Cool.
So, this is a Pilot card:
You can see from the stats, that this Pilot is mediocre with energy weapons, average with Ballistic weapons, mediocre with Missile weapons, and insanely good with Physical weapons, as well as being good at dodging and reasonable at tactics. We'll get to what all this means a little later.
This is a Chassis card:
This Chassis has two mount spaces (sort of a combination of "critical space" and "mass") on its torso, and four on each arm. It also has 5 armor on its torso, 3 armor on each arm, and 4 on its legs. It also has a Maneuver of 3 - this is how "fast" the 'mech is; robots with more Maneuver rating can do more things per turn.
This is a Weapon card:
You can see that this is an Energy weapon, that it can hit at Short and Long range, that it does 3 damage (although its special ability says it will deal 5 damage at Short range), and that it takes up 4 Arm mount spaces if mounted on an arm, or 4 Torso mount spaces if mounted on a torso.
This is also a Weapon card:
You can see that it's a Physical weapon, that it can only hit at Contact range, that it does 3 damage (all of which must be assigned to one location, according to its special ability), and that it takes up 3 Arm mount spaces if mounted on an arm. Note that the bottom of the card doesn't have any Torso spaces - this means it can't be mounted on your Torso at all.
So, before you start a game, each player picks their pilot, chassis, and weapon cards - think of this as just like MWO's Mech Bay screen.
Then, they each pick out 18 Maneuver cards and shuffle them into a Maneuver deck.
This is a Maneuver card:
You can have up to 3 copies of any one Maneuver card in your Maneuver deck, and your deck has to be at least 18 cards.
Play starts at Long range. Each player draws a number of Maneuver cards equal to their pilot's Maneuver rating, then they decide who goes first.
That player can play any Move (green) or Strike (red) Maneuver card from their hand. If they don't have any that they want to play, they can instead play any maneuver card face-down, and declare that it's a Basic Strike or Basic Move.
If you play a Move, you get to either advance one range step (Long -> Short or Short -> Contact), or retreat one range step (Contact -> Short or Short -> Long). You also get to do whatever is on the card, if you played it face-up. It's generally way better to play face-up Moves, because they give you sweet abilities, like:
Flank - you get behind your opponent, so all your weapons deal double damage at Contact range for the rest of the round.
Evade - you get +1 to dodge for the rest of the round
Sprint - you get to make TWO advances/retreats, instead of one.
Reload - you get to ready ("turn back to up-and-down") some of your used ballistic weapons.
If you play a Strike, you get to use ("turn sideways") any weapons that are ready ("not turned sideways") and shoot them at your opponent. If your robot has lots of Maneuver but few weapons, you'll want to fire a few at a time, to maximize the number of times you get to shoot. If your robot has lots of weapons but low Maneuver, you'll want to alpha-strike a lot of your weapons at once, to conserve your remaining Maneuvers for things like dodging. Each Strike card has cool things it can do, like:
Aim - you get to pick where the damage goes
Critical Hit - you blow off a weapon when you deal damage
Suppressing Fire - your strike is harder to dodge
Sensor Hit - your opponent will suffer a penalty to shoot back for the rest of the round.
Your opponent can then play a Response maneuver to respond to your Move or Strike. If he does, you can play a Response to respond to his response, and back-and-forth until someone declines to play a Response. Responses all do cool things like:
Counterattack - shoot back
Dodge - subtract your Piloting skill from your attacker's Weapon skills
Break Away - advance or retreat immediately
Defensive Roll - halve all damage
You can only play a single Response to each of your opponent's Maneuvers, and your Response has to be appropriate to their Maneuver. (You can't Dodge and Defensive Roll at the same time, for example).
Whenever you play any Maneuver, you immediately draw another one from your Maneuver deck. You ALWAYS have a number of cards in your hand equal to your pilot's Maneuver skill.
You can only play a maximum number of Maneuvers per round equal to your robot's Maneuver rating (written on the bottom of the card, under its Leg armor). Once you've played that many Maneuvers, you CANNOT play any more until next round.
Once everyone is finished playing Responses, you resolve the action. If it was a Strike, you look at each weapon and see if your Weapon Skill for that weapon is greater than zero, and if you are still at a Range that is appropriate for that weapon. If both of these are true, then your weapon deals damage. Unless some card says otherwise (like Aim or the Axe), the target always gets to pick where damage goes, and can spread it around.
If your Arm armor drops to zero, you lose all weapons in that arm.
If your Leg armor drops to zero, you can only play one Maneuver per round.
If your Torso armor drops to zero, you lost the fight.
Once the action is resolved, the next player gets to play an action, unless his robot has played its maximum number of Maneuvers (in which case he passes back to you and you play the next action). Once you BOTH have played your maximum number of Maneuvers, you both place all those Maneuvers face-down on the bottom of your Maneuver decks, turn all weapons back right-side up, and the player who didn't play the last action starts the next round.
Clear so far?
Edited by Ialdabaoth, 05 August 2013 - 04:27 PM.
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