Overview
Cabals: The card game is a hybrid between a traditional trading card game and a turn based strategy game set around the 1930s with a lot of mystic iconography, spirituality, and technological elements over six cabals forming three alliances.
The game is played every turn by playing cards on designated tiles, first only your stronghold, then certain tiles after they are conquered. Other tiles provide the player with resources, these are needed to summon cards and activate abilities, including the hero's ability. The game is over when either stronghold is conquered or one player reaches 60 domination points, these are points generated every turn by certain tiles.
Cabals
Each cabal represents a part of the world and its mysticism.
Cabal name | Location | Element |
---|---|---|
Bearclaw Brotherhood | Russia | Shamanism |
Danann Covenant | Ireland | Sidh |
Vril Society | Germany | Vril Energy |
Order of Zahir | Spain | Alchemy |
Sons of Osiris | Egypt | Thelema |
Dragon Enclave | China | Chinese martial arts |
These cabals form three alliances:
- The Bearclaw Brotherhood and the Danann Covenant together form the Primal.
- The Order of Zahir and the Vril Society together form the Dominion
- The Sons of Osiris and Dragon Enclave together form the Nether.
Heroes
Each cabal, except for the Nether cabals, has two heroes. As well, the Primal and Dominion alliance have a dual loyalty hero; every hero that belongs to a single cabal has a unique ability that can be used only once, these are used much like ability cards.
Name | Cabal | Ability |
---|---|---|
Rasputin | Bearclaw Brotherhood | 2*, once per game: give a unit toughness and +1 stamina, draw 1 card. |
Baba Yaga | Bearclaw Brotherhood | 3*, once per game: move target exhausted unit to an empty and adjacent non-stronghold tile. |
Morgana Le Fay | Danann Covenant | 2*, once per game: target unit gains +1 power, draw 1 card. |
Queen Mab | Danann Covenant | 4*, once per game: conquer target empty non-stronghold tile. |
Boris Kane | Primal | Dual loyalty |
Karl Maria Viligut | Vril Society | 3*, once per game, sacrifice a unit: deal 2 damage to adjacent units. |
Tarnhari | Vril Society | 3*, once per game: target unit gains fast attack. |
Franz Tausend | Order of Zahir | 2*, once per game: Gain the * in opponent's resource pool, draw 1 card. |
Fulcanelli | Order of Zahir | 4*, once per game: return target unit to its owner's hand. |
Miguel Rosenau | Dominion | Dual loyalty |
Alistair Crowley | Sons of Osiris | 4*, once per game: deploy the top unit of your discard pile exhausted into a tile you control, unit gets +1 power. |
Elder Zhang Guo | Dragon Enclave | 5*, once per game: gain 7*, discard 2 cards from the opponent's deck. |
Loyalty
Every card that can be played has a loyalty to it, this is an extra cost above the regular playing cost (top number) of the card; this extra cost can be reduced by your hero's loyalty and by other creatures in play with that loyalty.
power
Every creature has a power (bottom number), this indicates the amount of damage it can deal and how much damage it can sustain before dieing; stamina can be used to increase the amount of damage a creature can take, but won't increase the damage dealt.
Toughness
A creature with toughness has all damage done to it reduced by one, this includes damage from hero abilities, creature abilities, and spells.
Fast/slow attack
An attack is resolved by the three different speeds an attack can have, cards with fast attack strike first, then the card without any special attack speed, and finally the slow attacker will always attack last. If two creatures with the same speed clash, they strike at the same time.