Tactical Cards

Standalone Cards

Standalone cards are played directly as a between-turn action — no negotiation required, no partner needed. They consume your one between-turn action for the cycle, and all effects resolve at the acting player’s next turn start. These are your solo tools for manipulation, defence, and disruption.

Betrayal

Break any active agreement immediately. The pact is dissolved, the benefits end, and your former partner is notified.

Commitment penalty: Your deploy is halved for 2x the remaining turns on the broken agreement (minimum 3 turns). A ceasefire with 4 turns remaining means 8 turns of half deploy. The penalty is severe by design — betrayal is always an option, but never a cheap one.

Betrayal cards are rare in the deck. Their existence makes every agreement a calculated risk: your partner could be holding one right now.

Forced March

Reposition troops before your deploy phase by moving half your troops from one territory to an adjacent one. The remaining half are destroyed — not transferred, not preserved. The source territory retains 1 troop.

Forced March is a blunt instrument. Use it to mass forces for a critical assault or to rescue a garrison from a doomed position. The troop loss hurts, but sometimes speed matters more than numbers.

Foreign Aid

Transfer any single card from your hand to another player of your choice. The card itself is private — other players see that a transfer occurred, but not which card was sent.

Cost: You lose 2 cards total — the Foreign Aid card itself is consumed, plus the gifted card leaves your hand. This is expensive, but it lets you arm an ally, fulfil an informal debt, or manipulate the balance of power in ways that formal agreements cannot.

Duration Modifier

Extend or shorten any active agreement by a set number of turns. Use it to prolong a beneficial truce or to hasten the end of one that no longer serves you.

• T1: Adjust by +/- 2 turns
• T2: Adjust by +/- 3 turns

The agreement cannot be shortened below 1 remaining turn. The other party is privately notified of the change — they’ll know the clock has shifted, but other players won’t.

Trap

Set a hidden ambush on a territory you own. The trap is invisible to enemies — they see nothing until it triggers.

When an enemy conquers the trapped territory, a percentage of their conquering forces are killed on arrival. The ambush springs, the attacker takes losses, and the trap is consumed.

• T1: 50% kill rate, lasts 7 turns
• T2: 70% kill rate, lasts 10 turns

Garrison lock: Troops in a trapped territory cannot leave or attack out. They are locked in place for the full duration, guarding the ambush. This is the cost — you sacrifice that territory’s offensive capability for a powerful defensive surprise.

Fortify

Apply a defensive buff to a territory you own. Attackers need 1.5x troops to conquer the fortified position. The effect lasts 8 turns.

Roach motel: Troops can enter the fortified territory, but they cannot leave or attack out for the full duration. The garrison is locked. Fortify turns a territory into an immovable stronghold — pour troops in and hold the line, but don’t expect to use those forces elsewhere until the effect expires.

Siege

Besiege an enemy territory from an adjacent node you control. The besieged garrison suffers 20% attrition per turn — troops are destroyed each round without any combat rolls.

To initiate a siege, your adjacent force must be greater than the defender’s garrison. The defender is locked — they can only attack the besieger, no one else. The siege breaks when the defender receives reinforcements from another direction or the besieger withdraws.

Discard Overflow

When you inherit cards — from eliminating another player, for example — that push you above the hand limit, you choose which cards to discard down to the limit. Unlike the automatic replacement that happens when you earn a card over the limit, inheritance overflow gives you the choice.