"The duel is in 10 days, you and your opponent have your time to prepare, but one you lay your feet upon that dueling ground, only one shall return standing."
Duels is a two part game, where in the first phase players play a simple deck building card game, but with a twist, every card has two functions, one for deck building and another for the duel that is to come. After the 10 turns, players build a deck from the cards they collected and trade blows with their actions and abilities with a unique discard as resource system until one player is reduced to 0 hp.
When you discard a card in the Preparation phase, you earn a gem, but you have a maximum limit of 10 gems in your hand at the end of each turn.
In the training phase you draw back up to 4
In the duel phase your starting hand size is based on the part before the duel.
Each player draws 3 characters cards and choses one to play as, one to be a mentor and the other to remove from the game.
The 4 temples decks are separated and placed in their columns
Each player constructs their starting deck from their hero's 6 cost cards and the 5 starting gems (10 card deck)
Each player places their hero's other cards in front of them in an easy to access location.
The mentor characters are placed near the board and their decks are shuffled and placed beside them.
For each deck in the 'Training area' two cards are revealed.
Decide which player is going first, the player going second starts with 1 gem.
Each player draws 4 Cards
Set the turn timer to 10. Play can now begin.
Duels takes course over two distinct phases, in the rules these will be explained separately:
Training
Duel
In both of these players will take turns, performing actions.
The training phase unfolds over 10 turns or days, during which players will build their decks to prepare for the duel.
On a player's turn they do the following:
Replenish Decks
Purchase Cards
Resolve Training Card Effects
Sell Unused Cards
Draw back up to 4 cards.
At the end of each 'round', decrease the turn counter by 1. When the turn counter reaches 0, the training phase will end, each player will construct their deck from the cards they have purchased.
When building the deck, if a player has more than 20 cards, they may choose to use as few as 20 of the cards they have purchased.
At the start of your turn, refill any gaps in the trade area.
When refilling, you may put cards from any temple into the temple area, or cards from either mentor into the mentor area, but you may not refill mentor cards into the temple area or visa versa.
Discard cards from your hand and discard gems pay the COST of a card, then add that card to your discard.
When purchasing cards, if the card you discarded matches colour with the card you're buying, it has +1 value. If it is a multi colour card then it has +2 value.
Multiple cards may be bought on a single turn.
Instead of using a card, it may be discarded to perform the effect listed on the training side of the card.
You may do this with multiple effects per turn.
Note: Not all cards have effects that can be used this way, they may be discarded to do nothing.
At the end of your turn, discard what remains in your hand, for each card discarded, gain gems equal to it's value, up to 10 gems.
After you've done this, draw back up to 4 cards and it is now the other player's turn.
At the end of each 'round', decrease the turn counter by 1. When the turn counter reaches 0, the training phase will end, each player will construct their deck from the cards they have purchased.
When building the deck, if a player has more than 20 cards, they may choose to use as few as 20 of the cards they have purchased.
Both players build their decks and when ready can progress to the duel phase.
The first player to finish their deck gets to choose if they want to play first or second in the duel phase, in a tie, the player that went second in the training phase gets to choose.
The duel phase begins with both players putting their decks out, and moving their heroes to the duelling ground. Both players set their life counter to the HP indicated on their hero card (default 30)
In the duelling ground, there are zones for the Deck, the Discard, The exhaust, the hero, weapons and EXTRA zones.
For now, both players draw 4, but I'd like a moment of circling in the designÂ
During the Duel phase, players perform the following:
Draw a Card (The player going first skips this on their first turn)
(Optional) Discard a card, draw a card
Play Quick Cards (Any number per turn)
Quick Cards
Equipment (Max 2 at a time)
Summons
Flash Cards (May also be played on your opponent's turn)
Perform an Action
Play an Action Card
Attack (Deals 3 Damage base)
Alternately, you may REST.
On an Opponents turn a player may:
Play a Quick Card
Block with a weapon
When discarding a card, place that card into your discard, the discard is used for resources for cards.
To play a card, that card's "requirement" must first be met. The Requirement is the number of cards of the correct colour need to be in your discard. For example:
"3" means, 3 cards in the discard.
"4R" means 4 red cards in the discard.
"3YR" means 3 yellow and 3 red cards in the discard.
If a Yellow & Red card is in the discard, it counts as a yellow card and as a red card.
When a card has [#R] or similar notation, this means if that condition is met, then that bonus effect also occurs.
When a card has +[#R] or similar notation, this means the bonus effect occurs for every time that condition is met by your discard. E.G. +[2R]: +1 Damage, would deal +2 damage when you have 4 red cards in your discard.
When a card has X[#R] or similar notation, that means Exhaust that many cards from your discard into your exhaust area. If the effect has repeat, you may do this multiple times in a single action.
Equipment & Summons enter with a number of durability counters on them equal to their durability, each time you attack with a weapon, reduce it's durability by 1.
When taking damage you may exhaust an equip item to block damage equal to it's remaining durability to reduce the damage you suffer by that much.
You may only block with one equip item per attack you suffer.
If an equip item breaks by running out of durability it is placed in your discard rather than exhausted.
Summons, like equipment have durability, but a summon may be targeted with an attack. When a summon is targeted with an attack, you may block using equipment for that summon, but not using your own life.
Summons lose 1 durability at the end of each turn, but otherwise have persistent effects.
Hero cards have a Life and both a DUEL and TRAINING passive.
You may find yourself in a situation where you do not have cards in your deck, or you may have too many cards exhausted.
When you rest, do the following:
Shuffle your exhaust into your deck
Shuffle any number of discarded cards into your deck
Shuffle your hand into your deck
At the start of your next turn, draw 4 cards instead of 1.
When your opponent is reduced to 0 HP, you win the game.