Wiz War   5th Edition Rules

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Expansion 1 & 2 Rules!!

INTRODUCTION 

Wiz War is a game for magical combat in a stone labyrinth.  Players attempt to bring two of their opponent’s treasures back to their home bases while at the same time guarding their own treasures against theft.  A game usually takes from fifteen minutes to an hour to play, and can be played with two or more players.

WINNING 

There are two ways you can win Wiz War.  One way is to eliminate all the other players in wizardly battle.  The other way is to obtain two “treasure chests” from any of the other players (they need not both be from the same player), then return them, one at a time, to your home bases, and drop them there.

 Alternatively, it is also possible to lose the game by allowing both of the treasures that you protect to be taken to another players’ home bases and left there.  The moment that both of your treasures sit on other players’ home bases, you are out of the game.

EQUIPMENT

 A four section playing board, a deck of 124 cards, one sheet of cardboard tokens, a rule booklet, and one die (numbered from 1-4).  It may be 8-sided or 4-sided, depending on what game edition you have.

 STARTING THE GAME

 Each player chooses onE of the four sectors, face down, at random.  Put these sectors (together in any of the setups shown on the last page, depending on the number of players, and turn all the sectors over simultaneously.  This is now your playing board.

 Each player starts his playing piece in the exact center of the sector he chose.  This center square is his HOME BASE, to which he will try to bring two of his opponents’ treasures.

 In each player’s sector, his two treasure chests are placed on the small circles evident on each sector board.  for the rest of the game, the other players will try to steal these, and he will try to protect them.  He in turn will try to protect them.  He in turn will try to steal theirs.

 Shuffle the cards and deal seven, face down, to each player.  Put the remainder of the deck aside as a drawing stack.  If  “TRAP!” is drawn on the deal, discard it and redraw.

 Take a sheet of paper and write the players’ names and the number “15” below each.  These are your life-points, and you will lose or gain points as the game progresses.  If you get down to “0” points, you are considered dead, and you are out of the game.  There is no upper limit to the number of points you might gain through actions in the game.

 Turns go clockwise, starting with the player rolling highest on the die.

THE BOARD

 Notice the letters on the setup diagram on the last page of the rules.  These boards have open sides; that is, if you leave a board at point “A” on either side, you will reenter at point “A” on the opposite side.  By the same token, if you smash down a wall right next to the “A” exit, then you can enter the opposite board edge at the point relative to where you smashed the wall.

 The apparent double wall at the junction of any two sectors is not double at all; it should be treated as a single wall.

 The AUTO WARP is only used in the three-player game.  It does not count as a space; you go directly from one end to the other.  For all purposes, treat the connected board edges as though they are adjacent.  It serves to connect the three sectors together in such a way as to prevent any unfair advantages for any particular board.  If a sector gets RELOCATED through use of the RELOCATE card, then the AUTO WARP is discarded, and only opposite board edges connect.  ROTATION has no effect on the AUTO WARP.

 If casting a spell, or checking line of sight through the AUTO WARP, treat it as a straight line, and the two connected boards as though they were adjacent.

 Doors are the narrow sections in the walls that look a bit like doors.  They are considered locked at all times, and require special cards from the deck to be opened.  After passage through a door, it automatically relocks itself.

 You can, if you like, cast a spell through an opened door without passing through yourself.

 You can’t follow someone through a door unless they state they are holding it open for you.  There is no way, besides a REMOVE LOCK card to jam a door open.

 MOVEMENT

 You may move up to three spaces per turn.  If you wish, during any turn you may add one NUMBER card to your movement to increase your allowed movement for your turn.  If the NUMBER card was “4”, then you could move up to seven spaces that turn.  The die is not used for movement.

OBJECTS

 Fixed/Movable Objects:  Fixed objects cannot be moved.  These include such things as walls, firewalls, illusion walls, thorn bushes, doors, and solid stone squares.  Movable objects include magic stones, treasure chests, the DAGGER, the LARGE ROCK, the WIZARDBLADE, and other players.  Other players cannot be picked up, of course, but they can be DRAGged with the DRAG spell.  Generally speaking, movable objects do not block line of sight, while fixed objects do.

 Dropping and Retrieving Objects:  Sometimes you will have objects in your card hand that you do not wish to carry at the time, since you are limited to seven cards in your hand and you may wish to get new cards.  In that case, you can drop any or all of them.  To do this, you merely state that you are dropping and object, and put an appropriate cardboard token representing that object on the space that your playing piece occupies.  You can do this any time during your turn.  Anyone else may pick this object up at a later time, if they land on it.  The card designating the object, if there is one, is placed next to the sector where the object was dropped.  Another player picking this object up must take the card for it into his own hand.

 If an object is thrown, it is considered to have landed in the targeted square unless some barrier, such as a THORNBUSH, is in the way.  In that case the object lands immediately before the barrier.

 YOUR TURN ENDS IF YOU PICK UP ANY OBJECT, and you may perform no more actions that turn,  except for drawing cards.  You can’t pick up an object out of turn, even if you TELEPORT onto it.

 Treasures are treated like other objects, but YOU CAN ONLY CARRY ONE AT A TIME!  After all, theses things are pretty heavy.  You can carry any number of other objects along with the treasure, though.  Treasures do not count as a card in your hand.  Treasures may NOT be thrown.

 You can carry your own treasure, and may even go retrieve your treasure after someone has placed it on their own home base, In addition to taking yet another player’s treasure off of someone else’s home base.  If you are carrying a treasure, keep the token with the playing piece and do not remove it from the board.

 Objects cannot be forcibly taken from you unless another player has a DROP OBJECT spell card that allows him to do so, or unless he kills you.  He cannot paralyze you with MEDUSA, then take everything you have.  He must use a card that directly applies to the removal or destruction of a physical object.

THE CARDS

 There are five different kinds of cards in the game.  They are called ATTACK cards, NEUTRAL cards, COUNTER-ACTION cards, NUMBER cards, and MAGIC STONES.

 ATTACK cards say “Attack” in the upper life-hand corner of each card.  ONLY ONE ATTACK CAN BE USED DURING EACH PLAYER TURN.  In the upper right-hand corner, the abbreviation “L.O.S.” might appear.  This means that a spell can only be used if a player has a clear line of sight to the person or object the spell is to be cast upon.  Line of sight is defined as the line going from the center of the attacker’s square to the center of the target’s square.  The center is the dot marked on each space.  In the case of a CREATE WALL spell, the center would be the center of the wall to be created.  If this line of sight is interrupted by any part of a wall, the spell cannot be cast.

 NEUTRAL cards are non-offensive or non-defensive spells.  ANY NUMBER of Neutral spells can be cast during a player’s turn.  It is not impossible for a player to use his entire hand in one turn.

 COUNTERACTION cards are the only cards that can be used OUT OF TURN.  They can be used (but aren’t usually) during a normal turn as a NEUTRAL card, but their primary use is as a defense against attacks.  They are played immediately following an attack by the player who was attacked.  You CANNOT counteract a Neutral card.  You can, however, use an ABSORB or BLUNT against indirect damage caused to you (e.g., by a falling DESTROYed WALL).

 More than one COUNTERACTION card can be used to defend against a single attack, either used sequentially or added together.  It is also possible to COUNTERACT a COUNTERACTION card, so an attack may bounce back and forth a few times before coming to rest.  In case a COUNTERACTION card only stops half of a spell, always round the resulting damage UP to the nearest whole number.  If all damage from a spell is stopped, any secondary effects, such as a lost turn, are also stopped.

 A player is not obligated to play a COUNTERACTION card if he does not wish to.

 COUNTERACTIONS are instantaneous; they only affect the one attack spell they were played against.

 NUMBER cards that have three purposes.  First, they can add to your movement, as mentioned earlier.  Second, they can affect the DURATION of a spell, the NUMBER then representing the number of turns that the spell lasts.  A duration spell starts when cast and ends at the start of one of the caster’s next turns.  Duration-based spells are marked as such on each card.  Third, they can represent the POWER of a spell, so that a LIGHTNING BLAST with a “5” NUMBER card would do five points of a damage to an opponent (plus one turn lost due to stunning, as mentioned on the card).  This damage would then be subtracted from the victim’s point total.

 Only one NUMBER card can be played per action.  So in one turn, a player may use a NUMBER card to enhance his movement, use another to ATTACK with, and use yet another to become INVISIBLE (if he has the card) for a certain number of turns, and so on.

 MAGIC STONES are magical gems that bestow a special power upon the holder.  Stones may be discarded like any other card if a player does not wish to keep them, or they may be dropped.  The cards are permanent, and the power they bestow may e used as often as the opportunity arises.  The name of each magical stone contains the word “STONE” and the description on each card is prefaced by the word “POWER”.

 Cards are used once, then discarded face up onto a discard pile.  There are exceptions!  These include physical objects such as MAGIC STONES, the DAGGER, the LARGE ROCK, the WIZARDBLADE, and the MASTER KEY.  Physical objects are not removed from your hand unless they are dropped or thrown.  Of all the physical objects, MAGIC STONES and the MASTER KEY have one other requirement:  They must be displayed face up in front of you after you have used them.  They are still considered part of the seven-card hand.  If any cards are to be randomly lost or taken from a player’s hand, these cards must be taken back into the hand before the choice is made.

 If you kill an opponent, you get all of his cards, but you must immediately discard enough to bring your hand down to seven cards.

 Some cards involve physical actions, like picking locks, removing locks, jamming locks, and throwing daggers.  These are not spells.

THE TURN

 You can do a lot during your turn.  You may move, attack once, and use as many NEUTRAL and COUNTERACTION cards as you like.  As an example, you play a “3” NUMBER card and say “I’m moving six spaces this turn.”  Then you move two spaces into L.O.S. with another player, cast an attack, move back three spaces, create a wall, shrink yourself, then move back one more space.  The order you use doesn’t matter, and you can break up your movement while performing other actions.  If you pick up an object during your turn, your turn ends the moment you pick it up.

 Losing a turn means you can do NOTHING for that entire turn, except COUNTERACTION.

 For the purpose of lost turns, or spell duration, a “turn” starts when a spell is cast, and ends at the beginning of one of the caster’s turns.

COMBAT

 There is no combat during the first round of turns.  Combat consists of taking a card from your hand and playing it against your opponent during your turn.  If that player has a COUNTERACTION card, he may play it then.  If you want to COUNTERACT his COUNTERACTION, and have the card to do so, you may.  You may attack only once per turn.  Spells automatically hit their target if not COUNTERACTed.  If a spell misses for some reason, it dissipates harmlessly, and does NOT hit some object behind the target!

 Any damage done to either player in the form of damage points is removed from the 15 points on his score sheet.  If you get to “0” points, you are dead.

 Damage points, points, damage, and point-based spells all refer to the same thing: things that take away points from you, an opponent, or object (such as a wall or door).  They have nothing to do with duration-based spells.

 If a person is eliminated from the game by being killed, then the last attacker gets all the dead person’s cards.  If a player is eliminated by having lost both his treasures to opponents’ home bases, his cards are discarded.

 You cannot physically attack through any type of wall, firewall, or bush.  You cannot attack yourself.  You cannot attack on the first round of turns, even if you have the SPEED spell.

 ANY CARD MAY BE PLAYED WITHOUT A NUMBER CARD, but its power is only “1”.  There are no “1” NUMBER cards in the deck.

 When all else fails, you may PUNCH your opponent.  This requires no card, but does constitute your attack for the turn.  A punch does one point of damage, and you must be in the same square as your opponent to do it.  If the object to be hit fills an entire square, you may be in an adjacent square to hit it.  It is possible, though time-consuming, to punch a wall down.  A wall takes 20 points of damage to destroy; a door takes 15.  Any attack against an inanimate object counts as your one attack for the turn.  The only inanimate objects you can attack are the walls, doors, and thornbushes.

 It is possible to walk by an opponent or cast a spell past him without affecting him at all, if you want to.

 Any deal can be made while in L.O.S. with another player, including, but not limited to, trading cards.

 PHYSICAL DAMAGE and MAGICAL DAMAGE both take damage points from a player, but on rare occasions (designated on the cards) they are treated differently.  Physical damage would include things like damage from the LARGE ROCK, the DAGGER, a PUNCH from another player, or a wall that falls on you from a DESTROY WALL spell.  Magical damage would include any damage caused as a direct result of a spell, such as walking though a FIREWALL, getting hit with the WIZARDBLADE, or being hit with a LIGHTNINGBLAST.

CARDS AND ACTIONS THAT CHANGE THE MAP

 If you add a wall, destroy a wall, create a bush or firewall, etc., then you must take an appropriate cardboard token representing this and place it where the item was created.

 You CANNOT create an object on a player’s home base, or on any space already occupied by a player or object (unless it is a wall, which doesn’t actually exist ON a space, but in between them).  You cannot, for example, cast a FIREWALL where an ILLUSION WALL already exists, or two THORNBUSHES in the same square.

 Walls cannot be cast diagonally.  They must be cast on the lines between spaces.

 If a card has no duration mentioned on it, the effect is either permanent (such as CREATE WALL) or instantaneous (such as FIREBALL).

 If someone has cast CREATE WALL or DESTROY WALL on a junction between sectors, and some other moron decides he wants to use ROTATE SECTOR on one of them, then roll the die for a 50-50% chance to see which one of the two sectors, the “alteration” stays with.

GETTING NEW CARDS

 You start with seven cards.  You may draw up to two per turn, but may never have more than seven cards in your hand at one time.  If for some reason you do, you must immediately discard enough cards to bring your hand down to the seven card limit.  Draw new cards only at the end of YOUR turn.

 If you want to discard cards from your hand just for the sake of getting new cards, you may.  This includes cards which represent permanent objects, which give you the option of dropping the object or discarding it.

THE DIE

 This is referred to as a D4 in the game.  It is either 8-sided (number from 1-4 twice) or 4-sided, depending on which game edition you have.  It is NOT used to roll movement.

 Whenever a random direction is called for in the course of the game, pick a number representing the direction you are trying to go, or trying to cast a spell (if you are BLINKed), and then roll for that number.

 If you need to roll a 50-50% chance, just call 1,2 as low and 3,4 as high, determining which roll represents what, beforehand.

DEATH

 A dead player is out of the game and may not win even if two treasures are placed on his home base.  His home base is no longer valid for the purpose of eliminating other players.  His treasures, though, are still valid to use to win the game.  A player who dies while performing an action that would normally win the game is considered to have died first, and is eliminated from the game.

© 1985 Jolly Games