Starfall Book II Game — B2G-0.1

By Lim Boon Chuan. Complete first digital playtest set: 180 base designs and 6 showcase Leader frames. This standalone game does not use Book I's engine, rules or fixed decks. All game values are new playtest designs. All cards are available as digital proxies. Rarity does not limit access or promise power. The six paths are deck themes, not new canonical sects. Teams, including antagonist cards, are gameplay abstractions and do not assert story alliances. This public set contains spoilers for The Unfinished Form. Illustrations are reused authorized story art, sometimes representative of a theme rather than a specific action. Showcase frames use the same illustrations and gameplay, with no physical foil, alternate-art, scarcity or pack-odds claim.

Quick start

Choose two different starter decks and print each complete 41-card list: one Leader and 40 main-deck cards. Both Leaders begin at 30 life. Shuffle your main decks, draw 5, and choose the first player randomly. Each turn: refresh and increase maximum Energy by 1 (maximum 8), draw, play cards, attack with eligible allies, then end and discard down to 7. The first player skips their first normal draw. Keep unspent Energy for one matching Reaction per opposing attack or Technique. Reduce the opposing Leader to 0, or make them fail a required draw, to win. Read the targeting, Guard and response-window rules below before resolving the first fight.

What you need and card anatomy

Two players, one 40-card deck and one Leader per player, life counters, damage/Barrier/Stun markers, and a way to shuffle. Use opaque sleeves with a consistent back if printing. Each face shows its name, Energy cost (a dash for Leaders), thematic path, type, complete ability, power/health or Leader life, rarity, and B2-G ID. Artwork is illustrative; it never adds rules. Flavor on catalogue pages is original prose, not a quotation from the novel. R, SR, UR and SCR are presentation labels, not different rules tiers.

Each player has a face-up Leader zone, a hidden deck, a hidden hand, a face-up ally board (at most 5), and a face-up discard. Equipment stays attached beside its ally, not in another ally slot. There are no trap, reserve, exile or token zones. Discard order has no rules effect and is public; either player may examine it. Hands and deck order are private; do not inspect a deck unless instructed. Deck and hand counts, Energy, markers, attachments and printed card information are public. Owners retain ownership when cards change zones. Only friendly allies receive your equipment. No card transfers control.

Deck construction and setup

Choose any one base Leader or its showcase variant outside the deck. Every Leader has 30 life. Build exactly 40 non-Leader cards from any mixture of all six paths, at most 3 copies of each base ID counting presentation variants together. There is no named-character uniqueness restriction: multiple versions or copies of a person may coexist. A Leader's base card and showcase have identical gameplay. None of the six starter lists requires a showcase, Secret Art or rarity purchase. Every starter is 40 main cards plus its base Leader.

Shuffle the main deck, set maximum/current Energy to 0/0, and set Leader life to 30. Randomly choose the first player. Each draws 5. Each may take one optional full-hand mulligan: set the original five aside face down, draw five replacements, THEN shuffle the original five into the deck. Decide in first-player order; no second mulligan. Setup and mulligan draws do not cause a deckout loss. An incomplete/illegal deck is corrected and setup restarted, rather than played with fewer cards. There are no plays, abilities or reactions during setup. The first player skips only the Draw step of their first turn.

Your turn

1. Refresh: ready all your allies (turn them upright). Remove all Barrier counters you control, including counters on your Leader. Stun does not prevent readying, but still forbids attacking until its expiry. Increase your maximum Energy by 1, up to 8; reset current Energy to that maximum, replacing any unspent Energy.

2. Draw: draw 1, except for the first player's first turn. Draw from the top. Every required draw after setup can cause deckout. Draw instructions on cards are also required draws, one card at a time.

3. Main: play Allies, Techniques, Secret Arts and Equipment in any order you can afford. You may use your Leader skill once in your own Main, paying its printed Energy cost. Allies' Deploy abilities, Equipment and Leader skills open no response window. A Leader skill cannot be used on the opponent's turn or in Battle. Once per Main means once per own turn, even if some effect refers to another Main. There are no additional Main phases.

4. Battle: you may declare attacks one at a time with eligible allies, or make none. Resolve an attack completely before declaring the next. You cannot play Main cards or use a Leader skill here. The defender may use only a matching Reaction in the single window for each attack.

5. End: expire all power bonuses that say until end of turn, regardless of which player created them. Discard chosen cards from your hand until you have at most 7. Then expire Stuns whose specified controller-next-turn End has arrived. The next player starts their turn. There is no response window during End.

Unspent Energy remains available for Reactions in the opponent's turn. It never accumulates at your next Refresh. There is no gaining Energy from discarding, attacking, or a path match.

Playing cards, targets and instructions

For a play or skill, verify timing, all required targets, space, and sufficient Energy first. Choose targets (and any printed choices), then pay the full Energy cost. An illegal action is not declared and costs nothing. All target choices are public. Non-target choices such as an inspect selection or a discard choice occur at their instruction. An Ally enters the board, then chooses any Deploy targets and resolves Deploy. If no Deploy target is legal, skip that targeted instruction; the Ally still enters. Self can be a friendly target after entering unless the text says other.

At 5 allies, playing a sixth is illegal. There is no free sacrifice or arbitrary discard to make room. This set has no sacrifice effect. An Ally may be played even if its Deploy will have no legal target. Techniques and skills require every printed mandatory target at declaration. Up to permits choosing zero, one, or the stated number of different legal targets. Different means distinct cards; otherwise separate instructions may target the same card. A card saying one enemy ally cannot target a Leader. Each affects all members of the specified group present when that instruction resolves and is not targeting; Guard does not protect them. Friendly means controlled by you, enemy means controlled by the opponent. Your leader is never an ally.

Resolve printed sentences in order. An atomic instruction completes, lethal allies and their equipment go to discard, and loss is checked before the next instruction. Damage to each leader or to each ally in one instruction happens simultaneously; if both Leaders lose simultaneously, the game is a draw. A player who loses before a later healing or damage instruction cannot be rescued by it. One lost target skips only its targeted instruction; other unaffected instructions continue. Do not retarget. A returned and replayed card is a new object. Group effects use the current group at that instruction. A chosen target must still match its stated conditions (including cost, power or Guard) when its instruction resolves.

If told to discard 1 with an empty hand, discard nothing and continue. Drawing is different: a required draw from an empty deck immediately loses. Inspect is not draw. Recover is not draw. You cannot use a recovered Reaction during a window already consumed. Costs are paid before responses, with no refund for canceled actions. Techniques, Secret Arts and Reactions go to their owner's discard after resolution or cancellation. A Reaction leaves the hand before its effect, so discard 1 cannot discard that same Reaction. Recover cannot recover the still-resolving card itself. There is no random discard unless printed; this set has none.

Allies, combat and Guard

Allies enter ready but cannot attack on their entry turn unless they have Swift. Each may attack at most once per own turn. Exhaust the attacker (turn sideways) and choose an enemy ally or enemy Leader. Leaders do not attack. An exhausted, Stunned or ineligible ally cannot attack. An ally returned and replayed loses its old damage and markers, but is a new entrant and needs Swift to attack that turn. No effect readies an attacker or grants another attack.

Guard: if the opponent has any Guard ally at declaration, an attack must target one of those Guard allies. Guard affects attacks only, not Techniques, Deploys or skills. Multiple Guards let the attacker choose one. After a response, check attacker and target are still present, and that target is still permitted by Guard. If no longer legal, the attack does nothing. Exhaustion and its used attack remain spent. Stun applied to an already declared attacker does not cancel that attack by itself; it prevents future declarations.

For ally against ally, each simultaneously deals its current power to the other, even if the defender is exhausted, newly entered or Stunned. For ally against Leader, only the ally deals damage; Leaders have no retaliation power. Damage stays marked on allies; health is not reset on Refresh. An ally with marked damage equal to or above its current maximum health immediately goes to its owner's discard. No excess damage spills into the Leader. Power cannot deal negative damage; this set has no negative-power effect.

Worked Guard/Barrier example: your ready 3-power/4-health ally attacks an enemy 2-power/4-health Guard holding Barrier 2. You must target that Guard rather than the Leader. The defender passes. Simultaneous combat deals 3 to the Guard: Barrier absorbs 2, leaving 1 marked damage. Your attacker takes 2 damage. Both survive. The attacker is exhausted and cannot attack again this turn. The Guard's marked damage persists after Barrier expires.

One defender response

Only attacking and playing a Technique or Secret Art open a response window, after targets and costs are fixed. A Secret Art is a Technique for every response, including cost checks. The defending player may play at most ONE matching Reaction from hand and pay its cost, or pass. The active player cannot react to their own action. Reactions have no response windows: no recursive reaction or counter-chain. Neither player can change the original declared targets during this window.

A Reaction must match its printed trigger at declaration. When it names that defender or the attacker, it refers to that specific attacking pair. If the trigger requires a Technique targeting a friendly ally and there are multiple such targets, choose one of those targets for that Reaction's singular reference. Targeting your Leader requires an explicitly chosen Leader target: damage to each leader is a group instruction and does not match a targeting trigger. A Reaction with an independent target chooses it on declaration. Cancel that Technique prevents all its instructions. Cancel that attack prevents combat, but the attacker remains exhausted and the attack counts as used. If a Reaction removes the attacker or defender, the original attack fails its legality check. Resolve the Reaction fully, then the still-legal original action. If the game ended during the Reaction, stop immediately.

Cancel example: at the start of your opponent's Main you have 3 unspent Energy from your last turn. They pay 2 for Scabbard Intervention and select its enemy-ally damage target and friendly-ally Barrier target. You pay 3 for Challenge the Correction (Technique cost 3 or less). The Reaction cancels it: both cards go to their respective discards; your Energy is now 0 and theirs is reduced by 2. No damage or Barrier happens. They cannot counter your Reaction. Alternatively, suppose the ally chosen to receive Barrier has 3 remaining health and no Barrier. You can spend 3 on Deny the Feed, dealing 3 damage to that enemy ally and defeating it. Scabbard Intervention still deals its 2 damage to the other, legal target, but its Barrier instruction fails because that recipient has left play. No target is replaced.

Keywords and action glossary

Guard: attacks must choose an enemy Guard ally while one exists. See combat for legality after responses.

Swift: an ally may attack on its entry turn. It still needs to be ready, unstunned, and not have used its attack. Gaining Swift from Equipment in Main permits an entry-turn attack; it does not grant an extra attack.

Barrier N: add N Barrier counters to the specified ally or Leader. Counters stack without a cap. Damage removes counters one for one before marking ally damage or reducing Leader life. Use as many as possible automatically; leftover damage applies normally. Each entity has its own counters. Barrier never prevents healing or return. All counters on your entities expire at the beginning of your next Refresh, even if added in the opponent's turn. Removal/return also removes counters.

Stun: the target ally cannot declare an attack until the end of its controller's NEXT turn. On your own turn, Stun on an enemy covers their upcoming turn. On an opponent's current turn, their next turn means their following turn, not the current one. Multiple Stuns use the latest expiry; they do not add extra turns. Mark the exact expiry turn. No card in this set removes Stun; leaving play removes it. Stun does not prevent retaliation, Deploy, being healed or being targeted. There are no permanent Stun effects.

Draw N: move the top card to hand N times. Failure of any required draw loses immediately, even if later instructions would recover cards. Hand limits apply only in End.

Discard N: choose N cards from your own hand and put them in your discard; if you have fewer, discard those available. Discard does not mean return or destroy an ally. Discard piles are public. End discards are also chosen.

Inspect N: privately look at the top N cards of your deck (or all remaining if fewer). Choose exactly one of those cards to put into your hand if any exist, and place the rest on the bottom in your chosen order. If none remain, do nothing and do not lose. Inspect is not mandatory draw. Do not shuffle after inspect. Record no private deck information in public markers.

Recover: choose the stated type of card in your own discard and move it to your hand. Cards with type Secret Art count as Techniques for recover as well as reactions. Recover one Ally costing 3 or less checks printed cost. Up to two different Techniques means two distinct physical cards, which may have the same name if copies exist. If a mandatory recover target is absent when declaring a Technique/skill, you cannot declare it; an absent Deploy target merely skips that instruction.

Return: move the target ally to its owner's hand, even if it is damaged. Discard attached Equipment separately. Remove damage, temporary buffs, Barrier and Stun on leaving play. Return is not damage and Barrier cannot stop it. Returned cards count toward the End hand limit.

Damage N: reduce Leader life or mark ally damage, after Barrier. Damage does not reduce printed maximum health. An instruction dealing damage to each leader or each enemy ally applies that group's damage simultaneously, then checks lethal and loss. Heal is never damage prevention for an already lethal ally.

Heal N: remove up to N marked ally damage or restore up to N Leader life. Never exceed a Leader's printed 30 or an ally's printed maximum health plus active Equipment. Heal on an undamaged target does nothing. A dead ally cannot be healed from discard. A previously lost game cannot be reversed.

Temporary power: add the printed bonus until the current turn's End, including a bonus granted by a defending player's Reaction. Multiple bonuses add. They expire even if their controller's next turn has not begun.

Deploy: a timing label, not a separate response event. Resolve the printed ability once when the Ally enters from hand. No Ally deploys from any other zone in this set. No repeated upkeep, attack trigger or hidden ability exists.

Equipment and changing health

Play Equipment only in your Main, pay, then attach to one friendly ally. No Leader can hold Equipment. At most one Equipment per ally. You may replace its current Equipment: discard the old card and then attach the new one in one replacement action, before checking health. Static modifiers and Guard/Swift apply only while attached. There are no Equipment triggers, equip-cost discounts or moves between allies. Barrier is temporary and never printed as an Equipment modifier.

Damage marked on an ally stays when Equipment changes; after attachment or removal recheck lethal. A 2-power/3-health ally with Travel Worn Coat (+2 maximum health, Guard) and 4 marked damage is alive at maximum 5. Replace it with Scarred Scabbard (+1 power): its maximum becomes 3, and the 4 marked damage is lethal. Discard the ally and the new Scabbard. If instead that ally returns to hand, both its damage and Coat are removed, and the Coat is discarded. Heal cannot rescue it between replacement and the lethal check. Work Hammer's -1 maximum health can similarly cause immediate lethal; an ally with maximum health 0 or lower is lethal even with no marked damage.

Worked opening: first two turns

Player A's opening five include Ferry Wristkeeper (1), Red Eave Pupil (2), Open the Closed Hand (1), Turn the Wrist (1), and Repaired Steel (2). B has Bridge Tollkeeper (1), Hesh at Reed Cut (2), Oren with Clean Cloth (2), Brace at the Rail (1), and Set the Spear (1). Both keep. Leaders start at 30 and Energy 0/0.

A turn 1: Refresh raises maximum/current to 1/1; A skips Draw. In Main, A pays 1 for Ferry Wristkeeper, leaving 0. In Battle its Swift allows an entry-turn attack for 2 to B's Leader. B has no Energy and passes; B goes to 28. A ends with 4 cards.

B turn 1: Refresh gives 1/1, then draws 1. B pays 1 for Bridge Tollkeeper, leaving 0. It has Guard but no Swift, so it cannot attack yet. B ends with 5 cards. A's Energy is still 0.

A turn 2: Refresh readies Wristkeeper and gives 2/2; Draw adds one card. A pays 2 for Red Eave Pupil (0 left); its Deploy gives Wristkeeper +1 power this turn. In Battle Wristkeeper must attack Tollkeeper because of Guard. B passes, having 0 Energy. Wristkeeper deals 3 and takes 1 simultaneously. Tollkeeper (1/3) and Wristkeeper (2/1) are both lethal and go to discard. The Pupil cannot attack on its entry turn. Its temporary bonus on the departed Wristkeeper no longer matters.

B turn 2: Refresh gives 2/2; Draw adds one card. B pays 2 for Hesh at Reed Cut, leaving 0; it enters with Guard but cannot yet attack. Both Leaders remain A 30, B 28. Each player spent exactly their available Energy. Alternatively, B could play Tollkeeper only on their first turn and preserve future Energy for a Reaction by spending less on a later Main; no player receives free Reaction Energy.

Ending the game and edge-case FAQ

You win when the opposing Leader reaches 0 life or the opponent fails a required draw after setup. Life below 0 is treated as 0. Check immediately after each atomic instruction and after simultaneous combat. Both losing simultaneously (including a simultaneous damage instruction) is a draw. An empty deck alone is not a loss; failing a required draw is. Setup/mulligan deckout instead restarts a corrected setup. Never resolve later healing after a loss.

Can I attack the Leader through Guard with a Technique? Guard restricts only attacks. An effect explicitly targeting an enemy Leader may choose it; an enemy-ally-only effect cannot.

Can I attack again if a Reaction cancels? No. Exhaustion and the attack are spent. No effect in this set grants another attack or readies an ally midturn.

Can I play a sixth ally and discard one? No. There is no sacrifice action in this set. Return one first in Main if you have an appropriate card and Energy.

What if a target is gone or changed? Skip that targeted instruction, keep the remaining instructions, and never choose a replacement target. Recheck printed target conditions when resolving. Targets of group instructions are determined only when that instruction resolves.

Does healing or Barrier bring an ally back? No. Lethal is checked after each atomic instruction before any later instruction. Barrier absorbs damage, not loss of maximum health or a return effect.

Can a Reaction respond to a skill, Deploy or Equipment? No. Only an attack or Technique/Secret Art opens its one defender window. A Reaction cannot respond to another Reaction. Passing closes that window permanently.

Are rarer cards required or stronger? No. All digital proxies are available; the starter base Leaders are always included. The initial set has no claimed balanced win rates or human-playtest results. High-rarity cards often demand more Energy or narrower situations.

Can I use this with /play or /gameplay? No. Those are preserved Book I experiences. This ruleset is a standalone tabletop/digital-proxy duel, not a new browser combat engine. Follow only B2G-0.1 here. Explicit card text overrides a general rule only to the extent it says so; invent no unprinted abilities.