How to Play

Goal of the Game

Lead your Heroes and Survivors to claim 2 Locations before your opponent. You’ll play Survivors and Items by discarding cards, use Heroes to draw cards and play Events, attack enemy Characters, and send Characters to Scavenge Locations.

Setup

1. Shuffle your 50-card deck; place your 3 Heroes outside your play area.
2. Draw 5 cards; you may recycle any number and redraw the same amount.
3. Shuffle the 16-card Location deck; reveal 3 Locations face-up.
4. Randomly determine the first player.

Turn Structure

1) Refresh Phase — step by step

1. Transfer Scavenge: Move all scavenge tokens from your Characters to the Locations they’re at.
2. Return Characters: Move all of your Characters back to your play area (from Warzones and Locations).
3. Claim Locations: For each Location where your tokens meet or exceed its requirement, win it now; gain its reward immediately, put it by your play area, and reveal a new Location to keep 3 in play.
4. Ready Cards: Un-exhaust all of your cards.
5. Hero Recovery: If a Hero is face-down, flip it face-up and exhaust it.
6. Deploy a Hero: If you still have Heroes outside play, you may put one into your Hero area. On the first player’s first turn, skip this step.
7. Draw Cards: Draw a number of cards equal to your face-up Heroes.

2) Action Phase — do any actions, any number of times

• Draw: Exhaust a Hero to draw 1 card.
• Play an Event: Exhaust a Hero to play an Event from your hand.
• Play a Survivor: Discard cards equal to its cost; it enters play exhausted.
• Play an Item: Discard cards equal to its cost; attach to a valid Character.
• Attack: Exhaust one of your Characters to fight an enemy Character. You can always attack Characters in Warzones; you must clear a Warzone before attacking Characters at its guarded Location.
• Scavenge: If a Location is unguarded (its Warzone is empty), exhaust a Character there to place scavenge tokens equal to its Scavenge value on that Character.

3) End Phase

Resolve any effects that say “during your End Phase.”

Combat & Damage

• Persistent damage: Damage stays on Characters. If a Survivor’s damage ≥ Health, recycle it. If a Hero would be defeated, flip it face-down; it returns during your next Refresh (Hero Recovery).
• Targeting: Characters at Warzones are always attackable. Characters at a Location are protected while that Location’s Warzone has enemy defenders.

Tips for Your First Games

• Develop a Hero each Refresh: Bring a new Hero into play early to increase your draw per turn.
• Scavenge early, guard smart: Uncontested Scavenge speeds up Location wins. Use Survivors to hold Warzones when you need to protect a Location.
• Cards are currency: Survivor and Item costs are paid by discarding cards; use Hero draws and Events to keep your engine going.
• Watch the Refresh window: Location wins and Hero recovery happen only during Refresh—plan your Action Phase around that timing.