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Game Rules
Contents
    1. Object of the Game

    2. Summary of Play

    3. Game Elements

    300. Parts of a Miniature

    301. Parts of the Dreamscape Map

    302. Attack Dice

    303. Activation Requirements

    304. Zones of Play

    4. Four Aspects

    400. Valor V

    401. Madness U

    402. Fear F

    403. Passion P

    5. Lineages

    500. Janus

    501. Lost

    502. Hivelings

    503. Hellbred

    504. Bloodcut

    6. Building Your Warband

    600. Before play, you build your warband.

    7. Starting the Game

    700. The First Turn

    8. Turn Sequence

    800. Initiative Phase

    801. Spawn Phases

    802. Action Phases

    803. Conquest Phase

    9. Abilities

    900. Ability Concepts

    Glossary
    1. Object of the Game Win six turns to control the dreamscape and win the game.

    2. Summary of Play In the Dreamblade™ game, two players battle, each using a warband of 16 miniatures, plus the dreamscape map, several special attack dice, and two regular dice. From turn to turn, players put some of their miniatures into the dreamscape, where they claim territory and battle the other player’s creatures. The winner of each turn is the player whose creatures have claimed the most key territory and destroyed the most enemy creatures. Victory goes to the first player to win six turns.





    3. Game Elements

    300. Parts of a Miniature

    300.1. Cost A miniature’s cost has two parts—spawn cost and aspect cost.

    300.2. Spawn Cost The minimum number of spawn points you have to spend in order to spawn this miniature (move it from your reserves to the dreamscape).

    300.3. Aspect Cost The miniature’s aspect and an indicator of how soon you can play it. Each miniature has one or more aspect symbols after the spawn cost. The symbols indicate which aspect the miniature belongs to. If there is more than one kind of aspect symbol, the miniature belongs to more than one aspect.

    Each aspect symbol also represents one miniature of the indicated aspect. If you spawn this miniature when you have fewer than that many miniatures of the indicated aspect in the dreamscape and/or in your graveyard, then you have to pay one additional spawn point for each creature that you’re short.

    For example, if a creature has a cost of 7VVV, and you have one Valor creature in the dreamscape and a second in your graveyard, then you have to spend 8 spawn points to spawn that creature.

    300.4. Power The number of attack dice that this creature contributes to an attack.

    300.5. Defense The amount of damage that is enough to disrupt this creature. When an opponent disrupts one of your creatures, he or she moves it to an empty cell in the dreamscape at the end of the combat.

    300.6. Life The amount of damage that is enough to destroy this creature. Your destroyed miniatures go to your graveyard. When one of your creatures is destroyed, the opponent who destroyed it scores 1 conquest point, and you get 2 bonus spawn points on your next spawn phase.

    300.7. Name The miniature’s name.

    300.8. Ability Reminder A shorthand description of this miniature’s abilities. Full descriptions are on the bottom of the base. (See section 9, "Abilities")

    300.9. Lineage If a miniature belongs to a lineage, the lineage is listed here. Certain abilities interact with miniatures belonging to specific lineages.

    300.10. Ability Special rules that change the way a miniature works. Many abilities include an activation cost of some kind (see rule 303, "Activation Requirements"). Abilities can also include reminder text, in parentheses and italics.

    300.11. Flavor Text Some miniatures include flavor text, reflecting the nature of the miniature in the game world. Flavor text has no effect on game play.

    300.12. Set Icon The set icon tells you what set a miniature belongs to.

    300.13. Collector Number The collector number lists the miniature’s order in the set, as well as the total number of miniatures the set contains.

    300.14. Rarity Symbol The rarity symbol indicates how easy the miniature is to find. There are three levels of collectability: common (Common), uncommon (Uncommon), and rare (Rare).

    301. Parts of the Dreamscape Map

    301.1. Cell The dreamscape is divided into 25 separate cells, or areas. When a creature moves, it moves from one cell to an adjacent cell. When creatures fight, all the allied creatures in a cell can fight together, dealing damage to any or all of the local enemies.

    301.1a. Stacking Limit A cell can contain up to eight creatures (no more than four creatures for each player) and one location.

    301.2. Portal This is the dream lord’s connection to the dreamscape. You spawn your first creatures here.

    301.3. Spawn Row These are the cells where you spawn your creatures. To spawn a creature outside of your portal in a spawn-row cell, you need to have a miniature somewhere in that cell’s column, and that cell must have contained no allied creatures at the beginning of your spawn phase.

    301.4. Key Cells/Scoring Cells The nine cells in the center of the dreamscape are key cells. Players score conquest points when their creatures claim these cells. The three key cells on the opponent’s side of the dreamscape are scoring cells for you, while the three key cells on your side are scoring cells for your opponent. The three in the middle are scoring cells for both players.

    301.5. Rows A row is a line of cells that goes from left to right.

    301.6. Columns A column is a line of cells that goes from your edge of the dreamscape to the opponent’s edge.

    302. Attack Dice You’ll use attack dice when your creatures attack enemy creatures in a cell. When your creatures in a cell attack, add up their total power scores and roll that many attack dice. Each attack die has the following sides.

    [Rulebook has pictures of dice here.]

    303. Activation Requirements Many of the most decisive abilities are blade abilities, activated during combat. Some other abilities are activated by spending spawn points on them, having the miniature on a scoring cell, or simply by spawning the miniature.

    303.1. Blade Abilities During attacks, you’ll often get “blade” results on the attack dice. The blade faces will come up randomly, but you decide how to use them when you get them. Using these blades effectively, and setting up combats where you can put blades to good use, is one key to winning the game. Blade abilities come in different kinds, as determined by the blade symbols on the miniature.

    303.1a. B “blade” To make this ability work, you need to assign a blade to it. You can assign only one blade to this ability. As with all blade abilities, you must attack with a creature to use its blade ability. You can use a location’s blade abilities provided local allies are attacking.

    303.1b. M “multiblade” For each blade you assign to this ability, it activates once. You can assign any number of blades to this ability.

    303.1c. BB “double blade” To make this ability work, you need to assign two blades to it instead of one. You can’t assign one blade to this ability.

    303.1d. MM “double multiblade” You must assign two blades to make this ability work, and each time you assign two blades, it works once. You can’t assign an odd number of blades to this ability.

    303.2. Other Abilities These types of abilities give you more options.

    303.2a. 1. 2, 3, etc. “one spawn,” “two spawn,” “three spawn,” etc. To make this ability work, you must spend spawn points. You spend spawn points only during your spawn phase. You may activate each such ability only once per spawn phase.

    303.2b. S “score” To make this ability work, the miniature must be on one of your six scoring cells. This ability works even if the scoring cell is contested. This activation cost is sometimes combined with spawn points; for example, when a creature has a spawn ability that you can only activate if the creature is on a scoring cell.

    303.2c. C “comes into play” This ability works when you spawn the miniature.


    304. Zones of Play There are four zones of play where your miniatures can be located during the game.

    304.1. Reserves Your warband (or “army”) is the group of miniatures that you bring to use in the game. All the miniatures in your warband start in your reserves. When you spawn miniatures, you take them from your reserves and put them into the dreamscape.

    304.2. Dreamscape This is the shared arena where the action happens. Once spawned, creatures move across the dreamscape fighting each other and claiming scoring cells. When one of your miniatures is in the dreamscape, you are said to “control” that miniature. If an ability refers to a “creature you control,” then a creature in your reserves or graveyard doesn’t count.

    304.3. Graveyard Destroyed creatures go to your graveyard and stay there until the end of the game.

    304.4. Removed from the Game Some effects remove miniatures from the game altogether.

    4. Four Aspects Dream lords spawn dream creatures from their subconscious emotions, which affects the nature of the creatures. For example, creatures made of Passion tend to be ferocious in combat, while those created out of Valor are more likely to be tough and defensive. There are four aspects that they draw from: Valor, Madness, Fear, and Passion.

    400. Valor V Valor creatures are tough and hard to budge. As a group, Valor creatures excel at getting themselves and their allies to the fight. Some are able to protect other creatures. Valor is the enemy of Fear.

    401. Madness U Like intrusive thoughts or haunting phantoms, Madness creatures are easy to disrupt but hard to eliminate. Unbound by the limits of three-dimensional thinking, some Madness creatures are able to attack enemies at a distance. Madness is the enemy of Passion.

    402. Fear F Fear creatures come in large numbers, overwhelming their enemies. Fear creatures often shut down, weaken, thwart, push, or stymie enemy creatures. Fear is the enemy of Valor.

    403. Passion P Passion creatures are violent and destructive, but they don’t have the same staying power as creatures of other aspects. Dream lords that tap into Passion find a powerful reservoir of primal energy, allowing them to harness more energy to spawn even bigger creatures. Passion is the enemy of Madness.

    5. Lineages A lineage is a group of dream lords, or the creatures spawned by such a group. Creatures of the same lineage often work particularly well together. Here are the first five lineages. For more information, see the World Glossary on page 40.


    500. Janus Psychics working for the Akasha Corporation who draw on Valor and Madness to create two-faced creatures.

    501. Lost Dream lords that are no longer fully human who draw on Madness to create faceless creatures.

    502. Hivelings Mysterious—and perhaps inhuman—dream lords who create insect-like monsters, mostly based on Fear.

    503. Hellbred Self-styled sorcerers who draw on Fear and Passion to create—or possibly summon—demonic creatures.

    504. Bloodcut Self-taught vigilante dream lords who call on the primal power of Passion and Valor to create bestial creatures and beastpeople.

    6. Building Your Warband

    600. Before play, you build your warband.

    600.1. Sixteen Miniature Maximum You may have up to 16 miniatures in your warband.

    600.2. Any Aspect Combination Your miniatures can be of any aspect or combination of aspects. The more aspects you have in your warband, the more miniatures you can choose from when assembling your force, but the more spawn points you’re going to have to pay to satisfy your miniatures’ aspect costs.

    600.3. Three-Copy Limit You can have up to three copies of a given miniature in your warband.

    600.4. Miniature Costs Having miniatures of different costs gives you a better chance use all your spawn points each round.

    600.5. Locations Locations can help your creatures prevail, but most of your miniatures should be creatures.

    600.6. Limited Play One fun way to play the Dreamblade game is with limited warbands. Instead of creating your warband out of all the miniatures you own, each player builds a warband from a limited number of miniatures. Each player opens one Starter Set and one Booster Pack (or three Booster Packs), and builds a warband from the random miniatures inside. The normal rules for building warbands apply. Making the most of what you get is a real challenge, and you’ll have fun fielding unusual warbands that you normally wouldn't put together.


    600.7. Etiquette Each player is allowed to see the opposing player’s warband.

    7. Starting the Game Place the dreamscape map between you and your opponent. Put your warband on the table. It’s best to arrange your miniatures in cost order so that you can more easily choose which miniatures to spawn each turn. You and your opponent can look at each others’ miniatures. The game begins when each player rolls for initiative on the first turn.

    700. The First Turn The first turn of play goes a little differently than later turns.

    700.1. Initiative Reroll 1s and reroll both dice if there’s a tie.

    700.2. Portal Miniatures you play go in your portal. On later turns, you’ll also be able to spawn creatures into certain cells on your spawn row.

    700.3. Action Phases Since your creatures and your opponent’s creatures start on opposite corners of the dreamscape, they won’t be able to fight in the first turn. Each player should use both action phases to shift (move). The best place for your creatures to end up on the first turn is usually the cell one row up and one column over from your portal.

    8. Turn Sequence A turn is divided into several phases.

    800. Initiative Phase Each player rolls the initiative die. The player with the higher result goes first. If the rolls tie, the player who has won more turns goes first. If neither player has won more turns than the other, reroll ties.

    800.1. Skipping Spawn Phases If either player rolls a 1, each player skips his or her spawn phase this turn. On the first turn, reroll an initiative die if it’s a 1.

    801. Spawn Phases The first player spawns miniatures. When the first-player’s phase is over, the second player does the same. Both players skip their spawn phases if either rolled a 1 on the initiative die.

    801.1. Spawn Points Add both player’s initiative rolls together to see how many spawn points each player can spend. This number will be anywhere from 4 to 12.

    801.2. Bonus Spawn Points For each of your miniatures that has been destroyed since your last spawn phase, you get 2 bonus spawn points. If you skip your spawn phase, any bonus spawn points that you have remain until your next spawn phase.

    801.3. Paying Spawn Costs You can spawn any number of miniatures one at a time. If you spawn two, the first can help satisfy the aspect cost of the second.

    801.4. Aspect Costs For each aspect symbol in a miniature’s cost, you must have one miniature of that aspect already in the dreamscape or graveyard. For each miniature you come up short, you must spend one extra spawn point to spawn the miniature.

    801.5. Spawn Row You can spawn creatures into one of your spawn-row cells other than your portal if:

    1. That cell didn’t contain an ally at the start of your spawn phase.
    2. You control a miniature in the same column as the spawn-row cell.

    You can spawn up to four creatures into a cell each spawn phase.


    801.6. Your Portal You can always spawn creatures in your portal, even if you control no miniatures in that column, even if it isn’t empty, and even if there are already four or more of your creatures there. There can still be only one location in the portal.

    801.7. Spawning Locations Unlike creatures, locations can be spawned in any cell where you control a creature. There can only be one location in a cell, so you can’t spawn a location in a cell where there already is one. Locations don’t move, so plan carefully when spawning them.

    801.8. Spawn Abilities Some miniatures have abilities that you can activate during the spawn phase. These abilities start with a number in a circle, like this: “2: Advance.”

    In general, you can activate these abilities at any point during your own spawn phase. Most of these abilities require you to spend spawn points on them. Each spawn ability can be activated only once per spawn phase.

    801.9. Leftover Spawn Points You can’t save spawn points. At the end of each spawn phase, any unspent spawn points are wasted.

    801.10. Modifying Initiative Some abilities alter initiative results. These effects don’t alter spawn points. Use the unmodified results on the two initiative dice.

    802. Action Phases Action phases are the core of the game. After each player has taken his or her spawn phase, the first player takes two action phases, then the second player takes two action phases. During each action phase, you can either shift or strike.

    The option you choose applies to all the creatures you control. You can’t choose shift for some and strike for others. When you shift, your creatures can move but not attack. When you strike, your creatures can attack but not move.

    Finding the right balance between shifting and striking is the key to winning the game. If you shift at the right time, you’ll have a strong position on the dreamscape map. If you strike at the right time, you’ll beat your opponent’s creatures down.

    802.1. Shift When you shift, each of your unengaged creatures may move to an adjacent cell.

    802.1a. Engaged and Unengaged Creatures A creature is engaged if there is at least one enemy creature in the cell with it.

    A creature is unengaged if there are no enemy creatures in the cell with it or if the only enemy miniature in its cell is a location.

    Engaged creatures can’t move when you shift.

    802.1b. No Diagonals Creatures move forwards, back, left, or right, but not diagonally.

    802.1c. Stacking Limit Your creatures can’t enter a cell if you already have four creatures in it.

    802.2. Strike When you strike, your engaged creatures may attack. When your creatures make a regular attack, they don’t select specific defenders ahead of time. Your creatures attack, you roll the attack dice, you add up how much damage they deal, and you divide that damage up among the local enemy creatures. For more information on attacking, see the Attack section on page 25.

    802.2a. One Cell at a Time Conduct combat one cell at a time in any order you choose. You can’t choose the same cell twice, even if creatures that haven’t attacked move into it after the combat.

    802.2b. Creatures Attack Together All your creatures in a cell that attack do so as part of a single combat. You may keep some of your creatures out of an attack if you wish.

    802.2c. Blades If locations or attacking creatures have blade abilities, and you roll one or more blades, you must assign the blades to these miniatures. Blade abilities sometimes affect the local battle and sometimes affect miniatures elsewhere in the game. Activate blade abilities before damage is assigned. You don’t have to assign all your blades at once—you can activate blade abilities one at a time. If a miniature has more than one blade ability, you may activate some and not others, and you may activate them in any order.


    802.2d. Damage Disrupts or Destroys Enemy Creatures Damage your creatures deal is split up however you like among the enemy creatures in the cell. At the end of the combat, damage at least equal to a creature’s defense will disrupt it, and damage at least equal to its life will destroy it.

    Sometimes you’ll want to disrupt a creature even though you’ve dealt enough damage to destroy it. If you deal damage at least equal to both a creature’s defense and its life, you choose whether to disrupt or destroy it.

    802.2e. Stacking Damage If a creature takes damage more than once during a single attack, apply all the damage before checking whether the creature is disrupted or destroyed. For example, if you activate two blade abilities that deal damage, and the first one deals enough damage to an enemy to disrupt that enemy, the enemy isn’t disrupted immediately. You have time to apply damage from the second blade ability as well, perhaps destroying it instead.


    802.2f. Disrupted and Destroyed Creatures During a strike, creatures don’t get disrupted or destroyed until the end of the combat in a cell. When a creature is disrupted, all damage on it clears.

    802.2g. Deathblow If some of the second player’s creatures are destroyed during one of the first player’s action phases, those creatures may attack local enemies just before they are put into the opponent’s graveyard. Creatures that are destroyed in the same attack make their deathblows together. Blades count as misses during a deathblow.

    Creatures destroyed during one of the second-player’s action phases, don’t make deathblows. Neither do creatures destroyed during other phases, including the spawn phase. Disrupted creatures don’t get deathblows.

    You choose how to assign damage from a deathblow among the local enemy creatures. Even creatures that didn’t participate in the original attack can take damage from a deathblow.

    802.2h. Damage Remains Until the End of the Phase Sometimes your creatures have abilities that allow a creature to take damage more than once during a phase. At the end of each combat, creatures that have taken sufficient damage are disrupted or destroyed. Creatures that have taken less damage than their defense or life still have that damage until the phase ends. If they take more damage later in the phase, they could still be disrupted or destroyed.

    If creatures take damage during a phase other than an action phase, the damage remains until the end of the phase.

    802.2i. No Saving Damage Any extra damage is wasted at the end of each phase. You can’t hold over damage from one phase to another.

    802.2j. Moving During Combat Sometimes abilities will result in creatures moving, so that creatures that were engaged at the start of a strike become unengaged, and vice versa. Creatures that have attacked in one cell might also end up in cells where combat hasn’t yet taken place. In these cases, what matters is the state of the cell when you conduct the attack there, not the state of the cell at the start of the phase. For example, if a creature attacks in one cell, then gets moved into a cell where combat hasn’t taken place, that creature will be able to take part in an attack in that cell, too.

    803. Conquest Phase After the second player’s last action phase, both players add up their conquest points to see which player won the turn. The first player to win six turns is the winner of the game.

    803.1. Scoring Cells At the end of the turn, if you have at least one creature in one of your scoring cells and there are no enemy creatures in that cell, you score the conquest points for that cell. Total up the conquest points for all the scoring cells that your creatures claim. Your opponent does the same for his or her creatures.

    Locations can’t claim cells, nor do they contest cells to prevent enemy creatures from claiming them.

    803.2. Destroying Miniatures Each player scores 1 conquest point for each enemy creature that he or she destroyed that turn.

    803.3. Total Scores Whichever player has the most total conquest points wins the turn and advances one space on the victory track. On a tie, neither player wins the turn. The first player to win six turns wins the game.

    9. Abilities This section covers general ability concepts. Refer to the glossary for rules on how specific abilities work and what specific terms mean.

    900. Ability Concepts

    900.1. General Rules When an ability conflicts with the rules or when two abilities conflict with each other, follow these general rules.

    900.1a. Miniatures “trump” rules. If a miniature’s ability directly contradicts the rules of the game, the ability takes precedence.

    900.1b. “Can’t” trumps “can.” If one ability says something can happen and another says it can’t, the “can’t” ability wins.

    900.1c. Do as much as you can. If an ability has you do something you can only partly complete, do what you can. For example, if an ability had you assign damage to all the creatures in a cell and something prevents you from assigning damage to some of them, assign the damage to all of them that you can assign it to.

    900.2. Damage to Creatures When you deal damage to creatures, you must assign that damage if you can. You can’t voluntarily reduce the amount of damage you deal.

    If you deal a creature enough damage to disrupt or destroy it, you must do so. You may not decline to disrupt or destroy the creature. If, however, you deal damage at least equal to both the creature’s defense and its life, it’s your choice whether you disrupt or destroy the creature. For example, you might choose to do this to avoid a deathblow or to prevent the opponent from getting bonus spawn points.

    You may assign more damage to a creature than is necessary to disrupt or destroy it if you want to waste the extra damage.

    900.3. Damage Outside of Combat Sometimes abilities damage creatures outside of combat. For example, Fleshless Reaper has the Ambush ability and makes an attack against each enemy that enters its cell. Generally, you check to see whether a creature has been disrupted or destroyed each time it takes damage. Damage clears at the end of every phase.

    Exception: Damage from simultaneous effects adds up; don’t check for disruption and destruction until all simultaneous effects have resolved. Effects are simultaneous when they trigger from the same game event. For example, if your creature enters a cell where there are two enemy Fleshless Reaper creatures, don’t check for disruption and destruction until both attacks have resolved.


    900.4. Blades and Special Attacks Special attacks, including deathblows, generate damage only. Blades rolled on the attack dice are treated as misses.

    900.5. 0-Power Creatures Creatures with 0 power may participate in an attack just like any other creature. Naturally, such a creature contributes no dice to the attack. Still, you can assign blades that you might roll during the attack to this creature’s blade ability, if any. And there may be other special reasons why you would want a creature to attack even though its power is 0.

    900.6. Timing A player that is doing more than one thing in a phase can generally do them in any order. For example, if a player is assigning one blade each to two different blade abilities, they can be assigned in either order.

    900.7. Simultaneous Effects Sometimes multiple effects are triggered by the same game event. These effects are said to be simultaneous. All simultaneous effects are resolved before any other effects or actions take place.

    900.7a. Order of Simultaneous Effects The effects controlled by the player whose phase it is resolve first. If it’s a shared phase, such as the conquest phase, effects controlled by the first player resolve first. If one player controls more than one simultaneous effect, then that player decides their order.

    900.7b. Simultaneous Damage If simultaneous effects deal damage, resolve all simultaneous effects before checking for disruption and destruction.

    900.7c. More Triggered Effects If simultaneous effects in turn trigger multiple effects, those effects are also simultaneous.

    900.8. Minimum Stats Effects can reduce a creature’s power, defense, life, and even cost. Power and cost can’t be reduced below 0. Defense and life can’t be reduced below 1.
    Damage can’t be reduced below 0.

    Minimums apply after all modifiers. If a new modifier is added, recalculate the result with all modifiers and then apply the minimum. For example, if an attack deals 2 damage but has a –5 penalty, then the attack deals 0 damage. If the attack then gets a +5 bonus to damage, the damage goes back up to 2, not to 5.

    900.9. Targeting Some abilities use the term “target,” such as in the phrase “target creature.” This term means that you choose the miniature, cell, or other thing in question.

    900.10. Negative Blade Abilities Some blade abilities are drawbacks rather than advantages. They take effect when you assign blades to them. Unfortunately, you must assign all the blades that you can. If you have more blade abilities than you have blades, then not all the blade abilities will be activated. The safest time to attack with a creature that has a negative blade ability is when there are other creatures with blade abilities participating in the attack. That way you can assign blades to those creatures first. A creature with a multiblade ability is even better because you can assign it all the blades you like. You can even assign blades to abilities that have no effect, such as to the Scare ability when your opponent has no unengaged creatures. But you may not leave blades unassigned when there are blade abilities that you could activate with them.

    You can’t activate the blade abilities of creatures you don’t control.

    900.11. Blade Abilities with “May” Some blade abilities use “May.” Even if you assign a blade to the ability, you don’t have to use it. You can use these abilities to “dump” blades that you don’t want, such as when an ally has a negative blade ability.

    900.12. Scoring Cells and Abilities Abilities with an activation cost that includes S only activate if they’re on a scoring cell. Remember, only six of the key cells count as scoring cells for you and your creatures. For these abilities, it doesn’t matter whether the cell is contested, just whether it’s a scoring cell.

    900.13. Stacking Limit Many abilities allow you to move creatures. These abilities don’t allow you to put more than four of a player’s creatures into a cell.

    900.14. Effect Modifiers Some abilities have modifiers. For example, the Nullify ability negates local blade abilities. The ability Nullify Valor negates only the blade abilities on local Valor creatures. The ability Nullify Enemies negates only the blade abilities on local enemy creatures.

    900.15. Numbers Many abilities have numbers associated with them, defining the specific effect of that ability. For example, “B: Crit 3” means that you deal an additional 3 damage that combat when you assign it a blade, while “B: Crit 5” means that you deal an additional 5 damage. Numbers are sometimes negative.

    900.16. Ability Duration : If a blade ability affects a creature’s stats, its effect lasts only until the end of combat.

    If a blade ability somehow moves a creature into another cell or a different zone of play, that creature doesn’t get moved back to its original cell at the end of combat.

    If a miniature’s ability grants a stat bonus/penalty to a local or adjacent creature, that bonus/penalty stops as soon as the creature is no longer local or adjacent.

    900.17. Destroying Your Own Miniatures Unless an ability allows you to do so, you can’t destroy your own miniatures. For example, you can’t assign combat damage to your own creatures.

    If one of your creature’s abilities does destroy a miniature you control, then no player scores conquest points for it. But you do get the +2 bonus spawn points on your next spawn phase.

    Sacrificing a miniature doesn’t count as destroying it. If you sacrifice one of your own miniatures, no player scores conquest points for it. You don’t get the +2 bonus spawn points on your next spawn phase.

    Glossary

    1, 2, 3, etc. . . “one spawn,” “two spawn,” “three spawn,” etc. . . : An activation cost. To make this ability work, you must spend the indicated number of spawn points. You spend spawn points only during your spawn phase. You may only activate each such ability once per spawn phase.

    B “blade”: An activation cost. To make this ability work, you need to assign a blade to it. You can assign only one blade to this ability. As with all blade abilities, you must attack with a creature to use its blade ability. You can use a location's blade abilities provided local allies are attacking.
    See also blade ability

    BB “double blade”: An activation cost. To make this ability work, you need to assign two blades to it instead of one. You can’t assign one blade to this ability.

    You also aren’t required to assign “as many blades as you can.” Instead, you’re merely required to assign blades if there are blade abilities that they could activate. For example, if you roll two blades and have one creature with a B ability and another with a BB ability, you’re not required to assign both blades to the BB ability. Once you’ve assigned a blade to the single B ability, there’s nothing you can do with the second blade, so doing nothing with it is legal.

    C “comes into play”: An activation trigger. This ability triggers when the miniature comes into play.

    F “Fear”: A symbol that indicates a miniature’s aspect and its aspect cost.

    M “multiblade”: An activation cost. For each B you assign to this ability, it activates once. You can assign any number of blades to this ability.

    MM “double multiblade”: An activation cost. You must assign two blades to make this work, and each time you assign two blades, it works one time. You can’t assign an odd number of blades to this ability.

    P “Passion”: A symbol that indicates a miniature’s aspect and its aspect cost.

    S “score”: An activation condition. To make this ability work, the miniature must be in one of your six scoring cells.

    U “Madness”: A symbol that indicates a miniature’s aspect and its aspect cost.

    V “Valor”: A symbol that indicates a miniature’s aspect and its aspect cost.

    ability: Special rules for a miniature that are written on its base. Some creatures have no abilities. Some miniatures have several abilities.

    action phase: A part of a turn. Each player takes two action phases each turn. On each of your action phases, you either shift or strike.

    activation requirements: What is needed to make certain abilities work. Activation requirements include:
    B “blade;”
    M “multiblade;”
    BB “double blade;”
    MM “double multiblade;”
    1, 2, 3, etc. “one spawn,” “two spawn,” “three spawn,” etc.;
    S “score;”
    C “comes into play.”

    Some abilities have more than one activation requirement, such as one that you spend spawn points on, but that only works when the creature is on a scoring cell.

    active: An ability is active when it’s working. Some abilities are always active, which means that there are no activation requirements for them. Other abilities have activation requirements and are active only when the requirements have been met.

    adjacent: In a cell next to this one (but not diagonal to it). A cell is not adjacent to itself.

    Advance: An ability name. After activating its ability, a miniature with the Advance ability may move target unengaged ally one cell.

    ally: Another creature controlled by the same player. A creature isn’t its own ally.

    Ambush (X): An ability name. A miniature with an active Ambush ability makes an X-power attack against each enemy creature that enters its cell. If more than one enemy enters the cell at the same time, make an attack against each one.

    Appease: An ability name. After activating the Appease ability, sacrifice a creature.

    aspect: A category of miniatures. The current aspects are Valor, Madness, Fear, and Passion.

    aspect cost: A miniature stat. The number of miniatures from an aspect that you must have in the dreamscape or graveyard in order to spawn the miniature for just its spawn cost. If you have fewer than this number of miniatures of that aspect, then you must pay one additional spawn point for each miniature you are short.

    If more than one aspect is indicated, you must satisfy each aspect cost separately and pay the difference for each aspect cost that you fail to satisfy.

    Assault (X): An ability name. After activating its ability, a creature with the Assault ability makes an X-power attack against target local enemy.

    attack: When you strike, your engaged creatures can attack. When creatures in a cell attack, roll a number of attack dice equal to their total power. The attack results in a certain amount of damage and a certain number of blades. Blades are assigned to locations and attackers with blade abilities, and damage is assigned to local enemies.

    A creature gets an attack (deathblow) if it’s destroyed during an opponent’s action phase and its controller hasn’t taken an action phase yet that turn. For deathblows, blades are treated as misses.

    Sometimes abilities allow creatures to make special attacks at other times. Again, blades count as misses.

    attack die: A special six-sided die with these faces: 1 damage, 2 damage, 3 damage, miss, miss, and blade.

    banish: To take a miniature from the dreamscape and put it in its controller’s reserve.

    blade ability: An ability that you activate by assigning it a B from an attack. By default, most blade abilities can be activated only once per attack.

    You must assign each blade if you can. Even if an attacker’s blade ability is negative, you must activate it if you have an unassigned blade. Some blade abilities are multiblade abilities (see multiblade).

    Some creatures have multiple blade abilities. If you assign fewer blades to a creature than that creature has blade abilities, you may choose which abilities to activate.

    Some blade abilities require more than one blade to activate. You may not assign fewer blades than are necessary to activate an ability.

    If a creature didn’t participate in an attack, you may not assign it blades.

    If your location has a blade ability, you may assign blades to it from regular attacks made by your local creatures, but not special attacks.

    If a blade ability affects a creature’s stats, its effect lasts only until the end of combat.

    If a blade ability somehow moves a creature into another cell or a different zone of play, that creature doesn’t get moved back to its original cell at the end of combat.

    Bloodthirsty: An ability name. If a creature with an active Bloodthirsty ability makes a regular attack and no enemies are destroyed by the attack, sacrifice it.


    Bodyguard: An ability name. A creature with an active Bodyguard ability prevents opponents from assigning damage to other local allies until enough damage has been assigned to disrupt or destroy each local creature with the Bodyguard ability.

    Bolster (+X): An ability name. Allies that are local or adjacent to a miniature with an active Bolster ability have +X defense.

    Bomb (X): An ability name. After activating its ability, you can sacrifice a miniature with the Bomb ability to deal X damage to each local enemy.


    bonus spawn points: When a miniature is destroyed, you get 2 bonus spawn points on your next spawn phase. If you skip a spawn phase because a player rolls a 1 on an initiative die, then the bonus spawn points aren’t used up. They apply to the next spawn phase that you actually play.

    cell: One of the 25 “squares” or areas in the dreamscape.

    Channel (X): An ability name. If you control a miniature with an active Channel ability, your miniatures cost X less to spawn.

    Charge (X): An ability name. Whenever a creature with an active Charge ability enters a cell where there are one or more enemies, it makes an immediate X-power attack against target local enemy.

    claim: To occupy a cell with no enemies in it during the conquest phase. If a creature you control claims a scoring cell, you score the listed number of conquest points.

    column: A line of cells going from one player’s edge of the board to the other player’s edge.

    combat: The attacks and activated blade abilities that occur within a cell when you strike. It’s possible that there could be more than one attack during a combat, such as when a blade ability makes a special attack.

    conquest phase: A part of a turn. During the conquest phase, each player totals up his or her conquest points to determine who has won the turn.

    conquest points: You score conquest points for claiming scoring cells and for destroying enemy miniatures. Each scoring cell is worth a different number of conquest points. You score 1 conquest point for each enemy miniature you destroy each turn. The player that scores the most conquest points in a turn wins that turn. If there’s a tie, no player wins the turn.

    contest: Engaged creatures contest the cells they’re in. A creature can only claim a cell if it isn’t contested. Locations don’t contest cells.

    contested cell: A cell containing creatures controlled by different players.

    control: To have a miniature from your warband in the dreamscape, as in the phrase “creature you control.”

    Copy: An ability name. A miniature with an active Copy ability has the blade abilities of each local creature. If a miniature with an active Copy ability uses a blade ability of an allied creature during a combat, the ally can still also use its blade ability that combat.

    For example, if you control a creature with the Copy ability and a creature with the Crit 5 ability, and roll at least 2 blades during combat, you can use the Crit 5 ability twice that combat.

    Copied blade abilities can’t be copied. Say, for example, you control two creatures with the Copy ability and one creature with the Crit 5 ability, and they are all in the same cell. Then, each creature with the Copy ability has just one copy of the Crit 5 ability—they don’t copy additional copies of the Crit 5 ability off each other.

    cost: A miniature stat. The spawn cost plus the aspect cost. If the miniature has a higher aspect cost than you can satisfy, you have to pay one additional spawn point for each miniature you are short.

    creature: A type of miniature. Creatures have stats printed on the tops of their bases. Unlike locations, they have power, defense, and life stats.

    Crit (X): An ability name. After activating its ability, a miniature with the Crit ability deals +X damage this combat.

    damage: Harm inflicted on a creature. At the end of each combat, check to see whether creatures are disrupted or destroyed. Damage dealt within a single phase adds up. At the end of a phase, damage clears.

    Damage from different phases or turns doesn’t add up. All damage assigned to creatures is cleared at the end of each phase.

    deathblow: During the first player’s action phases, enemy creatures that are destroyed can attack before going to the second player’s graveyard. All the creatures that were destroyed in a single cell make their deathblow attack together. For a deathblow attack, treat blades as misses.

    Deathblows don’t happen during the second player’s action phases or during other phases of the turn.

    Defender: An ability name. When you shift, you can’t move a creature with an active Defender ability into a cell that contains one or more enemy creatures.

    defense: A creature stat. The amount of damage that is enough to disrupt the creature.

    Demolish: An ability name. After activating its ability, a miniature with the Demolish ability destroys target local or adjacent location.

    destroy: To put a miniature from the dreamscape into a graveyard. Usually, a creature is destroyed by taking damage at least equal to its life.

    Detonate: An ability name. If a creature with an active Detonate ability attacks, sacrifice it at the end of the combat (unless it has been destroyed).

    disrupt: When you disrupt a creature, you put it in any empty cell in the dreamscape. Usually, a creature is disrupted when you assign it damage at least equal to its defense. All damage on a creature clears when it is disrupted.

    You can’t put an enemy creature in your own portal.

    If there are no empty cells, a disrupted creature is destroyed.


    Dominate: An ability name. A creature with an active Dominate ability claims scoring cells even when those cells are contested.

    Drain (X): An ability name. While enemies are in the same cell as a miniature with an active Drain ability, they have -X life. A creature’s life after all modifiers can’t be less than 1.

    dreamscape: A zone of play consisting of the 25 cells on the play map.

    dreamscape map: The sheet of paper with the dreamscape printed on it.

    enemy: A creature controlled by an opponent. Also, belonging to an opponent, as in an “enemy location.”

    Energize (X): An ability name. A miniature with an active Energize ability gives you X extra spawn points during your spawn phase.


    engaged: In a cell with one or more enemies. Engaged allies may attack when you strike but can’t move when you shift.

    Enrage (+X): An ability name. Allies that are local or adjacent to a miniature with an active Enrage ability have +X power.

    enter: To move into a cell from another cell in the dreamscape. Creatures don’t “enter” cells when they are spawned. Creatures don’t “enter” cells when they are moved to a cell from a different zone of play.

    Expel: An ability name. After activating its ability, a miniature with the Expel ability may move target engaged enemy into an adjacent cell.

    Fade: An ability name. Whenever a creature with the Fade ability attacks, banish it at the end of that combat (unless it has been destroyed).

    Ferocity: An ability name. After activating its ability, a creature with the Ferocity ability targets a local enemy during combat. If the target enemy is disrupted during that combat, destroy it instead.

    Fight (type) (+X): An ability name. While a creature with an active Fight ability is in the same cell as an enemy of the specified type, it has +X power.

    Flanking (X): An ability name. After activating its ability, a miniature with the Flanking ability deals +X damage that combat if you control more creatures in the combat cell than each opponent.

    Fortunate (X): An ability name. When a creature with an active Fortunate ability attacks, you may reroll up to X dice. Decide how many dice to reroll before rerolling any. This ability applies to special attacks as well as regular attacks.

    Fumble (X): An ability name. After activating its ability, a miniature with the Fumble ability deals -X damage this combat. The total combat damage after all modifiers can’t be less than 0.

    Geomancy (X): An ability name. A miniature with an active Geomancy ability has +X power, +X defense, and +X life for each location you control in its column.

    graveyard: A zone of play. Where you keep miniatures that have been destroyed or sacrificed.

    Hell’s Fury: An ability name. A miniature with an active Hell’s Fury ability grants all local and adjacent Hellbred allies the “B: Crit 2” ability.

    Heroics (X): An ability name. After activating its ability, if you control fewer creatures in this cell than each opponent, a miniature with the Heroics ability deals +X damage this combat.

    Inciter (X): An ability name. Enemies in the same cell as a miniature with an active Inciter ability have +X power.

    initiative: A roll during the initiative phase to see which player goes first. On a tie, the player who has won more turns goes first. If neither player has won more turns, reroll ties. The total of the two initiative dice is the number of spawn points that each player may spend that turn. If either die is a 1, however, both players skip their spawn phase that turn. Abilities that alter initiative rolls don’t alter the number of spawn points each player gets each turn, or whether the spawn phase is skipped.

    initiative phase: A part of a turn. The inititative phase is the first phase of each turn.

    Invigorate (X): An ability name. While allies are local or adjacent to a miniature with an active Invigorate ability, they have +X life.

    key cell: One of the nine central cells in the dreamscape that are scoring cells for one or both players.

    life: A creature stat. The amount of damage that is enough to destroy a creature.

    lineage: A designator that some miniatures have that represents membership within a group. Some abilities interact with miniatures of particular lineages. The first five lineages are Bloodcut, Hellbred, Janus, Hivelings, and Lost.

    local: In the same cell. A miniature is local to itself.

    location: A type of miniature. Locations don’t have stats printed on the tops of their bases. Unlike creatures, they don’t have power, defense, and life stats.

    Locations don’t move or attack. They don’t contest cells.

    If your location has a blade ability, you may assign blades to it from regular attacks made by your local creatures, but not special attacks.

    Unlike a creature, a location can be spawned in any cell where you control a creature. You can’t spawn a location in a cell that already contains a location.

    Loner: An ability name. A creature with the Loner ability can’t attack when other creatures are attacking, not even with a deathblow. Remember, you can keep local allies out of an attack so that the creature with the Loner ability can attack on its own.

    Lure: An ability name. By activating its ability, a miniature with the Lure ability may pull target unengaged enemy one cell closer to itself. You don’t have to move the target enemy in any particular direction as long as it ends up being one cell closer.

    miniature: A creature or a location. You have up to 16 miniatures in your warband. They start the game in your reserves. You spawn them a few at a time into the dreamscape.

    move: To go from one cell to an adjacent cell. Your unengaged creatures may move when you shift. Certain abilities also move miniatures. Miniatures may not move diagonally or out of the dreamscape.

    multiblade ability: A blade ability to which you may assign multiple blades in a single attack. Each B you assign to a multiblade ability activates the ability once.

    nonlocal: Not in the same cell.

    Nullify: An ability name. A miniature with an active Nullify ability negates the blade abilities of local creatures (not locations).

    opponent: The other player. A player that isn’t you.

    Pack: An ability name. After activating its ability, a miniature with an active Pack ability deals +X damage this combat, where X is equal to the number of local and adjacent allies.


    Panic (X): An ability name. While enemies are in the same cell as a miniature with an active Panic ability, they have –X defense. A creature’s defense after all modifiers can’t be less than 1.

    Payback: An ability name. After activating its ability, a miniature with an active Payback ability deals +X damage this combat, where X is the power of target local enemy.

    phase: A part of a turn. The phases, in order, are: initiative, spawn phases, action phases, and conquest.

    portal: The cells in the bottom-right and top-left corners of the dreamscape. Each player has one portal. You may spawn creatures in your portal, even if you have four or more creatures in it.

    As with any other cell, there can be only one location in a portal.

    You may have up to four creatures and one location in an enemy portal.

    power: A creature stat. The number of attack dice that a creature contributes to an attack.

    pull: To move a target miniature closer to a miniature you control. A local creature can’t be pulled because it can’t be moved any closer. You don’t have to move the target in any particular direction as long as it ends up being one cell closer.

    Purge: An ability name. After activating its ability, a miniature with the Purge ability allows you to choose a target opponent. That opponent puts a miniature of your choice from his or her reserves into his or her graveyard.

    push: To move a target miniature farther away from a miniature you control. You don’t have to move the target in any particular direction as long as it ends up being one cell farther away.

    Raise: An ability name. After activating its ability, a miniature with the Raise ability allows you to put a creature from your graveyard into your reserves.

    Regenerate: An ability name. If a creature with an active Regenerate ability would be destroyed, banish it instead. It doesn’t get to make a deathblow. Your opponent doesn’t score a conquest point for the “regenerated” creature during the next conquest phase, and you don’t get any bonus spawn points for it during your next spawn phase.

    Reincarnate: An ability name. When a creature with an active Reincarnate ability is destroyed, put a different creature from your graveyard into your reserves. If your graveyard is empty, this ability does nothing.

    Reinforce: An ability name. A miniature with the Reinforce ability may be spawned in any cell that contains an ally. The reinforce ability doesn’t allow you to break a cell’s stacking limit.

    Relentless: An ability name. Whenever a creature with an active Relentless ability attacks, enemy creatures damaged by the attack can’t be disrupted.

    removed from the game: A zone of play. Where you keep miniatures that have been removed from the game.

    reroll: Some abilities let you reroll attack dice. When you reroll attack dice, you choose which dice to roll again, and you reroll them all at once. You take the new results even if they’re the same or worse than before.

    reserves: A zone of play. The miniatures in your warband that you haven’t spawned yet (or that you have spawned but that have returned to your reserves).

    Respawn X: An ability name. If a miniature with the Respawn ability is in your graveyard, you may spawn it for the specified cost as if it were in your reserves.

    row: A line of cells going from the left edge of the dreamscape to the right.

    sacrifice: Move one of your creatures from the dreamscape to your graveyard. Your opponent doesn’t score conquest points for the sacrificed creature and you don’t get bonus spawn points for it during your next spawn phase. Sacrificing isn’t destroying.

    Scare: An ability name. After activating its ability, a miniature with the Scare ability may push target unengaged enemy one cell away. You don’t have to move the target enemy in any particular direction as long as it ends up being one cell farther away.

    scoring cell: One of the six key cells that are worth points if one of your creatures claims it during the conquest phase. Three key cells are scoring cells for one player. Three other key cells are scoring cells for the other player. The three key cells in the center row are scoring cells for both players.

    self: An ability modifier. An ability with this modifier changes the ability to apply only to the miniature itself.

    shift: One of two actions you can take during an action phase. When you shift, each unengaged creature you control may move to an adjacent cell.

    Skirmish: An ability name. After activating its ability, a miniature with the Skirmish ability may move target engaged ally to an adjacent cell.

    spawn: To take a miniature from your reserves and put it in the dreamscape. To spawn a miniature, you must pay its spawn cost in spawn points, plus additional points if you don’t satisfy its aspect cost.

    spawn ability: An ability that you may activate during your spawn phase by spending spawn points. You may activate each spawn ability only once per turn

    spawn cost: A miniature stat. The number of spawn points you have to spend to spawn this miniature. The other part of a miniature’s cost is the aspect cost.

    spawn phase: A part of a turn. Each player has one spawn phase each turn. During each player’s spawn phase, that player can spawn miniatures and activate spawn abilities.

    spawn points: Points used to spawn miniatures and activate spawn abilities during a player’s spawn phase. The number of spawn points each player may spend equals the total of the two initiative dice rolls. In addition, you get 2 bonus spawn points during your spawn phase for each miniature of yours that has been destroyed since your last spawn phase.

    spawn row: The bottom row of cells on your side of the dreamscape. You spawn creatures in your spawn row.

    special attack: Any attack other than a regular attack made while striking.

    stacking limit: Each cell can have up to eight creatures in it, and each player can have up to four creatures in a cell. In addition, each cell may contain only a single location.

    Portals are the exception. You may break the stacking limit when spawning miniatures in your portal. A portal can still have only one location in it.

    Stalwart: An ability name. After activating its ability, a miniature with the Stalwart ability deals +X damage this combat, where X is the number of local enemies.

    strike: One of two actions you can take during an action phase. When you strike, every engaged creature you control may attack.

    Strikeback (X): An ability name. During an opponent’s action phase, if local enemies attack and don’t disrupt or destroy any creatures, a creature with an active Strikeback ability makes an X-power attack against target local enemy.


    Swap: An ability name. After activating its ability, a miniature with the Swap ability may exchange positions with a nonlocal ally. Put the creature with the Swap ability into the cell containing the nonlocal ally and vice versa. Remember, a creature that enters a cell after the attack dice have been rolled can’t use its blade abilities that combat because it didn’t attack.

    target: Specifically selected, as in “target creature.”

    Teleport: An ability name. After activating its ability, a creature with the Teleport ability can move a creature into any nonportal cell. The Teleport ability doesn’t allow you to break a cell’s stacking limit.

    Thanatomancy: An ability name. A creature with an active Thanatomancy ability has power equal to the number of creatures in your graveyard.

    triggered ability: An ability that happens “automatically” in response to some event in the game. Once a triggered ability occurs, players can’t take voluntary actions (moving creatures, starting combat, spawning creatures, etc.) until the triggered abilities are resolved.

    For example, if you spawn a creature with the “C: Appease” ability, the Appease ability is triggered and you have to sacrifice a creature. You can’t quickly spawn a second creature in order to sacrifice it and resolve the Appease ability. You have to resolve the Appease ability by sacrificing a creature you already control before spawning another creature (or activating another creature’s spawn ability).

    turn: A game is divided into turns. During each turn, the players roll initiative (during the initiative phase), each spawns miniatures (during his or her spawn phase), each takes two action phases, and finally both players score conquest points (during the conquest phase) to see who won the turn.

    unengaged: In a cell with no local enemies. Unengaged creatures can move when you shift but can’t attack when you strike.

    Unique [NAME]: An ability name. You can’t spawn a miniature with the Unique ability if you already control a miniature with the same Unique ability in the dreamscape. You can still spawn such a miniature if an opponent has a miniature with the same ability. You can control more than one miniature with the Unique ability if the Unique abilities are different from each other, such as Unique Ekkyon and Unique Glorious. If you somehow control more than one miniature with the same Unique ability, sacrifice all but one of them.

    Vengeance (X): An ability name. A miniature with the Vengeance ability can’t be spawned unless an opponent has won X or more turns.

    Vessel (X): An ability name. When a miniature you control with an active Vessel ability is destroyed, you get X bonus spawn points for it during your next spawn phase instead of 2.


    Wail: An ability name. After activating a miniature’s Wail ability, roll two initiative dice and add their totals together. Then banish each creature in the dreamscape with exactly that spawn cost.

    warband: Your warband consists of up to 16 miniatures. Your warband starts in your reserves, and you spawn miniatures a few at a time until you’ve spawned them all or the game ends, whichever comes first.

    Warpstrike X: An ability name. After activating its ability, a miniature with the Warpstrike ability makes an X-power attack against target nonlocal enemy.

    Weaken (X): An ability name. While enemies are in the same cell as a miniature with an active Weaken ability, they have -X power. A creature’s power after all modifiers can’t be less than 0.

    X: A variable amount. If the ability doesn’t define what X equals, you can choose it.

    zone of play: Each miniature in your warband is in one of four zones of play: reserves, dreamscape, graveyard, or removed from the game.
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