Spells
Types
- *Magicks
- Slow effects that happen once.
- *Arcana
- Fast effects that happen once.
- *Enchant
- Slow effects that are permanent.
Battle
You start with one of the ten different monsters in play. Each monster is a 1-10 at the beginning, signifying that it deals 1 damage each turn and can take 10 before dying.
Cards can aid and hurt monsters. When your monster dies you lose.
At the end of each player's turn, their monster attack their opponent's monster. In multiplayer, one may choose whether or not to attack and where to aim it. In a standard 2 player duel, you have no choice and must attack. Cards can make monsters attack themselves, or other targets.
Decks
Requirements for decks are as follows:
- 50 Cards Minimum
- No more than 5 of any givien card.
Set does not matter; all cards of the same name are counted as the same card.
- A monster is required and so is not counted as a card in your deck, even though it is a card.
Winning
You win when you kill your opponent's creature, or your opponent is forced to draw a card that does not exist, or a card specifies that you win.
Aether
At the beginning of each of your turns, your Aether count goes up by one of any of the four alignments (Order, Chaos, Fear, and Logic).
This Aether is yours until you spend it to play spells (when it is used up and disappears), and is called Permanent Aether.
When a spell produces Aether, it specifies whether the aether is temporary or permanent. Temporary aether only lasts until the current turn ends.
If you do not spend temporary aether, then it gives you recoil damage. This hurts your monster, at a rate of 1 point per aether lost.
Due to some confusion on the subject, a clarification on Aether: There are no actual cards to represent Aether that go in your deck (Like land in MTG). Aether is an entirely imaginary substance. To represent Aether, we recommend keeping track of it on paper, or using glass beads. If you use the beads, be sure to have some way of telling types of Aether apart.
Monsters
Monsters have two scores: Attack and Life. These are written 1-10, where 1 is attack and 10 is life.
When a monster's life is 0, it dies and you lose. Monsters also have abilities, such as Healing or Confusion, which has a chance of doing bad stuff to your opponent or good stuff to you (Or vice-versa).
Some monster abilities are triggered, and some must be paid for with Aether. Also, some are optional, others not. Some abilities may not be as good as others, and others are bad for you, because the monster has something else that's good.
Monster cards have different backs than playable cards.
Playing Spells
To play a spell, you declare the spell, and reveal it. After the spell is revealed, you pay for it, and it goes to the stack.
The other player gets to respond to the spell with any fast effects they may have. If they respond, you get to decide whether or not to respond to it, and then repeat.
When players stop responding, the spells on the stack resolve. After each spell resolves, the stack reopens, first to the active player, then to the nonactive player.
Spells respond in a Last-In-First-Out (LIFO) order, so the last spell played is the first to respond.
Spells are paid for in that you have to pay for any aligned aether with aether of that alignment, but nonaligned aether can be paid for by any alignment. For instance, a cost of {2}{C}{C} would cost 2 of any alignment, plus two Chaos aligned aether.
Due to some confusion on the subject, a clarification on spending Aether: Aether, once spent, is gone, never to be seen again. You can get Aether of a type you spend all of at the beginning of the turn, but spent Aether will never return.
Fast vs. Slow Effects
Fast effects can be played at any time you have priority over the stack, on either turn. Slow effects can only be played on your turn when the stack is empty.
Permanent Effects vs. "Happen Once" Effects
Permanent effects cause a card to be put into play. A "Happen Once" effect, as the name implies, happens once and goes to the graveyard. "Happen Once" effects may cause a lasting result, but they do not go into play. By definition, permanent effects are less common than the "Happen Once" variety.
Beginning a Game
Each player starts the game with a hand of five cards and a monster in play. Each player may only have one monster. During each player's first turn, they may take a mulligan; in other words, draw a fresh hand of one less card.
Turn Order
How the turn works. Turns are based on phases, each of which has several steps. The steps follow:
1. Begin Phase
2. Main Phase
3. Attack Phase
4. End Phase
Each phase is devoted to different steps.
Beginning Phase
During the Begin Phase, there is the Aether Step, the Reset Step, and the Begin Step, and the Draw Step.
- Aether Step
During the Aether Step, you get +1 Permanent Aether of any alignment.
- Reset Step
During the reset step, all permanents you control reset. Reset means that any permanents that were used (as in, turned sideways by an effect, akin to tapping and untapping) are reenabled (as in, returned to vertical).
- Begin Step
During the Begin Step, Begin Step abilities trigger. During the Draw Step you draw 2 cards.
Main Phase
During the Main Phase, the active player (the one whose turn it is) may play slow effects as long as the stack is empty. The main phase has no steps to it - treat each stack as a step.
Attack Phase
During the attack phase, there are three steps. The modify step, the damage step, and resolve damage tep.
- Modify Step
During the modify step players can play fast effects.
- Damage Step
During the damage step, the amount of damage is locked, and substitution effects take place, such as confusion or damage prevention.
- Resolve Damage Step
During the resolve damage step not even fast effects may be played. All damage resolves, and is subtracted from the appropriate card(s).
End Phase
The end phase is compromised of two steps - end and cleanup.
- End Step
During the end step, the non-active player can play fast effects (which start a stack and are responded to normally. The active player just can't start a stack).
- Cleanup Step
During the cleanup step, you do things in the following order - "Until end of turn" abilities end, and hen you discard until your hand has 10 cards in it if you have more than ten.
Alignments
There are four alignments of aether, into which almost all cards fall. Some cards have no alignments, and can be played with any alignment of aether, or mixed. The alignments are:
- Order
- Chaos
- Fear
- Logic
Each alignment is pretty much summed up by its name.
Tournament Decks
In order to play in a tournament, your deck must be recorded in the following format:
Monster: (Insert Monster Name Here)
Card List:
- 5x Card 1
- 5x Card 2
- 3x And so on.
Sideboard:
- List of 20 cards, same format as deck.
A tournament deck may only have one monster. You must accurately record your decklist, so any discrepancies can be checked.
You must have some way to record your Aether in a tournament. We recommend using paper and writing it down, or using glass beads. If you use glass beads, establish at the beginning of each game how they represent Aether. We suggest two methods:
- The Color Method
- Have a different color for each color of Aether. We suggest the following: Red for Chaos, black for Fear, white for Order, and blue for Logic.
- The Sorting Method
- Have a sheet of paper with a label for each alignment on it, and sort beads by that.
At sanctioned tournaments, we would hope to make available these things, but you never know. And, since we haven't any money to do this, and production is purely theoretical, we've no clue as to if tournaments will ever be sanctioned.
Please comment on the rules, include anything you think should be changes/removed.