Awesome Rules Concept

Under Construction These pages are under heavy construction & only intended for the developers. Notice that most of the info will change. Please contact us if you want to help us out or join the dev. team.

Intro.

Disclaimer & info

• These rules are, in their current state, only intended for developers that work on the same ruleset as ngoeminne, which is dubbed "the Alternative Rules Concept", or ARC in short.
• Lingual edits are allowed by anyone as long as they keep the semantics and logic of the game, the intention of a rule and so on, fully intact and don't change how the game works.
• Rule-edits are allowed only after being cleared with ngoeminne first.
• The ARC intends to live up to the General Design Document & the Local Design Document for the ORC.
• All content in here can and will likely change as we continue development, concept- & playtesting and revising. Nothing in here represents the finalized game nor should it be seen as set in stone.
• Questions? Please post them in our forum after mailing us for an account in there or mail them.

Getting Started

WTactis is a card game, with freely accessible cards (downloadable).

• Each card in the game belongs to a certain faction; Gaian, Dark Legion, Red Banner, House of Nobels and the Empire.
• Each card has a card type; city, creature, enchantment, magic and event.

To get started each player builds a main deck of at least 60 cards. The deck may contain cards of multiple factions, and all kind of types, except for the cities.

Secondly each player builds a cities deck of exactly 5 city cards.

Winning the game

The aim of the game is to defeat all your opponents. You can defeat an opponent on several ways.

1. You are able to reduce your opponent's Life Points (LP) to zero
2. You have captured or destroyed all of your opponent's cities, and his/her cities deck is empty
3. You have reached the target Victory Points (VP)
4. Your opponent has used up all the cards in his/her deck and is forced to draw another card

In case you and your opponent's life points simulations reach zero, the player with the most victory points wins. In case of a draw in victory points, the player holding the most cities in play wins.

You will need something that can help to keep track of both the life points and victory points (i.e. pen & paper, two 20 sided dices)

Gold, the source of all your power

During the game you'll be able to gather gold reserves which you'll have to manage into different piles on the table. One pile for each faction you've put in your deck.

The gold reserves give you the power to play cards from your hand, and bring them into play.

Card Layout

Let's look at a typical card layout.

1. Cost & Faction Logo: The Faction logo - in this case a leaf for the Gaian faction - shows which faction the card belongs to. If the card has a gold cost, it will be shown there as a number. The cost is the amount of gold you will have to spend from the corresponding resource pile. In this case, you'll have to use the gold you've put the Gaian gold resource pile.
2. Loyalty: A card may have a number of loyalty marks. In case you ran out of gold for a certain faction, you are allowed to use one gold resource reserved for a different faction, for each loyalty mark on the card.
3. Card Art: The illustration has no impact on the rules of the game or anything else. The card art is of purely aesthetical value and also helps the player to quickly identify and remember cards in addition to give the game a nice theme and setting.
4. Card name / types: Every card has a unique name. Each part of the name also doubles as a subtype.
5. Additional Card subtypes: This line contains the types(s) of the card. Each card type is governed by specific rules found in this document, while subtypes are usually associated with rules found on other cards.
6. Coloured border: The border around a card reveals what faction it belongs to. Our Elvish Sorceress has a green surrounding border, revealing - together with the faction logo in 1 - that this is indeed a Gaian card.
7. Card Text: Additional abilities of the card are written in this area.
8. Combat Statistics: The first red value is the units attack (ATK). Second green shield value is it's defence (DEF). These values are used when being part of a combat.
9. Discipline: <This is obsolete and will be removed.>
10. Footer: Contains info about the cards collectors number and version, rarity and the game.
    

Setting up the battleground (the kitchen table :-)

The playing table is divided into imaginary areas.

will vary In a normal game of WT the number of cards on the table will vary greatly during the course of the game. Typically there would be fewer cards in the start of the game and more of them as the game progresses. The amount of cards that each player has on the table during any given time will also vary.

Your Army (1)

Creatures that will help launch an attack or defend against enemy attacks must be in the your Army face up.

Kingdom (2)

When you build a city you place it in the kingdom area. When creatures visit the city they become residents of that city and are placed on the same imaginary row as the city.

Cities deck (3)

The cities pile will keep your unbuild city cards face up.

The Faction's Gold Reserves (4)

Each faction in your deck has it's own gold stash. Gold resources for a faction are kept in a single imaginary row.

• During a player's turn he/she may put exact one of the cards in hand face down in one of the faction's gold stash.
• Cards that are placed in the resource area in that fashion become resource cards.
• Resource cards produce one gold each for a given faction when they are marked.
• If you have produced more gold than you have used during a turn the surplus is lost at the end of the turn. The resource cards stay marked, until your next turn.

Main deck (5)

This area is where the deck resides and from where the player draws new cards every time it becomes his/her turn.

Graveyard (6)

The area where all the discarded, used up or somehow wasted or killed cards go, like for instance dead creatures and used event cards. All cards in the grave are face up. Any player may search through any players grave at any time. The order of the cards in the grave should however be kept intact, meaning that the most recent discarded card would be on the top and first on the grave, the next most recent card second, and so on.

The below table overview is an example of how a game should be properly setup. It shows only the table side of one of the players. Each additional player should have the same table layout.

Card States

In Play

When a card is legally moved from hand, main deck, cities deck or grave onto the game table it is entering play, and if nothing hinders it the card is then in play.

All cards that have been paid for, if any, are considered to be in play. Typically that would be all permanents that are on the table, like your creatures and enchantments. Events, effects of abilities and Magic are technically speaking also in play for a very short moment: They enter play, are in play, resolve and then become discarded into the grave - leaving play.

Marked & Unmarked

• Cards in play are always in either a marked or an unmarked state. All other card types lack the ability to (un)mark.
• Cards always come into play in their unmarked state unless it's clearly specified otherwise.
• The marked state is normally used to show that the card has been exhausted/used somehow.
  • Examples of when a card becomes marked: When a creature attacks, moves or uses an activated ability that requires it to mark.
• A card can only be marked once per turn unless an effect or rule unmarks it after it was marked.
  • There is no limit on how many times a card can become marked or unmarked if it happens as a result of an effect.
• During every new turn the player gets all of his/her marked cards unmarked during the players own unmark/unassign-phase.

Mark me

The Mark Me symbol

Different actions, abilities and rules require a card to mark when the player wants to use it in a particular way. Marking is not a cost, as gold is. It should rather be seen as a kind of prerequisite, an action that needs to happen in order for an effect to happen. Whenever the mark me symbol is shown (a horizontal rectangle with a symbol within, ) it means that you have to mark the card itself if that is a part of the pre-requisite for whatever you're trying to accomplish.

Disclaimer How a player (un)marks cards is not decided by the rules or us behind WTactics due to legal reasons. It's up to the players to agree on it. In many CCG:s cards are rotated 90 degrees so that they lay down horizontally Rotating a card in this way is supposedly a patented idea in the U.S.A. To not violate patent(s) that protects that amazing invention we do not with this text want to give the idea that we encourage anyone to use that system to mark/unmark cards, and we also don't take any legal responsibility for players doing so.

Not in Play

• A card that is not in the in play state is considered to be not in play.
• All the cards in a players hand, main deck, cities deck and grave are examples of cards that are not in play until their owner pays for them and meets other criteria so that they can be put in play.
• There is a distinction between being "in play" and "was played".
  • Card types that can stay on the table (permanents) are put "in play".
  • Card that don't stay on the table after they "were played", like for example Event cards that are discarded directly after their effect tries to happen happen, are never considered to be "in play".

Removed from Game

A card that is removed from game is not considered to have the in play state or the not in play state: A card that has been removed from the game ceases to exist for all intents and purposes for the remaining duration of the game. Removed from game cards are not placed in the grave. They are be placed in a pile more distant from the game since there will be no interaction with them while playing.

There is a huge difference between cards not in play and cards removed from the game: Cards not in play are still a part of the game and might come into play at some point. Cards in hand or in the deck or even in the grave are an example of cards not in play. Cards that have been removed from the game may never in any way become part of it again during that game.

Card Types

WTactics provides the players with different card types that have their own associated rules:

Creatures

Creatures are the backbone of every army, they are the courageous forces that will bring a player glorious victory (or a miserable defeat that is best forgotten).

During the Entrance phase a player may put new creatures into play by meeting their loyalty requirement, paying their gold cost and then placing them into one of the two regions - the Front or the Kingdom. Creatures that are part of the Front can attack the opponent, as well as defend against oppositional forces. Creatures that are part of the Kingdom are able to defend against the opponent's creatures, but can never be a part of the attacks launched against them.

Unlike other cards, creatures have specific and distinct values that show their fighting skills in combat:

• Attack (ATK): The skills a creature has in combat. This is the number of damage the creature will inflict on it's enemies if they should stand in the creatures way.
• Defense (DEF): How much damage a creature can take before it becomes wounded and dies.

When other cards manipulate these combat values they are often paired and written in the form of x/y, where x is ATK and y is DEF.

• Example: +5/-2 would mean that a creature would gain 5 more to it's ATK and lose 2 of it's DEF.

Creature Types

All creatures also belong to one or more creature type. Creature types are words separated by spaces in the creatures name and subtype line. An example of a a couple of creature types a creature could have is: Leader Beast Caster. Leader would be one, Beast another type, and Caster a third creature type. They don't necessarily relate to each other in any way even if it may look like it in some cases.

Creature types have no function by themselves. They are however relevant in many situations when other cards interact with the creature cards.

Civilians

While creatures are in the Kingdom they are far away from the fronts of the war. As such they are partaking in everyday duties in their society and considered to be civilans as long as they stay in the protective walls within the domain of the Kingdom.

• Civilian is a special subtype to the Creature type of cards that is added to the creature whenever it is in Kingdom.
  • The subtype civilian is applied whenever a creature enters the Kingdom somehow, and it is removed when it leaves the Kingdom.
  • A creature is either a civilian and inside the Kingdom or it is not a civilian, meaning it is outside of the Kingdom (i.e. front, hand, deck, grave et.c)
• Civilans can't use any of their abilities unless they explicitly mention that it is possible from withing Kingdom. This is shown by the special C-sign, a filled circle with a capital C inside of it, signifying that "whenever this creature is a civilian, the following applies..."
• Civilians can't launch an attack of their own from the Kingdom using ATK/DEF as in normal combat in the Front.
  • Civilians can however help to defend by using their DEF-values as in normal combat, but they do never strike back while doing so.
• Civilians do however still retain all their characteristics, such as gold cost, faction belonging, subtypes et.c.

Movement

Each turn one creature can perform a movement between the kingdom and front or vice versa by it's controller if:

• it is unmarked
• it is on top of it's domain pile.
• it is the phase during the players turn where movement occurs.

To move a creature from one zone to the other do the following:

• • mark it
  • announce the move
  • place it in the destination - either a domain in the Kingdom or in the Front.

A creature may not move from one domain into another.

Front

Creatures located in the Front may both attack or defend. They are part of all the action in the game.

Kingdom & Domains

A Kingdom has 3 different domains in which it excels and that could help the player establish tactical or strategical advantages during the course of the game, as well as earn him/her victory points. The domains are called Body (B), Mind (I) and Soul (S). They are represented by 3 piles in the Kingdom, one pile for each domain. There are 0 up to an unrestricted amount of creatures into every domain at any given time.

• Every civilian must contribute within one of the 3 domains while in the Kingdom.
• The player decides which domain the creature contributes to when the creature enters the Kingdom. He/she then places the creature on top of the chosen domain pile, face up.
  • The top creature(s) can be moved from the front into a given domain (see rules for Movement).
  • A creature can be played directly from hand into the Kingdom and the given domain.
  • Token creatures can't ever be placed in a domain.

Usually the player may only interact with the top creature of each domain (i.e. moving, defending, using Kingdom abilities, marking et.c.).

Life & Death

• If all damage has been resolved in a battle and the result is that a creatures defence (DEF) was equal to or smaller than the attacking creatures attack (ATK) then the creature dies.
• Creatures that die are placed in the Grave. Any and all cards attached to it go to their owners grave.
  • Exceptions to this is the Equipment pickup rule, discussed in a separate paragraph further down in this text.

Equipment

• Cards with the Equipment cardtype are considered to be Equipment.
• A creature can carry an unlimited amount of Equipment but may only use the effects of one Equipment card from each Equipment subtype at the same time: Equipment effects only stack if the Equipment cards either lack subtypes or have different subtypes.
  • Example: A creature has an "Equipment - Weapon" card called "Damocle's Sword". The sword gives the creature +5/0. Giving the creature an additional "Equipment - Weapon" card will not add any of it's effects while Damocle's Sword is being used since both cards share the same Equipment subtype "Weapon".
  • If a Creature is attacking and has multiple Equipment cards with the same subtypes the creature's controller should clearly state which Equipment the creature will use during that turn. This must be announced when the creature is declared to be an attacker, before the defender's are appointed by the opposing player. When the creature is a defender instead the announcement of what equipment is used does not have to be made until after the creature has blocked an attacker.
• When equipment is put into play it is given, attached, to a specific creature. Hence that creature becomes an Equipped creature. A creature is unequipped if has no equipment cards attached to it.
  • Equipment stays attached to an equipped creature and follows it wherever the creature is going. This includes, but is not limited to: The grave, if sent there by some other effect than combat, back up to hand, a domain. The equipment stays on the creature until a) the equipment it's somehow removed by an effect or b) the creature dies.
    • Equipment that came back into a players hand by following the creature that carried there becomes, when it reaches the hand, unattached from that creature. The equipment is then considered to be like any other card in hand, and has to be paid for and attached to a creature again in order for it to come into play once more.

Reassign Equipment

An equipped creature may, during it's controllers own play phase, give one target equipment it is carrying to another target local creature. To be able to perform that action the giving creature as well as the receiving creature must both be unmarked and unassigned. The player pays the cost for the equipment once again, takes the equipment card from the equipped creature and places it on the target ally creature in front, making it equipped. Both creatures are then marked.

Drop & Take equipment

• When a creature dies while in combat it drops all it's equipment on the ground: The creature is discarded and put into the graveyard while the equipment is left on the table unattached to any other creature. All of it's equipment cards are considered to be dropped on the ground for the time being.
• Equipment pick-ups allow each unmarked ally creature in the front to pick up one of the dropped Equipment cards.
• Any local creature may perform an Equipment pick-up during any players play phase (while there are no ongoing attacks).
• To perform the pick-up the player must announce that it is being executed and mark the creature that does the picking-up. Once the pick-up is performed, attach one of the Equipment cards the dead ally creature was carrying to the creature that picked it up.
  • This action costs no gold.
• Notice that all effects and restrictions of a an equipment are still in place even if a pick-up is attempted.
  • Example: If a goblin tries to pick-up equipment that explicitly states that it can't be equipped to any other creature type other than Human then the goblin will not be able to make the pick-up since picking up also entails equipping it.
• A marked creature can't pick up any Equipment since it can't meet the mark criteria.
• A player can use any amount unmarked creatures to pick up dropped equipment, but each creature may only pick-up one piece of Equipment per turn.
• At the end of turn each player discards all dropped equipment that wasn't picked up.

Events

• Events are cards representing one time effects that try to resolve instantly. In CCG terminology these are more widely known as interrupts or Instants.
• You may play an Event card at any time, even on your opponents turn as a response to what he/she has done.
• After an event has been used and the resolution of it decided it is always discarded, and that happens the same turn it was played.
• When you play an event, you follow the instruction provided by its rules text, then you put it in your grave.
• Keep in mind that whenever you play an Event, your opponent may do the same in response, and back and forth until nobody want to play more Events.

Magic

• Magic can only be played during the player's own turn, during the play phase.
• There are 3 main kinds of magic that correspond to the domains in the Kingdom: Magic of the Body, Magic of the Soul, Magic of the Mind.
• To be able to cast a certain kind of magic it's corresponding domain must contain one or more creatures in it.
• Magical effects stack.
• Once a magic card has been played it is discarded into grave.

Enchantments

• Enchantments can only be played during the player's own play phase and only in a front.
• Enchantments are always targeting something or someone, like for example the player or a creature.
  • are always attached to it's target,
  • are permanently in play on the table until some effect removes them.
• Enchantments that don't share name stack.
  • Example: If a player casts two Enchantments that share a name and they each give the target creature +1/+1 then only one of them will benefit the creature.
  • Example: Same scenario as in the above example, but in this case the opponent removes one of the enchantments. There is then still one Enchantment left on the creature, and in contrast to earlier, it now becomes activated.

Variable Gold Costs

Cost of X

This card costs X gold.

• Apart from integers, a card can have a cost of X, as well as X with a modifier. If that is the case, X is always defined in the card text.
  • Example: A card costs X + 2. It's text says that X is equal to the ATK value of the target creature. The target creature's ATK is equal to 3, thus we'd have to pay 3 + 2 = 5 gold to play our card.

Cost of T

This card costs T gold.

• T is also around as a cost, as well as T with a modifier. T is always equal the target cards gold cost.
  • Example: A card costs T - 3. The target cards gold cost is 5, which means hat we have to pay 5 - 3 = 2 gold to put our card in play.
• T reminds us of X, with the difference that it always takes into account one and the same type of variable no matter when or how it is played.

Paying a card

1. The player looks at the card's gold cost.
2. The player then marks the corresponding amount of unmarked resource cards in the corresponding faction's gold stash to produce that much gold.
3. The gold has now been spent, regardless if the card actually gets resolved or not.
4. The card is put into play if it resolved.
5. Additional cards can be played by repeating the steps above.

Prerequisites

In order to play a card one has to be able to pay it's cost and, if any, meet all the conditions it requires to be true for it to come into play or it's effect to be activated. The more powerful the card is, the higher is the cost, and/or the trickier the prerequisites become.

Prerequisites are printed in written text on the card, as a part of the card text field. These kinds of prerequisites are often custom, straight forward and vary highly depending on the card.

Examples

• This card can only be played if you control less creatures than your opponent(s).
• This Equipment can only be attached to a Northener.

If a card can not get all of it's prerequisites met, it can't be played.

Round Structure

WTactics is played using individual player turns, that are divided into different game phases.

The player who is currently taking his turn is named the active player. All other players are considered to be passive players even if they would do something (i.e. play Event cards) during the active players turn. When we refer to "the player" we most often refer to the "active player". In cases where we don't refer to the active player, we use the "passive" or "any" player terminology.

Turn Structure

A turn is made up of the following phases, where each name is followed by the postfix "phase":

1. Unmark/Unassign
2. Upkeep
3. Tactical
4. Draw
5. Play
6. Move or Attack
7. Play
8. Move or Attack
9. Entrance
10. Discard

The phases that are mandatory are the Unmark/unassign, Upkeep, Tactical, Draw and Discard-phases. The Play, Move or Attack and Entrance phases are all optional phases and can all be omitted by you if you choose to do so.

The phases must occur in the given order. Example: You can't use a Play or Move/Attack-phase once you have used your Entrance or Discard-phase.

Turn Phases

Unmark/Unassign

• During the unmark and unassign phase a player must unmark all his/her cards that are marked. This replenishes them for future use.
• In contrast, assigned cards do not automatically become unassigned: During the unmark/unassign-phase a player may unassign target ally creatures that is assigned.

Upkeep

• Sometimes cards require that an upkeep cost is paid. This phase is only relevant when that kind of cards are around.
• All such cards have explicit text that tell the players if that is the case. Such text is written in the form Upkeep cost ~ What happens is the upkeep isn't paid.
  • Example: Upkeep 3 ~ Discard card. means that the cards upkeep is 3 gold and that if it isn't paid then the card must be discarded.
• The player always chooses if he/she wants to pay the upkeep or not.
  • If the upkeep is paid the card continues to be in play as usual and it's ~ effect isn't triggered.
  • Should the player choose not to pay the cards upkeep the text after the ~ is triggered.

Tactics

In the tactics phase the player compares his/her domains with the opponent domains in order to see if he/she has won any of the three possible tactical victories.

Each unmarked card in a domain adds one additional domain point of that given type. Example: 2 unmarked cards in the Body domain means that you have 2 body domain points.

Advantage (ADV)

When you have 2 or more domain points in a given domain compared to what your opponent has in the same domain, you may win that domains tactical advantage. If you want to do so you must claim it for it to take effect. Claiming the advantage is done by announcing the name of the advantage, the total sum in that particular discipline, and also stating that you claim the tactical victory. Example: "I have 7 Soul compared to your 5 and claim victory of the Soul". Unclaimed victories can not be claimed after the player has continued into any other phase beyond the tactical.

Check your active region card to see what happens when you win a specific advantage.

Domination (DO)

If you have won at least 2 of the tactical advantages you may claim Domination instead of both of them: Their tactical advantage effects will then not trigger. Instead, you get to choose one of the following:

1. You get 1 victory point, or
2. Check your active region card to see what happens when you perform a Domination.

Total Domination (TDO)

If you have won all 3 of the tactical advantages of Body, Mind and Soul you may claim Total Domination instead of any other advantage: Their tactical advantage effects will then not trigger. Instead, you get to choose one of the following:

1. You get 3 victory points, or
2. Check your active region card to see what happens when you perform a Total Domination.

Draw

• The player must draw up to 2 cards each turn if there are cards available in the Deck. The player decides him/herself if 1 or 2 cards are drawn and may look at the first drawn card before deciding if another one should be drawn.
• This applies even if the player already has the maximum number of allowed cards to his/her playing disposal in hand.
• If a player can't draw a card during the draw phase due to his/her Army Deck being depleted he/she loses the game.

Play

• The play phases allows the player to use creature abilities & play any non-creature cards if he/she wants to.
• The inactive player always gets a play (response) phase after each one of the active players actions, i.e. to play Event-cards or use abilities.
• The number of things a player can do during his/her play phase is limited only by that player's resources and cards.

Move / Attack

• This phase is not mandatory - the player chooses if he/she will use it.
• The move/attack phase allows the player to either move or attack with any number of the creatures.
• It does not allow the player to do both and let one creature move and let another attack.
• Whatever is done in the first move / attack phase can not be done in the second move / attack phase.
  • • Each turn there's only one attack phase per player and/or one move phase per player.
  • Example: If you decide to move creatures in the first move/attack phase, then no creatures can move in the second.
• Please see the relevant sections for movement and attacking for more details on how to execute those actions properly.

Entrance

During the Entrance phase you may put new Creatures into play in the Kingdom or Front.

Discard

• If the player has more than 7 cards (>7) in his/her hand the playermust select and discard any excess cards down to 7.
• A player may notdiscard cards from hand in the discard phase if he/she has 7 or less cards in hand.

Abilities

Many creatures have special skills and some are able to perform different kind of actions. There are numerous ways how the creatures can interact with one and another without engaging in actual physical combat. These skills are called abilities, regardless of what they do, and if they have any drawbacks or not.

Abilities are not limited to just creatures – Equipment or Magic could have them as well, granting a creature additional abilities they wouldn't have without them.

There are three main types of abilities : activated, passive and triggered.

Passive

A passive ability is one that is always in effect. As soon as the object with the ability enters play, the ability effect starts, and stops when the object leaves play.

Example: "All Elvish creatures gets +3 defense" is a passive ability.

Activated

• In contrast to passive abilities, activated abilities requires the activation by the player.
• To use a card's ability the player must pay the cost required. The effect of the ability will not activate before that is done.
• Only the controller of a card may activate it's abilities. Usually that means the player that put the card in play by paying for it.

Payment for activation

WTactics uses the above simple system to tell you what the card demands from you in order to have it's effect activated. What's always common for all types of costs and prerequisites is that we always reveal the cost first, followed by a colon separator, and lastly the effect is written. It looks like this:

Cost : Effect

Whatever is on the left side of the colon (:) is the cost or prerequisites. The text on the right side of the colon is the card's effect that will activate once you have met the cost/prerequisites demands.

There are three main groups of costs and prerequisites that are used to activate abilities: Gold cost, mark (self or other) and custom.

1. The first example (gray) shows us a custom prerequisite. Custom prerequisites are often text instructions on what you need to do in order to activate the ability. If you can't or won't do exactly as the text says, then the ability is not activated. Keep in mind that custom prerequisites can be formulated in any way. They are also more rarely used in the game compared to the other types of costs & prerequisites.
2. The next example (purple) is straight forward: To activate the ability you would need to pay exactly 4 Gold. Not more, not less. If you can't afford 4 gold, then you can't activate the ability.
3. The third example (blue) introduces marking as something that must be done first in order to activate the ability. Whenever you see the empty horizontal rectangle it means that in order to activate the ability you must be able to mark the card. If the card is already marked, it can't be marked again, thus, the requirement needed to use that ability (you marking the card now when you want to use the ability) is not met, and as a result you won't be able to activate the ability.
4. Next example (green) also uses marking as a requirement to activate the ability. The difference from the previous case is that there is a number written inside of the rectangle. This means that you have to mark that many other creatures in play under your control in order to activate the ability.
5. Lastly, we have a complicated example (yellow): It shows us that a card can mix any two or more types of costs and prerequisites with each other. Although there is no limitation to how they can be mixed, mixes are seldom as complicated as in this example.

Triggered

• A triggered ability is activated if and only if it's trigger takes place.
• Triggered abilities are not optional and must always be applied if possible.
  • If a triggered ability's effect can't be applied then nothing happens.
• Example: Discard a non-Black Legion creature every time a skeleton comes into play.
  • If my opponent played that curse on you, and your opponent puts a skeleton into play, then you must discard a non-Black creature. If you have only black creatures however, then it is not possible for you to discard a creature, in which case you don't have to do anything.

Conflicting rules

As in many games some rules and mechanics may seem to contradict themselves and even do so at times. This is actually a feature and what makes the deep, complex and modular nature of a CCG possible to begin with. Always use the following two rules to resolve such situations:

Cards vs rules

• If a card contradicts the core rules found in this document, the card wins over the core rules.

Effects vs effects

• If an effects forbids something to happen while another allows it, the forbidding effect always wins.
  • Example: A creature has the effect "Can not fly." printed on it as card text. Playing a spell on the creature with the text "Target creature can fly." will not make the creature able to fly. The "not/no/can't" etc always outweigh what "can" happen.

Combat

General

• Only unmarked creatures may attack or defend,
• The active player is the only one that can perform one or more attacks during his/her Attack/Move-phase.
  • When doing so the player must use one or more creatures in his/her the Front.
• In the same manner, the inactive player is the only one that may defend against attacks during the opponents turn.
  • When doing so he/she may use
    • one or more of his/her creatures in the Kingdom or
    • any combination of the top creature from each of the three different Domains
  • A creature is, depending on this, either an attacker or defender while in combat. It is never designated as both while in one and the same combat.
• If there are several combats battled out during the same turn they do not resolve simultaneously.
  • Combat is resolved on a "per attacker basis": Each attacker (together with all it's blockers) is part of one single and specific combat.
  • The order of how a combat(s) are resolved could often matter and affect the outcome of other combats or states in the game. Choose wisely.
  • The resolution order of several combats is decided by the attacking player, before the defending player announces a) if and how he/she will defend and b) which defenders he/she will assign to which attackers.

Combat sequence

I.

• The attacking (active) player may choose to attack during a Move/Attack phase using any number of creatures in his/her Front.
  • Creatures assigned to attack are called attackers.
  • Please note the distinction between an attacking player and attackers: The former is a player that launched an attack, the latter are all Creatures that are currently attacking.
• The player chooses and announces all attackers that will fight that turn by marking them & announcing them as attackers.
  • The target of these attacks is always the opposing players currently active Region.
• In cases where there are more than one attacking creature the attacking player must announce and choose the order of the attacks, which is first, then second, and so on.
• Once the attackers are announced, the passive player gets a Response phase, that gives him/her the opportunity to play one Event card or one Ability (but not both at the same time).
  • The attacking player then gets the same opportunity, and this process is repeated until both players make a pass on the opportunity to play something in the Response phase. When the players pass on the Response phase the attack continues as follows:

II.

• All creatures assigned to defend are called defenders for the duration of the battle.
• The defending player may choose to:
  • Defend against the attack(s) with the top creature from one or more of the 3 Domains in his/her Kingdom. (Civilian Defense)
  • Defend one or more of the attack(s) with one or more creatures from his/her Front. (Military Defense)
  • Allow the attacks to go on undefended.
  • If the player decides not to defend the attack his/her Region loses HP that's equal to the total amount of damage dealt by the attackers.

III.

• If the player decides to go for a Military defense with creatures in hio/her the front he/she:
  • May assign any number of creatures as defenders to any number of attackers.
  • Must clearly show which defender(s) is assigned to which specific attacker.
    • A specific defender can only defend against one single attacker.
    • Several defenders can be assigned to the same attacker.

• If the player decides to go for a Civilian defense with creatures in his/her Kingdom he/she:
  • May assign up to 1 creature - the top one - from each of his/her Domains to the attacker(s).
  • Must clearly show which defender(s) is assigned to which specific attacker.
    • A specific defender can only defend against one single attacker.
    • Several defenders can be assigned to the same attacker.
  • Defenders from the Domains do not strike back on the attackers, meaning they can only be used to soak up damage that the attackers deal, and never kill an attacker themselves by using their ATK.

• A player may choose to defend against some creatures, and let others be undefended against so that they deal damage to the players Region.
• A player can not compose a defense made up of both creatures in the front and in the domains. Defenders must always come from either the Front, or the Domain(s).

IV.

• Each individual combat takes place. In each combat the players take turns with Response phases.
• When both players pass instead of responding to the other player's actions the combat is resolved:
  • Take into account all effects and then compare the values of the Attackers ATK value with the Defenders DEF value.
    • If it is higher or equal the Defender will die. If it is lower the Defender will survive.
    • Regardless of the outcome the Defender successfully protects the defending players Region from that attacker.
    • Regardless of the outcome the Defender always gets to strike back at the Attacker if he is defending from the Front: Compare the Defender's ATK value with the Attackers DEF value - if it is equal to or higher then the Attacker will die.
• When combat is over place all dead Creatures into the discard piles, along with all Events that were used during the combat and also any Enchantments that were attached to the Creatures.

Deck Building

Basics

Every deck should contain at least 60 cards + the region pile.

Details

Every player composes his/her pile of cards (army deck) of whichever cards he/she wants, within the limits of the loyalty restrictions mentioned below. Usually you would want to have prepared a deck and be done with the building of it before you sit down to play a game.

Each card has it's own unique identification number and a version that precedes it at the bottom right. These are the card number and card version numbers, and they're very important if you always want to stay up to date or compete with other players. The card number for a card wont ever change. Any other info on the card may however become a target for revision, and, those revision will be reflected by the cards current version number. Huge changes in card versions are always announced at the site and well in advance before people are allowed to compete with them. For casual players this isn't really that important - play the way you all agree on.

It's allowed to have 4 copies of a card in the deck. A card is only considered to be an instance of itself if it has the same card number and/or card name. Two cards are only equivalent if they share both card & version number.

The deck building process is vital for the outcome of the game. In it the decisions about your play style and possibilities are decided, directly affecting how well you could fare against your opponent. As the game proceeds you will draw a given number of cards from the deck almost every round. The deck is often shuffled and the player seldom knows what card(s) he/she will draw from it.

The back of all cards in a deck must look identical. Having somehow different backs is considered cheating and prohibited.

Regions

Regions are a card type of their own, placed in a certain order in the players region pile, face down, before the game begins. Regions affect what the player can do and which benefits or disadvantages the player gets. Regions have a HP value, showing in what general condition the region is in. When a regions HP reaches 0 or lower the region is discarded into the grave.

If a player loses his/her last region then he/she loses the game.

Tactics

Some regions offer huge benefits of you manage to pull of tactical advantage, domination or total domination. These benefits vary and are written on the region card.

Loyalty

How many different factions a player can put into play during simultaneously is determined by the active Region that the player controls. Each Region is loyal to some faction(s) and it specifies which faction it supports. Every Region supports at least one faction.

A player can not play any cards that belong to a faction which is not supported by the active region. A player may however still use any cards already in play even if they are no longer being supported by the new region.