You Will Need
- A printed HarshTone deck of your choice.
- 1 quarter for flipping (to determine play order and chance mechanics).
- 10 Nickels per player (these will represent your ‘political capital’ pool).
- 10 Pennies per player (these will represent changes to your minions’ health; heads for +1, tails for -1).
- 5 Dimes per player (these will represent changes to your minions’ attack; heads for +1, tails for -1).
- A piece of paper and a pencil (for keeping track of the players’ health).
If you do not have any coins handy, you may instead keep track of your political capital and changes to your minions’ stats by writing down the changes as you play. Multiple sheets of paper may be needed.
Game Mechanics
Each deck includes the following card types: 1 player card, 1 player ability card, several action cards, several minion cards, and handful of summonable cards. Certain decks also include weapon cards.
Your player card describes who you are playing as, and your player ability card describes what unique ability your player possesses. Your ability card can be used once per turn.
Action cards are used to generate specific effects during your turn, such as causing damage to a particular minion or player. They are single-use cards and must be placed in the discard pile after use.
Minion cards represent characters or forces under your control. They are placed on the playing field and can be used to cause or block damage to your opponent and their minions, but cannot be used during the first turn they are played. The amount of damage a minion can inflict on an enemy character is represented by the number at the bottom-left of the card. The amount of health your minion has (or, how much damage they can take before being forced from the playing field), is represented by the number at the bottom-right. Some minion cards also include special one-time or passive abilities. These abilities are as follows:
Weapon cards allow the player to equip that weapon, and inflict direct damage to enemy characters for a certain number of hits, indicated by the weapon’s durability (the number in the lower-right corner of the weapon card).
Summonable cards are minions, weapons, or actions that are summoned with your player ability, or by certain cards in your deck during gameplay.
Gameplay is governed by political capital. You gain 1 political capital (or PC) per turn, for a maximum of ten. You spend political capital to play cards, and your political capital “pool” is replenished at the start of each turn. The amount of political capital needed to play a card is shown at the top-left.
Your player card describes who you are playing as, and your player ability card describes what unique ability your player possesses. Your ability card can be used once per turn.
Action cards are used to generate specific effects during your turn, such as causing damage to a particular minion or player. They are single-use cards and must be placed in the discard pile after use.
Minion cards represent characters or forces under your control. They are placed on the playing field and can be used to cause or block damage to your opponent and their minions, but cannot be used during the first turn they are played. The amount of damage a minion can inflict on an enemy character is represented by the number at the bottom-left of the card. The amount of health your minion has (or, how much damage they can take before being forced from the playing field), is represented by the number at the bottom-right. Some minion cards also include special one-time or passive abilities. These abilities are as follows:
- Battlecry: an ability where a particular effect activates when the card with the Battlecry is played directly from your hand.
- Taunt: an ability which forces the opposing player to direct any attacks not caused by action cards toward only enemy targets with taunt.
- Immunity: An ability which causes a minion to ignore the next damage it receives. Upon receiving any damage the Immunity is removed, and that damage is reduced to 0. The amount of damage taken is not relevant, and may be from any source, including combat as either attacker or defender, actions, or player abilities.
- Charge: a minion may attack the same turn it is summoned or brought under a new player's control.
- Zeal: an ability which allows a character to attack twice per turn.
- Efficacy: an ability which boosts the overall damage of actions by the listed amount (ex: Efficacy +1 would cause an action which deals 2 damage to deal 3 instead). Efficacy does not increase healing.
- Poisonous: an ability that causes any minion damaged by a character with poisonous to be destroyed.
Weapon cards allow the player to equip that weapon, and inflict direct damage to enemy characters for a certain number of hits, indicated by the weapon’s durability (the number in the lower-right corner of the weapon card).
Summonable cards are minions, weapons, or actions that are summoned with your player ability, or by certain cards in your deck during gameplay.
Gameplay is governed by political capital. You gain 1 political capital (or PC) per turn, for a maximum of ten. You spend political capital to play cards, and your political capital “pool” is replenished at the start of each turn. The amount of political capital needed to play a card is shown at the top-left.
- Add 1 nickel to the field per turn. Move each coin used that turn above the others to indicate it was tapped. Return all coins to their proper position at the start of your next turn.
Game Play
- Select your deck out of the five available deck options. Shuffle your deck thoroughly, and set out your cards in accordance with the diagram above.
- Flip the coin to determine who goes first. The loser is given the card “The Coin”, and plays second.
- From your 30 card deck, select your starting hand. The winner of the coin toss selects 3 cards, and the loser selects 4 cards. Each player may mulligan as many cards from their starting hand as they would like before play, but players may only mulligan a hand once; whatever cards are drawn in replacement, the player must keep.
- At the start of your turn, place a nickel (representing political capital) on to the field, then draw a card. If able, play any desired action, minion, or weapon cards, or use your player ability. If able, make any desired attacks with minions already on the playing field, or with newly summoned minions with ‘Charge’. Calculate damage accordingly, and record.
- When no other moves can be played, or the player is done with their turn, their turn ends and control switches to the opposing player.
- The first player whose health reaches ‘0’ loses, and the other is the victor.