The rules.

Two sides compete for influence across three lanes — Boog, Court, and Limit. Get your influence (INF) to 15 in two lanes at the same time and you win.

Every lane keeps two influence totals, yours and your opponent’s, and they never cancel each other out. Reaching 15 does not claim, close, or lock a lane: your opponent can reach 15 in that same lane and count it toward their own win. Both of your lanes have to read 15 at the same instant, so influence you lose is a win you give back.

Each player opens with seven cards and draws one at the start of each of their turns. If you ever have to draw from an empty deck, you lose.

Your unit on the field. Beings that can enter lanes, move, and engage in the Court of Jol.

There are a few relevant details on a Cogum: its Virtue, its Faith, and its planet.

A Cogum carries three stats — DET (Determination), HRT (Heart), and SPRT (Spirit). See Instigate and Influence for how each one is used.

Virtue and Skill

A Cogum’s Virtue is its kind — Brave, Proud, Wise, or Stoic. It is set by the Cogum’s highest printed stat: highest DET is Brave, highest HRT is Proud, highest SPRT is Wise, and all three equal is Stoic. Both Faiths share the same four Virtues, and a Cogum’s Virtue never changes.

A Skill is an effect printed on a Cogum — always on, never played or spent. A Virtue carries no Skill, and the two are unrelated: knowing a Cogum’s Virtue tells you nothing about what it does. Jovinet Cogum print Skills and pay for them in smaller numbers; Terrisol Cogum print none and carry bigger numbers instead.

Faith

A Cogum’s Faith is the Order it belongs to — Jovinet or Terrisol. It is printed, not derived, and some cards and Skills care which one a body follows.

Your support cards. Techniques, statuses, and auras that affect assets on the field.

Capacities cost nothing, and there is no limit on how many you may play in a turn — only what your hand holds and what the family’s timing allows. The one exception is the Prayer, capped below.

Talent

Playable during your Formation phase. Resolves immediately, or persists on the field until end of turn.

Vow

Playable during your Formation phase. Attaches directly to a Cogum and persists until that Cogum is broken.

Prophecy

Playable during your Formation phase. Placed face-down in the Manifest, flipping face up and resolving any time its trigger is satisfied.

Prayer

Played during an engagement — yours or your opponent’s. The effect is instantaneous. An engagement has two actions, the declaration and the choice of defender, and each one is answered: the player who did not take it may play one Prayer, then the player who did may play one Prayer. That gives every engagement two Prayer steps, and in each step each player may play one Prayer.

Passing is final for that step — once you pass you may not answer a Prayer your opponent then plays, and your next chance is the next step. A Prayer resolves the instant it is played, so the other player always answers a board that already includes it. Both steps happen even when nobody defends.

Draw the top card of your deck.

Each player Readies their Cogum on the field and in their Manifests.

In any order you may:

• —Summon one Cogum per turn from your hand into an open space on your side of the field. It enters Exhausted unless its Skill says otherwise.
• —Move any Ready allies to your Manifest — they become Exhausted. The Manifest holds at most three Cogum.
• —Move any Ready allies from your Manifest to a lane with an open space, on your side of the field. They arrive Ready.
• —Use Talents, attach Vows, and place Prophecies — as many as you like.

In any order you may Instigate or Influence. Each of your Ready Cogum can make one engagement — its own choice of the two — taken one at a time.

Finish an engagement, both Prayer steps included, before declaring the next. When you have no more Ready Cogum that can legally engage, you enter the End phase.

Select any one of your Ready Cogum and Exhaust it. Your opponent chooses a Rival in that lane, and it Exhausts as well. Only a Ready Rival can defend — and while one stands in the lane, one must.

Compare your ally’s DET (Determination) to their Rival’s HRT (Heart).

Each of the two Prayer steps is played out first — one after the declaration, one after the defender is chosen. Once both players are finished, Instigation resolves like this:

• —If the Instigator’s DET is greater than OR equal to the HRT of the Rival defender, the Rival defender “breaks” and goes to the graveyard.
• —If the Rival defender’s HRT is strictly greater than the DET of the Instigating ally, the Rival defender Persists (stays on the field).
• —If your opponent has no Rivals to defend Instigation in that lane, nothing happens.

Instigating never moves influence, in any outcome.

Select any one of your Ready Cogum and Exhaust it. Your opponent chooses a Rival in that lane, and it Exhausts as well. Only a Ready Rival can defend — and while one stands in the lane, one must.

Compare your ally’s SPRT (Spirit) to their Rival’s SPRT.

Each of the two Prayer steps is played out first — one after the declaration, one after the defender is chosen. Once both players are finished, Influencing resolves like this:

• —If your opponent has no Rivals to defend Influence in that lane, gain the full SPRT value of the Influencer as INF (Influence) in that lane.
• —If the Influencing ally’s SPRT is strictly greater than the SPRT of the defending Rival, gain INF equal to the difference between the two in that lane.
• —If the defender’s SPRT matches or beats the Influencer’s, no INF is gained.

INF is added to your total in that lane. Your opponent’s total in the same lane is untouched.

When you have no more Ready Cogum that can legally engage, you enter the End phase.

Resolve any End-phase effects; then priority passes to the opposing player, and they begin from the Draw phase.