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Tower- WizWar is a tactical card game where you play wizards battling from tower to tower. It shares some DNA from Magic: The Gathering, but plays very differently. Henceforth for the remainder of this document we will use TWW to mean Tower- WizWar.

Wizards in the TWW battle constantly for a multitude of reasons, but mostly because it is very hard to hurt them. Even when they lose a battle, they simply retreat, rebuild their strength, and wait for the next challenger to appear. Here are the core game ideas you need to learn to play the game:

• Rule of three: Three wound tokens kills/destroys a thing. If your Wizard takes three wound tokens you lose, if a creature takes three wound tokens it dies, if anything takes three wound tokens it expires. Every three uses of mana or activations, increase your Mana Drain one.
• Rule of five: Your hand of available cards seeks to balance at the size of five. At the beginning of your turn, and it's end, you discard excess or draw to refill to a count of five cards in hand. A full draft from your deck is a draw of five cards. When cards form groups (such as attacking and blocking) they may not exceed five cards.

The above rules are the core absolute rules. They never change or will never be adjusted (replaced) by card effects. Physically the game is played in a space containing two types of cards, two or more Wizard Play Maps, a special draft deck and pools of counters that can be put in and out of play. Each player of the game has these before them:

• Deck of Magic: A deck of sixty cards (at the start of play) that is full of: spell cards that are played onto your play map, and celestial events. There are always exactly six celestial event cards in the sixty card deck. These cards trigger a celestial moment when they are drawn and revealed (only when drawn face up).
• Deck of Towers: A two to six card face up stack of tower cards. Each is a tower your wizard can summon onto their play map. A wizard only ever has a single tower at once, and it's played on the tower location of the play map. When a tower play is triggered, a wizard can replace a tower in play with a new one from their deck of towers. Each tower card has a value on it, and all the tower cards in your stack must add up to 10 or less at the start of play.
• Discard: A place where your discarded cards go all face up and in order. This is a public space through which anyone can freely look when it is their turn.
• Aether: A place where your lost cards go face down. These cards are out of play and never return to the game.
• Mana Pool: A place where your stack face down cards, each card one mana in your mana pool. You can discard cards from this pool as needed (at whim, interrupting all play) to create mana: one mana per card discarded.
• Play Map: A physical space to play your spell cards. Each wizard player in a game of TWW has a play map. In order to use a spell you must use it from a spot on the play map. You cast a spell into a spot on the play map, either filling an empty spot or replacing a card at a spot (the card in that spot is discarded) unless rules say otherwise (some cards can overlay a card on the map and not replace it). There are eleven spots on a play map: 1 tower spot, 2 rear adjacent spots, 3 rear shield spots, and 5 forward spots. There is a diagram in the Wizard Play Map section.
• Mana Drain: A track at the bottom of the play map that moves a counter each time something is activated. In this way the track allows you to know your current mana adjustment (rule of three, increase mana cost +1 each three). Each time you activate a spell effect (even if it's cost is 0) move the counter on the track. And yes, that means when you reach +1, even 0 mana cost effects now cost 1 mana to activate.

There are two types of tokens in TWW: Coins, and Harms. In general: tokens are drafted from their source pools, and discarded back to their source pools. Tokens always move onto cards in play.

• [c]oins: Coin tokens come in three base types: [cG]old, [cS]ilver, and [cB]ronze. A rule can specify Coin to mean all types of coins, or a specific type. As in a spell could require expending a Coin or it could specify a Gold. If a rule says to draft a Coin, you draw a card from the draft deck, and take the shown coin. If a rule specifies the draft of a specific coin, just take one of that type from the pool. Coins are activators and triggers in the realm of magic, and magical in nature as much as physical.
• [h]arms: Harm tokens all work to inflict wounds. Harm is just harm in the base rules, but there is no reason more could not exist in expansions. Unless a rule says otherwise, at the end of turn, all harm tokens turn into wounds on their card (one per token), and the Harms are discarded.

The wizard play map in TWW holds 11 card spots, you could use a simple board or a fancy plastic play board, etc. Here is the design:

The details of the different spots are such:

• T / Tower: Rear/Tower - This is a Rear spot that can only hold a tower card or a card that specifically says it can be played into the Tower spot.
• J / Juxtapose: Rear/Juxtapose - This is a Rear spot that can only hold any card. Cards in this location CANNOT be used to block an incoming attack against your tower, and CANNOT be the target of attacks (but can be targeted by other magic).
• S / Shield: Rear/Shield - This is a Rear spot that can only hold any card. Cards in this location CAN be used to block an incoming attack against your tower.
• F / Forward: Forward/ - This is a Forward spot that can only hold any card. Cards in this location CAN make attacks against others, and only can block incoming attacks if they have the keyword Guardian.

You play a spell card into a allowed spot, and there it remains until you play another card into that spot (usually replacing it). During the move phase of your turn, you may move cards into legal spots, based on the rules here.

Cards can be expended, an expended card has no game effects and has an expended token place on it. At the start of each turn, unless otherwise affected by a card rule, you will renew expended cards and remove this token. In this way you normally can only use a card ability that requires expending once a turn. Cards that are expended can still be the target of attacks and other magic.

A wizard loses a game of TWW in a few ways, the winner of the game is the last wizard standing - the one that didn't lose.

• Forfeit: You can choose at any point to forfeit the game and lose. Some cards may say explicitly that in a situation, forfeit the game. Such as: Discard 3 Gold, or forfeit the game.
• Wounds: If you are attacked without a Tower in play, every 7 damage is a Harm token you place on your Wizard themselves. It is Harm your wizard has taken. However, unlike Harm on a card, it does not automatically turn into Wound(s) at the end of turn. Instead, every time a celestial card is revealed from your deck, discard one Harm and earn one Wound. Other spell card effects may give a wizard Harm, or make them discard a Harm and earn Wound(s). By the Rule of Three, once you have taken 3 Wounds your wizard retreats to mend themselves and you lose the game.
• Ascension: There are multiple triggers in the game that call for your wizard to play a Tower onto the Tower spot of your play map. If such a trigger occurs, and you have no Tower to play onto an empty Tower spot: your wizard is called to ascend time and space, leaving and losing the game.

When a wizard loses, they may not trigger any spell effects or use spell abilities etc. However, any spell effect that says it is triggered by “you lose” take effect immediately, and choices for that spell are made by you. Other wizards may also have cards that can trigger from a wizard loss (another wizard) they resolve those after you resolve any of yours in an order of your choosing. In a normal one on one battle, these subtle rules have little effect - but can arise in multiplayer play.

All cards that are not marked with the keyword Ethereal, have a stat line of two numbers: [AA/MM]. AA is attack power, and MM is Might. These cards can make an Attack from any Forward spot in your play map. These cards can Block if they are in any Rear Shield spot in your play map, or from any spot if they have the Guardian keyword. While your wizard in the game has no card, they are corporeal and have the stat line: [00/07]. Any card that is not marked as Ethereal, but has no stat line, is assumed to have the stat line [00/01].

Card attacks can be made only during your attack phase (last phase before end of turn), and a card making an attack is expended by the Attack unless the card says otherwise. For each attack do the following:

1. Declare attackers: You pick one to five cards that can make an attack, and then pick a target. A target is either: 1 Forward card of any wizard, 1 Shield card of any wizard, or the Tower/Wizard opponent themselves.
2. Declare blockers: If the target allows a blocker, the controller of the target can elect to block the attack with an eligible card. A Forward target can only be blocked by another Forward card with the Guardian keyword (or a spell effect that says something allows/does blocking). A Shield card attack can be blocked by any card with the Guardian keyword. A Tower/Wizard attack can be blocked by any Shield card or any card with the Guardian keyword.
3. Calculate attack Damage: Add up all the combined attack power (and modifiers, etc) to get a final attack damage.
4. Resolve attack Damage: Controller of the defending target resolves incoming damage, assigning it to all blocking card(s) first, and then any remaining to themselves (Tower/Wizard). This process is simple: Apply damage to the blocker(s) first, starting with the lowest Might. They can soak damage equal to their Might. Additional damage moves on, and repeat. If a card/target is saturated (damage done equal to their Might) then they earn a Harm token. All cards with assigned damage are expended (a Wizard is godlike and can never be expended, ignore this effect).
5. Counterattack Damage: Repeat the two steps above, but add the attack damage numbers of the blocker(s) and resolve that on the attackers (with the controller of the attackers making those choices).

Note that the text above says 'blocker(s)' with the optional plural, but when defending it says pick a single blocker. This is the case because a wizard may choose cards with Guardian keyword in Shield spots to join a blocker forming a blocking group.

Some card effects can deal damage to a target. These effects cannot be blocked without a special rules saying such is possible. Instead the controller of the target resolves damage as an attack, but with one special caveat: Damage does not pass through, but loops back. If you do 6 damage to a might 3 target, it takes two Harm tokens. As above, it is also expended.

Some card effects have a Might score of 00. This means they take no damage when assigned (but are still expended), and never earn Harm counters. As a consequence of this however, as part of a blocking group, all 00 Might cards are expended automatically - as you assign damage to the lowest might first. If the card has the keyword Ephemeral, when damage is assigned to it instead return it to it's owner's hand.

A Battle is between two wizards, or two equal matched sides of wizards (2×2, 3×3, etc.) Before play each player wizards deck of magic must be shuffled well and always show a spell card on top. You can just cut the deck as needed to comply. A turn order must be decided upon and then each player wizard in sequence will take a special setup turn which is called an entrance. In a starting wizard's play space, all spaces are empty and mana drain is set to a count of zero.

A player wizard making an entrance does the following:

1. Draw a hand: Draw five cards from the top of your deck face down, placed left to right. If they are all spell cards, move the left two into your mana pool (still face down) and discard the other three. Repeat and draw another five cards. When you draw and you have ten cards in your mana pool, discard all cards when you have all spell cards. Once you have a face down set of cards that has one or more non-spell cards shown, move to the next step.
2. Enter the game: If you have a celestial card play one, or if you have an orbital card play one. Keep the other four cards and take that as your starting hand. If you have less than five cards in your mana pool, draw five cards into your mana pool from the top of your deck.
3. Cast: Play this just as the cast phase of a normal turn - playing turn by turn.
4. Stabilize & Wound: Play this just as the stabilize and wound phase of a normal turn - playing turn by turn.

- TODO -

TWW is played in rounds of turns. Each round allows each player wizard to take their turn, in an established order at the start of play. Rounds are symbolic, and no mechanics or rules are attached to them. Turns however are quite rigid in rules and structure.

A player wizard takes there turn in a series of phases, each phase completes and you move onto the next. Here are the seven phases of a turn in TWW:

1. Stabilize: If you have six or more cards in hand: Discard cards from your hand if you have an excess of five, three of these discarded cards can be added to your mana pool. If you have four or less cards in hand: draw a amount from your deck to make your hand five cards.
2. Renew & Reduce: All expended cards in your play space are renewed, in an order of your choosing. After all your expended cards are renewed, reduce your mana drain: If you have a tower in play: reduce mana drain to 0. Otherwise, reduce your mana drain by 3.
3. Draft: You may either: Draft a number of cards from the top of your deck into your mana pool equal to the draft rating of your tower, or draw five cards from the top of your deck then select two to discard and place the other three into your hand or mana pool as you like.
4. Cast: First, if you have one or more orbital cards in play, choose one and follow the text on the card. Second, you may cast spells from your hand into legal spaces in your play map, paying the mana cost for them from your mana pool (discard a mana pool card to generate 1 mana). Finally, If you have ten or more cards in your mana pool, pick two cards in your mana pool to discard.
5. Movement: If you have non-spell cards in front of you, you must pick one and play it. Then, you may move three cards to other valid unoccupied spaces, exchanges are legal too between valid locations. You may move three token stacks from your cards, to other of your cards, except harm tokens. A stack is 1-5 of a given single token type.
6. Attack: You may make one attack, and one more for every full three cards in your mana pool.
7. Stabilize & Wound: If you have six or more cards in hand: Discard cards from your hand if you have an excess of five, three of these discarded cards can be added to your mana pool. If you have four or less cards in hand: draw a amount from your deck to make your hand five cards. Harm tokens on cards in your play space are discarded and become wounds on those cards.

Spell cards in you deck all have a mana cost, sometimes also called their level. You must pay their mana cost to cast the spell into a legal location on your play map. Spell cards in your deck of magic come in a few types, and a spell cards type is a game keyword:

• Creature: Minions, Monsters, and Demigods all have this as a base keyword type. A legal deck must contain 15 or more Creature spell cards at the start of play. All creatures have the ability to make attacks.
• Non-Creature: Rituals, Implements, Locus, and Artifacts are non-creature cards. They do not have the ability to make attacks.
• Minion: These are Creatures used to attack and defend with a cost of 3 mana or less.
• Monster: These are Creatures used to attack and defend with a cost of 4 to 6 mana.
• Demigod: These are Creatures used to attack and defend with a cost of 7 mana or more.
• Ritual: These are powerful magics you play over your tower, while they block your tower from play they grant stunning abilities. A legal deck must contain five Ritual cards at the start of play.
• Implement: These are magic infused tools that create effects. They are physical in general and therefore get the auto-assigned [00/01] combat stat line, which you won't see on their card normally.
• Artifact: An Implement with the Unique keyword from a bygone era of rediscovered magic. Unique means only one can be in play at a time. When you cast an Artifact and another player has it in play, they place theirs into their Mana pool and you put yours into your target location.
• Locus: These are a gathering of magic in a location and are usually Ethereal keyword cards. While they function much like Implements they lack a corporeal form that can be controlled.

Non-spell cards are not cast, but simply played from your hand. They can not be placed in your Mana pool, and are not discarded but when used (or leave play) are sent to the Aether. They have a different back from Spell cards that identify their type when face down.

• Celestial: The celestial card allows your Wizard to summon a celestial event, when the planets properly align (when you get the card and choose to use it). Each time a celestial card is played by a Wizard they must place a Tower from their Tower deck into their Tower play map location, and return the current Tower there (if they have one) to their Tower deck at the bottom. A legal deck must contain six Celestial cards as the start of play. When you play a celestial card, you discard a harm token if you have one (on your wizard) and take a wound counter.
• Orbital: These are powerful items that enhance your Wizards power. In the base game they are all Wizard Hats, and when you draw one you place it into a Rear/Juxtapose spot next to your tower (this is not casting, as the orbital is not a spell card). Orbital card effects are not directed as a normal card, but are triggered at the start of each of your casting phases. A legal deck must contain exactly four Orbital cards at the start of play.

All Spell cards can be unaligned, or aligned to one of the elements: Air, Earth, Fire, or Water and belong to a spellbook (with a distinct card back). All non-spell cards can be unaligned or aligned, but do not come from a spellbook.

Tower cards come from your Deck of Towers, and remain independent always from your spell and non-spell cards. Tower cards are always played onto the Tower location of your play map, and act as a last line of defense for your wizard. While a Tower card is in play, attacks made against your wizard are instead made against your Tower. Like as corporeal cards, Towers have a combat stat line. They take Harm counters, can earn Wounds, and are destroyed on the third Wound taken.

Tower cards also have a value - 2 to 7, which limits how that can be placed in your deck of Towers. You must have 7 to 10 total value of Tower cards in your deck at the start of play.

All Tower cards also have a draft value listed on them from 2 to 5, and at the start of turn if the Tower is in play, you may elect to draft mana cards from the top of your deck equal to that number or less. For each mana drafted this way, increase your mana drain one.

Each game has a shared group of token pools, one each for Gold, Silver, Bronze, Light, and Harm. Tokens are pulled from these pools and returned to them when discarded.

Each game also has a shared deck of draft cards, which are pulled when a random coin is needed, or a random number (1 - 6). There are 18+ cards in this deck, and these six cards repeat (three of each). The deck is larger for 3+ wizard games, adding another 6 duplicate cards per wizard beyond 2. Here are the cards:

{ 1 - Bronze, 2 - Bronze, 3 - Silver, 4 - Silver, 5 - Gold, 6 - Gold }

The draft deck, like the deck of Magic is endless. Once all cards of the draft deck are played, shuffle it's discard to renew the deck.

There are many rules that make a deck of magic valid or not (also called legal to play or illegal). These rules are applied only at the start of play, as the contents may change (as cards are added or sent to the Aether) during play. Here is a list of the rules to make a valid (legal) deck of magic:

1. must contain exactly six celestial cards.
2. must contain exactly four orbital cards.
3. must contain exactly five ritual spell cards.
4. must contain fifteen or more Minion, Monster, or Demigod (Creature) spell cards.
5. must contain exactly sixty cards in total.

As you can see, when you add up the required part of a deck of magic, you have 30 cards specified, and that means you have 30 cards to add of whatever type you like. These must be spell cards only.

All spell cards belong to a specific spellbook. This is shown as a specific card back, and means all plays can see the spellbook of a card in your deck, even if they don't know the particular spell. There are three spellbooks in the base game, each one belonging to the color of wizard (White, Red, and Blue). Here are the names and nature of each:

• Scrolls of the Blind Preacher: The spellbook of the white mage, aligned to Earth, and blessed by the Blinding Sun.
• Records of the Dream Storm: The spellbook of the blue mage, aligned to Water, and blessed by the Silver Moon.
• Journals of the Distant Wildfire The spellbook of the red mage, aligned to Fire, and blessed by the Dark Comet.

There are three core wizard decks in the base game, one for each wizard: White, Red, and Blue. These are sixty card decks that can be played as is, or with cards swapped in and out (as long as you obey the deck validity rules). There are no hard rules of what spellbooks can be mixed and matched, though players will know what spellbooks are in your deck from the back of the cards.

The White wizard deck all comes from the spellbook: Scrolls of the Blind Preacher. These spells are mostly Earth aligned, and are connected to the Sun celestial sign. …

The Blue wizard deck all comes from the spellbook: Records of the Dream Storm. These spells are mostly Water aligned, and are connected to the Moon celestial sign. …

The Red wizard deck all comes from the spellbook: Journals of the Distant Wildfire. These spells are mostly Fire aligned, and are connected to the Comet celestial sign. …

In addition to the core decks, the base game has 3 expansion packs for each element: Air, Earth, Fire, and Water. Each expansion pack is twenty spell cards with an elemental spellbook back. These are all legal spell cards to place into your deck of magic, which restrictions depending on the type of play you are doing. The normal open type of play has no restrictions, but you could also be used a draft style of distributing these cards for a session of battles.

These expansions have 3 Tower cards, 2 orbitals, and 10 spell cards in a given spellbook. - TODO -

Quick summaries follow of the basic mechanics of the game.

When you draft, you draw cards from your deck into your hand or mana pool (as directed by the magic or game rule). Non-spell cards (celestial or orbital) are ignored when drawn and placed down in front of you - these do no count as your hand, but instead are played at the start of your movement phase one at a time.

Draw and draft are the same, but in general Draw specifically means take from your deck into your hand. Follow the same rules as draft, and place non-spell cards face down before you and don't count them towards your draw total.

In multiplayer games, wizards may lose but they still are able to play the game from a weaker stance. These are called wizards in retreat. Here is how their turns play:

1. Stabilize: If you have six or more cards in hand: Discard cards from your hand if you have an excess of five, three of these discarded cards can be added to your mana pool. If you have four or less cards in hand: draw a amount from your deck to make your hand five cards.
2. Reduce: Reduce your mana drain by 4.
3. Draft: Draw five cards from the top of your deck then select two and discard them and place the other three into your hand or mana pool as you like. When non-spell cards are drawn, send them to the Aether and they do not count to your draw total.
4. Cast: You may cast spells from your hand into legal spaces in your allies play map, paying the mana cost for them from your mana pool (discard a mana pool card to generate 1 mana). Finally, If you have ten or more cards in your mana pool, pick two cards in your mana pool to discard. If an ally does not want you to cast a card into their play space, they may pay 3 mana to rebuke you, which cancels your cast (no mana spent, but cast card discarded), ends your cast phase, and you draw three cards from your deck.
5. Stabilize: If you have six or more cards in hand: Discard cards from your hand if you have an excess of five, three of these discarded cards can be added to your mana pool. If you have four or less cards in hand: draw a amount from your deck to make your hand five cards.

If it isn't clear above, a wizard in retreat has no play space. Instead they play cards into their ally's spaces. This means they have no renewal or attack phase. Cards played into their ally's spaces are controlled and used by that ally and not the wizard in retreat.