Combat

At the venue

A ring around the enemy card, a pointer sweeping round it, one gap in the guard. Hit pips above, guard pips below. The stakes line says what a loss costs before the Fight button is pressed, and the outcome line lands the same number after it.

The rule

• Land enough hits and the card is yours; run out of guard and it is not. There is no clock.
• After every landed hit the sweep runs 8% faster, never under 420 milliseconds — the fight tightens on your wins, never on your misses.
• Three choreographies, keyed to the enemy's type: a Foot Soldier's steady sweep, a Monster's sweep that reverses on every hit, a Boss that rages at half health and relocates the gap once a round. A pattern never moves the four numbers.
• Enter and Space strike as well as a tap, so a keyboard fights too.

You decide

• The enemy's attack, defense and vitality. Nothing else reaches the duel.
• Its type. Foot Soldier, Monster and Boss are the three seeded choreographies; a type you add fights the steady sweep.

From the library

The Boss tier above carries the numbers the demo deck's Tyrannosaurus rex is seeded with — attack 6, defense 3, vitality 2. Against this team it takes 3 clean hits to beat and is lost on miss number 2.

At the venue

The readout under the arena prints the four this fight was dealt beside the range the engine can deal at all, so a team sees where its fight sits on the ladder.

The rule

• Hits to win come off the enemy's defense and vitality, less your attack — 2 at the least, 5 at the most. Its vitality is its health, and it is what makes a boss a boss.
• Guard comes off your defense and earned vitality, less the enemy's attack — 2 to 6 misses before the fight is lost.
• The gap comes off the enemy's defense alone: 26° behind heavy armour, 70° behind none.
• The sweep comes off the enemy's attack alone: 0.75 seconds at its fastest, 2.1 at its slowest.
• Every number is clamped, so no card can deal a fight with no hits to land or no misses to spend.

You decide

• Arm the team through allies and weapons and the hit count falls; give it defense and vitality and the guard rises.
• Give an enemy vitality to make it a boss, defense to narrow the gap, attack to speed the sweep — and know that its attack is also what a loss costs.

From the library

Against this team the demo deck's boss deals 3 hits to win, 2 of guard, a 52° gap and a 1.26-second sweep.

At the venue

The stakes line above the Fight button quotes the price in the card's own words, and the sentence that lands after a loss carries the same numbers. A knocked-out team sees the bench and its clock; the card stands where it was.

The rule

• Vitality: the enemy's attack less your defense, never below zero. Armour genuinely protects.
• Coins: the card's value, capped at a quarter of what the team is carrying — so one lost boss fight cannot erase an afternoon.
• Knocked out at zero vitality: 60 seconds on the bench, then the team revives at half the vitality it had earned, never under one.
• The card is not consumed. A beaten team tries again with the same guard; wounds still cost health.

You decide

• The enemy's attack is the whole of the damage. Gate a hard hitter behind the armour that blunts it, or let an ungated one hit no harder than the age band allows — the playtest checks that line.
• A checkpoint before the boss heals a team to the highest vitality it has earned: the tent halfway round the trail.

From the library

Lose to the demo deck's boss with this team and it costs 4 vitality and 8 coins — a knockout, which is why the arena opens on it.

At the venue

A creature pauses, notices you, then darts. Tap to catch it. A timing card offers a sweeping marker: tap in the zone for a bonus, or choose Collect now. Both work with the card’s existing image.

The rule

• Difficulty comes half from the card’s rarity, half from its attack and defense, capped at one. Catch escapes restart in the browser with no penalty.
• A timing win adds bonus coins. Skip or miss still grants the item, coins, points and gear. Each team gets one bonus attempt per card, even after selling it.
• Enter and Space work too. Holding a key or tapping repeatedly cannot create extra attempts.

You decide

• Choose Catch, optional Timing, no challenge or the type default on each collectable card. Every enemy still fights a duel.
• Rarity and stats set the difficulty. Reduced motion slows the games and removes decorative motion.

From the library

The demos use the same games and difficulty rules as cards at the venue. You can replay a demo without saving rewards.