Home | Strategic Card Game

How a Game Unfolds

Understand the game at a glance

Before the first turn

Choose your first protagonist

Each player places a protagonist in their Court, face down to hide its identity, or face up for a chance to start. Among the face-up cards, the one with the lowest number plays first.

Victory conditions

The game ends as soon as one of these is met:

Overthrow 3 of the opponent's protagonists

OR

The opponent has no protagonists left in play

Mounting an attack

Each turn, you choose one action. Here is the typical sequence to mount an attack — spread across several turns.

Click an action to learn more

Draw

You draw 3 cards.

If you have more than 3 cards in hand at the end of your turn, you discard only the surplus.

Discarded cards go into the Gardens ; arranging them into pairs or sequences earns you bonus actions.

Warning: unlike other card games, drawing is not free — it costs an action.

Conspire

You commit your hidden conspirators to target an opponent's card — a protector or a protagonist. The conspiracy unfolds in two beats.

1. Opponent's reaction Only if the opponent has at least one bonus action

Before resolution, the opponent may try to parry.

Reorder Hide their protagonists again and shuffle their order.

Emergency placement Place protectors or protagonists to absorb the strike.

2. Resolution

To overthrow an opponent's card, you must hit the right number. Combine your conspirators' effects.

Enhance Shift the next conspirator's value by ±1 or ±2.

Impersonate Copy the power of any visible opponent card onto the next conspirator.

A number only beats the one directly below it — but 1 beats 13.

The Cards

26 beautifully crafted cards await

26 Total Cards

13 Unique Numbers

2 Copies Each

Each number defeats only the one directly below it. But beware — 1 defeats 13 in a cyclic twist of fate.

Core Mechanics

Master the art of intrigue

The Art of Conspiracy

Tune your conspirators and exploit every fallen card:

Reinforce or Impersonate — adjust a conspirator's value to overthrow an enemy protagonist.
Redeploy — bring a protector home, or fish a card from the Gardens that has become crucial.

Predisposition Advantage

The dominant group on the board grants a shared bonus to both players.

Adapt each turn to the active predisposition: free actions, hidden deployments, reveal tokens, or extended draw.

Revelations

Tilt the predisposition in your favour:

Play protectors to shift the balance.
Spend reveal tokens to activate the Conspirator dominant and expose enemy protagonists.

Ultimate Decrees

Three single-use decrees that can swing the game:

Total War — sacrifice your protectors to overthrow that many enemy cards.
Peace Treaty — block all attacks on your protagonists during the conspiracy.
Infiltration — sacrifice a protagonist to reveal every protagonist your opponent is hiding.