V-Wars Rulebook

Table of Contents

Table of Contents

• Components
• Objective
• Set-Up
  • Who's Human? Who's a Vampire?
• One Last Note About the World of V-Wars
• The Game Turn
  • 1. Revelation
  • 2. Take Four Actions
  • 3. Resolve Event
  • 4. Riots!
    • The Riot Begins
    • Taking Control
    • Massacres
    • Rally
    • Riot Results
    • After Combat
    • Victory?
  • 5. New Cards

Components

• 16 Player Standees (8 human and 8 vampire)
• 8 Role Cards
• 1 Game Board
• 30 Event Cards
• 12 Vampire Law Cards
• 12 Human Law Cards
• 84 Player Cards
• 5 Reference Cards
• 5 Faction Cards
• 60 Vampire Troops (40 grey, 1-unit; 20 red, 3-unit)
• 60 Human Troops (40 tan, 1-unit; 20 green, 3-unit)
• 16 Vampire Control Markers
• 5 Investigation Tokens
• 16 Sympathy Tokens
• 6 Martial Law Tokens
• 1 Victory Marker

Objective

V-Wars begins as a co-operative game, but shifts as players reveal themselves to be vampires or the virus takes hold in infected players and forces them to change sides mid-game.

In V-Wars, the vampires are trying to infiltrate the world's governments, taking over human cities while simultaneously attempting to sway public sympathy to recognize them as victims of a viral outbreak, not just cold-blooded killers. Meanwhile, the humans are trying to stem the vampire tide, fighting back against their covert attacks and outright rebellions.

The vampires win immediately when they've reached a balance of city control and public sympathy to a point where their Victory marker and Sympathy markers reach each other on the Vampire Victory track or, alternatively, engage in a holding action long enough to exhaust all Player cards. Humans win by placing six cities under Martial Law in different regions of the world or if the vampires' Sympathy tokens are reduced to zero on the Vampire Victory track.

Set-Up

[4 Player Set-Up]

1. Players choose a Role card. Each role provides the player with a different bonus and a starting city. Give each player 1 Investigation token and a Human player standee matching their Role card. Everyone places their standee in their starting city as provided by their Role card. The player who has donated blood most recently goes first.

2. The game starts with a number of vampire-controlled cities equal to the number of players, each containing 2 Vampire troops, and an equal number of human cities that are still human-controlled but containing 1 Vampire troop each.

   To select these cities: i. Shuffle the Player deck. Turn over cards equal to the number of players in the game. ii. Put 1 Vampire Control marker in each city listed. If you get two of the same city, discard and draw again. iii. Put 2 Vampire troops in each vampire-controlled city. iv. Draw Player cards again equal to the number of players and put 1 Vampire troop into each city. If any of the cities drawn already have a Vampire Control marker, or if you draw two of the same city, then redraw as before. v. Shuffle all cards back into the Player deck.

   (Note: If a city has no troops from either faction on it, it is considered human-controlled.)

3. Deal 3 Player cards facedown into each of the 8 Region decks and 3 into the Riot deck. Place 2 Player cards face-up into the Now and Soon spaces on the board for Riots.

4. Deal each player 6 Player cards to form their starting hand. Place the remaining Player deck facedown in the designated area.

5. Place an Event card face-up on the Now and Soon spaces on the game board in the designated areas. Place the remaining Event deck facedown on the board in the designated area.

6. Separate and shuffle the Human Law and Vampire Law cards. Place both decks facedown on the board. Turn over the top card of each deck.

7. Based on player count, build a Faction deck containing the following cards:

   • 3 Players: 2 Human cards, 1 Vampire card
   • 4 Players: 2 Human cards, 1 Vampire card, 1 Infected card

Who's Human? Who's a Vampire?

Each player receives one Faction card, in one of the following categories:

i. Human card. You do not have the virus. You play for the human faction.

ii. Vampire card. You have the virus and play for the vampire faction. You will be keeping this secret at first in hopes of sabotaging the humans before publically declaring yourself their foe.

iii. Infected card. You have the virus but are still working for the humans. However, this may change because once the Vampire player goes public, they can persuade you to their side.

(Note for Infected players: If you think the vampires may be winning, you might want to start secretly playing for that side early.)

One Last Note About the World of V-Wars

Much of the game centers around deception and possible betrayal. Players are not allowed to show each other their Player or Faction cards at any time nor can they reveal what cards they have when placing them facedown into the different regions and draw piles. Players may also fib about the cards they have and which cards they've seen.

Ok, with that done, you are ready to begin the war!

The Game Turn

Each player turn has five steps. When the turn is complete the next player to the left takes their turn.

The steps in order are:

1. Revelation (optional)
2. Take four actions
3. Resolve Event
4. Riots!
5. New cards

1. Revelation

The player with the Vampire card may turn it over to reveal themselves as a vampire!

If they do, the vampire faction loses half the Sympathy tokens from the Vampire Victory track, rounded down. The player is now a Public Vampire and follows rules for Public Vampires.

Note: Public Vampires should use the vampire side of their Role card from here on. Don't forget to change your standee from human to vampire!

2. Take Four Actions

Perform any of these actions in any order. All can be used multiple times. You do not need to use all your actions.

Move. Move to a different city in your region or a city in an adjacent region. Players must always be in a city, although many of their actions can be used to affect the entire region.

Note: Public Vampires cannot enter cities under Martial Law.

Deploy Troop. Discard any Player card, facedown, to put one of your faction's troops into any city in the region you are in.

Note: Humans, infected, and unrevealed vampires always place Human troops. Public Vampires only place Vampire troops.

Place A Card. Place a Player card either into the deck of the region you are in or into the Riot deck. Whenever you place a card, you must name one other person in your faction to place a card alone in the same location you did. The hidden vampire or infected players may use this opportunity to secretly play cards that will hurt the human faction's cause.

Note: The Public Vampire may place one Player card alone if there is no one in their faction.

Assassinate. Remove an Enemy troop from the city you are in.

Humans, infected, and unrevealed vampires always remove Vampire troops. Public Vampires remove Human troops.

Investigate (once per game). If you do not have the Vampire token, use your Investigation token to investigate another player to see if they are the vampire.

To Investigate: i. Select a player to investigate. ii. If they have the Vampire card, they turn it over and are now a Public Vampire. If they have a Human or Infection card, they keep their card hidden. iii. If you successfully reveal a vampire, remove half the Vampire Sympathy tokens from the Victory Track, rounded down. iv. If they are not the vampire, you have falsely accused an ally, lowering morale for all! Add Vampire Sympathy tokens to the Victory Track equal to half the number of tokens on the track, rounded down. v. Discard your Investigation token from the game.

Once the vampire player has gone public, no further Investigate actions may be taken.

Public Vampires. Players who are Public Vampires gain one additional possible action: Awaken.

If a Public Vampire is in a city with another player, they may try to awaken the virus within them to force that player into joining the vampire faction.

When the Public Vampire declares this action they select their target player. If that player has an Infection token, they are persuaded and must turn their Infection card over, becoming a Public Vampire.

If they have a Human card, the attempt fails and nothing happens.

Public Vampire Rules Reminders:

• The Hire Troop action now places Vampire troops instead of Human troops.
• Vampires assassinate Human troops.
• Vampires cannot enter cities under Martial Law.

3. Resolve Event

If there is no event (because the deck ran out), the game ends and the vampires win.

Resolve the event in the Now slot following the instructions provided on the card.

If an event adds Vampire troops to a Human city to cause it to go over 6 troops, place troops until there are six and then turn the city to Vampire Control. If an event adds Vampire troops to a Vampire city to cause it to go over 6 troops, place troops until there are six and then place a Sympathy token on the Vampire Victory track.

Event - Elections and Laws. Election events will place laws on the board in a region. Select the top, face-up card from the winning side's law deck and add it to the designated region. Flip over a new law card so that both sides have face-up cards on top of their law decks. Active laws stay in effect until they are replaced by a new law.

4. Riots!

There do not have to be troops in a city to have Riots. Troops represent visible military presence but both sides of the conflict have a lot of hidden forces working underground.

The winner of a Riot is determined by whichever side's combat strength reaches 6 or higher first. Combat strength is a combination of troops and values shown on Player cards in the region deck.

The faction that controls the city is the defender, the other faction is the attacker. (Unless there is a Vampire Control marker on the city, every city is considered to be under human control).

Riots happen even if one or both sides start with 6 troops in the city.

The Riot Begins

Take the Player card from the Now slot and shuffle it into the Region deck where the Riot is taking place. Reveal the cards in it, one by one, resolving each before drawing the next. White numbers count toward Human strength; red numbers count toward Vampire strength.

Place the first card face-up on the table and then:

If the city contains troops opposite of the face-up Player card: The card that was just flipped over removes enemy troops from the city equal to the number on the card. Once the troops are removed, turn the card facedown. If the number is higher than the number of troops in the city, excess strength is wasted.

Example: A Vampire strength 4 is on the card. There are 3 human troops in the city. The three troops are removed and the card is turned facedown.

If there are no enemy troops in the city: Leave the card face-up on the table. Add the value of all allied troops in the city to all of that faction's face-up cards to determine combat strength.

If the combat strength of either faction totals 6 or more, that side wins the riot and the riot ends immediately, even if there are more unplayed facedown cards in the Region deck. Otherwise draw the next card.

If all the cards in a deck have been played and neither side has a total strength of 6 or higher, the riot sputters out and nothing happens. Skip the Taking Control section and proceed to 5. New cards.

Taking Control

If the attacker wins the riot, and it is not a Massacre, they take control of the city, otherwise the defender holds it. (See Riot Results Table for details.)

Massacres

If the winning side had a combat strength of 6 or 7 then they won the riot using the right amount of force.

If the winning side had a combat strength of 8+ then they caused a Massacre, which causes a swing in sympathy. (See Riot Results Table for details.)

Rally

Defending a city without causing a Massacre results in a rally for the defender. This is either a big swing in sympathy or the faction may elect to use a rally power.

• Humans: If the humans rally in a region without a Martial Law token, they must put that city under Martial Law. If it is the sixth Martial Law token, they win.
• Vampires: If the vampires rally and the vampire is hidden, they may choose to become a Public Vampire at that time without losing sympathy. If they are already a Public Vampire they may choose to try and awaken another player to see if they are infected.

Otherwise the vampires have sympathy swing in their favor and put two Sympathy tokens on the Vampire Victory track.

Riot Results

Result	Outcome
Attacker wins, without Massacre	Change city owner. Move victory marker on track. Move sympathy in attacker's favor.
Attacker wins, with Massacre	Change city owner. Move victory marker on track.
Defender wins, without Massacre	Move sympathy two in defender's favor OR rally.
Defender wins, with Massacre	No effect.

Rally options:

• Humans: Put city under martial law.
• Vampires: Become public vampire with no penalty OR awaken another player to see if they are infected.

After Combat

The Active player takes all face-up cards from combat and secretly chooses one to discard facedown to the discard pile. The Active player then returns the rest of the cards facedown back into the region. For clarity, only one card is discarded from the Region deck. The rest return no matter what the combat results were.

The Active player may not physically reveal which card has been discarded and may mislead others about which card has been removed.

Victory?

After the results of a Riot are completed, check for the following game end conditions:

Human Victory. Humans win if they can get 6 cities under Martial Law in six different regions or if the vampires have zero Sympathy tokens left on the Vampire Victory track.

Vampire Victory. The Victory Marker shows how many cities the vampires currently control militarily. If at any time the Victory marker is on the last visible space of the Vampire Victory track, the vampires win the game immediately.

Vampire Sympathy tokens are put on the Vampire Victory track to show the political sympathy of the vampires in the world. When a token is put on the track it covers up the highest visible number on the track, lowering the number of cities required for the vampires to win the game. (See example.)

5. New Cards

i. Discard the Riot and Event cards from the Now slots. Slide the two cards in the Soon slots into the Now slots.

ii. Draw the top card off the Event deck and put it in the Soon slot.

iii. Shuffle the Riot pool and draw one card to go into the Soon slot.

iv. Draw your hand of Player cards back up to 6.

If the Player deck runs out, shuffle the discard deck to make a new deck. If there are ever not enough cards for a player to draw back up to 6 cards, the vampires win.

If neither side has claimed victory, begin the next round!