Simplified Rules

Goal of the Game

The objective of the game is to earn Victory Points (VP), with a standard game played to 12VP. VP are gained by winning duels with soldiers that you draft. To win a duel, your soldier's rank must be higher than your opponent’s soldier. Use cards from your hand or activate abilities from cards in play to boost your rank and secure victory. 

Game Formats:

Blitz - 8VP win count.

Standard - 12VP win count.

Extended - 16VP win count.

Card types:

Soldiers - Draft these to earn VP. The number in the top left is known as its base rank. Other abilities are in the abilities box. Soldiers with “Transpose" can be used as they are counter attacks. To do so reveal the soldier and resolve the effect. Then place the card into the fallen pile. (Similar to counter attacks. Can play any number on your turn).

Counter Attacks - One time use cards. Reveal the card, resolve the effect, then put it into your fallen pile. In your reaction phase you can play any number of these.

Equipment - Equip these by placing the card onto a soldier to gain its effects. In order to equip, you must first pay the equipment cost by pitching cards equal to the cost number (To pitch a card, place a card from your hand into the survivor pile). Once equipped the attached soldier gains the ability or rank as stated by the "Attached Soldier" effect. A soldier can have any number of equipment attached to it, but equipment cannot be moved off of the soldier unless otherwise stated. Equipment unequips and returns to your arsenal at the end of the turn.

Items - When these flip up and they gain counters called supply. In your reaction phase you can remove supply to pay for the costs to gain effects.

Enhancements - Passive effects or triggered effects. Some have activated abilities, follow the activated cost to gain its effects.

Other Card Rules

Subtype: Tribeless, or “Colorless” cards. These cards are considered all colors, they use yellow as their color. Any card type can be “Tribeless”.

Cards can have more than one type. EX: Item Equipment (It counts as an item and a equipment)

Most cards specify a target, this means you choose a card in play as the target, the following effect applies to that card. All cards that ask for a target will specify a type of card that can be the target. EX: Target soldier gets +3 rank.

Setup

Start by identifying the “Priority Player” (Win a game: coin flip, high rolls, Rock-Paper-Scissors, etc.). 

Each player will shuffle their deck and draw 7 cards. 

If you don’t like your hand you can mulligan as many times as you like. To do so, shuffle your hand back into your deck and draw 7 new cards. When you like your hand, put a number of those cards equal to the number of times you have taken a mulligan on the bottom of your deck in any order.

Game Phases:

All phases are shared, the game itself will move through the phases as players finish taking game actions or resolve their effects in each of the phases.

1. Arsenal Phase 

2. Draft Phase

3. Reactions Phase

4. Rank Comparison Phase

5. Clean Up Phase

 

1. Arsenal Phase: Each player will put any number of statics (non-soldier and non-counter-attack cards) face-down into their arsenal. Each player can also destroy any cards from their arsenal, they put them into their fallen pile. Once each player is done, flip all cards face-up. Put supply on items that flipped up. Resolve any “On Flip” effects. The game moves to phase #2.

2. Draft Phase: Each player will draft a soldier. To do this put down a soldier card from your hand face-down into the frontline in the active duel. Then once each player has done, flip each soldier face-up. You will then resolve any “On Flip” effects. The player with the lowest rank goes first. If tied, use the “Priority Player”. The game moves to phase #3.

You can choose to bluff. If you do, do not draft a soldier. You can do this even if you have a soldier in hand, but must do this if you have no soldiers in hand. If a player bluffs, the player who did not bluff can put their soldier back in hand or flip their soldier up to gain effects from it. Either way the player who did not bluff will earn 1VP. The game moves to phase #4.

You can swap a drafted card in play with another soldier with “Bodyguard” from your hand. Put the card from play into your hand, then put the card with “Bodyguard” from your hand into play. Do this before your on flip effect, after you swap, resolve any new on flip effects.

3. Reactions Phase: Where most of the game actions are taken. The player with the lowest rank soldier will start this phase, if its tied priority player will start. Each player will get one chance to take actions. If any actions were taken by a given player the other player may take more actions. When priority is passed by a player that takes no actions, the game moves to phase #4.
These are the 3 actions you can take any number of times:

1. Use any number of counter attacks or soldiers with “Transpose”.

2. Activate items or enhancements in your arsenal any number of times.

3. Equip any number of equipment (after paying for equip cost).

4. Rank Comparison Phase: Calculate your total rank and compare ranks of all player's soldiers in the duel. The soldier with the highest rank wins. All soldiers on the winner’s side become victorious. All soldiers on the loser's side become defeated. The winner earns 1VP for each card that is victorious (unless a card states otherwise). The game moves to phase #5.

If all soldiers in the active duel are tied for rank, a clash is started (or if “Forced Clash” is present). When a clash starts, keep all cards in play and start a new active duel next to the previous one. Move back to phase #2 and repeat until someone wins a duel. The winner of any duel in a clash is considered the winner of the clash. All soldiers on the winner’s side become victorious. All soldiers on the loser's side become defeated. The winner earns 1VP for each card that is victorious (unless a card states otherwise). The game moves to phase #5.

If a clash would start but is stopped by the “Anti-clash” keyword, the duel/clash is a stalemate. If a turn is deemed a stalemate all soldiers go to the survivors pile but are not marked victorious. No VP is earned by any player. The game moves to phase #5.

5. Clean-Up Phase: Clean up after a duel or clash. Move all victorious soldiers to the survivors pile and all defeated soldiers to the fallen pile. Any cards that were marked for destruction are now placed into the fallen pile. Each player draws a card from their deck (this is the “end of turn draw”). If a player has no cards in hand before the draw they can draw 3 cards instead of 1. This marks the end of the turn. The game moves to phase #1.

If a player was forced to bluff due to having no soldiers in hand to draft, that player can reveal their hand, if they do, they reveal the top card of their deck until they reveal a soldier, they put that card into their hand, then they shuffle all other revealed cards back into the deck (this replaces the end of turn draw.)