Terrors of London Rulebook

Table of Contents

Table of Contents

• Overview
• Components
• Setup
  • Play Area Diagram
• Winning the Game
• Golden Rule
• Game Turn
• The Action Phase
  • Play Action
  • Buy Action
  • Attack Action
  • Horde Action
  • Relic Action
  • Overlord Action
  • HAUNT Action
  • Pass Action
• The Cleanup Phase
• The Draw Phase
• Game End
• Glossary
• Keywords and Icons

Overview

In Terrors of London, players assume the roles of powerful characters called overlords. Each overlord represents one of the four factions: Undead, Beast, Mortal, and Spirit. Each player receives a starting deck of cards that represent their power at the start of the game. During each turn, players buy new cards to improve their decks while battling other overlords.

Credits and Thanks:

Designer: Brad Pye Illustration & Graphic Design: Ryan Pye Graphic Design Support: Chris Byer, Kevin Haemmerle, Heath Geddes Lead Developer: Chris Hamm Developers: Travis R. Chance, Heath Geddes Rules Editing & Proofing: Van Willis Production & Logistics: AJ Lambeth, Zongxiu Yao-Charpentier, Arnaud Charpentier Project Management: Kira Anne Peavley

Special Thanks to: Katelyn Pye and Brandon Pye.

Components

• 108 Cards
• 10 Muster tokens
• 2 Health markers
• 10 Haunt tokens
• 4 Overlords
• 2 Player reference cards

Setup

1. Remove all game components from the box (cards, tokens, overlords, Health markers). Determine First Player: Do this randomly or by any method of your choosing.

2. Choose a Faction: Beginning with the First Player, each player selects a faction (Undead, Beast, Mortal or Spirit), takes all of the overlords from that faction and chooses one to play.

3. Set up Health: Each player takes a Health marker and places it on their overlord at full Health.

4. Take Influence Cards: Beginning with the First Player, each player chooses two of their overlord's four Influence cards.

   NOTE: It is strongly recommended that first-time players use the two Influence cards with the icon.

5. Create Starting Deck: Each player adds five Cultists and three Fanatics to the two Influence cards selected earlier, for a total of 10 cards. Each player shuffles their 10 cards to form their starting deck. Place any remaining Cultists, Fanatics, overlords and Influence cards back in the game box.

6. Lay Out Play Area: Players create their play area in front of them as shown in the play area diagram.

7. Create the Market: Shuffle the eight Acolyte cards and place them facedown in a central area that all players can access. Combine and shuffle all remaining cards to form the Market and place it facedown next to the Acolyte cards.

8. Set up Street: Take the top five cards from the Market, and lay them out faceup next to the Market as shown in the diagram. These five faceup cards are called the Street.

9. Draw hands: Both players draw their starting hands. The First Player draws four cards, and the other player draws five.

You are now ready to play, beginning with the First Player, players alternate taking turns until one player's overlord has zero Health and the game ends.

Play Area Diagram

The play area diagram shows, for each player: the Market Deck and its Discard Pile, the player's own Play Area and Discard Pile, the Street, and the Acolytes pile.

Winning the Game

You win the game by reducing the opposing overlord's Health to zero.

Golden Rule

If the text on a card contradicts a rule in this book, the card text takes precedence.

Game Turn

On your turn, complete the following three phases:

1. The Action Phase: Take actions to play cards, form hordes, activate relics, utilize Overlord abilities, buy cards, and deal damage to the opposing overlord.
2. The Cleanup Phase: Clean up the cards played during the Action Phase.
3. The Draw Phase: Draw a new hand and end the turn.

The Action Phase

The possible actions you can take during the Action Phase are:

• Play Action (Play a card from hand)
• Buy Action (Buy a card)
• Attack Action (Deal damage to an opponent)
• Horde Action (Form or expand a horde)
• Relic Action (Activate a relic)
• Overlord Action (Activate Overlord ability)
• HAUNT Action (Activate the text on a monster that began your turn in play)
• Pass Action (End turn)

During the Action Phase, a player can take any combinations of actions in any order, as many times as they wish. The one exception is the Pass Action, which ends the turn.

Play Action

The Play Action allows you to add one card to your play area from your hand. There are three types of cards that you can play from hand: Monster, Influence, and Relic. There is no cost for playing cards from hand when taking a Play Action and cards played with a Play Action are added to your play area faceup.

How to activate a card's abilities: Each time you play a card from hand you activate the abilities on that card.

Resource Abilities: In Terrors of London there are three main types of resources represented by the following icons: Coin, Power and Regeneration. When an ability that shows one of these symbols is activated, you gain that resource. Resource icons have a number on them which show how many of that resource you gain when the ability is activated. For example, a card showing 2 Coin means you gain 2 Coin.

Each turn, resources gained from Resource abilities accumulate and are held in a Resource Pool and can be spent at any time in the Action Phase. Any unused resources in a player's Resource Pool are lost at the end of their turn.

Keyword Abilities: Abilities written in all capital letters and made up of only one word. Keyword abilities are activated immediately after a monster is played. See the Keywords section for a detailed explanation.

Unique Abilities: Activate after all resource and Keyword abilities have been fully resolved. The Unique ability text explains how to resolve the ability.

Triggered Abilities: These abilities are not activated immediately, and only provide their benefit after meeting a specific condition. There are many different kinds of Triggered abilities, and they all follow the same pattern:

First, the text explains what benefit you will receive, then how many times the ability can be activated to receive the benefit, and lastly what condition is required to trigger the activation of the ability.

NOTE: Before activating a Triggered ability, fully resolve the effect that would cause the ability to trigger. If an effect would cause more than one ability to be triggered the player chooses the order in which to resolve the Triggered abilities.

Playing Influence cards: Influence cards are a special kind of card unique to each overlord. They contain a Keyword or Resource ability and a Triggered ability that is activated only when you have a monster of your overlord's faction in play. If a player does not have any monsters of their overlord's faction in play when an Influence card is played, this ability cannot be activated.

NOTE: If a monster of the appropriate faction is played after an Influence card its Triggered ability cannot be activated.

Playing Relics: Relics played from hand are placed in your Relic area indicated on the right side of your overlord. Unlike Monster and Influence cards, Relic abilities are not activated when played, but instead as part of a Relic Action.

NOTE: You can only have three relics in your Relic area at one time. If you have three relics in play and would like to play a new relic, you must permanently remove one relic in your Relic area from the game before adding the newly played relic to your Relic area.

Buy Action

The Buy Action allows you to spend Coin to buy one card from the Street. After you purchase a card, immediately refill the Street by adding the top card from the Market faceup, ensuring there are five cards available in the Street at all times. Three types of cards are available to buy: Acolyte, Monster, and Relic.

Buying Monsters: Pay the monster's cost by spending the indicated Coin from your Resource Pool. Once bought, place the monster faceup in your discard pile.

NOTE: You may place cards with the CLAIM ability facedown on top of your deck instead of in your discard pile.

Buying Acolytes: At the start of a game, there are eight acolytes in a facedown pile next to the Market. You may buy acolytes for 2 Coin with a Buy Action, as long as there are acolytes available. Just like other monsters, acolytes are placed faceup in your discard pile.

Buying Relics: Pay the relic's cost by spending the indicated Coin from your Resource Pool. Once bought, place the relic directly into your Relic area where it is immediately available for use with a Relic Action.

Attack Action

The Attack Action allows you to spend Power from your Resource Pool to damage your opponent's overlord. For each point of Power you spend from your Resource Pool during an Attack Action, you can assign one point of damage to your opponent's overlord. An overlord loses 1 Health for each point of damage assigned to it.

Armor: Some cards provide a player with Armor. Cards that provide Armor do so automatically. Reduce the total damage your overlord takes during any turn by an amount equal to your total Armor. Armor does not reduce Health loss due to effects such as CURSE or paying Health as part of the cost of an ability.

Example: 1 Power + 1 Power = 2 Power. In this instance the Ghoul is adding 1 Power and the Relic Hunter is adding 1 Power for a total of 2 Power which is spent to deal Fenris 2 damage.

Horde Action

In Terrors of London, you can group monsters to form powerful hordes that allow them to activate their Horde abilities. With this action, you can either form a new horde or expand an existing horde. Once a monster is part of a horde, it cannot be part of a different horde during the same Action Phase. You cannot take a Horde Action unless you have monsters in your play area with compatible Horde indicators.

Forming New Hordes: To form a horde, you must have two monsters in play that have compatible Horde indicators. Horde indicators consist of a faction icon as well as a set of colored arrows. Horde compatibility can be determined in two ways:

1. The Horde indicator at the bottom of the card matches the faction of the monster it is forming a horde with.
2. The arrows at the bottom of each monster match with the adjacent monster.

Both of these statements are going to be true or both are going to be false. After you meet the above conditions, you have successfully formed a horde. You can now activate one Horde ability on either monster (those in the boxes at the bottom of all Monster cards).

Example: In this instance either Horde ability will provide 1 Power. The player chooses to activate the Horde ability of the Skeletal adding 1 Power to their Resource Pool.

Expanding an Existing Horde: Additional Horde abilities can be activated by expanding a horde. To expand a horde, add a monster to an existing horde on any monster's unpaired side. As with forming a horde, the Horde indicators of the new monster must be compatible with the Horde indicators at the bottom of the adjacent monster. After expanding an existing horde, activate one unused Horde ability on any monster in that horde.

NOTE: A player cannot activate the same Horde ability more than once in an Action Phase. Which Horde ability you activate is independent of the Horde indicators connecting the monsters.

Example: This example shows a player expanding the existing horde from the previous example by adding the Werewolf to it. The Skeletal's 1 Power Horde ability was previously activated and is now unavailable. The player must choose one of the unused Horde abilities, as each Horde ability can only be activated once per Action Phase.

NOTE: Some monsters have two Horde abilities. When a monster has two Horde abilities, they are separated by a "◆". This is not one ability that provides two options, but rather two separate abilities available to be activated as the result of a Horde Action.

Relic Action

The Relic Action allows you to activate one unused relic in your Relic area. When activated, relics provide the effect described in their text immediately.

Overlord Action

The Overlord Action allows players to activate the ability described on their Overlord card. When a player takes an Overlord Action they resolve the text on their Overlord card accordingly.

HAUNT Action

The HAUNT Action allows you to activate abilities on a monster that began your turn in play. To perform a HAUNT Action requires all of the following:

• Choose a monster that began this turn in your play area.
• The monster's HAUNT token has its Dismiss side up.
• The monster has not yet been activated by a HAUNT Action this turn.

If all of the above conditions have been met, resolve the HAUNT Action by activating all of the monster's resource, keyword, and unique abilities. Remember, a monster with a HAUNT token on it can never have another one added to it.

Pass Action

The Pass Action ends your Action Phase and can only be taken if you have one or no cards in hand. If you have one card in hand when taking this action, place it facedown on top of your deck.

The Cleanup Phase

Place all Influence cards and monsters without a HAUNT token faceup (see HAUNT in the Keywords section) in your play area into your discard pile, and remove all unused resources from your Resource Pool. Then flip all HAUNT tokens on remaining monsters in your play area to the Dismiss side. Never place relics into the discard pile during the Cleanup Phase.

The Draw Phase

Draw five cards from your deck and end your turn. If at any time you need to draw cards and your deck is empty, shuffle your discard pile to form a new deck from which you continue to draw cards. Otherwise, never shuffle your discard pile or deck unless instructed by an ability.

Game End

The game ends when one overlord has zero Health remaining. The player whose overlord still possesses Health is the victor.

If you need to know any additional rules, check the Glossary and Reference cards for game terms, keywords, and icons.

Glossary

Convert: When an ability allows a player to convert one resource type to another, they may do this on a one-for-one basis at any time during their Action Phase.

Cost: Cost appears on most cards and represents their price in Coin. To purchase a card a player must spend its cost in Coin from their Resource Pool.

Discard: After an effect forces a player to discard a card, they must immediately discard from hand. A player may not discard a card unless required to do so by an ability or effect. A player's discard pile is open knowledge.

Discard Pile: Cards in the discard pile have no effect on the game, and the order of a player's discard pile is not important.

Faction: The four factions are Undead, Beast, Mortal, and Spirit. If a card has one of the four faction symbols it belongs to that faction.

Faction Monster: Faction monsters are any monsters with one of the faction symbols: Beast, Mortal, Spirit, Undead.

Hand: Your collection of drawn cards is kept secret from other players. There is no hand limit in Terrors of London.

HAUNT: The rules governing HAUNT are as follows:

• HAUNT tokens have two sides: The HAUNT side and the Dismiss side.
• Only monsters that do not have HAUNT tokens can gain HAUNT tokens.
• When a monster gains HAUNT, place a HAUNT token on it with its HAUNT side faceup.
• When a monster with a HAUNT token becomes part of a horde, flip its token to the Dismiss side.
• During the Cleanup Phase, remove all monsters with HAUNT tokens that are Dismiss side faceup from the player's play area. Then flip all remaining HAUNT tokens in the player's play area to the Dismiss side.
• Monsters beginning their controlling player's Action Phase with a HAUNT token are available for activation during that Action Phase. A player can only activate each monster in this manner once per Action Phase. When doing so, resolve all of the monster's resource, unique, and keyword abilities. Triggered abilities on the monster are activated in the same manner as those on any other card in play.

Health: A player whose overlord has zero Health has lost the game. Some abilities like Regeneration increase an overlord's Health when used, however, an overlord's Health can never increase above its starting Health. The Health marker should always indicate the overlord's remaining health.

Horde: A grouping of two or more monsters connected by the Horde indicators at the bottom of their cards. When a horde is formed or expanded, the player in control of the connected monsters activates one of the unused Horde abilities on the monsters in that horde. The same Horde ability can never be activated more than once during a player's Action Phase.

Horde Abilities: This refers to all abilities within the box at the bottom of a Monster card. Faction monsters will either have one or two Horde abilities. These abilities can be activated by forming hordes or by abilities that allow a player to activate them. Each Horde ability can only be activated once per Action Phase. The Horde ability a player activates is independent of the monster to which it is connected.

Look: When an ability or an effect requires a player to look at a card from any pile, the player is not required to show the card to their opponent. If there are insufficient cards to satisfy the ability, shuffle that player's discard pile and place those cards under the player's existing deck, resolving the effect normally.

Lose Health: After an ability requires an overlord to lose Health, that player reduces their overlord's Health by that amount. Health loss cannot be reduced by Armor, as it is not the same as damage from Power.

Market: The facedown pile of cards consisting of monsters and relics. Whenever it is necessary to replenish a card from the Street, do so from the Market. If the Market ever runs out of cards, players will no longer be able to replenish the Street.

Non-Faction Monsters: A monster without the Beast, Undead, Spirit, or Mortal Faction symbol. Cultists and Fanatics are examples of non-faction monsters.

Resource Pool: All resources a player generates each Action Phase (such as Coin, Power, and Regeneration) go into a Resource Pool. All resources in a player's Resource Pool are available for use during the player's Action Phase. All unused resources in the Resource Pool are lost during the Cleanup Phase.

Reveal: When an ability or an effect requires a player to reveal a card from any pile, the player must show the card to their opponent. If there are insufficient cards to satisfy the ability, shuffle that player's discard pile and place those cards under the player's existing deck, resolving the effect normally.

Street: The Street is where players purchase monsters and relics. There should be five cards faceup in the Street at all times unless there are no more cards in the Market. The Acolyte cards are not considered part of the Street.

Target: Targets are always of a specific type, such as player, monster, and so forth. A player must select the type of target stated in the text of the ability.

Keywords and Icons

Armor: The symbol represents Armor. Cards that provide Armor do so automatically and reduce the total damage an overlord takes during any turn by an amount equal to the total Armor on cards in the player's play area.

NOTE: Armor does not reduce "Lose Health" effects like CURSE.

CLAIM: After a player buys a card with CLAIM, that player may place it on top of their deck.

Coin: The symbol represents Coin. The number within this symbol represents the Coin gained when this ability is activated. Coin is a resource that goes into a player's Resource Pool for use this Action Phase.

COMMAND: The player chooses a monster from their discard pile with cost 3 or less and returns it to their hand. The monster is then available for use with a Play Action.

CURSE: Choose an opponent to target. An opponent targeted by CURSE must choose to either lose 2 health or discard 1 card from hand.

DESTROY: To use DESTROY, choose one of the following:

• Choose a card in play and place it in its owner's discard pile.
• Choose a card from the Street. Remove that card from the game permanently, then replace it with the top card of the Market.

DRAW (#): Draw a number of cards equal to the number shown.

HAUNT: This monster gains a HAUNT token if it does not already have one. Place the HAUNT token on the monster with the HAUNT side faceup.

MUSTER: After a player activates a MUSTER ability, take a MUSTER token from the reserve and place it next to their deck. During the player's Draw Phase, draw 1 card for each MUSTER token next to that player's deck. All MUSTER tokens are returned to the reserve after the Draw Phase.

Power: The symbol represents Power. The number within this symbol represents the amount of Power gained when this ability is activated. Power is a resource that goes into a player's Resource Pool for use this Action Phase. Spend Power to deal damage to an opponent's overlord during the Action Phase.

RAGE: After a player activates the RAGE ability the player can choose to gain either 2 Power or 2 Regeneration.

Regeneration: The symbol represents Regeneration. The number within this symbol represents the amount of Regeneration gained when this ability is activated. Regeneration is a resource that goes into a player's Resource Pool for use this Action Phase. A player can spend Regeneration from their Resource Pool to increase their overlord's Health, however, regeneration can never increase an overlord's Health above the starting Health printed on the Overlord card.

SACRIFICE: Choose a card to remove from the game permanently. Players can only choose to SACRIFICE a card from their play area unless an ability states otherwise. The player gains 1 Power for each card removed from the game in this manner.