The Official VIKTORY Blog

The early playtesting version of the Battle Cards can be downloaded at:

www.viktorygame.com/viktoryiicards.zip

This addition to the game can be played with dice, so that only the special effect portion of the card is used, or may completely replace dice in combat.

Cards are either Attack, Counter, or Attack/Counter cards - 33% are Attack, 16% are Attack/Counter, and 50% are Counter.

Each card contains important information, such as the # of hits, # of misses, and text. The text describes an action the player can take during the battle.

Each card also has a terrain pictured on it.  If the battle is being fought in a hex whose terrain matches the terrain on the card, then all hits on the card become selective hits.

Turn Sequence:
Move/Attack; Build; Reinforcements of Units; Discard; Draw

Battle Sequence:
1. Play Attack card and begin moving units into enemy occupied hex.

You have to play an Attack card to move your units into a hex containing enemy units.

2. If Overwatch is triggered, resolve Overwatch, remove casualties.

Artillery can wait to do Overwatch until all attacking units have been declared, are positioned along the attacking hex sides and are moving in - before replenishment cards are drawn

3. If both sides have units surviving Overwatch & Bombard Attacks, then each draws replenishment cards.

The number of replenishment cards drawn is equal to 1 fewer than the number of dice the player would normally get in the battle.  If an attacker would normally get three dice in a battle, then he would draw two cards as replenishment before the attack commences.

4. Conduct combat using cards.  The attacker has already played an attack card.  All hits shown on the attack card are “live” against a defender, assuming that all the hits are qualified.  An attacker can qualify as many hits as he would normally have dice.  So if an attacker would normally get three dice to make an attack, then he can qualify up to three hits on the card.

The defender now gets to play a card.  Surprise Counter, Flank Counter, and Frontal Counter cards respond to Regular Attack cards; only Surprise Counter cards respond to Surprise Attack cards.  All misses listed on the Counter card are immediately applied and cancel out that many hits.  The defender then immediately takes as casualties any unblocked hits and now the defender’s card’s hits are live against the attacker.

The attacker now gets to play a card.  If the defender played a Flank Counter, then the attacker may only respond with a Flank Counter or Surprise Counter.  If the defender played a Frontal Counter, then the attacker may only respond with a Frontal Counter or Surprise Counter.  If the defender played a Surprise Counter, then the attacker may only respond with a Surprise Counter.  Similarly the misses are applied, and hits are now live back at the defender.

The defender now gets to play a card.  If the attacker played a Flank Counter, then the defender may only respond with a Flank Counter or Surprise Counter.  If the attacker played a Frontal Counter, then the defender may only respond with a Frontal Counter or Surprise Counter.  If the attacker played a Surprise Counter, then the defender may only respond with a Surprise Counter.  Similarly the misses are applied, and hits are now live back at the attacker.

At some point, a player will either be unable or unwilling to play another card.  That ends the card battle round.  However, if playing with the Battle Cards, then you can attack the same hex as many times as you want.  In general, once units make an attack, they can only do additional attacks in the same hex (exception: cavalry, certain cards’ special events).  These followup additional attacks on the same hex to not cost any additional movement.  The units reattacking must be via the same source hex and basically just stay on the hex side until they choose to either renew the attack or stand their ground.  The source hex can be a water hex containing a friendly frigate and the units may retreat back onto the frigate.

However, players do not get a second round of card replenishment for followup attacks on same hex, although you do still have to play another Attack card to make a second wave attack and may bring additional units, although any units that were in the first wave may ONLY reattack the same hex and can’t go attack somewhere else (exception: cavalry, certain cards’ special events). Note the card text on the followup attacks is still applicable, but doesn’t carry over. If you play Secrecy on first wave, you don’t get that benefit on the second wave.

Cards that are noted “Special Event” may be played either for their Special Event, ie the card text, or as a normal Attack/Counter card.  If you play a card just for its Special Event, the hits/misses on the card are meaningless

If you play a card that partially counteracts a previously played card, the new card’s effects take place, ie if Mud has been played on a hex, then you could counter by playing an Ignore Terrain card.

If a player plays an Attack/Counter card as an Attack card, any misses noted are meaningless.

If the defender plays a card that hits all remaining attacking units, the only way an attacker gets the right to play a card is if they have a surviving unit (qualifies if you have a card with enough shields to first block the hit(s) upon them and then respond).

If artillery gets drawn into battle during a card battle round, they can’t make a Pre-Battle Attack along the way. After that card battle round ends, they could conduct a Pre-Battle Attack in the process of launching a 2nd attack wave. Similarly a defending artillery that gets drawn into battle during a card battle round doesn’t get to do Overwatch immediately, but may against a second attack wave.

When needing to make a special defense roll, Overwatch, Bombard Attack, Pre-Battle Fire, etc, the player making the attack flips over from the top of the deck as many cards as he normally would get dice.  All Attack & Attack/Counter cards that show up are “hits” for special defense rolls, overwatch, bombards, pre-battle fire. The # of hits on the card doesn’t matter, just that it IS an Attack or Attack/Counter card. If it IS an Attack or Attack/Counter card, then the opponent loses one unit.  If it is not, then the opponent does not lose anything.  If the terrain matches, it is a selective hit.

After card battle round, attacking units must pull back to source hex and must play another attack card to renew the battle with another card battle round. 

Source hex is not the origination hex, but rather the hex immediately adjacent to the attacked battle hex from which the attacking unit entered.

Replenishment cards are only drawn if the defender has units surviving for a battle. An Attacker would not get them for taking an empty town whose defenders had died from Pre-Battle Fire.

A player that takes a town/city gains a card, a player losing a town/city must lose a card.

Can only “land” as many hits as “dice” you qualify for as either attacker or defender. If an infantry horde attacks on 1 hexside, then only one hit on any cards the attacker plays actually counts, and the defender only has to block one hit with a “miss” to be protected from that card play, even if there are other hits on the card.

Attacker always must have a “miss” or surviving unit to play another card. Defender always gets to respond, ie play same # of cards as attacker. Example: Defender can be losing 1 of 2 infantry and play a 2 hit Counter card, where both hits are “live” because the defender always gets to match play. If the Attacker was losing 1 of 2 attacking infantry, only 1 hit would count on a 2 hit Counter card played by the Attacker, because the surviving infantry could inflict a maximum of 1 hit.

At the end of every player’s turn, every player must discard down to their max hand size, which is the lesser of 10 cards, or the number of town/cities controlled by the player. Both towns and cities each add 1 to a player’s max hand size.

Once a Reversal of Fortune card cancels another card, that other card is canceled. A second Reversal of Fortune card cannot cancel the Reversal of Fortune card’s cancellation of the original card. All the second Reversal of Fortune card would do is cancel the hits on the first Reversal of Fortune card. The effects of cancellation happen immediately and are irreversible.

Whenever a player builds a town, he gains another card to his hand.

At the end of a player’s turn, he may draw additional new cards up to his max hand size, with the restriction that he may only draw as many new cards as he has cities.  Cities are the draw limit at the end of turn, in case a player wants to discard and draw new cards or in case a player is just below his max hand size and is just drawing more cards.

You get to keep the cards you don’t use, but must discard at the end of any player’s turn to get back down to max hand size.

Don’t have to play an attack card to move into an empty town/city, because you wouldn’t normally roll dice as the attacker.  The defender would just flip over the top card(s) to see if they got any hits (which are represented by Attack & Attack/Counter cards).  However, you may WANT to play an Attack card to move into an empty town/city to take advantage of the card text, which might allow additional movement.  In that case, the hits/misses on the card would not matter, only the card text.

Special Events allow you to interfere with other players, but you may not intervene and cancel out someone’s hits for them.  You can’t cancel out the card text on battle cards.

Reversal of Fortune cards need to be revised. They a.) block all hits and b.) can cancel Special Events.  They do not cancel battle card text.

Even though you don’t have to play an attack card to move into an empty town/city, you can if you want in order to take advantage of the card text, eg +1MP. The hits/misses on the card would of course not matter, only the card text.

Note: When reviewing the Word .doc files that contain the cards, the cards that have partially deleted name information along the side are to be ignored.  Only playtest using the cards that have completed information.