Category:Gameplay

=WINNING OBJECTIVE= Victory is achieved by defeating your opponent's General (reducing from 25 Health to 0 Health).

=CARD TYPES=
 * BATTLE UNIT: Each Battle Unit has 4 stats: Cost, Attack, Health, and Ability. Only Battle Units can move and attack on the battlefield (we use the term "Battle Unit" and "Minion" interchangeably).
 * SPELL: Spells generally target empty tiles, minions, or globally. Spells applied to Minions are permanent (unless Dispelled).
 * ARTIFACT: Only your General can equip Artifacts which grant your General unique abilities. All Artifacts have a starting Durability of 3. Whenever your General is damaged, the Artifact’s Durability is reduced by 1. Artifacts are destroyed once their Durability reaches 0. Your General can wear up to 3 Artifacts at a time (and they can be identical).

=DECK COMPOSITION= Custom/Constructed: Each squad must be composed of exactly 40 total cards consisting of Battle Units, Spells, and Artifacts with a maximum of 3 copies of the same card. You may pick Neutral Minions to complement your squad with no restrictions on Minion-Spell-Artifact ratios.

=RESOURCE COSTS= Cores are the primary resource cost for taking actions such as summoning Minions, casting Spells, and using Artifacts. At the bottom of your screen is an Action Bar with 4 Active Slots. Each turn, empty slots in your Action Bar are refilled and randomly drawn from your remaining deck. Minions and Spells that have already been played are permanently discarded from your deck. Each turn, you may use the "Replace" button which replaces and shuffles a card back into your deck and you draw a new card to replace it immediately (you cannot redraw the exact specific instance of the card you replaced).

=BATTLE UNITS (MINIONS)= Summoning: Your minions on your Action Bar can be summoned around ANY of your friendly minions on the battlefield. Your minion on the battlefield can only take 1 action per turn. An action is defined as a move, move-attack, or attack. A minion cannot take an action on the same turn it is summoned unless the minion has the 'Rush' ability. Movement: Minions on the battlefield can move up to 2 tiles per turn. Your minions can move through friendly minions but not through enemy minions. Flying minions can move anywhere on the battlefield. Attack: Minions can only attack at nearby spaces (surrounding 8 tiles). Ranged minions can attack from anywhere on the battlefield. Combat Resolution: Minions at 0 Health are immediately destroyed and removed from the battlefield. Whenever a minion or General is attacked, they will attack back (Strikeback) and "trade hits". Facing: If you're Player 1 (starting on the left side), your summoned minions will always face right (-->). If you're Player 2 (starting on the right side), your minions will always face left (<--). There is no 'up' nor 'down' facing in our game.

=TURN SEQUENCE= Every match starts with 2 Cores for Player 1 and 3 Cores for Player 2. At the beginning of your turn, your Total Cores will increment by 1 up to a maximum of 9 Total Cores. Your turn ends when you have no actions left to complete. You only have 90 seconds to complete your turn during live matches. If you completely play all your cards (ie. deck out), your General will receive [-1, -2, -3, ...] damage after each subsequent turn.

=TERRAIN= A standard Battlefield consists of 5 x 9 tiles. Player 1 starts on the left side and Player 2 starts on the right side of the Battlefield. Tiles may offer temporary bonuses if your minion occupies the tile that turn (such as the +1 Core Globe). Tiles may incur environmental effects such as damage, healing, or global bonuses to your friendly/enemy minions.

=MULLIGAN= At the start of the match, each player can mulligan their initial 4 cards. Out of the 4 cards, each player can select the cards to mulligan (set aside) and the system will draw new cards from your deck to replace them (and randomly shuffle the mulligan'd cards back into your deck).

=CARD RARITY (6)= Basic cards cannot be disenchanted. There are 6 Rarities: Basic (not displayed), Common (white), Rare (blue), Epic (purple), Legendary (orange), and Mythron (green). =MINION ABILITIES - QUICK GLOSSARY= Airdrop: Summon this minion anywhere on the battlefield. Backstab: This minion deals double damage when attacking from behind. Blast: If attacking forward, hits all enemies in its row. Celerity:	This minion may activate twice per turn. Deathwatch:	Triggers an effect whenever ANY minion dies. Dying Wish:	Triggers an effect when this minion dies. Ephemeral:	Bound to this plane for only a short time (until end of owner's turn). Flying:	Move anywhere on the battlefield and ignore any terrain effects. Forcefield:	Prevents all damage to this minion until caster's next turn. Frenzy:	Simultaneously strike ALL enemies within attack range. Gateway:	This structure can NEVER move or attack. Grow:	Gain +X/+X at the start of your turn. Opening Gambit:	Triggers an effect when first summoned. Provoke:	Nearby enemies are rooted by this minion AND they must attack it first. Ranged:	Attack from anywhere on the battlefield. Rebirth:	When this minion dies, it leaves behind a 0/1 Egg that hatches the same minion at the end of owner's next turn. Retribution:	Bonus effect towards an enemy that has attacked this game. Rush:	Enables this minion to attack on the same turn that it is summoned. Strikeback:	Whenever this minion is attacked, it simultaneously counterattacks. Summon Dervish:	At the start of your turn, summon a 2/2 Ephemeral Dervish with Rush into a random nearby space. Zeal:	Gains bonus effect when next to your General.

=RANKED LADDER= Ranked Ladder is when you PLAY against opponents in our matchmaking queue. Note: Ranked Ladder systems will change as the volume of players increases (eg. subdivisions from 5 to 6 Divisions), but here's the current version: 30 Total Ranks and only 5 Divisions. Bronze Division: R30 - R21 (1-2 Chevrons per rung) Silver Division: R20 - R11 (3-4 Chevrons per rung) Gold Division: R10 - R6 (5 Chevrons per rung) Diamond Division: R5 - R1 (6 Chevrons per rung) Elite Division: R0 (ELO-Ranked system) Each season runs from Day 1 to Day 29/30/31 of the month Each win earns you 1 Chevron and you lose 1 Chevron for a loss Win Streaks begin at Silver Division R20 (every 3 wins in a row, you get 2 Chevrons) Once you enter a Division, you can't drop below the lowest Rank for that Division. You are safely floored into that Division. For example, even if you keep losing Chevrons in Silver Division, you can never fall below R20 for the current season. Not yet implemented in Pre-Alpha, but each season (monthly) we plan to release completely new cards to impact the meta. Each Division you achieve will earn you one of the brand new cards for that season (this is an alternative way to acquiring new cards besides earning them via Gold/Packs).

<!--Here is a textual introduction to the basics of gameplay. Feel free to skip down to [Deckbuilding].

This introduction discusses general rules and assumes that the cards played do not have special abilities that are exceptions to the general rules (e.g. it states that minions cannot move or attack on the turn they are summoned, but minions with the ‘rush’ keyword are an exception to this rule).

The goal of Duelyst is to kill the opposing player’s [general] by reducing it to 0 [health] or below. If both generals are reduced to 0 health at the same time, the game is a draw.

In a standard game of Duelyst, each player starts with a [deck] of forty cards. One card is the player’s [general]. The general starts the game on the board, so you never have its card in your hand or deck during a game. The other cards are of three types: minions; spells; and artifacts. Minion cards allow you to summon (play) a minion (unit) on to the board. Minions generally cannot move or attack the turn they are summoned. Spells allow you to interact with the board or (occasionally) players’ hands or decks in some way — for example, dealing damage to an enemy minion, improving the stats of one of your own minions, or moving a minion. Artifacts give your general an ability (such as an increased attack stat). Artifacts are destroyed after your general takes damage three times.

Each player starts with a hand [HL] of five cards. Before the game begins, each player has an opportunity to “mulligan” [HL] (switch out) up to two of those five cards. A player’s hand is displayed in the [action bar] on the bottom of the screen.

Duelyst takes place on a board composed of 9x5 square tiles. At the beginning of the game, the generals are on opposite sides of the board. During their turn, a player may generally move and attack with their general and any minions that were already on the board at the start of their turn, summon minions, cast spells, and equip artifacts by playing cards from their action bar. Each card has a [mana] value in its top left corner. This is the number of [mana crystals] the card costs to play. A player can play as many cards in a turn as the player wants, as long as the player has enough mana. Player 1 starts with two mana crystals and player 2 starts with three. A player’s mana crystals are refreshed at the start of each new turn. The number of mana crystals available to each player increases by one per turn throughout the game until it reaches the maximum of nine.

Around the center of the board are three [mana springs]. When player moves or summons a friendly unit onto a mana spring during their turn, they gain an extra mana crystal for that turn only.

Units may move up to two spaces. A diagonal move counts as moving two spaces. Generals and minions may only attack enemy units that are adjacent to them (horizontally, vertically, or diagonally).

Each player may replace a card from their hand for one from their deck once per turn. At the end of their turn, a player draws another card. Cards drawn above the full hand size of six cards are discarded.

Units have two stats: attack and health. When a unit [attacks] an enemy, the attacking unit’s attack value is deducted from the enemy unit’s health value. The enemy unit then [counterattacks] (even if its health has already been reduced to 0 or below): the enemy’s attack value is deducted from the attacker’s health. If either unit’s health is now 0 or below, it is destroyed and removed from the board.

Some minions have special abilities. Units may also be given special abilities by spells, artifacts, or other units. Common special abilities are identified by [keywords] such as [provoke], [rush], or [ranged]. Other abilities are explained by card text. Information about particular keywords is available as an in-game tooltip. More detail is available on each keyword’s wiki page. Explanations of particular cards’ abilities are (or will soon be) available on that card’s wiki page. -->