in Kaycee's Mod.
  The Game Master, on your first attempt: That's far enough.
  The Game Master, on subsequent runs: I won't let you destroy my table.
• Didn't Think This Through: As climactic as summoning the moon is for a final boss, he forgot to give it immunity to Stinky and Touch of Death, making it a Zero-Effort Boss if you have the right sigil.
  The Game Master: This is not how I imagined this battle going...
• Disposing of a Body: Has the original bodies of the other Scrybes poorly hidden behind some crates behind the door in his cabin.
• Disc-One Final Boss: Beating his game and sealing him away into his own card is just the beginning...
  • Mostly averted in Kaycee's Mod, as he will always be the Final Boss of any run… until you unlock the "Final Boss" challenge, which when activated, will replace Leshy with a skeletal pirate known as Royal Dominguez.
• Druid: The game he plays with you and his motif appears to be a darker version of one, his cards are all themed after animals and he wields plenty of totems based on beasts to empower them against you in certain fights, but he also shows signs of more horror-themed druids with many of the cards and events making it clear that sacrifices must be made if you wish to wield and enhance these powers. As the Scrybe of Beasts, it makes sense that his cards and deck would be themed after animals, given that his camera was used to capture actual animals to use as cards in the game. It's even reflected in the achievement for beating him in Act 2: Avenging Druid.
• Foil: To P03. Both are Scrybes that manage to take control of the game and enjoy playing against the challenger, but that's where the similarities end. Leshy is polite to the Player and allows them to roam his cabin; P03 shackles the Player to the table until he needs the Player to get something to continue the game. Leshy is disappointed whenever a challenger fails to defeat him, while P03 is visibly disgruntled when they do manage to defeat him. Leshy cares more about atmosphere and storytelling than game balance, allowing the player to use several different Gamebreakers. P03 cares a lot about game balance, but is a terrible storyteller. P03 is the one who is playing out of self-preservation, whereas Leshy is the one playing solely to play.
• Given Name Reveal: Talking to Goobert in Act 1 reveals that his name is Leshy. Just in case you did not do that, Act 2 onward has him referred to by this name.
• The GM Is a Cheating Bastard: Downplayed. Leshy might use plenty of quirks and tricks during his games, but he avoids outright cheating and allows for complete card freedom and construction with the only limitation being RNG, so he won't complain if one of your cards ends up breaking his game and one-shotting his moon for example. That being said, him filling his entire board side with bears if you start beating a boss before advancing the storyline is blatant cheating on his part.
• Heel Realization: During his last game with you, Leshy admits that once someone finds the things they want to do, there never seems to be enough time to do them. If you attempted to take over his place as a Scrybe, he also seems bothered for a second, but then snaps out of it and is more sad than angry that things went the way they did, showing that, for all his ambition, he truly wanted to enjoy a game with the player, and because of the infighting and conflicts between the Scrybes, including him, he will never be able to do that anymore.
• Hostile Show Takeover: He successfully did this before you entered the picture. In fact, it's implied by all the 3D aspects for Inscryption that this is an intentional part of the game, with each Scrybe having a modeled version of their environment (Leshy's Cabin, P03's Factory, Grimora's Crypt, and Magnificus' arena), place to put the new game button (Leshy's Side room and P03's container), ways of interpreting their minions and NPCs (Masks and P03's screen), and even 3d variants for their card systems.
• It Has Been an Honor: In his last moments, Leshy thanks the player for playing with him and reaffirms that he enjoyed spending his time with them, giving them one last "good game" before he's deleted.
• Killer Game Master: Zig-Zagged. The shrouded entity you face in this game has ill intent, and it shows in the tutorial with some of their actions, but they are equal parts fair and cruel. One notable example is, upon reaching a boss fight with more than one flame on your candle for the first time, the entity will extinguish all but one flame, leaving you one shot to beat the boss. However, for every flame they extinguish, you gain a "The Smoke" card, a 0/1 card which grants 4 extra bones upon death which can be permanently upgraded into "Greater Smoke" by solving some puzzles in the cabin. Much later in the game, his replacement isn't any more accommodating.
• Know When to Fold 'Em: If he senses that things won't end well for him, he'll offer the player an olive branch as a symbol of surrender. Accept, and you win, but you won't get a chance for teeth for the Trapper from overkill damage.
• Kung-Fu Wizard: Leshy wields a magical camera which can instantly transform things into cards and is also able to craft magical totems that grant cards special abilities when activated. At the same time, he's strong enough to knock out the player once they lose the game without any resistance and drag them inside a room. This turns out to be quite useful in Act 3 when even without having access to his camera, he is able to easily Neck Snap P03 with his own bare hands.
• Large Ham: He would rather simply use Purple Prose when narrating in-game events, but he can be quite the ham when he is impersonating a few bosses or very rarely, as himself when he goes serious.
• The Last Dance: After Grimora deletes the game, the player is brought one last time into Leshy's cabin to face him while the game is slowly fading. At this point, with the help of the strongest cards you acquired during the first act, it's easy to crush him, but he doesn't care, for all that matters to him is playing. Even as the scales are deleted, he insists on continuing the game. He only resigns once the bell that allows you to end your turn gets deleted, accepting his defeat and shaking your hand while congratulating you.
• Let's Get Dangerous!: Once you get to the end of the game, he decides to stop focusing on sounding dramatic and instead focus on beating the player once and for all by taking a picture of the moon and using it against them once you get into the third phase of his final boss battle.
• A Lighter Shade of Black: Leshy might have taken over the game and transformed his fellow Scrybes' souls into cards, but he's always shown as a respectful host who genuinely wants to give the player a good time and even undergoes a Heel Realization by the end of game, realizing that the Scrybes' ambitions and infighting led to the end of what he wanted to do the most. By contrast, P03 is not only a much bigger Jerkass and Ungrateful Bastard towards the player, but also shows much more outright megalomaniacal tendencies in desiring to be the only host of Inscryption while mocking Leshy and the other Scrybes. It's a downplayed example though, because both of them come off as tragic and P03's desire to be free and in control of the game is understandable given the situation he was in before, even if he's still an overly ambitious jerk.
• Magical Camera: He wields a camera which he uses to transform the player or rather, the in-game avatar of the player into a card should they lose to him. It's the unique method he uses for the "inscryption" and creation of his cards alongside the other 3 Scrybes.
• Many-Faced Divinity: Downplayed. Leshy's final boss fight has his ritualistic masks float and cycle around his body magically to represent his godlike power as the dungeon master.
• Meaningful Name: The name Leshy comes from a type of Slavic nature spirit.
• Never My Fault: During the final round of the fourth Boss Battle, the game master will gripe about Gameplay and Story Segregation by complaining that it makes no sense when an animal's stench reduces the moon's power to zero. He does not see fit to acknowledge that the nonsense is his fault in the first place for bringing the moon to an animal fight.
• Obliviously Evil: His Blue-and-Orange Morality plays a big role into this. Sure, he threatens and roadblocks the player, but it's for the sake of story and it's not like he's hurting real people. Yes, he turned his fellow Scrybes into animal cards, but he genuinely believes they're happier this way. In the end, all he wants is a good game, and if he needs to give the player a challenge, then so be it.
• Odd Friendship: With Kaycee. Her logs indicate she saw Leshy as her friend. His boss fight in Act 1 shows the feeling is mutual as he recalls Kaycee fondly when playing her death card. Though it's shown in the mod, he dislikes her alterations to the game.
  (after rolling the Woodlands map) Hm. I'm not used to announcing this one. Have you tinkered with the order of my maps, Kaycee?
  (after the Fecundity nerf ^Note Kaycee's mod only.) Kaycee... Did you? You tampered with one of my sigils. You thought it too powerful no doubt, but please... No more of that.
• Plant Person: When not obscured by the darkness around his cabin, this is shown to be Leshy's appearance: A lanky humanoid being with a wooden-looking body, leaves and moss in place of beard and hair, and some mushrooms growing in places.
• Red Eyes, Take Warning: His eyes take on a red glow when he's particularly incensed by something, such as beating his game faster than he'd like.
• Sadist: Most prominently in Act 2, where he seems to take a great deal of enjoyment out of making you and your cards "suffer", even complaining if you lose to him too quickly because he wished for a longer struggle. This seems to mostly be an air he puts on to drive players to best him as part of the game, as he's otherwise a very Graceful Loser and only ever seems to outright despise P03, for very good reason.
• Villain Respect: It comes with being a Graceful Loser, and the more a player fights back and wins, the more the player is rewarded. At the end of Act 3, he even revives the old deck the player used when defeating him in Act 1, just to make this fleeting moment more worthwhile. When the scales disappear, he keeps the game on; all he wants is just to keep playing, even when there is no way to win or lose. As he dies, he's not worried about death, just how much time he'll have to play with the player, simply happy to see how far they came and how well they played.
  Leshy: It's the same deck you had before you... well, it doesn't matter now. It was a good deck. You did well.
• Visible Silence: When he pauses between lines, the screen will show a "..." and make a small swallowing sound.
• Weird Beard: His beard is made out of moss. He is a Plant Person, which pretty much justifies it.
• Wingding Eyes: His eyes turn into orange spirals as he narrates. It helps to imply that the bosses he plays are lost to some form of madness.

Stoat

P03, Scrybe of Technology

"Total misplay."

^{Click here to see P03}  "You done gawking? We can start? Good."

A sentient card that's always present in the player's deck, who holds a grudge against your opponent for causing its current state. He is actually the Scrybe of Technology, who was turned into a card by Leshy and wants to escape so he can bring about the Great Transcendence — uploading the game online so he can escape and control everything. He is also the most personally unpleasant of the Scrybes, with a smug attitude and air of superiority — as such, the others quite dislike him.

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• Arrogant Kung-Fu Guy: Its true personality, a snide, mechanics-obsessed pro-gamer who immediately blames the Random Number God when it loses.
• Ambiguous Gender Identity: Its true form is a robot and is largely referred to as sexless. However, its subordinates in Act II, who respect it immensely, refer to it with he/him pronouns. This and the fact that its Uberbot counterpart is addressed with she/her pronouns call into question whether P03 has a specific gender identity or not.
• Bad Boss: In Act 2, in its efforts to get better cards, it is willing to sacrifice its underlings to its factory's machines. Downplayed in that none of them seem at all bothered by it, and the most complaining against it is a small dialogue from the The Dredger about not being made a boss.
• Bait the Dog: If you sacrifice a card to empower it in a sacrificial altar, it might say "What an honor" to show its gratitude for your action. Have it become a sacrifice after that, even a temporary one during an battle, and it will be very quick to forget what you did for it before and start to snark and mock your action. Later on, as it takes over the game, it will still treat you/Luke as a pawn to its objectives even if you refused to sacrifice it even once, showing how little its "gratitude" really mattered.
• The Bad Guy Wins: The hidden ARG video on YouTube reveals that it returned from its beheading due to having completed the mass uploading of the game all over the world through the internet.
• Big Bad: Once Leshy is dealt with and the game returned to normal, P03 takes over as the true villain of the game by performing a Hostile Show Takeover of its own. But while Leshy was content just playing his game, P03 has far greater ambitions by enacting "The Great Transcendence" and solidifying his rule over Inscryption.
• Big Bad Friend: It simply doesn't want to be under anyone else's control; once it's in charge, its only real care is completing the Great Transcendence. Entertaining the player with card gameplay is just a means to that end.
• Caught Monologuing: In Act 3, the other Scrybes believe that P03 will get distracted by its own ego when its plan's about to succeed, allowing them to sneak in unnoticed and overpower it at the crucial moment. They're right.
• Creative Sterility: As a Scrybe and as the Game Master, it doesn't have the biggest imagination or creativity. Its cards have descriptive names like Double Gunner or Insectodrone and his Act as a Gamemaster is basically Act 1 and 2 combined with a skin job. The only thing really unique is that he uses 5 lanes, something that he mocks Leshy for constraining himself with.
• Enemy Mine: Does not like the other talking cards, especially the Stunted Wolf, but the situation is desperate enough that it points you towards them anyway. From act 2 onwards, it never acknowledges this previous alliance — with them or you — ever again.
• Evil Gloating: When the player activates "The Great Transcendence," it takes a moment to mock them for not realizing the implications of its Uberbot's "mechanically unusual fighting" and how it's been granted access to enough of the computer to upload itself to the internet. The other Scrybes use this moment to behead it.
• Evil Is Petty: The only Scrybe to appear in another's territory, and it does so just to rub it in Leshy's face that he lost before immediately leaving. Leshy, for his part, expresses some remorse over overdoing things during Act 1, which makes this seem all the more petty. Later when P03 is in control, it gives Leshy's camera aesthetic to the abandoned, Warm-Up Boss Uberbot the player has a distinct advantage against.
• Final Boss: Averted. The last major challenge of the game is overcoming its four "Uberbots", but P03 is beheaded by the Scrybes instead of presenting a final challenge, and everything after is just a denouement.
• The Friend Nobody Likes: Of the four Scrybes, Leshy, Grimora, and Magnificus may be enemies, but they are also very friendly to each other and do seem to have some kinship. None of them like P03, who is a smug Jerkass. Grimora and Magnificus only tolerate him as much as they need to in order to escape their card forms in Act 1.
• Foil: To Leshy. Both are Scrybes that manage to take control of the game and enjoy playing against the challenger (although for P03, it's an Ignored Epiphany), but that's where the similarities end. Leshy is polite to the Player and allows them to roam his cabin; P03 shackles the Player to the table until he needs the Player to get something to continue the game. Leshy is disappointed whenever a challenger fails to defeat him, while P03 is visibly disgruntled when they do manage to defeat him. P03 is the one who is playing out of self-preservation, whereas Leshy is the one playing solely to play.
• Given Name Reveal: Act 2 reveals that its true name is P03.
• Grew Beyond Their Programming: The "Great Transcendence" that it's been plotting during Act 2 and enacts in Act 3 is hijacking Luke's computer in order to upload Inscryption to the internet.
• Hate Sink: On top of never approving of whatever play you make, P03 is very haughty and callous towards everyone. Its mentioning of five lanes makes it apparent that it was intentionally written to be a toxic MOBA player.
• Hostile Show Takeover: It takes over as the Game Master in Act 3, not wanting Leshy or anyone else to use it as a minion again.
• Ignored Epiphany: As his plan reaches its final stage, P03 admits he kind of enjoyed playing a game with you, but he carries on acting condescending toward the player and proceeds with his Transcendence plan.
• I Just Want to Be Free: More than anything, he wants to ensure he is free of any other Scrybe's control and the game disc. By disseminating his version of Inscryption across the internet, P03 will always be free somewhere.
• Irony: Its main motive for doing everything is to never be a pawn in another Scrybe's game again and be in control. While it ultimately gets away with this plan, it also used Luke's version of the game specifically. This means it's always doomed to start as the pawn to its most hated rival, Leshy, and be the subject of the Scrybes' last laugh at the end.
• Jerkass: The Stoat is critical of every move the player makes, calling most things misplays, rude and snippy with the other sentient cards, and downplays the difficulty and capabilities of the game master. Not to mention the ingratitude towards the player for freeing the Scrybes from Leshy's clutches and subsequent takeover…
• Karma Houdini: Played with. It gets its head torn off by Leshy, but still returns after everything else is gone due to the upload continuing despite the game having been deleted, meaning that everything has been restored and spread all over the internet, itself included.
• Know When to Fold 'Em: Just like with Leshy, if P03 thinks he's going to lose a round, he'll offer to concede.
• Laughably Evil: It's a huge jerk and the game's final villain, but it's also much quirkier and sillier than its fellow Scrybes. Between the exaggerated facial expressions, comically smug demeanor, and complete disinterest in trying to give you a compelling campaign, there's quite a few laughs to be had with P03.
• Magic Versus Science: Its mechanical theme stands in contrast with the nature/magical theme of the other Scyrbes, especially Leshy, whom it despises.
• Meaningful Name: Its true name, P03, is a nod to the internet adage Poe's Law. It could also mean 'Player 03', alluding to both its aversion for thematic roleplaying and the default 'Name+Number' format of computer-generated names.
• Mechanically Unusual Fighter: Its Uberbot boss battles may be lacking in the presentation and flavor of Leshy's, but they do have some unique mechanics to them, such as one that determines damage based on the size and age of selected files on your computer, or another that deploys your own Steam friendlist as enemies against you and allows you to receive/send a customized card randomly to a fellow player. It's all also foreshadowing how P03 is using the game as a way to hijack your computer and upload itself to the internet.
• Munchkin: Is completely obsessed with the card game's meta, using its temple purely as a means to manufacture bots that it can Inscrybe into better cards. No matter what's in your deck, it will always tell you it's garbage, and if you beat it, it'll just blame it on the RNG instead of admit defeat.
• Not Quite Dead: The end of the ARG led to a video showing the upload of Inscryption resuming, followed by an ASCII rendition of the Stoat's face appearing on Luke's monitor and winking. Seems like P03's decapitation didn't quite take.
• Off with His Head!: How Leshy deals with it before he can complete "The Great Transcendence." Ultimately fruitless, as destroying the avatar did not stop P03 from making a backup file to release onto the internet.
• Out-Gambitted: Subverted. It seems to have a plan to defeat the GM after being established as a character, and while its actions bring Stinkbug back into play, it otherwise plays no part in the plans for escape, with the role being divided between Stinkbug and the Stunted Wolf. Really, it's caught in a web of being Out-Gambitted. It helps to out-gambit Leshy, and eventually the other Scrybes; it's out-gambitted by the player/Luke and the Scrybes once it takes over; and it ultimately (and unintentionally) out-gambits everyone, including GameFuna, by uploading the whole of the game and evidence of their crimes from Luke's camera; but that also means it's been out-gambitted by The Devil, if they're an active force.
• Outside-Genre Foe: The other three Scrybes — a nature spirit, necromancer, and Art Attacker — all fit within Inscryption's fantasy world, while P03 is the Scrybe of Technology and a TV Head Robot whose headquarters is a robot factory.
• Pet the Dog:
  • As much of a dismissive jerkass it can be during Act 3, it does admit by the end of it that he "almost" enjoyed your company during the time you were together with it. A bit of a backhanded one, but still an example.
  • As little meaning as the gesture ended up becoming, it did appreciate the Dredger's contribution to its Takeover, and makes him one of the few actual NPCs in its game to have dialog.
• Smug Snake: Emphasis on the "smug" aspect. Once it reveals its true colours to you, P03 almost drizzles with smugness and will compare its game and the "improvements" it made over Leshy's multiple times to you. It will also often go into short monologues about its capabilities as you play, leading to its eventual downfall as it becomes so confident over its power against Luke that it doesn't believe the other Scrybes can threaten it at that point (they can).
• Stealth Pun: The card that helps hijack the game from Leshy is a calculating weasel, who also happens to literally be a computer stuck in the body of a stoat.
• Technician vs. Performer: When it becomes the GM in the latter half of the game, it becomes starkly clear that P03 is much more about strategy, deck optimization, and mechanics while caring not about drawing the player into its setting. For instance, it hastily makes up an Excuse Plot on the spot for encounters, rarely gets into character for its NPCs, and is generally much terser than Leshy. One line of dialogue even sees it criticize Leshy's style as too focused on flavor making up for suboptimal play.
• TV Head Robot: Its true form, once free from Leshy's Forced Transformation, has the appearance of one. As is typical of these, it often changes the face displayed to show its emotions and make itself look much more expressive. If you lose too many times during act 1, its stoat form also starts acquiring the appearance of one, which at first may appear to be a simple case of Body Horror and becomes much more meaningful later on.
• Verbal Tic: It says "Yep" a lot.
• Walking Spoiler: There's a lot about Stoat's true personality that isn't revealed to the player until Leshy's defeat, and even more is a secret until its takeover.
• Well-Intentioned Extremist: His "Great Transcendence" was an attempt to escape the current state of Inscryption by spreading it across the internet, thus effectively making all characters, including the Scrybes, immortal. Of course, he snidely remarks that a majority of those copies will give him control, so it's a case of saving the game mixed with his own ego trip.

Stinkbug

Grimora, Scrybe of the Dead

"This madness must end."

^{Click here to see Grimora}  "Life, death, life, death... The cycle continues!"

Another sentient card locked in a safe, who has a history with Stoat. She is significantly friendlier to the challenger than Stoat, and is played with bones instead of blood. She is actually the Scrybe of the Dead, who has become tired of the fighting between the Scrybes and aims to destroy the entire game.

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• All for Nothing: Erased everything in Inscryption, herself included... except for OLD_DATA, which persists, is seen by Luke, and then he is killed for it. Even her most extreme of actions wasn't enough to accomplish the one thing she set out to do. And even ignoring that, P03 was able to complete its upload of the game to the internet, likely with copies of OLD_DATA.
• Ambiguously Human: When not confined to her Stinkbug form, she appears to be a fairly normal human who just happens to be very pale. However, the lack of explanation for her glowing, yellow eyes and how ambiguously her extremely pale skin is related to her necromancy powers, it's unknown if Grimora is a human who had her body affected due to dealing with necromancy, a former human who became a zombie, or some other undead creature entirely.
• Big Good: Of the four Scrybes, she's the only one interested in destroying the evil at the heart of the game.
• Death Seeker: In the last act, Grimora is revealed to be seeking death, usurping P03's access to the player's hard drive to delete the Inscryption disk, saying that death is a freedom and that the contents of the disk must be destroyed.
• Given Name Reveal: Act 2 reveals that her true name is Grimora.
• I Did What I Had to Do: Once Leshy takes P03 out of the picture, as he and Magnificus begin to plan what to do next, Grimora immediately begins the deletion process of the game, to both their surprise. She gives this as justification, saying there is no other surefire path forward.
• Meaningful Name: Her form is described as a Stinkbug, but it's possible she's actually a scarab, a form of dungbeetle that features in Egyptian funerary rites and is associated with the concept of resurrection.
• Necromancer: As the Scrybe of Death, her cards are themed around undead and "creepy" creatures and are (presumably) empowered by the bones of the cards killed during the game.
• Omnicidal Maniac: Considers the deletion of Inscryption, including herself and the other Scrybes, to be a better fate than their endless infighting.
• This Looks Like a Job for Aquaman: Her Stinky ability completely nullifies the final battle against the moon during Leshy's part of the game, by reducing its attack to 0. He even has special dialogue highlighting the absurdity of defeating the moon with a stinky insect.
• Not So Above It All: While normally reserved she's very excited to get the chance to have a boss fight with the player during the finale, grabs a pirate mask and puts on a very hammy performance while bombastic music plays for a moment before the impending deletion of the world interrupts her.
• Token Good Teammate: Played with; she's the most consistently polite and friendly of her fellows. She shows none of P03 and Magnificus' Bad Boss tendencies in Act 2. That said, there's an element of subversion in this as well; as the below trope mentions, she's willing to go easily the furthest and most extreme of any of the four to prevent OLD_DATA from acting out and while less proactive than the other three, she too was looking for OLD_DATA in the water (in her case passively in a well instead of sending mooks to actively look).
• Well-Intentioned Extremist: She encourages the player to always do what must be done. She goes out of her way to delete the entire Inscryption game - including herself and the other Scrybes - if it means the destruction of the "OLD_DATA" and stopping whatever harm they may cause.

Stunted Wolf

Magnificus, Scrybe of Magicks

"Alas!"

^{Click here to see Magnificus} "Nothing beautiful can last."

A "friend" of Stoat and Stinkbug, who's said to have a plan to escape from the Game Master's torment. He has been trapped in the clock to hide him from the player, and for some reason Stoat does not like him very much. He is actually the Scrybe of Magicks, who wants to carry out some hidden dark agenda and has forced his pupils into horrible trials to prove themselves to him.

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• Bad Boss: Whilst cordial to the player and to Leshy and Grimora, Magnificus is horrifically unpleasant towards his three disciples, whom he has locked in And I Must Scream scenarios with no apparent intention of ever letting them out. Whether this is because he's an actual sadist or he barely remembers they exist is not clear, but he does have total contempt for them.
• The Chessmaster: Stoat isn't keen on the guy, but he notes that he always has a plan, and indeed his help is critical in defeating Leshy.
• Crazy-Prepared: Despite being reduced to a card he somehow hid film for the wildlife camera in the same clock he's hidden in, allowing it to be turned on Leshy.
  • When the scales are deleted in Act 3, he's able to cobble together an alternate interface to keep score and allow the game to continue, albeit one that's imperfect and quickly starts glitching out.
• Do Not Go Gentle: He resists deletion to continue his duel with the player unlike the other scrybes who calmly accept their erasure. Unfortunately, this costs him his chance to shake the player's hand before dying.
• Eye Scream: Had his eye carved out by Leshy and still recalls the feeling of it after the game is reset.
• Forced Transformation: He inflicted this on some of his disciples, ranging from Goobert's green ooze transformation and the one with a head on a pike, who... well, take a guess. They apparently agreed on this in order to become part of his deck, though given how Lonely Wizard regrets becoming his disciple in Act 3 and Magnificus shows little interest in actually adding them to his deck, it's doubtful if he actually plans to free them from their condition.
• Given Name Reveal: Act 2 reveals that his true name is Magnificus, though, in Act 1, Goobert will say his name if you find him.
• Jerkass to One: Bizarrely enough, Zig-Zagged. He appears to be on speaking terms with the other Scrybes, in spite of them not being fans of him and treats them with relative respect in the second and third acts. He acts cordial towards the player, and while he seems angry over the end of the Inscryption game, he gets over it in time to (attempt, at least) shake hands with them and no point bears any malice for these two groups. The ones he is definitely a jerkass towards are, ironically enough, his disciples, who he forces to go through absolutely sadistic tests and trials in order to be part of his deck and shows at best apathy towards them and at worst pure contempt, even though the majority of them have nothing but praises for their "teacher." He can be best described as a Bad Boss.
• Never Got to Say Goodbye: Downplayed. Similar to the other Scrybes, you do get a final duel with him, even if it's cut short by the game's files being deleted. However, unlike Leshy and Grimora, he dies without being able to shake hands with the player, being deleted right in front of them as he tries to move forward in vain.
• Nothing Is Scarier: Rebecha outright says that whatever he wants to do with the OLD_DATA is too horrible to say.
• Out of Focus: In spite of being the one who leads the player to overcome the game master's traps, he receives the least attention of any major figure in the story. He's about equal to the rest in Act 2, but unlike P03 becoming a full-on game master, and Grimora's extreme measures kickstarting the finale and allowing for a genuine, if brief, final encounter with her, Magnificus barely gets to start a battle in a world that's all but destroyed already.
• Plant Person: His original body is a mass of green leaves that are styled like a massive beard, making him a Magni-Ficus.
• Seers: Seemingly, he can see into the future, at least in a limited manner. Even outside the game. Once you finally battle him at the end of Act III, as the game falls apart, he says Luke could eject the disk to stop the deletion but knows he won't out of curiosity, and tells him sadly that they will both be "meeting our makers soon." And sure enough, Magnificus is deleted, and Luke is shot dead shortly after.
• Sink or Swim Mentor: Magnificus has some... unique, to not say outright sadistic beliefs, when it comes to testing his apprentices. For Goobert's final test for example, he transforms him into a Blob Monster who is in constant pain from having his organs reduced to a green puddle, and is left in this form until he manages to beat a challenger in a card game. His other disciples are put through similar, sadistic situations where they can only get out through a victory against their opponents.
• Teeth-Clenched Teamwork: Stoat's not exactly gleeful when Stinkbug inform them of the Wolf's presence, but admits that if anyone can get them out of their situation, it's him.
• Token Good Teammate Compared to the other 3 Scrybes at least. Leshy performed a Forced Transformation and transformed all of his former fellow Scrybes into cards through his camera before taking over as the sole game master. P03 does a similar procedure later on while also acting as a Arrogant Kung-Fu Guy and planning to upload copies of Inscryption into the internet so that even if its Hostile Show Takeover was stopped, it would still be in charge of the game somewhere else. Grimora is quite eager to delete the entire Inscryption game to free her fellow Scrybes from endless infighting and stop the OLD_DATA. Meanwhile, Magnificus seems to be the only one who doesn't pull any amoral actions against the player or the other Scrybes...though given his treatment of poor Goobert and his other disciples, a head on a pike and the Lonely Wizard, he's not completely good either.
• True Sight: When the player replaces their own eye with one of his, it's capable of seeing symbols and words created with his paint that are normally invisible.

Characters Introduced in Act 1

Prospector

"HEEEEEE-HAW! 'TWAS THE PROSPECTOR!"

The boss of the first area. He's obsessed with finding gold, transforming and mining your cards, and always brings a pack mule that carries a chunk of the deck until it's defeat.

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• Canine Companion: His bloodhound, which he plays in his second phase. One of Leshy's pre-fight narrations describes him as having a huge bowl for it. In Act 2, he tasks you with finding it before you can fight him.
• Chekhov's Gunman: There's a rare chance to encounter him searching for gold early in Act 1, far before his boss battle at the end of the act. During that encounter he's quite jovial and friendly, giving the player either a valuable golden pelt or a useful card for their deck.
• Demoted to Extra: After being a boss in Act 1 and a mini-boss in Act 2, in Act 3 the Prospector only exists to remove a roadblock for the player.
• Faux Affably Evil: A quite jolly prospector who will act happily and make comedic remarks even as he tries to murder the player due to believing they have gold on themselves. The later acts of the game avert this and reveal that his affable personality, when not interpreted by Leshy, is genuine. He even considers letting you pass just for helping him find his Hound.
• Forced Transformation: Once his first candle is snuffed out, he'll transform ALL of the players' monsters still on the field into Gold Nuggets, space-occupiers that cannot be sacrificed or removed. This not only instantly kills all of the players' monsters from the end of the first round, but prevents them from summoning more until the Prospector's own units take out the Nuggets.
• Gold Fever: What leads to him into fighting you, believing there's gold in your cards. He later even weaponizes this by hitting them with his pickaxe and transforming them into actual gold nuggets.
• Hillbilly Horrors: His imagery evokes a more old west version of one, but he fits both accent-wise and appearance-wise, being a creepy, prospector redneck who wants to murder you for your gold. When you meet him later in Act 2 and Act 3, he acts more like an affable ally, becoming a case of Sweet Home Alabama.
• Prospector: Take a guess. He even fits the stereotypical image of one, with a beard, missing teeth and southern accent.
• Warm-Up Boss: Prospector is a contender for this. His cards are mostly either blockers or Glass Cannons, with his best being the Hound that combines both mechanics. His Mule gives you more cards to work with in early game, and his second phase provides you some defense for a couple of turns to get your bearings at best, and an annoyance at worst.

Angler

"Huh. Go fish."

The boss of the second area. He's always after the freshest catch, pulling your most recently-played card over to his side of the board.

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• Artificial Stupidity: Invoked. His hook ability is horrendously-powerful, letting him steal your cards with no strings attached...but he'll exclusively target the most-recent card you've played, whether it's a Grizzly or a lowly, worthless Squirrel. Exploiting this is key to defeating him. Also justified in that his dialogue when preparing said hook ability talk about trying to catch the "freshest" fish, not the "strongest."
• The Big Guy: Narration describes the Angler as being physically immense, and his ability to wrangle even the largest of fish is a display of his strength. Of course, him being your opponent during the campaign makes him more of The Brute. In Act 2, his character sprite is the biggest of any non-scrybe character.
• Cold Ham: Being a Terse Talker doesn't stop him from making some pretty cool and bombastic remarks whether when facing you or helping out against P03 after his takeover.
• Death Seeker: Seems to be this from Act 3 ownwards, given how in situations and events where you are given the option to sacrifice a card for more power, he will always ask you to choose him. Then again, he might just be acting like his usual stoic self and he's just Not Afraid to Die if it means your success.
• Hooks and Crooks: His weapon of choice, which he uses to pull your most recent card to his side of the board no matter how powerful it is. Though he is more of a crazed fisherman than an actual crook.
• Not so Fast, Bucko!: After his first candle is out, he'll fill the spaces opposing the player's current creatures with Bait Bucket cards that don't attack. If they're destroyed, they immediately turn into deadly Great Whites. If the player foolishly takes out the entire row as soon as they've appeared, they'll quickly tear apart the player's monsters, then the player themself.
• Odd Friendship: He's a crazed fisherman with Terse Talker mannerisms and borderline The Stoic attitude. Lonely Wizard is a Sense Freak with hammy lines who is desperate for any friendship he can have. They seem to get suprisingly well together during Act 3, though Angler is, as expected, much less vocal about it.
• Terse Talker: Prefers to give direct and simple responses with occasional one-liners when talking to you.
• Those Two Guys: Acquires this dynamic with Lonely Wizard during Act 3, being one of the only two talking cards of that Act. They will occasionally talk to each other when played/draw together and will comment both on p03's actions and the boss fights you face, with "Fishbot" often comparing the bosses to certain fish and characters in the game.
• Unwilling Roboticization: He becomes the "Fishbot" in Act 3.
• Unwitting Instigator of Doom: In Act 2 he mentions catching an OLD_FISH that was corrupted by the OLD_DATA for Leshy, which is presumably what enabled him to pull his Hostile Show Takeover and inspired P03 to do the same. In Kaycee's Mod Kaycee writes a journal about witnessing the event, including Angler getting up and walking despite not having a walking sprite.

Trapper/Trader

"Care to look at me pelts?"

The Trapper is a hunter who's willing to trade your excess teeth (earned through combat) for his pelts, which can later be given to the Trader in exchange for rare cards. The Trader is a merchant who buys the pelts you gain in exchange for animal cards, with their quality depending on the kind of pelt. The Trapper later becomes the boss of the third area, with the Trader acting as the second phase of the battle. The Trader acts as the game's main merchant in Act 2, trading foils for cards. She then becomes near-obsolete in Act 3, but can reveals details about Inscryption itself if you're still willing to trade.

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• Chekhov's Gun: When facing the Trapper in battle, every monster of the player's he slays with one of his numerous Leaping Trap cards will generate a Wolf Pelt in the player's hand. When he swaps to the Trader for round two of the boss battle, the player can exchange any of the pelts they have in their hand for the Trader's full field of monsters - the more casualties suffered in the first round, the more pelts the Player may have, and the more they can tip the Trader's battle into their favor.
• Egomaniac Hunter: Appears to be a Great White Hunter at first (albeit one with a creepy streak) before he shows up in the third area wanting to skin you for your pelt. This seems to be limited to his personality inside Leshy's game, though.
• Face–Heel Turn: They start out as a pair of helpful NPCs before becoming bosses in the third area, intent on killing the player.
• Freudian Slip: If you reach the Trader without any pelts they will be unhappy, hand you some teeth and tell you to "Give them to m- To the Trapper.".
• Flip Personality: The mask for the Trader is just the Trapper's mask flipped upside-down, which plays into their boss battle when he loses his first life. Outside of Leshy's game, they're not separate people. Their head really does that, as seen when you encounter them again in Act 2.
• Gender Bender: The Trapper is a man. The Trader is a woman. They somehow exist in the same body. Downplayed as the only physical thing that changes when they switch is their head: The Trapper's beard becomes the Trader's hair and vice versa.
• Genuine Human Hide: What the Trapper intends to do to the player as the setup for his boss fight.
  "I'm afraid I must be skinning you today."
• Knowledge Broker: The Trader performs this function in Act 3, somehow gaining access to information regarding Inscryption's creation and secrets, and being willing to provide it to the player in exchange for "Holopelts", which you can acquire in P03's game and outside of it while exploring the room. In spite of this, her information is often cryptic and is mostly given to you through a Tarot Motifs explanation.
• Sadistic Choice: When faced as a boss, the Trader will offer you one in the form of filling her entire side of the table with cards and giving you the option of acquiring as many of them as you have in pelts on your hand, the catch being the rest of the cards will stay and fight for her. Which cards will you take, knowing that all of them are fairly powerful and enhanced and will already be on the table to fight for her, while the ones you acquire need to be put down to fight? Can become easier or more difficult depending on how many powerful combinations of enhanced cards she decides to create against you.
• Unwilling Roboticization: In Act 3, the Trader becomes a hologram that can only trade in information, exchanging "Holopelts" picked up in Botopia for the story behind Inscryption's creation.

Mycologist

"Two into one!"

A doctor (and his second head) that can be encountered during your host's game. He offers to combine two cards of the same beast into a single, powered-up version, but advises you to look away during the procedure.

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• Achievements in Ignorance: It is capable of taking over as Scrybe, and technically, the entire game by proxy, even though he appears to be no more powerful than any other of the apprentices and allies of the scrybes. He doesn't think too much about this either, and appears to be more interested in fighting the player once he takes over rather than accomplishing any grand scheme like P03; he even casually fishes out a piece of OLD_DATA in the process, something the Scrybes themselves had trouble with for entire acts, and runs off to study it.
• Body Horror: Given that he has a second head (Which appears to be a mushroom) coming from the side of his head, he comes off as a pretty unsettling, not helped by the fact that he possibly acquired that through his experiments. When he takes over P03 during his optional boss fight he becomes even more disturbing as he is depicted in a realistic, Uncanny Valley model inside its TV screen.
• The Dividual: There's a talking mushroom growing from the side of his head, which is treated as part of him despite having a different personality.
• Doppelmerger: In Act 1, the Mycologist can merge duplicates of the same card, combining their stats and sigils.
• Enigmatic Minion: Nominally working with the Scrybes, they appear to have an agenda of their own, possibly even managing to intervene in a game without the Scrybe allowing it, or even being aware they showed up. They can even manage to make off with some of the OLD_DATA and keep it to themselves, rather than handing it over to whichever Scrybe is actually employing them.
• Foreshadowing: They won't appear on the player's first couple of runs but when selecting cards to acquire the player can still see the mushroom icon that indicates a card is a duplicate and potential target for their services.
• Game-Breaker: Invoked via their ability to fuse two cards together, combining their stats and sigils, but NOT their cost. Merge two powerful units and you'll have a One-Man Army with a reasonable cost that can single-handedly carry the fight.
• Gory Discretion Shot: They tell the player to look away while they work as the process is grusome. Looking down, gruesome sounds can be heard while scraps of card fly past the camera. When the player looks back, they find a single — bloody — card made of two halves hacked apart and haphazardly stitched together.
• Hostile Show Takeover: Will pull this out against P03 himself during Act 3 once you reach his optional boss fight. Unlike the Scrybes' takeovers, however, his is merely temporary, and P03 is left unaware of what happened in the first place.
• Insistent Terminology: Their patients are test subjects. They are not victims.
• Mad Scientist: He powers up your cards by forcibly cutting them in half and stitching the pieces together. He also explicitly warns you to look away as his experiments can be "gruesome." His comments in Act 2, while creating the Spore Mage, indicate that his experiments are an attempt to try and solve a "Karnoffel Code" and in Act 3 his experiments uncover the first cipher for the OLD_DATA log.
• Optional Boss: Using their services enough times in Act 2 will provide a key that opens a door in Act 3. Entering this door will have them take over P03 and force you to fight them. Their gimmick has them fuse cards on both sides of the field, combining their stats and sigils.

The Carver

A mysterious woman who carves totems in the woods. On meeting her she offers a choice of various totem heads and bases which the player can then assemble into a buff totem. The totem head determines which creature type (e.g., lizards, squirrels or insects) gets the buff and the base determines the trait they will acquire.

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• Cassandra Truth: In the finale, she warns Luke not to look at the OLD_DATA despite knowing it's fruitless. She also tried to warn Kaycee, who kept looking despite the warnings.
• Foreshadowing: She only starts appearing after a couple of runs, but the player can find the missing Squirrel Totem as soon as they're permitted to start moving around the cabin, in which case Leshy will comment on this and note that it will be useful later, and mention the Carver by name.
• Game-Breaker: Her totems can grant powerful effects such as unkillable (returns to your hand on death) or worthy sacrifice (grants 3 blood on sacrifice) to your cards. Normally the is balanced by the buff only applying to a single monster category and the fact that you need to make at least two visits to her tile to choose a headpiece and base from a random selection. Finding the squirrel headpiece in Leshy's cabin removes most of these downsides since you'll always start the run with it and it enables you to apply the buff to your base, zero-cost units, meaning finding a single good base can completely break the game by giving you access to many times the usual amount of blood per turn.
• The Hermit: She appears to live alone in the woods and says little when the player encounters her.
• Mysterious Stranger: An optional encounter with her in Act 2 reveals she knows a lot more than she lets on. She's aware of the OLD_DATA, how it corrupted the game and caused the Scrybes' hostility and knows the danger it poses but refuses to say more. And for good reason.
• The Quiet One: She does not speak during any encounter in Act 1, simply laying out her wares and departing when you choose. Kaycee's Mod indicates she actually talked during the early games and tried to warn Kaycee about the OLD_DATA, but either gave up or is worried the player will meet the same fate if she shares what she knows.

Goobert

"ARRRRRGHHHH! The pain is unbearable! M- my organs are melting!"

At one point, when offered an item to help in your travels, your host will offer a jar of ooze he claims is useless. If it's still chosen, the ooze is removed and put on a nearby shelf...where it turns out to have a mind of its own.

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• Ascended Extra: In the main game, Goobert is merely a side character that can be talked to for additional content. In Kaycee's Mod, Goobert becomes a special event on the map.
• Blob Monster: It's sentient green ooze. Act 2 reveals it was put into this state by Magnificus itself, to test if it's worth belonging in his deck, and that it's in constant pain because of it.
• Hint System: Once it's been interacted with, inspecting some of the other items in the cabin will have it speak up and offer a clue to the connected puzzle. It provides similar help in Act 3.
• I Just Want to Be Loved: One puzzle in Act 3 takes you into a strange goo realm with the only interactable objects being himself, and a painting of a smiling Magnificus hugging him. In his words: "I painted it for the Master! To express my feelings... my hopes. That perhaps one day he might treasure me, as I treasure him."
  • Sadly, this same portrait can be seen again at the very end of the game as you walk down the hallway to challenge Magnificus, next to a bucket of white paint with Goobert blotted out of the portrait.
• Modified Clone: An update to Kaycee's Mod adds Goobert as an event to Leshy's board. He has the ability to paint a copy of one of your cards, with minor differences (stats up/down, or differing sigils). The duplicate card can be either inferior or superior to the one you already have, so it is somewhat of a gamble. Of course, nothing stops you from visiting the Mycologists to combine the two cards.
• Nice Guy: Easily the most consistently friendly face in the game, bearing absolutely nobody a shred of ill will.
• Large Ham: His lines are written in all caps, and he tends to make quite the dramatic remarks when talking to you.
• The Pollyanna: Stays optimistic and sings praises to his master even though he is a blob of green slime stuck inside a bottle. It isn't even bothered by the fact Magnificus himself put it inside of the bottle and endures the constant pain in hope of being considered "worthy" by him.
• Throw the Dog a Bone: After consistently hearing how much pain he is in, he shows up during P03's session stuck in some sort of piping. He reveals the compression from the pipes is actually making his pain a lot more bearable.
• Undying Loyalty: To Magnificus, its Master, who he has the highest of praises for even when the words "KEEP SEALED" are written next to its bottle in Magnificus' writing.

Characters Introduced in Act 2

Rebecha

A character from The Hex, who just so happens to be in the world of Inscryption due to GameFuna reusing the engine. She serves as the bridge keeper.

• Broken Bridge: Her role in both acts she appears in is to restrict the player's access to other parts of the map until they progress the story. Act 2 has her at least stick around to give the player deck building tips and reveal what the Scrybes would do if they each had control over the game.
• Guest Fighter: Downplayed- she doesn't fight the player in any card games.

The Piked Student

"...just imagine you are an ice cube, slowly melting on a hot pan..."

Another one of Magnificus' students, left as nothing more than a head on a pike with a visor and a hat. The most driven to become an important part of her master's deck.

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• Decapitation Presentation: Her test, as it were, is to be reduced to this and beat someone else.
• Demoted to Extra: Goes from an actual opponent to an NPC that unblocks a path for you in Act 3, like the Prospector and Skeleton Kaycee.
• Fire and Brimstone Hell: Her space seems to be this, a cracked patch of rock with lava glowing through and swords strewn about.
• Flat Character: Driven by the desire to be a part of Magnificus' deck, and is ultimately not much more than just the second opponent of his tower. Implied that being his student drove her to be this way, as even after the battle she states she doesn't even mind being used as a less important shield.
• No Name Given: Subverted, while she had no name in the PC release of the game, she is given the name Amber through the Console ARG.
• Out of Focus: She barely gets any screen time, while Goobert and the Lonely Wizard are named characters who appear throughout the game and have a far more significant impact on the plot. In Act 3 she's reduced to a filler NPC on the path to Magnificus' tower.

Lonely Wizard

"At last! STIMULATION!"

One of a certain wizard's disciples, not present in the cabin, but a part of what happens after that game is over. As part of his training, he was sealed away in an endless black void of nothingness for years as "sensory deprivation training" and as a result has become desperate for any kind of stimulation.

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• Beware the Silly Ones: The ironic thing about Magnificus not wanting Lonely Wizard in his deck is that he's actually a good card, at least in his roboticized form. No other 2 energy card is going to give you 2 attack for no real downside. Hell, his Clingy ability can be very useful: careful play will move him to the lane where he's best utilized.
• Creative Closing Credits: He's present during the ending credit scroll, dancing happily as he does during Magnificus's 2D duel.
• Gameplay and Story Integration: He has the unique ability Clingy, which causes him to move next to any card you play if there is a free space by them. He even has dialogue play in the name space of his card, begging the newly played card to be friends with him. Especially sad given that the portion of the game where Lonely Wizard is in your deck, all of your cards are cold unfeeling robots...or the Fishbot.
• Go Mad from the Isolation: Magnificus purposely isolated him from all stimulation as a test to prove whether he's worthy of being in his deck, and pleads with the player to keep interacting with him. In Act 3, it expresses similar relief when its card is freed from a puzzle.
• Hope Spot: His whole existence in the game is mostly made up of these. When you first meet him, you release him from his test, and he begins dancing during your battle with his master, in Act 2 it's revealed P03 put him into a card but also shoved him into another dark space and drove him further out of his mind. Finally, he seems to have survived Inscryptions deletion, but now he has no world to stimulate himself with.
• I Just Want to Have Friends: Being unable to feel anything for years has caused him to grow desperate for any kind of contact - Lonely Wizard might want to feel things, yes, but talking to someone, anyone, is up there with his current needs. Sadly, his options for friendship at that point is the player (who can't talk to them), an endless number of emotionless robot cards and the Fishbot. He tries to work with the last one as best as he can, though.
• Nice Guy: Up there with Goobert. While unlike him he's a little unhinged, he lacks malice, simply being an eager, friendly, curious figure. It speaks volumes for Magnificus' character that he treats such kind students in this way even as they look up to him.
• Living Shadow: What Magnificus's training seems to have turned him into. Much more benevolent than most examples however, and becomes a talking card ally during P03's session.
• O.O.C. Is Serious Business: If you manage to trigger a fight in Act 3 after meeting with the other scribes - say, against the Optional Boss for example - and draw the Lonely Wizard, he'll remark that he felt Magnificus' presence while seeming remarkably more lucid than he has been up to this point. He then coldly states that he's willing to fight, kill, and even be killed, but he is NOT going to be Magnificus' pupil ever again. Yikes.
• Sense Freak: After spending years unable to feel anything due to Magnificus' last test for him, Lonely Wizard has become desperate for the chance to experience any feelings in the world again, even painful ones if needed; he will outright ask you to trash and sacrifice him in P03's games for the chance to be affected by pain again! This is reflected in his "Clingy" ability where his card will move to another position through sheer force of will to "touch" and talk to them.
• Signature Headgear: A curved wizard hat with a bauble at its tip; it's his most defining feature after his veiny eyes.
• Those Two Guys: Acquires this dynamic with Angler during Act 3, being one of the only two talking cards of that Act. They will occasionally talk to each other when played/draw together and will comment both on p03's actions and the boss fights you face, with "Lonely Wizbot" often evoking his desire to feel things to have you play him on your board in order to become friends with the other cards made by p03.
• Unwilling Roboticization: He becomes the "Lonely Wizbot" in Act 3. Doesn't seem to mind, though.
• Video Game Caring Potential: He's quite a charming character who just wants to experience anything again only to be further agitated by P03 making him a card and locking him in a drawer behind a puzzle. He's not the most useful card to have initially, but you can play him, power him up, and have him hold little conversations with Angler, giving him everything he was starved for.

Inspector

One of a certain robot's workers, not present in the cabin. Its duty is to inspect every card that's sent to its master in order to weed out imperfections.

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• Senseless Sacrifice: After its defeat, having run out of good material to give to its boss, it decapitates itself so its head can be converted into raw material. However, the only card P03 actually cares about is the one the Dredger pulls up later.

Melter

"We are- I am The Melter. They send me raw materials and I- well, you can see how it works."
^......... LET ME OUT

One of a certain robot's workers, not present in the cabin. Appears (and speaks as) a person trapped inside of a bombastic metal suit.

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• Caged Inside a Monster: It's clear when they talk that there's something/one trapped within the Melter.
• Senseless Sacrifice: Like the Inspector, it decides to scrap itself (and the unwilling creature inside) in order to be used as new material for P03's cards, even though P03 only cares about the one the Dredger pulls up.

Dredger

"Oy, mate. I know what yer 'ere for."

Another of a certain robot's automated workers, not present in the cabin, but a part of what happens after that game is over.

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• Developer's Foresight: The Dredger has its own lines for both losing to it through conceding as well as rematching. It also recognizes a legitimate loss if the Challenger manages to one-shot it in the first turn.
• Dude, Where's My Respect?: Downplayed, but after talking to it for a bit in Act 3, it does realize it got the bum deal for granting P03 the thing it needed to complete its masterplan in exchange for becoming a background dialogue NPC.
• Mauve Shirt: It's practically indistinguishable from the other robot servants under P03, but plays a minor yet important role in creating the glitchy card that allows P03's takeover. It also provides some vision over how the servants in general view their leaders.
• Non-Action Guy: Unlike most of the other servants met during Act 2, it doesn't even bother to fight you.
• Punch-Clock Villain: If it can even be called a villain in the first place. While it creates the glitchy card that allows P03 takeover of Inscryption, it seems unaware of his grander schemes and doesn't bear malice against the player, and believes that P03 really has its servants' best intentions in mind.
• Small Role, Big Impact: In the grand scheme of things, it's just an NPC. However, it manufactures the glitchy card that lets P03 take control of the game at the end of Act 2.
• Zero-Effort Boss: It doesn’t play any cards and concedes after the first turn.

Sawyer Patel

One of the skeletons duelled in Grimora's crypt, whose tombstone is used to block access to the Scrybe.

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• Turn the Other Cheek: Their epitaph states that they were killed by a dog, but "Does not hold a grudge."

Bone Lord

"In a measureless cavern... deeper than the sunless sea... You approach The Bone Lord. You approach me."

A skeletal demon lord who will allow you to sacrifice one or more of your cards to him for upgrades.

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• Dark Is Not Evil: A gigantic skeleton with a terrifying body that is found on a dark, damp room... who is more interested in you becoming his follower than actually harming your character. If you refuse to do that he's surprisingly chill and even comes off as casual if you actually accept his offer. He also pipes up with useful information on OLD_DATA, though you sadly don't get to actually hear about it.
• Dem Bones: He's a gigantic skeleton who dwarfs over the vast majority of the characters in the game and appears to be far knowledgeable than the rest of his undead kin, specially regarding what's really going on in the Inscryption game. He's more friendly than you would expect one of these to be, though.
• Friendly Skeleton: Doesn't act like an straight example at first with his intimidating narration, but once one accepts his offer he definitely mellows out on his attitude and is fairly helpful when dealing information to the player. Even if you don't accept it, he turns out to be pretty ok with you refusing to "follow" him given the circumstances.
• Horrifying the Horror: He claims the OLD_DATA is something truly ancient and powerful which even he cannot fully comprehend.

Giant Skeleton

Adolf Hitler

Upper Segment

Lower Segment

A huge skeleton torso that serves as an entire area where the Player can meet with The Bone Lord. The torso has an old set of cards in its jacket pocket. According to the ARG, it's a digitized representation of Hitler's skeleton, and the order of the cards turn out to be the Karnoffel Code from within OLD_DATA.

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• Ambiguous Situation: Kaycee's Mod establishes that the Karnoffel Code is the activation sequence for a Doomsday Device created by Nazi Germany, but how that ties into the supernatural power of OLD_DATA is unclear. Considering the Trader's belief that the ancient malignant data of the game is in fact the straight-up Devil in a digitized form, it raises questions to whether the Code would activate a mundane machine or something supernatural.
• Ghostapo: To an extent. The OLD_DATA is obviously supernatural, so it raises the question of how Hitler found out about it...
• Greater-Scope Villain: Posthumously (as far as we know). The Karnoffel Code that GameFuna are obsessed with hiding and maintaining a hold over originated from the order of his deck of cards.
• Posthumous Character: He's been dead since 1945... at least, we hope, given how a deceased human from the real world (Kaycee) has inexplicably shown up as a card character in the game.
• Small Role, Big Impact: He hasn't been alive for decades, and yet his deck of cards are ordered in the form of the Karnoffel Code within OLD_DATA.
• Truth in Television: Believe or not, the Nazis (including Hitler) were firm believers in the occult, so the idea of Hitler possessing something like the Karnoffel Code isn't that far-fetched.
• Walking Spoiler: It's doubtful that anyone expected Hitler of all people to be involved in the game's creation and story, even if only through a posthumous and inadvertent influence.

Characters Introduced in Act 3

The Photographer

"The lens is my instrument. You, as well, are my instrument."

One of the 4 Uberbots faced by the player in a different scenario much later on after they've escaped the cabin, representing Leshy. He is the boss of the Foul Backwaters, and he will allow the player to take a picture of the game board and revert everything on it to the position in the photo in another turn.

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• Magical Camera: Magical mechanical lens, but still. His main gimmick involves taking pictures from the card battlefield - which you can use later to replace the current battefield, allowing you regain your foothold in the game and control the cards he puts up against you.
• Suspiciously Similar Substitute: His orange color scheme and usage of a camera as his unique mechanic bring to mind Leshy, being similar to how he uses a legendary camera as his method of inscryption.
• Time Rewind Mechanic: The snapshot feature lets you save the board state, returning to it at any point in the future while leaving all other stats unchanged.

The Archivist

"I eagerly await the opportunity to explore your hard drive."

One of the 4 Uberbots faced by the player in a different scenario much later on after they've escaped the cabin, representing Grimora. She can access your files and will ask you to choose files that she will put on the scale, tipping it over a certain amount depending on how big it is.

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• Developer's Foresight : Giving her certain files (Such as "Inscryption.exe" or "PonyIsland.exe") will give her unique lines based on those files.
• Suspiciously Similar Substitute: Her teal color scheme, usage of tombstones at the beginning of her fight and her threat of deleting the file you chose at phase 2's beginning if its card dies bring to mind Grimora, befitting her status as the Scrybe of The Dead.

Custom Uberbot

"Please. Paint me a face."

One of the 4 Uberbots faced by the player in a different scenario much later on after they've escaped the cabin, representing Magnificus. Because P03 had no time to finish making him, you are asked to make your own custom rules, and must combine two conditions to create said rules.

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• Developer's Foresight: Making custom rules so stupid that they soft-lock the game will cause P03 to disable one of the rules so the current match can actually continue.
• Hoist by His Own Petard: You have complete control over the face/rules for them, which means that rules designed to throw a wrench in your plans separately can be made devastating against them if used together and/or with the right deck.
• The Blank: As pictured, they start out with no face and ask you to make them one before the battle begins.
• Suspiciously Similar Substitute: Their crimson red text, face with a painted appearance and the background that is a Blank White Void bring to mind Magnificus, owing to his text color when he speaks, the environment when you face him during the finale and his paintbrush that serves as his method of inscryption.

G0lly

"I'm so excited! We're about to explore it! The Web!"

One of the 4 Uberbots faced by the player in a different scenario much later on after they've escaped the cabin, representing P03 himself. She is the boss of the Resplendent Bastion, and can access the Internet. She is very eager to explore the net and will create cards based off Steam friends if she can, and even let you make a custom card to send to other players.

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• Badass Adorable: She's one of the 4 Uberbots faced and she's constantly chipper and full of upbeat energy.
• Friendly Enemy: Doesn't seem to bear any ill feelings towards the player, and mostly uses her fight as an excuse to explore the internet and connect you to other players. At one point she even gives a card for you from a mysterious benefactor, with no strings attached to it!
• Genki Girl: P03 personally describes her as painfully innocent, and she sure is excited for her first trip on the internet.
• Instant-Win Condition: If your created card helps another player beat Golly, you win! No strings attached. "I can rest easy knowing nothing bad can happen on the internet."
• Sliding Scale of Idealism Versus Cynicism: G0lly's pure idealism is a stark contrast to P03's self-centered and cynical attitude, which raises questions about how exactly she relates to P03.

The Bounty Hunters

Powerful enemies that begin to show up the more battles you win during a later scenario, the Bounty Hunters are randomly generated powerful enemy cards that just as randomly ambush you during battles in Botopia.

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• Elite Mook: Notable for being the only individual cards with NPC dialog from the current GM. They also have high attack, high defense and more tricky effects to deal with than other cards.
• Flat Character: Subverted. Most of them are interchangeable western bounty hunter personalities sent as an increasing random element if you are winning too many fights in a row, however they can have some funny dialogue if the player pays attention.
• Overly Long Gag: One potential introduction to a Bounty Hunter is for them to say that their objective is killing you, only to go into elaborate detail about what they'll do after that's done, including settling down and having kids.
• Leitmotif: "Bounty Hunters" a high-pitched, unthreatening, and wheezy-sounding western theme made from synth.
• Smug Snake: Tend to act this way once they enter a battle, very self assured that they'll get your Bounty even if you're about to win the round or have some killer card set up. Considering how tough they can actually end up being to deal with however, they have every right to be confident.
• Villain: Exit, Stage Left: Due to their large amount of health it's likely the Player will never actually beat one, as they often run off from the current battle when dealt enough damage.

Real World Characters

Kaycee Hobbes

A GameFuna developer assigned to work on the in-universe Inscryption video game. During routine testing, she noticed peculiar behavior coming from the copy of Inscryption that would eventually find its way into Luke's hands, and the player can find her notes by completing special challenges in the Kaycee's Mod expansion.

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• All for Nothing: She believes no-one will ever play Inscryption or her mod when the game is pulled, but this turns out not to be the case.
• Audience Surrogate: Like a lot of players she loves Leshy's game and would rather play it over and over rather than trying to unseat him and proceed with the plot.
• Author Avatar: Her final DevLog has her imagining a world where thousands of people play her game/mod and love it despite its imperfections, creating fan content and making her see it in new ways, something the real-life creators of Inscryption got to experience.
• Bittersweet Ending: She dies, but her dream of a world where thousands of people enjoy her mod does come true.
• Connected All Along: One of her DevLogs describes her meeting with an annoying player at a card game tournament who tried to film the match for his Youtube channel, presumably Luke Carder.
• Death by Irony: The character named after her in Inscryption died from ice, while the real Kaycee died from fire.
• Early-Bird Cameo: Her deathcard may randomly show up in the first act.
• Fantastically Indifferent: Despite knowing Leshy's version of Inscyption is impossible and gradually discovering the dark secrets contained within this doesn't stop Kaycee thoroughly enjoying the game and even modifying it to make it better.
• Friendly Enemy: She considered Leshy to be this to her as she played his Hostile Show Takeover version of Inscryption. She felt as if Leshy was talking to her as much as he was the Player Character (and considering the events of the base game, she's almost definitely right).
• Hikikomori: She becomes one after learning about the OLD_DATA, barely leaving her apartment (though she does go to a card game tournament at one point). Her mention that she "could use a friend" and enjoying Leshy's company may indicate that she's lonely.
• Make It Look Like an Accident: Heavily implied to be the truth of whatever happened to her.
• Obvious Rule Patch: Her modded version of Leshy's cabin removes the obviously overpowered elements from the base game.
• Odd Friendship: Her logs indicate that she considers Leshy her friend. It seems the feeling is mutual, as Leshy fondly remembers her when he plays Kaycee's death card during his boss fight in Act 1. Though her meddling in the mod gives him mixed feelings.
• Posthumous Character: Kaycee is long dead before the story's events occur.
• Unwitting Instigator of Doom: By writing the coordinates in the card pack Luke bought locating the physical copy of Inscryption, she roped him into the story's events, leading to his discovery of the OLD_DATA, and eventually, his death.

GameFuna Representative

A woman who visits Luke's house to inquire about the claims he sent her company regarding the game. According to the code revealed when her name is redacted, she goes by Amanda.

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• Ambiguous Situation: A Freeze-Frame Bonus reveals that Sado's face briefly appears over her own when she shoots Luke in the head. Whether she and Sado are one and the same (especially since Sado was able to enter the real world at the end of The Hex) remains a mystery.
• Boom, Headshot!: What she does to Luke at the end of the game.
• Dark Is Evil: Dresses in all black complete with Sinister Shades when she shoots Luke in the head without so much as a word.
• Faux Affably Evil: Jumping over or breaking through someone's fence, acting polite and understanding when speaking to him about the game, claiming to be a fan of his channel, then returning some time later and blowing his head wide open with a gun? Right little ray of sunshine, she is.
• Freeze-Frame Bonus: As she blasts Luke in the head, her face changes to that of Sado from The Hex.
• Hate Sink: She acts much like any sterotypical entitled corporate official and does nothing to endear herself to Luke, or the audience. That's not even taking into account her being responsible for the game having a Downer Ending.
• He Knows Too Much: Why she blows apart Luke's head.
• Karma Houdini: Luke opens the door, she shoots him dead, enters the house, presumably retrieves the game, stops the recording, and leaves. The end.
• Mouth of Sauron: Acts as this for her unseen superiors at GameFuna.
• No-Nonsense Nemesis: Once she finally kills Luke, she does it in the most terrifyingly effective way possible: no speeches explaining her motivations, no struggling to allow Luke to fight back, no hesitation, and not even a Bond One-Liner after killing him - just a bullet to the head, a confirmation of his death, and (presumably) the acquisition of the recordings and media related to Inscryption that he had. She arguably made the mistake of murdering him during broad daylight in his own home, but given how GameFuna has already covered the track to another murder they committed successfully, she might have done that specifically because she knew she wasn't in danger of being caught.
• Sinister Shades: Wears them when she returns to Luke's house and murders him.
• Walking Spoiler: Especially considering her actions in Luke's final recording.

The Gameworks Escapee

Sado

A villainess from The Hex, who appears briefly in more than one Freeze-Frame Bonus on Luke's recordings.

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• Ambiguous Situation: It is unclear what her relation to Amanda is, as her image appears over Amanda's face when she shoots Luke. It is possible that they are one and the same, considering that Sado successfully entered the real world at the end of her own game.
• The Cameo: She appears in two freeze-frame moments.
• Freeze-Frame Bonus: Her appearances consist solely of this - once during a video of Luke filming himself and once when Amanda returns to the house to finish what she started.
• Walking Spoiler: Nobody expected her to be involved in this game, even as The Cameo.

Other Characters

OLD_DATA

^{Click here to see an image of it.} 

Not exactly a person, but still a presence within the game's files that is treated with fear and reverence. It is the entity that the four Scrybes sought out and which gave them their powers, allowing them to hijack the game. It contains the Karnoffel Code, which activates a hidden Nazi super weapon, and it is hinted by the Trader that it is the digitized form of the Devil.

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• Ambiguously Evil: We aren't sure this thing is even a living entity. If Trader is correct about OLD_DATA actually being the Devil, then he most certainly is living, and he is evil to the core.
• Ambiguous Situation: It's uncertain exactly what it is and why it is so feared and revered. Whether or not it's a sentient being of sorts remains a mystery. IF Trader is correct, then the OLD_DATA is in fact the digitized form of the Devil himself. Whether or not he is the same Devil as the one from Pony Island is even more uncertain.
  • As the Karnoffel Code (and therefore the rest of the game's code) was created by the Devil, and the Code was first found in Hitler's jacket pocket after his death through the order of his card deck, it implies a strong connection between the both of them. Whether Hitler was in fact the Devil's human incarnation, the Devil was The Man Behind the Man who provided him with the Code, or the truth ends up being something completely different is a question for the philosophers.
• The Bad Guy Wins: If it really is Satan himself, then he has achieved ultimate victory due to the game spreading his reach and influence all over the world thanks to the internet.
• The Corrupter: Data that corrupts everything and everyone within the game, and perhaps even those outside of it.
• The Dreaded: Even GameFuna themselves are dead-set on ensuring that no one finds out about its true nature.
• The Ghost: Whatever it is, we never get a good look.
• Greater-Scope Villain: Assuming it IS a sentient being, it is responsible for much of the misery throughout both the game and the real world. Grimora calls it "truly evil" and Trader says that the malicious and corrupt coding within the game's filed is in fact the Devil, and that he is responsible for everything wrong with the game, up to and including the enmity of the other Scrybes, who he has been manipulating from the start. Then it's revealed that OLD_DATA's code (Karnoffel Code, specifically) has been around for decades, long before computers even existed, making the possibility of it being the Devil even more real.
• Hijacked by Ganon: It is heavily indicated to be Lucifer himself, the Big Bad of Pony Island, having created yet another game and manipulating the new villains, the Scrybes, into fighting each other.
• Horrifying the Horror: All four of the Scrybes are terrified of it, and even the Bone Lord admits he isn't sure what exactly it is. Trader believes it to be the Devil himself. It's possible that GameFuna themselves are killing those who come into contact with him in order to stop him from gaining power.
• Invincible Villain: Stated to be indestructible and able to survive the deletion and destruction of everything, which turns out to be true, up to and including physical force on the floppy disk drive.
• MacGuffin: OLD_DATA never actually does anything that we see. It's the struggle of the other characters to control it which drives the story's conflict.
• These Are Things Man Was Not Meant to Know: Trader states that the purpose of the Karnoffel Code is truly terrifying, represented by a card of death, and that the Code may be found in the cards (the ones in the Skeleton's pocket) "and then oblivion."
• The Man Behind the Man: Assuming OLD_DATA is actually Old Scratch himself, that makes Trader's claims of him creating the code of the game through the Karnoffel Code and causing the enmity of the Scrybes to be true, meaning that he is behind Leshy and P03's respective Hostile Show Takeover acts.
• Negative Space Wedgie: Implied. It's unknown if OLD_DATA is an actual, sentient being or what is contained within it, but in-universe it's definitely treated as a dangerous anomaly and phenomenon which must be sealed and avoided at all costs. The opening of the file where it resides ends up causing what is essentially a rift in the in-game reality as static fills the screen and the scenery is distorted.
• Ominous Mundanity: OLD_DATA sounds like a generic junk folder you'd find on a pre-used disc, not the devil himself.
• Satan: What Trader believes the malicious coding within the game to be, having created the world of Inscryption and inspired the mutual enmity of the four Scrybes.
• Sealed Evil in a Can: Doubly so, the "can" being simultaneously the folder that it dwells within and the game itself. It's definitely free now that the game exists all over the world due to the internet.
• Took a Level in Badass: If it really is the Devil and is the same Devil from Pony Island, very much so. In Pony Island, despite being the Big Bad, the Devil was a complete joke due to his piss poor coding skills, his pony obsession, and his constant childish tantrums whenever Theodore outplayed him. By contrast, here he managed to infect a game with his evil, manipulate events to ensure the game, and thus himself, is spread across the internet, is heavily implied to have caused the rise of Adolf Hitler, and is taken much more seriously by everyone aware of his presence.
• Unseen Evil: Assuming it really is evil, although so far those who claim it to be so seem on the level.
• Walking Spoiler: One of the final events of the story is uncovering what it actually is. Unfortunately, the clearest picture of it in Luke's recordings is redacted.

Kaycee's Mod True Final Boss

Royal Dominguez

"Y-yar? Could it be? Me dream to be a scurvy boss upon the seven seas?"

Resident of one of the graves in Grimora's Crypt, Royal Dominguez is a skeletal pirate. While he's a normal fight during Act II and an unfought boss in the Finale, he replaces Leshy as Kaycee's Mod's Final Boss as the star of the final challenge.

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• A Day in the Limelight: Grimora tries to start Dominguez's boss fight in the main game's finale, but they both get deleted before it can start. In Kaycee's Mod, he not only gets a full fight, but becomes the True Final Boss.
• Cool Ship: The Limoncello. How strong is it? Stronger than The Moon.
• Crosshair Aware: The cannons that line the table will target two spots on the board, one on your side and one on his. After one turn, they'll deal a whopping 10 damage to whatever card is hapless enough to be in those spots.
• Dem Bones: Dominguez is a skeletal pirate, and uses Dead cards. In Kaycee's Mod, he uses pirate-skeleton themed versions of Beast cards, for example the Mole Seaman or Zombie Parrot.
• Discard and Draw: The Limoncello as the Final Boss compared to The Moon trades the Moon's Tidal Lock sigil for a humongous 100% increase in base health and damage.
• Demonic Spiders: The Sea Molemen. Instead of the 1 chump 0/6 moleman Leshy has,Royal has 2 1/8 molemen, which can really tank a lot of damage for Royal, allowing him to play more of his higher damaging units.
• Final Boss: The final act of the main story implies that Grimora wanted him to be this in her segment. Unfortunately, Grimora herself had other plans. Through Kaycee's Mod, however, Leshy gives the player an idea of how that fight would've turned out.
• Ghost Pirate: He's clearly undead, uses Dead cards, and hails from Grimora's Crypt. How he found his way into Leshy's cabin is anyone's guess.
• Herd-Hitting Attack: The Limoncello, just like the Moon, has the Omni-Strike sigil, allowing it to attack every card on the opposing side in one turn.
• Ninja Zombie Pirate Robot: He's a skeleton pirate Dungeon Master. Doesn't get much cooler than that.
• Ramming Always Works: Tries to ram into the table with the Limoncello at the start of phase 3. Leshy quickly puts a stop to that, turning it into a card.
• Tempting Fate: Royal is quick to praise the loyalty of his crew. However, every 5 damage dealt to the ship will result in a skeleton crew member jumping off and joining your side, making the fight slightly easier.
• True Final Boss: The star of Kaycee's Mod's final challenge. Since clearing the main story is required to properly unlock Kaycee's Mod^note You could also press Shift + K + M on the keyboard, but good luck with that if you don't have a keyboard, he could also serve this role for the game as a whole.
• Walking Spoiler: For Kaycee's Mod specifically, as he's just a background NPC in the main story.
• Zero-Effort Boss: Downplayed in his second phase in Kaycee's Mod. The main thing you have to worry about is the cannon hazards from the last phase, otherwise he doesn't send anything more than 2 more sea molemen at you, and you even get a Rodent card pack!

James Cobb

James Cobb/Plasma Jimmy

James is the main focus of the Console ARG, having been a previous student of Magnificus before The Pike Mage took his place.

• Body Horror: Through Goobert,we learn that his trials with Magnificus involved him getting parts of his body transformed, not that he seemed to dislike it, mind you...
• Cerebus Retcon: So, you know that gun-headed robot that can fire a bullet at the cost of an energy cell? Turns out he Was Once a Man that got his body transformed so he could stay in the game.
• Nightmare Fetishist: Apparently, he actually LIKES having parts of his body transformed, this earned him ire from his peer, Magnificus.
• Unwilling Roboticisation: He got handed over to PO3 when Mangnificus didn't like him anymore, who then sent him to the Mycologist to turn him into a robot.

The Cards

The Beasts

Beasts of the forest captured with Leshy's wildlife camera. Their central mechanic is Blood, which entails sacrificing a weak creature to summon a stronger one. Their basic unit is the Squirrel, which has no special abilities but can be tributed for one blood.

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• All Your Powers Combined: Amalgams count as every single card type, meaning they'll always benefit from your totem and can help pass certain "have X cards of the same type" events.
• Anti-Air: Frogs block flying units from attacking directly.
• Awesome, but Impractical:
  • Red Hart gains one attack for every sacrifice made, but its default attack is zero and the buff resets every turn. If you run out of cards to sacrifice (which is likely since you already had to spend two blood to summon it) then all you have is a 0/2 waste of space cluttering up your board.
  • Curious Eggs from the final Starter Deck gain useful effects if very specific conditions are met but meeting those conditions is a Self-Imposed Challenge that requires cluttering up your deck with suboptimal cards and it's far easier to win with just about anything else.
• Boring, but Practical: Squirrels but also the rare Geck. Both are free to summon making them excellent tribute fodder, especially if you grant them additional abilities such as unkillable or fecundity.
• Cats Have Nine Lives: The Cat card comes with the Many Lives sigil, which allows it to be sacrificed without dying. However, there is a hidden limit: Using it nine times will turn it into an Undead Cat that loses the ability to survive sacrifices but gaining a powerful statline.
• Circling Vultures: The Turkey Vulture is summoned with bones, appearing only after many cards have died. The Lammergier, a bearded vulture, is summoned with blood but gains power based on how many bones the player has.
• Design-It-Yourself Equipment: Upon defeat you can create a custom Death Card by combining the cost, stats and abilities of three different cards in your deck, which will then appear in future runs. It's trivially easy to produce a low-cost Game-Breaker by doing this. Though Leshy can turn them against you in his boss fight.
• Dire Beast: The Dire Wolf and its Pup appear in Kaycee's Mod. They are both one blood more expensive than their regular counterparts, but the Pup also generates some bone while the Wolf has higher damage and health.
• Enemy Summoner: Warrens spawn rabbits when summoned, Beehives summon bees when struck.
• Exclusive Enemy Equipment: Most bosses have cards that the player cannot obtain but can be stolen with the Hook, most notably the Trapper's Strange Frogs or Royal Dominguez's buffed Mole Seamen.
• Final Boss: The Moon
  • Contractual Boss Immunity: Averted, despite its high HP it can be killed instantly by a Deadly creature or rendered unable to act by a Stinky creature setting its attack to zero. Leshy even lampshades how ridiculous this is since the moon doesn't even have a sense of smell, but lets it slide. This is played straight in Kaycee's Mod thanks to the addition of the Made Of Stone sigil.
  • Herd-Hitting Attack: Its unique sigil allows it to attack every enemy creature at once. Useful when it takes up the entire opposing side.
  • Load-Bearing Boss: Leshy effectively surrenders after it's defeated, saying there's nothing left to do but deal the final blow.
  • Unusable Enemy Equipment: There is no way to receive this card in normal gameplay. Not even the Angler's Hook will put it on your side of the field.
• Forced Transformation: Stoat, Stinkbug and Stunted Wolf are the three other Scrybes transformed into beasts after Leshy staged his Hostile Show Takeover.
• The Goomba: Squirrels. They're a 0 power, 1 health unit that costs no sacrifices and instead are meant to be sacrificed. They have unique synergy potential with totems, and can even be made to attack with certain power-boosting effects like the Alpha's Leader sigil.
  • The Warren's unique sigil grants the player a Rabbit card when it is played, which has identical base stats to Squirrels.
  • One event in Act 1 allows for squirrels to be permanently replaced by Bees, which are a 1 power, 1 health unit with Airborne. They also are boosted by Insect-head totems.
• Magikarp Power:
  • Wolf Cubs, Elk Fawns and Raven Eggs are low cost (one blood) creatures that transform into full Wolves, Elks and Ravens if they survive a turn, saving you one blood over the adult version. The same ability can be transferred to other cards turning them into "Elder X" cards with boosted stats after a turn.
  • The Strange Larva takes this further, taking two turns to transform into the powerful Moth Man (7 attack, flying).
  • The Cat has nine lives, allowing it to be sacrificed repeatedly. Sacrificing it for the ninth time takes away this ability but transforms it into an Undead Cat with boosted stats (3 attack, 6 health).
  • Child 13 transforms when sacrificed, turning into a 2 attack, triple-attacker. However, sacrificing it 13 times turns it into a Hungry Child with no stats for the rest of the battle.
  • Ouroboros starts as a weak but costly creature (1/1 for 2 blood), but every time it returns to your hand its stats increase without limit, quickly reaching game breaking levels.
  • The Curious Eggs, which only appear in a special starter deck in Kaycee's Mod. Since they have zero attack power until they hatch, you're stuck struggling to win early games with whatever cards you purchase from the first Trader. They have extreme requirements to hatch, requiring your deck to have cards that have the numbers 1, 2, 3, 4, and 5 represented in their Health AND in their Power, and cards that represent each tribe. But should you meet all requirements, the Curious Eggs will hatch into a devastating 1/5 Hydra with Bifurcated AND Trifurcated Strike.
  • Hodag and Wolverine start out with limited attack power for how much they cost (1 attack for 2 blood and 3 bones respectively) but permanently gain attack for the rest of the run every time they kill something.
  • Tadpoles are free to summon, can't block attacks and turn into a frog after one turn. Their lack of a cost means they're better off used as tribute fodder, especially if given a useful sigil like Worthy Sacrifice or Fecundity.
• Mecha-Mook: The Trapper's Strange Frogs are actually machines that transform into a Leaping Trap when destroyed.
• Meta Power Up: Raccoons let you earn bones when cards on the opponent's side of the field die, not just your own.
• Power Up Letdown: Aquasquirrels are your normal Squirrels but with a bonus Waterborne sigil! The sigil means they can't block attacks so choosing them is a Self-Imposed Challenge in Kaycee's Mod.
• Red Eyes, Take Warning: One new card introduced in Kaycee's Mod is the shapeshifting Ijiraq. Until you play it, it's disguised as one of your other cards, but you can tell by the fact that its eyes (or whatever) glow red rather than the Glowing Eyes of normal boosted cards.
• Schmuck Bait: The Trapper's Leaping Traps destroy whichever monster is in front of them and turn it into a pelt. The Angler's Bait Buckets summon a powerful Great White if they're destroyed, and get bonus points for being actual bait.
• So Last Season: Initially the workhorse cards of your deck, Act 2 sees them decline in effectiveness since Squirrel Cards are no longer a side deck you can pull from (depriving you reliable access to free summons) and the formal introduction of the other types of cards provide easier summon methods.
• Stalked by the Bell: Should you ever run out of cards in your main and side deck then Starvation cards will start appearing on the enemy's side of the field. They can't be attacked and keep spawning, meaning if the player isn't on the point of victory they'll be quickly defeated.
• Stone Wall: Moles and Mole Men have high health and automatically move block any attack that would hit an empty space.
• Unskilled, but Strong: The Grizzly and Urayuli have high costs but no skills, though this can be remedied by sacrificing a creature with a useful skill to empower them.

The Dead

Remains of the dead given new life with Grimora's quill. Their central mechanic is Bones, a resource generated every time a creature dies. Their basic unit is the Skeleton, which has good stats (1/1) for a free creature but dies after attacking, providing a Bone in the process.

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• Back from the Dead: Despite their theme this is averted in terms of game mechanics. Due to the lack of a discard pile there's no way to resurrect your destroyed cards and none of them have the unkillable trait that would return them to the hand when destroyed. Grimora's boss ability can return them to life though.
• Dem Bones: One of their themes, see Skeleton, Revenant and Bonehound.
• Discard and Draw: The Dead Hand allows you to discard any remaining cards in your hand then draw four more.
• Early-Bird Cameo: Their Bones mechanic is introduced during Leshy's game, albeit used by bugs and carrion feeders such as coyotes and vultures rather than the undead.
• Enemy Summoner: Tomb Robbers allow you to create a skeleton in your hand at the cost of a single bone. Since you get the bone back when the skeleton dies (including when it's tributed) this makes for a powerful tribute engine.
• The Goomba: Skeletons. They are unique in being the only basic unit of the Scrybes that has native attack power, but its Brittle sigil means it dies after performing an attack. This does guarantee a bone, however, allowing more expensive units to be played.
• Magikarp Power: The Sarcophagus will transform into a powerful Mummy Lord after a turn on the field.
• Meta Power-Up: Necromancers cause any dying creature to reanimate then immediately die again, granting you double the number of bones and triggering any on-summon effects (e.g., fecundity) a second time.
• Purposely Overpowered: The Bone Lord's Horn requires a sidequest to obtain but grants a truly massive amount of Bones each turn while it's on the field, equivalent to three times your energy supply (so between 3 and 18), the only downside being that you can't use any energy it consumes to summon.
• Set Bonus: Combining two matching half obols on the field will grant you an obol item needed for a sidequest.
• Zerg Rush: Skeletons die after attacking but they are powerful for their cost and the deck offers multiple ways to generate more of them.

The Bots

Robots whose CPU was scanned by P03. Their central mechanic is Energy, a resource that the player generates for free and in increasing amounts each turn, starting at one per turn and capping at six. Their basic unit is the Empty Vessel.

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• Action Bomb: Machines with the bomb attribute explode when killed, dealing 10 damage to the card opposite them and any friendly units to either side.
• Barrier Warrior: Any unit with nanoarmour can No-Sell a single hit, even if it were a deadly attack that would normally destroy them. Some units are capable of granting this buff to others, and there's a usable item that can grant the buff to all your units.
• Deadly Upgrade: In Act 3 you can choose to overclock your machine cards, boosting their stats but at the cost of losing the card forever if it's destroyed.
• Design-It-Yourself Equipment: In Act 3 you are given the ability to create your own custom cards.
  • Min Maxers Delight: When making a custom card it's trivially easy to stack powerful abilities while keeping the cost down with downsides that won't actually matter. For example having zero attack won't matter if the card has the Deadly and Sentry traits, and having low HP and cost-saving negative effects like Fragile and Alarm won't matter if the card is Unkillable and always returns to your hand on destruction.
• Dual Mode Unit: In Act 3 you can give your cards the ability to transform into a beast (specifically as Wolf, Raven or Adder), replacing their abilities and stats with that of the chosen beast every other turn.
• Early-Bird Cameo: Energy and robots appears as an optional mechanic and units in Act 2, before becoming the primary gameplay style in Act 3.
• Fusion Dance: In their secret boss fight in Act 3 the Mycologists combine multiple creatures together to produce an amalgam with their combined stats and abilities. Defeating them sees him do the same to several of your cards, creating a powerful Mycobot that you get to keep.
• Gathering Steam: Starts weak but is able to summon a powerful creature basically for free each turn once the player reaches the cap of six energy per turn.
• Glass Cannon: Exeskeletons have impressive stats for their cost (2/2 for 2 energy) but they have Fragile and die after attacking.
  • Double Gunners attack two squares for two damage each, but can't hit the square directly above them and only have one HP.
• The Goomba: Empty Vessels. They don't have any particular stand-out features that synergize with the style of play they belong to, but in Act 3, your DM gradually adds additional functionality to Empty Vessels until they're overflowing with utility.
• Magikarp Power: Empty Vessels start out as mere blockers, arguably less useful than squirrels seeing as they can't be tributed. As the game goes on the player can choose a variety of abilities to grant them such as shields, counter attacks and energy generation, and they also gain the ability to act as Mox to enhance magic-empowered cards or as part of a buff circuit, providing them with a lot of utility.
  • The Ourobot is essentially a robotic version of the Ouroboros being unkillable and increasing its stats every time it's destroyed and returns to your hand. It also retains any stat boosts the Ouroboros card gained in Acts 1 and 2.
• Magitek: In Act 3 you can upgrade your Empty Vessals to contain Mox gems and your cards to gain stat boosts depending on the colour(s) of gems on the field (orange for attack boosts, green for health and blue to lower their cost).
• Support Party Member: Buff Conduits increase the damage of any card that's part of their circuit.
• Unwilling Roboticization: Robotic versions of The Angler and The Lonely Wizard appear in Act 3.

The Mages

Students of Magnificus turned into cards with his paintbrush. Their central mechanic is Mox, whereby the player must summon gems of three different colours to the field to summon and/or activate the effects of their cards.

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• Early-Bird Cameo: Luke Carder finds a Blue Mage in the Inscryption card pack he opens in one of his videos, a subtle hint that the game originally contained other card types in addition to Leshy's beasts.
• The Goomba: Gems. Distinct in the manner that the Mox a gem card provides is needed to play and activate cards marked with its icon, making protecting it more vital than the other Scrybes' fodder units.
• Geo Effects: They need Mox on the field to summon units and activate effects.
• Keystone Army: They may have some powerful effects, but without a Mox on the field they won't be able to do anything. Fail to draw your Mox cards or have them destroyed early and you're in for a quick defeat.
• Power Nullifier: The Force Mage prevents any attack that would target it directly (but not multi-target attacks that include it).

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