RULES

What is VARZ?

VARZ is a tactical trading card game played on a hex battlefield. Summon mysterious beings called Spils, shift them across the lands, and break your opponent's Portals.

• 2 PLAYERS
• TACTICAL TCG
• HEX BATTLEFIELD

VARZ TCG — Introduction

How to win

Your cards

Four kinds of card, and each one has a job.

On the card

COST

Lil' Aqua

POWER

Lil' Aqua

TYPE

Lil' Aqua

Costs are paid in VAZ. Power is what a Spil fights with — and it changes on the board, so the printed number is where it starts.

What you need

One legal deck, four sections.

• 

  HERO

  1 cards

  Your leader on the battlefield, printed on both faces. It carries your Life, it is on the board from the first turn, and damage that gets through comes off that Life.

• 

  SPELLS

  30 cards

  The heart of your Main Deck, and where a deck's plan lives. Every Spell card is one of three sub-types.

  • SpilThe units you summon onto the board. Each prints a cost and a Power, and it cannot attack on the turn it arrives.
  • CommandCast on your own turn, in your Main Phase. A Command cannot be played in response to anything.
  • SlashEverything a Command can do, plus the part it cannot: a Slash may also be cast inside a Slash window, which is what lets you answer your opponent.
• 

  PORTALS

  8 cards

  The cards stacked on your Lands. Each one has a Shield Life, they are what an attack has to get through, and losing every Portal on one Land loses you the game.

• 

  SKILLS

  9 cards

  Where VAZ comes from. Two Skills move from this deck into your Holder every turn, and Syncing an unsynced one there pays for a card.

Your eight Portals must add up to exactly 20 Shield Life.

The battlefield

Four lands: two are yours, two are your opponent's. Spils stand on hexes, and the hexes decide what can reach what.

ENEMY LANDSYOUR LANDS

1. 1Your HeroStarts on its own hex and stays on the board. Damage that gets through comes off its Life.
2. 2HexesSpils are summoned onto the hexes of your own lands, and shift between them.
3. 3PortalsFour Portal cards per land, stacked. Lose every Portal on one land and you lose the game.
4. 4Enemy HeroThe other way to win: reduce its Life to 0.
5. 5Main deckThirty Spell cards. You draw one every turn.
6. 6Skill deckYour nine Skill cards, face down. Two of them move into the Holder at the start of each of your turns.
7. 7HolderThe Lv1 to Lv9 row along your own edge. Your Hero's level is simply how many Skills are standing here, and Syncing an unsynced one is what produces the VAZ a card costs.
8. 8AbyssWhere Spils go when they drop — and where a few cards can bring them back from.
9. 9BanishCards put out of the game entirely. They never reached the Abyss, so no Dropped ability saw them, and only the handful of cards that name this zone can reach back in.

Game setup

1. 01

   Bring your deck

   One Hero, 30 Spells, 8 Portals, 9 Skills.

2. 02

   Set the board

   Your Hero starts on its hex, and four Portal cards go on each of your two lands.

3. 03

   Decide who goes first

   Roll for it — the winner chooses.

4. 04

   The second player's Holder Skill

   Whoever goes second starts with one extra face-down Skill in their holder.

5. 05

   Draw five

   Both players draw an opening hand of five.

6. 06

   Mulligan once

   Return any number of cards, shuffle them back, and draw the same number. Once each.

7. 07

   BATTLE START

Turn flow

Six phases, in this order, every turn — and most of a turn is spent in the Main Phase.

1. 01

   UNSYNC

   Everything you Synced last turn comes back ready.

2. 02

   LEVEL UP

   Your Hero's level rises, which is what opens up stronger cards as the game goes on.

3. 03

   DRAW

   Draw one card from your Main deck.

4. 04

   START

   Anything that triggers at the start of your turn happens here.

5. 05

   MAIN

   Your turn: summon, shift, use Skills and declare attacks. Combat is resolved right here, as each attack is declared.

6. 06

   END

   End-of-turn effects resolve, and the turn passes.

Summon a Spil

1. 01

   Pick a Spell card

   It is in your hand, and it prints a cost.

2. 02

   Sync Skills for VAZ

   Syncing an Unsynced, face-up Skill produces VAZ.

3. 03

   Pay the cost

   Spend that VAZ. A coloured cost needs Skills of the matching colour.

4. 04

   Place it on a hex

   The Spil arrives on an empty hex of your own land.

Move / Shift

A Spil can shift on your turn. What the keywords change is where it may go.

BEFORE

AFTER

Attack & block

1. 01

   Declare an attack

   Choose an attacking Spil and a target it can reach.

2. 02

   The attacker Syncs

   Attacking Syncs it — it is spent until your next Unsync Phase.

3. 03

   The defender may block

   A blocker steps in and takes the attack instead.

4. 04

   Damage

   Both sides deal their Power at once. A Spil at 0 or less drops to the Abyss.

BEFORE THE ATTACK

AFTER THE ATTACK

ATTACK DECLARED

BLOCKED

Portals

Portals are what makes VARZ a game about ground and not only about cards. Each of your lands is defended by a stack of four.

1. 01

   Four per land

   Eight Portal cards, split across your two lands.

2. 02

   They take damage

   An attack that reaches a land hits the Portal stack standing there.

3. 03

   A Portal is destroyed

   Its Shield Life runs out and the card is gone.

4. 04

   One land runs empty

   All four Portals on the same land are gone.

5. 05

   Victory

   The game ends the moment a land has no Portals left.

Sync

Sync is the price of acting. A card that acts becomes Synced, and a Synced card does nothing more until your next turn begins.

1. 01

   Act

   Attack with a Spil, or use a Skill to make VAZ.

2. 02

   It becomes Synced

   Turned to show it has already been used this turn.

3. 03

   Unsync Phase

   At the start of your next turn, everything you Synced comes back.

V-SYNC IS A DIFFERENT THING. Your Hero can evolve mid-game into a stronger face — that is V-Sync, and it is not the Sync above.

Keywords

• Flash

  Can be played during a Slash Window.

• Stealth

  Can't be chosen as an attack target.

• Taunt

  Adjacent opponent's units must target this when declaring an attack.

• Flying

  Can shift to any empty hex on a land this unit is on.

• Teleport

  Can shift to any empty hex within range N (ignores the path).

• Menace

  Can only be blocked by two or more units.

• Vigilance

  Does not become Synced when it declares an attack.

• Overstrike

  Deals any excess combat damage to the attack target.