Crave
Crave Rulebook
Table of Contents
Table of Contents
Setup
You begin the game with 70 life (health points) and represent either the Vampire side or the Vampire Hunter side. The winner is the one who first reduces their Opponent's life to zero.
Use the life tracker cards to keep track of your health during the game by putting the 2 cards together, one indicating the "tens" digit, and the other the "ones" digit.
There is a public market of cards for anyone to acquire cards from. Each side also has a personal, private market of cards to acquire cards from, but cannot acquire cards from the other party's private market.
Sort the cards and then begin the game.
Sorting cards: Each side will use the crescent moon icon of their respective side (red for Vampires, blue for Vampire Hunters) as their beginning 10-card hand. The other cards of the same color group go into their own private market to acquire. All remaining cards go into the public market for either side to acquire.
Shuffle the public and personal market cards and place them face-down on the table into their respective stacks. The public market row goes in the middle, in between each private market row. Begin by dealing 5 public market cards face-up in a row, and 4 each of the private market cards in a row next to their respective market decks.
Next, each player shuffles their starting cards, and places them face-down, forming their draw deck, and leaves room for their discard pile.
Determine a player to go first. The first player will draw 4 cards to begin the game, while the second player and all successive turns will draw 5 cards. The second player (on their first turn only, to counteract the first player having an advantage of going first) will look at the top card of their draw deck when their turn begins. They may discard it, move it to the bottom of their draw deck, or leave it on top. Then they will begin their turn as normal, drawing 5 cards and playing the game.
Gameplay
Primary Phase | Discard Phase
During the Primary phase of gameplay, you will play cards and use their attributes & unique abilities. You'll use Influence to acquire new cards from the personal & public markets (and sometimes spend Influence on other effects), use Health to increase your life points, and/or use Attack to attack and defeat targets (an Opponent and/or their Patrols).
Primary phase
- Realign (to the primary vertical position) any cards which are finished blocking from your previous turn.
- Play your 5 upcoming cards by turning them onto the table face-up. (Keep in mind that your Opponent may require you to discard 1 or more cards).
- Use the attributes of the cards to heal yourself (raise your life points), acquire new cards (using your Influence), and attack the Opponent and/or their Patrols and Sentinels.
- You may use your cards' abilities in any order you wish.
You will total the sum of each attribute and use the attributes as you see fit.
Health: For any Health you gain, increase your life points. Health is not given to Patrols or other Beings in the game. It is given directly to your life point total. Your life total can go above the number you begin the game with.
Influence: For any Influence you gain from your cards in play, you will total this and use this sum to acquire new cards or otherwise spend it. You may spend up to this total sum of Influence, and you may even choose not to spend it. Any unused Influence is zeroed out at the end of your turn.
The cost of a card is listed in the top right corner of the card. You may acquire cards from the public market or from your own personal market. You may not acquire cards from your opponent's personal market. Any cards you acquire are placed into your Discard pile for future use. If a card you acquire has the "Surge" ability, this card is put into play immediately instead of being placed into your Discard pile for later use.
Anytime you acquire a card from a market, you'll replace it with a new card from that market's draw deck in order to get back to the minimum number of cards in that market (5 cards in the public market, and 4 cards in each private market).
If all cards in any market (personal or public) have a cost of 6 or higher, draw an extra card for that market which will be available to acquire. There will be more than the normal number of cards available temporarily. Allow the market to reduce back to the normal number of available cards organically.
Continue to draw another market card anytime the cost of all cards in a market is 6 or higher or to bring the number of available market cards to the minimum number (5 for the public market and 4 for each private market).
Attack: The amount of Attack you gain from your cards in play is totaled, and you may use this sum to attack your Opponent and/or their Patrols (Beings with defense). The object of the game is to reduce your Opponent's life to zero before your life is reduced to zero, so Patrols are special.
When you attack a target (Opponent or their Patrols), your total available Attack is reduced. You may attack any number of times on your turn as long as you have Attack remaining.
When you defeat an Opponent's Patrol, it is discarded into their discard pile. When you attack an Opponent, their life points are reduced by the number you attack with.
Patrols
Some Creatures are Patrols, meaning they have a defense. The defense of a Patrol is a number in a Yield Sign or Stop Sign, representing the amount of Attack it must take on a single turn to defeat it. Patrols remain on the table until they are defeated by an Opponent, at which point they go into the discard pile.
Yield Sign Patrols are called Sentries, while a Stop Sign Patrol is called a Sentinel.
Sentinels (Stop Sign Patrols) remain on the table until defeated, and must be defeated or stunned before an Opponent or their Sentries are attacked. A stunned Sentinel allows you to bypass the Sentinel and attack that Opponent or their other Patrols.
If your Opponent has multiple Sentinels in play, you may choose which Sentinel to attack first.
Sentries (Yield Sign Patrols) remain on the table until defeated, but do not have to be attacked before an Opponent is attacked.
An Opponent may be directly attacked while a Sentry (but no Sentinel) is in play, although the attributes and bonuses from any cards in play will continue to be gained by the card's owner.
Any Patrols (both Sentries and Sentinels) who are blocking cannot be attacked.
Example: Your Opponent finishes their turn with Dolores the Griffin and Wayne the Werewolf still in play. You play your 5 cards and have a total of 7 attack. You must defeat Dolores the Griffin first before attacking your Opponent or Wayne because Dolores has a Stop Sign defense (Sentinel). You defeat Dolores with 5 of your 7 attack (she is discarded into your Opponent's discard pile), and you have 2 attack remaining. That's not enough to defeat Wayne, so he'll stay in play, but you do use your last 2 attack to reduce your Opponent's life points by 2.
Card Abilities
Cards have unique abilities and attributes which can be used in any order you wish. You may use a card's abilities once per turn.
If a card has an ability listed beside a faction icon, you receive that bonus if you have another card in play in the faction shown.
Icons: Vampire, Hunter, Groupie, Enchanted, Werewolf, Plant
Some cards may be trashed. This might be because it is directly listed as another card's ability, or it could be indicated by the (x) mark on the bottom of the card. By trashing a card, you completely remove it from the game, which can help to strengthen your deck. Trashed cards are set aside, and not used again.
Groupies are an example of this. Groupies desire to be part of your side, and will do anything for you, including sacrificing themselves for the greater good. When you trash this card (permanently remove it from the game – not simply discarding it), you will receive a one-time benefit.
You may use the complete ability of a card and then also trash it on the same turn. For example, Zane the Groupie can give you 1 Influence and 2 Health. You could then Trash it permanently and gain 2 more Health.
Discard Phase
During Discard, you lose any remaining Influence and Attack which you haven't used.
Any remaining cards in your hand which are not Patrols (or Items attached to Patrols) are placed into your Discard pile.
- Unstun any stunned cards. Any stunned cards are now vertically aligned (from upside down), showing they have spent one turn being stunned.
- Draw 5 new cards from your draw deck and place them face-down in front of you on the table. These will be the cards you play on your next turn. Your turn ends.
If you have fewer than 5 cards in your draw deck, you will draw the remaining cards in your draw deck, shuffle your discard pile and use it to begin your new draw deck. For example, if you have only 1 card remaining to draw from, draw it (put it on the table face down), then shuffle your discards and create a new draw deck. Draw 4 more cards from your new draw deck to bring your total to 5 cards as normal, and continue play.
Players may look through any discards and trashed cards, but may not look at cards in their draw deck unless directed to.
Items
Some Items must be equipped to a Being in order to use the Item. If no Being is in play, then the Item is discarded without being used.
The Yield Sign card gives additional defense of 3 to the Being it is attached to, without changing the existing shield type (Sentinel or Sentry) of the Being. If the Being had no defense, then it becomes a Yield Sign defense (Sentry).
Poisons
Plants are poisons which are dropped into an Opponent's deck. Plants will attack the holder (the receiving party) when the card comes into play and may have additional actions.
Poisonous Plants attack the holder's health directly, and don't affect Patrols. For example, if Amy acquires a Plant and drops it into Paul's deck, Paul would lose life points directly when the Plant comes into play, even if he had a Sentinel with a large defense.
Plants have the first effect in game play, unless another card would instead get rid of the Plant. For example, if Michael has only 2 life points remaining and draws (puts into play) a poisonous Plant which his Opponent gave to him earlier in the game with 2 attack damage, then Michael would be out of the game before he had a chance to attack his opponent with his other cards in play.
Some Plants may require you to discard another card (like a Werewolf or Groupie), so you would discard those cards without being able to use them. If you have Amani, a Groupie who allows you to discard a Plant, then you would first discard the Plant before taking other actions.
Keywords
Block This Being would block any first attack against it, and so stays in play another turn. It is turned sideways when it enters play, indicating it cannot be attacked or stunned by any Opponent for one turn. After all Opponents have had a turn and play returns to this Being's Player, the Being is "unblocked", returning to normal vertical alignment, showing that it may now be attacked.
Drain When you successfully attack, you also receive life back to yourself equal to your attack power. (If you are unable to successfully attack, no health is added back to your life point total).
Equip Some Items may be equipped to a Being in play. Place the equipped Item on the Being to indicate it is attached. This Being now receives these bonus attributes for as long as the Being remains in play. Up to 2 items may be equipped to any 1 Being. Once an Item is attached to a Being, it cannot be switched to a different Being in play. Once the Being is defeated, both cards (Item and Being) are placed into the discard pile. (The Item may of course be attached to a different Being in the future).
Fatal Automatically defeats any 1 Patrol (Sentry or Sentinel). Your remaining attack power can go towards attacking other targets. As normal, Sentinels must be defeated before Sentries.
Last Words Bonus you receive after your character with this ability is defeated. The defeated party chooses whom to attack. (Keep in mind that not all Last Words will be successful, if the Opponent has a Sentry whose shield defense is higher than the attack).
Patrol Stays to keep watch (remains in play) until defeated. These characters have a shield defense number (indicated in a Yield sign or Stop Sign) that indicates how much attack is taken all at once for this character to be defeated.
Sentinel Special Patrol who remains in play until defeated. Must be defeated before Opponent or other Patrols can be attacked. The shield defense number (indicated in a Stop sign) indicates how much attack is required all at once to defeat this character.
Sentry Patrol who keeps watch until defeated. The shield defense number indicated in the Yield sign shows how much attack is required all at once to defeat this character. Does not have to be defeated before attacking the Opponent's health directly, but remains in play until defeated.
Stun Any Patrol may be stunned. Stunned Beings are turned upside down, and are not able to attack or gain any attributes or abilities on their next turn. After that Opponent's next turn has been completed (if the stunned Being is still alive), any stunned Beings are realigned vertically to show they are active once again. (All Sentinels must be stunned or defeated before any Stun or other attack may occur to a Sentry or Opponent).
A Stunned character stays on the table, but does not help to trigger another of its faction's bonuses. For example, if you have one stunned werewolf, and only one other werewolf comes into play for you, you would not receive any werewolf attack bonus.
You may stun a Patrol (turn that target upside down) and use your attack power to attack other targets.
Surge Is put into play immediately when acquired (instead of placing into discard pile).
Triumph A bonus if you defeat any Patrol during that turn.
Turn Turns target into a body shield for your side. This turned victim must be defeated before any attack may occur on you or your Patrols.
Some Vampires can "turn" a Groupie who is in play. When using this ability, the Groupie is removed from the Opponent's side and placed horizontally in front of the Vampire's side on the table. All "turned" victims are now body shields (with no other attributes or abilities) who must be defeated (attacking it with its defense number as normal) or brought back (rejoining its original side by Coffee or another effect) before the Vampire's side or their Patrols may be attacked.
If a turned Groupie is brought back by Coffee (or another effect), it is returned to the original player's discard pile. If a turned Groupie is defeated with an attack, it is trashed permanently from the game.
Team Play
One copy of Crave is required for each 2 players. When playing 2v2 or 3v3, players on the same team represent the same side (Vampires or Vampire Hunters). Life points begin at 60 for each player, and one team wins when all players on the other side are defeated.
Each player begins with their own 10 starting cards. There remains one private market for each team and one public market. Each player's extra cards (of their own kind, blue for Vampire Hunters, or Red for Vampires) are combined for one private market per side, and all other cards combine for one public market in the game. Players may talk to each other and show each other their cards to discuss strategy. For example, the 2 players on the Vampire side may talk and decide to try and save the new Spellbind card for one Vampire so that the other Vampire player can try to acquire the Centaur which just appeared.
Turn order: Teams sit across from each other on the table. Play goes clockwise, with the left-most player on one team going first. Thus, one player on one side begins the game, followed by all players on the other side, and then back to the original side.
In a team setting, your Patrols continue to protect you, but not other players.