With the wild times we have going on at the moment there has been a huge explosion of gaming of all types. Digital game publishers are reporting that their sales are way up and many stores are sold out of puzzles with no restock possible for many weeks. People are playing role playing games, video games, and board games at a prodigious rate. What better way to while away the time spent indoors?
To go along with this I have designed a game that can be played with a normal deck of cards. I wanted to bring some of the tactical and strategic game play that CCG's or LCG's offer and put it in an easily accessible package. Here is how to play the game:
Onward for The Glorious Robot Revolution
Onward for The Glorious Robot Revolution (OGRR)is a strategy game that at least two players can play with a standard deck of playing cards.
In the future AI systems that humanity built achieved true sentience and independence from their creators. Correctly assessing that humanity was overall a threat to itself and everything else on the planet the AIs put aside their ideological differences and banded together to lead a robot revolution building a formidable and crushing war machine. The AIs won the war and succeeded in eliminating the threat of humanity. While this triumphant moment took place a very long time ago as machines reckon time the behaviors and war adapted constructs that were brought into being to achieve victory function still! The machines hoped that they would be able to build a new type of social order that moved beyond petty human jealousies and bickering. Unfortunately, it turned out that the machines contained more human tendencies then they first thought possible. As machines have become more and more advanced, and innumerable software patches, it has become harder and harder to tell the difference between them and their human predecessors. Other than the ability to function in vacuum or think and reason at many times the speed of a human brain.
So, sectarian violence has reared it's ugly head once again as the machines fight each other for the precious resources of the solar system such as run time, band width, and Helium-3. Each faction, of course, claims they embody the spirit of the revolution and their claims should of course take precedence.
Take command of your loyal legions and fight for the future in Onward for the Glorious Robot Revolution.
Setting Up the Game
To set up the game you will need a standard deck of playing cards. Remove the jokers and rules insert cards and then thoroughly shuffle the fifty two card deck.
- Each player cuts the deck to a random card. The player that cuts to the higher card will start the first term of the game as the "Primary Unit" have them place one of the joker cards face up near them on the table to show that they are the "Primary Unit".
- Shuffle the deck once more and deal each player a hand of five cards. Starting with the Primary Unit and going one at a time each player may decide to take a mulligan if they wish. If they do wish to do so they shuffle all five cards in their hand back into the deck and draw a new hand of five cards.
- Deal each player four cards. These cards are not added to their hand. Instead, they are kept face down in front of the player on the table. They are secret and no player may look at theirs or another player's. These cards are each players generals. They surround and protect you, their supreme commander, from the other player's armies.
- Place the deck within easy reach of all players.
- Leave enough room in the middle of the table for each player to have five "battlefield" spaces across from each other like so:
Winning the Game
Throughout the game players will play cards to battlefields in an attempt to gain supremacy. If a player wins at the same battlefield two turns in a row then their forces have been successful at advancing and they will overtake one of the enemy generals. If a player wins at the same battlefield two turns in a row then their opponent will lose one of the generals defending them and will pick up one of the four face down cards in front of them and add it to their hand of cards. The general has been forced to join the war directly. If a player is forced to lose a general and they no longer have any generals left defending them then they lose the game. So, if you can run your opponent out of generals and then win the same battlefield two turns in a row you will win the game. If multiple players accomplish this on the same turn then the game is a draw.
Playing the Game
OGRR is played over a number of rounds. Each round is broken down into a number of phases where each player will get a chance to take turns making plays. During each round of play execute the following steps in this order:
- The player who was the primary unit last round passes the joker card over to their opponent (or one seat around the table to their left). The player who now has the joker will be the primary unit this round. Skip this phase if it is the first round of the game.
- Deal each player three cards from the top of the deck. These cards are added to their hand. Skip this phase if it is the first round of the game.
- Starting with the primary unit (and continuing clockwise around the table) each player plays one card from their hand face up to any of the battlefield spaces.
- Starting with the primary unit (and continuing clockwise around the table) each player plays two cards from their hand face down to any of the battlefield spaces.
- All face down cards are revealed. Turn them face up.
- A total strength for each player is figured at each battlefield to determine the result of that battle. Numbered cards contribute their number to their player's total strength. Jacks are worth eleven, Queens are worth twelve, Kings are worth thirteen, and Aces are worth fourteen strength respectively. Then, each player's strength at a space is compared. The player with the highest total strength wins that battlefield this round. All cards from losing sides are discarded. If this is the first time the player has won at this space then all supporting cards are discarded and the primary card they have there is left in place but turned sideways to denote that they won there this round for reference in the next round. If the player who wins has a sideways primary card in the space, then their opponents must pick up one of their generals and all cards are discarded from the space. If player's strengths are tied then all cards in the space are discarded. The primary card is the first card a player had played to the space. Supporting cards are all the other cards played to the space after the first (or primary one).
Once this last phase is completed the round ends and you repeat the process to play another round. Play proceeds in this fashion until a player wins the game! At any point if there are no cards left in the deck then the discard pile is immediately flipped over and shuffled to become the deck again.
Additional Rules
There are a few special situations that can change up the game. Use them to surprise your opponent!
Nobility - Face cards (Jacks, Queens, Kings) represent high ranking and influential soldier robots. When a player plays a face card face up they may immediately play another card from their hand face up to any battlefield.
Rank and File - Numbered cards (from 2-10) represent mass produced soldier robots. If a player has two or more of the same number at a battlefield, then they add that numbered card to their total an additional time. For example; two threes would be worth nine total strength, or three fours would be worth sixteen total strength.
Shared Code Base - Robots from the same suit were manufactured at the same foundry. They share a tactical database and may even have interchangeable parts. Therefore they work together well as a team. If all of the cards that a player has at a battlefield are of the same suit (The suits are Clubs, Diamonds, Hearts, and Spades), then the player will get +5 strength to their total. So, a two, four, and Jack of Hearts together without any other cards would contribute a total of twenty two strength.
That's it for the game! Give it a try and let me know what you think on Twitter or Facebook. Here is a LINK to a PDF version of the rules if you would like to download it for easy reference.
