Forge War Game Overview The wild country lands are growing dangerous. The king has called upon all able-bodied men to fight back the ever-deepening darkness, and you, as a skilled blacksmith, are tasked with forging weapons to outfit adventurers, who will fight epic monsters of the wilderness to earn you riches, prestige and continued favor with the king. Players will spend turns gathering metals and precious gems from the mines, which they will then use in conjunction with designs purchased at the market to forge powerful weapons. These weapons will be wielded by a player s personal pool of adventurers to complete quests, which earn prestige points, as well as more money and resources which can be invested back into the player s burgeoning blacksmith business. The game consists of 3 stages with 6 turns in a stage and 3 phases in a turn (mine, market and quest). Components 1 game board 120 mine hex tiles: 36 copper (orange) tiles 39 iron (black) tiles 30 mithril (light blue) tiles 6 emerald (green) tiles 5 ruby (red) tiles 4 diamond (white) tiles 210 resource cubes: 50 copper cubes 50 iron cubes 50 mithril cubes 20 emerald cubes 20 ruby cubes 20 diamond cubes 20 quest tracker tokens 108 market cards, 36 for each stage 76 quest cards: 20 green stage 1 quests (including 2 removed for the simple game) 12 gold stage 1 quests (included for the simple game) 20 purple stage 2 quests 12 red stage 3 quests 12 gold stage 3 quests
8 starting player cards: 4 Copper Sword plans 4 Copper Dagger plans 4 player mats 48 adventurer tiles 72 adventurer tokens to denote level 48 champion title tokens 12 S slashing tokens 12 P piercing tokens 12 C crushing tokens 20 +1 attack tokens 13 bonus tiles (3 stage 1 tiles, 5 stage 2 tiles, 5 stage 3 tiles) 15 100 prestige tokens 30 1 gold tokens 12 5 gold tokens 30 quest tokens 3 wooden meeples in each player color 4 wooden disk markers in each color 20 multi-colored worker markers Setup Randomly determine a player order. Players should then collect the following in front of them: 1 of each of the 2 starting player cards: Copper Dagger and Copper Sword 5 adventurer tiles with markers - 4 level 1 tokens and 1 level 2 token A set of 12 champion title tokens 3 overseer tokens (meeples) of their color 2 disk tokens of their color 5 quest tokens 5 quest tracker tokens 7 gold in tokens for the starting player and each subsequent player receives one more gold than the preceding player Players should also place 1 disk token of their color on the 0 spot of the scoring track around the board, and 1 disk token of their color in the player order spot corresponding to their place in that order. A resource cube can also be placed on stage 1, round 1 of the turn track. Separate and shuffle the bonus tiles by stage. Randomly place 1 stage 1 tile on top of the last 3 rounds of stage 1, place 2 stage 2 tiles covering the first 3 and last 3 rounds of stage 2 and do the same for stage 3.
Shuffle the stacks of quest cards separated by color (green, purple, red and gold), then merge them into a single stack with the green stage 1 quests on top, then purple, red and gold, and place this quest deck on the board in the designated spot. Remove market cards from the market deck based on the number of players. A number in the lower lefthand corner of each market card designates the number of players a game must have for the card to be in use. (Play with all cards for 4 players, remove (4) market cards with 3 players and remove (3+) and (4) market cards with 2 players.) Separate the remaining market cards by stage number and shuffle each stack. Place these three market decks in the designated spots on the board with the numeral corresponding to the numeral of the deck. Draw 11 stage 1 quest cards off the top of the deck, placing the top 5 in the 1Q card spots, the next 3 in the 2Q card spots and the last 3 in the 3Q card spots. Collect a number of copper, iron and emerald hex tiles, shuffle them and place them randomly on the mine hex grid covering an area designated by the number of players. For a 2 (3, 4) player game, there should be a total of 21 (28, 36) copper, 12 (15, 19) iron and 4 (5, 6) emerald tiles on the board. Going in player order, players take turns placing their overseers on any open hex of the mine one at a time until all 3 overseers for each player are placed. For every overseer placement, the player can take a resource of the same type as the hex on which the overseer was placed. Start of turn Replenish market cards: Draw a number of market cards equal to the number of players plus 2 from the current stage s deck and put them into play. Replenish quest cards (not done on first turn): Move all cards in the quest queue as far forward as possible, leaving no open positions between them (pushing 2Q and 3Q cards into lower Q slots as well), then deal a quest card from the current stage to each empty position at the back of the queue. If the quest deck of the current stage is depleted, continue dealing cards from the next stage. Advance quests (not done on first turn): Advance all quests in front of each player by one step. If the last step of a leg (row) of a quest was reached last turn, this means advancing the marker to the first step of the next leg (row) of the quest. Otherwise, advancing a quest simply means the marker on the quest advances to the next step of its current leg. Mine Phase In player order, every player may move a single overseer of their color in the mine once, with the following restrictions:
Overseers move in straight lines across the hex grid. Overseers cannot move through other overseers. Overseers can move through any number of empty hexes. Overseers can move through any number of contiguous workers, but must end their movement on the hex after the last worker. It is not mandatory for a player to make an overseer movement. On their turn, they may pass instead. After the movement of an overseer, workers (multi-colored cubes) are generated based on the following: The hex on which the overseer started generates a worker of the same color as the overseer. Any workers the overseer moved through that were colored differently than the overseer change their color to that of the overseer. Any workers the overseer moved through that were colored the same as the overseer change their color to the color of the workers on the board who number the fewest, not counting the color of the active player. In case of a tie, the worker changes to the color of the tied player who is earlier in the current turn order. These changes are determined individually in the order in which the workers were passed over by the overseer. After the worker generation is resolved, any worker spawned or passed over by the overseer generates one resource cube of the same type as the hex they occupy and gives it to the player of their current color. After resources are produced, check the mine for contiguous groups of 5 or more workers of the same color. These groups of same-colored workers form unions and are removed from the board. Example: On blue s mine phase move, he moves his overseer to the right, jumping over four workers (2 blue and 2 yellow). First, he generates a worker on the space the overseer leaves. He then passes over his own worker. Out of his opponents, purple has the fewest workers on the board (1 to yellow s 3), so that blue worker becomes purple. The overseer then passes over 2 yellow workers and turns them blue. He now passes over another blue worker, but now there are 2 purple workers (1+1) and 1 yellow worker (3-2), so the last blue worker becomes yellow. Blue gets 2 iron and 1 emerald for this move. Yellow and purple both get a copper. Lastly, the 2 yellow workers that became blue now form a group of 5 blue workers with the blue workers above and below them, which enough for a union, so these 5 workers are removed.
Rearrange turn order At the end of each mine phase, turn order is rearranged based on the number of workers in the mine. Tally the number of workers each player has claimed in the mine. Whoever has the fewest workers is now first player, the player with the next fewest is second and so on. If there is a tie, the order for those tied relative to each other remains what it was previously. Market Phase Merchant and market stalls Players have the opportunity to interact with the merchant and use any market stalls they own. These actions are covered here, but can be done at any time during a turn. Once per turn, Players can buy 1 good and sell 1 good each for the prices listed on the merchant card. Any market stalls a player owns can also be used once per turn, including the turn in which they were acquired. Once per stage, independent of the 1 resource buy per turn restriction, players can also buy 1 quest token and 1 adventurer for the price listed. If they do so, they place one of their colored disk tokens on the leftmost available box of the merchant space on the game board for the good they purchased to signify that purchase for the stage. This increases the price of any future purchase of that good by other players in the same stage by 1 gold (i.e. the third person to buy an adventurer from the merchant in stage 1 would pay 8 gold (6+2)). If there is a dispute as to who is buying a good first, the purchases are resolved in player order. At the end of each stage, any disks placed on the merchant
card are removed. (Disputes should really only occur at the beginning of a stage. Otherwise, players should be courteous and allow the player who first stated his intent buy the good first.) Market cards In player order, players may buy a single card from the market for the price listed in the upper right corner of the card. It is not mandatory to buy a market card every turn. Weapon designs, market stalls and savvy cards give permanent advantages and are kept in front of the player for the rest of the game. All other cards which supply various resources are single-use. These cards are denoted by a red X in the lower right corner as opposed to a crown. When a single-use card is acquired, the player gains the specified resources or takes the describe action on the card and then removes the card from the game. Note that weapon design cards are not weapons themselves. They simply allow a player to spend the appropriate resources to forge the weapon on the card. Any cards not purchased are put in the market discard stack. This stack is separate from purchased single-use market cards. Quest Phase Each quest phase goes through 3 distinct steps: quest acquisition, quest management and quest rewards. Quest acquisition must be done in turn order, but once a player acquires a quest or passes, they can continue with the other steps independent of the other players. This also means that the next player in line does not need to wait for the previous player to complete his entire quest phase before taking his turn, but instead can immediately start quest acquisition once the previous player is done with quest acquisition. Quest acquisition In player order, players have the opportunity to pay quest tokens to acquire a single new quest, putting it in front of them and placing a quest tracker marker on the first step of the quest. The number of quest tokens needed to acquire the quest depends on the section the quest is in. 1Q quests require 1 quest token and so on. It is not mandatory to take a quest each turn. Players can pass on acquiring new quests and simply manage any existing quests they are currently undertaking. Quest management At the beginning of the turn, any quests players had from previous turns advanced one step. It is during quest management that the requirements of this new step must be satisfied, plus the requirements of the first step of any quest the player acquired this turn. If a player cannot or chooses not to meet the requirements of the step of the quest they are on, the quest is failed. When a quest is failed, the following happens: All equipped weapons are discarded.
Adventurers are returned to the player's pool without receiving any levels and can immediately be applied to other quests. Any physical rewards from previously completed legs are kept, and the player receives a number of victory points equal to the value in parentheses from the last successfully completed quest leg. A quest leg is considered complete during the quest rewards phase if the player is on the last step of that leg. A player can immediately fail a quest that was just acquired that same turn in order to deny another player from taking it. This would count as the player s single quest acquisition for that turn, the quest tokens paid for the quest would be lost and no rewards of any kind would be received. In each step of a quest, there is a number, possibly accompanied by any combination of the letters P (piercing), S (slashing) and C (crushing). This is the difficulty of the quest, along with any preferred weapon types. Quest difficulty In order to overcome a quest leg s difficulty level, a player must apply to the quest adventurers who wield weapons of strengths with a total equal to or greater than the quest difficulty. Players can only equip adventurers with weapons they have the designs for and do so by transferring the raw resources from their pool to the adventurer in the proper amounts. Placing the resources on the adventurer token signifies the forging of a weapon. These resources can never be used for anything else and will stay with the adventurer until he switches weapons, is moved to another quest, or his current quest is completed or failed. In all of these cases, the resources will then be returned to the general supply. In addition, adventurers are restricted in their weapon use based on their level. These restrictions are also specified on the weapon cards: Level 1 adventurers can only use unstarred swords and daggers. Level 2 adventurers can use any unstarred weapon (swords, daggers, axes, spears and maces). Level 3 and 4 adventurers can use all weapons, including the starred weapon plans that require precious gems (emeralds, rubies and diamonds). Preferred weapon types The letters S, P and C in a quest step call for a weapon of the corresponding weapon type to be equipped by at least one adventurer currently applied to the quest. Thus, if a quest leg has an S, at least one adventurer applied to the quest should be wielding a slashing weapon. Weapon types are denoted on the weapon design cards under the weapon s power. If the weapon type is not satisfied by at least one of the currently equipped weapons, the quest difficulty is increased by 3 per weapon type not satisfied. So if a player were missing two weapon types required for a leg, the difficulty of that specific leg would increase by 6 (3x2). If this increase in quest difficulty cannot be satisfied, the quest is failed. Other rules for applying adventurers to quests:
Adventurers have no inherent power without an equipped weapon. An adventurer must be equipped with a weapon to be applied to a quest. Adventurers can only equip one weapon at a time (shields count as weapons). A player can change the weapon of an adventurer applied to a quest, but any resources used to create the adventurer s initial weapon are lost and returned to the supply. Adventurers can be removed from one quest to be applied to another quest, but if the removal of the adventurer lowers the total power of all weapons currently applied to the quest to a value below the difficulty of the current quest leg, the quest will fail. Adventurers removed in this way lose any weapon they were equipped with (resources returned to the supply) and must be given a new weapon. Rewards/Quest completion There are often physical rewards for completing quest legs and there are always physical and victory point rewards for completing an entire quest. Note that all of these rewards are received AFTER all quest progression is finished, such that you cannot use the rewards from one quest to immediately help another quest progress on the same turn. After a quest is progressed to the final step of a quest leg (row of steps), any physical rewards associated with that quest leg (if any) are received at this time. Physical rewards are any listed rewards other than victory points. There is also a point value in parentheses associated with the quest leg. Players do NOT receive these points when the leg is finished. These points are only awarded if the quest is failed and the player does not receive the full point value for the entire quest. After a quest is progressed to the final step of the quest (last step of the last row), players receive all physical rewards listed at the end of the quest, plus the victory point value listed at the end of the quest. In addition, adventurers that were present for the completion of the quest have an opportunity to level up. Each adventurer can only gain one level per completed quest and a player can distribute a number of levels to their adventurers equal to the number of total steps in the quest divided by 2 and rounded up. Quests consisting of 1 to 2 steps give one level, quests 3 to 4 steps give 2 levels, 5 to 6 give 3 and so on. Once a quest is complete and the rewards are received, adventurers (with their new levels) are returned to the player s pool and any resources used as weapons on the quests are returned to the supply. The quest is then removed from play and kept at the player s side in a completed quest deck, which can be referenced in the case of a victory point dispute. Physical quest rewards:
Copper (orange), iron (black), mithril (light blue), emerald (green), ruby (red) and diamond (white) resources players receive these goods from the supply in the amount indicated. Gold (orange circle with $ ) and quest tokens (purple circle with Q ) players receive these goods from the bank in the amount indicated. Adventurers (sword symbol) players take an adventurer token from the supply and put it in their adventurer pool. Adventurers always start at level 1. Overseer movement (pickaxe symbol) players may immediately move one overseer of their color, obeying the normal mine phase rules for doing so and distributing workers and resources as usual for a mine phase movement. Worker movement (uncolored worker symbol) players may immediately pick up a worker of any color in the mine and place it on any empty hex in the mine, keeping the same color of the worker. Players receive no resources for this action. Market cards (black rectangle with M ) players can look through the market discard deck and acquire a single card for free. (Note: players cannot take from the previously purchased single-use market cards removed from the game.) Normally, after quest acquisition, all players can simultaneously manage their quests to save time. However, if two or more players receive an overseer movement, worker movement or market card reward on the same turn, the order in which they are allowed to take those actions is resolved in normal player order. Champions The maximum level an adventurer can reach is 4. When an adventurer advances from level 3 to level 4, he becomes a champion and gains a champion title. Remove the normal level marker from the adventurer tile and insert a champion title marker. Titles offer various perks to the player when the player uses that champion for a quest. There are 12 titles and each player can only have one champion with each title. Titles: Opportunistic The player immediately receives an extra 2 prestige points every time this champion is present when a quest leg is completed. Unrelenting This champion applies an extra +1 attack power to his equipped weapon every time he is present when a quest leg is completed. (Note: this advantage is applied to his weapon, so when he loses that weapon because it is switched or he is moved to another quest the attack power bonus is lost, as well.) Valorous The player receives an extra 4 prestige points when the champion fully completes a quest. Full completion of a quest necessitates that the champion is present from the start of the quest (initial adventurer application to satisfy the requirements of the first step) to the finish. Fortuitous The player receives an extra 3 gold when the champion fully completes a quest (see above). Expeditious When a player starts a quest and applies this champion to the quest, the quest can be started on the second step instead of the first. Any rewards or bonuses given for completing the first step (if the first leg is only one step long) are not received. This
champion s ability can only be used a subsequent time once the quest on which it was last used is completed or failed. Charming When a player starts a quest and applies this champion to the quest, they can pay 2 less quest tokens to acquire it (minimum 0). This champion s ability can only be used a subsequent time once the quest on which it was last used is completed or failed. Rending This champion applies S type to any weapon he equips. Brutish This champion applies C type to any weapon he equips. Thrusting This champion applies P type to any weapon he equips. Dendritic This champion applies an extra +2 attack power to any weapon containing an emerald that he equips. Sanguine This champion applies an extra +2 attack power to any weapon containing a ruby that he equips. Purified This champion applies an extra +3 attack power to any weapon containing a diamond that he equips. End of turn Once all players have finished the quest rewards step, the turn ends and the next turn can begin. In addition, quests should be removed from the front-most quest slots on the board based on the following: 2-player game: the first 2 slots are removed, plus a third if no quests were taken that round. 3-player game: the first slot is removed, plus a second if no quests were taken that round. 4-player game: if no quests were taken that round, the first slot is removed. If these slots are already empty, no extra quest is taken to compensate. Bonus Tiles At the end of every third turn (3, 6, etc.), when moving the turn marker to a new turn, a bonus tile will be encountered and should be resolved at this point. After its resolution, remove the tile from the board and continue on with the next turn. Note that bonus tile resolution occurs before transitioning to a new stage. The tiles provide bonuses as follows: Industrious bonus: If a player has the exact number of workers depicted on the tile (stage 1: 2, stage 2: 3, stage 3: 4), they can immediately make an extra overseer movement. If more than one player earns this bonus, the overseer movements occur in turn order. Adventurous bonus: If a player has the exact number of active quests (not counting those completed on the preceding round) depicted on the tile (stage 1: 2, stage 2: 3, stage 3: 4), they immediately gain an extra level 1 adventurer.
Stockpile bonus: For every 3 unused resources a player has stored in their pool (rounded down), they collect one free resource from the supply (stage 1: copper, stage 2: iron, stage 3: mithril). resources from the market based on the buy price and independent of the number of buys they usually have for the round. (Example: Player 1 has 4 champions and so gains 8 gold to spend in the market. He buys a mithril (5 gold) and an iron (3 gold).) Any money not spent is lost. Decorated bonus: For every level 4 champion a player has, they immediately gain 2 gold worth of Knowledge bonus: For every starred (level 3) weapon plan a player owns, they immediately gain: 2 gold (stage 2) or 2 prestige points (stage 3). Start of stages 2 and 3 After the ends of turns 6 and 12, after bonus tiles are resolved, there is a change of stages, where a number of different actions need to be taken. Remove all workers and overseers from the mine, then collect all the resource hexes. At the start of stage 2, for 2 (3, 4) players, randomly remove 21 (28, 35) of the tiles and add 12 (16, 20) iron, 6 (8, 10) mithril and 3 (4, 5) ruby tiles, shuffle them and then return them to the board in a random order. At the start of stage 3, for 2 (3, 4) players, randomly remove 14 (19, 24) of the tiles, add 12 (16, 20) mithril and 2 (3, 4) diamond tiles, shuffle them and then return them to the board in a random order. Remove any quest cards in the quest card spots still remaining from the previous stage (green quests in stage 2 and purple quests in stage 3) and replenish them as normal. This happens after normal end of turn quest removal. (Active quests in front of players from previous stages remain in play). Going in the current turn order players take turns placing their overseers on any open hex of the mine one at a time. Players DO NOT receiving resources for the overseers placed. Then the start of the turn s mine phase begins following normal rules. End of game The game ends after the 6 th turn of the 3 rd stage. If any player still has active quests, these quests are immediately failed and points are awarded as per a normal failure of a quest (the point value in parentheses from the last complete quest leg).
Once all quest points have been awarded, players also receive extra prestige points based on the following: +1 prestige point per level for each of a player s adventurers. The sum of the prestige point values of every market card in front of a player. The player with the most points at the end of the game is the winner. If there is a tie, the player who goes first in the current turn order is the winner. Quick game variant Forge War is an in-depth, complex game. If players are looking for a simpler, lighter experience, they can play just the first stage of the game with the following rule changes: The game will last 8 turns, instead of the normal 6 for stage 1. Deal out 1 less market card each turn. In the last 2 turns, only deal out 3 cards no matter the number of players. The stage 1 quest deck is used with the 2 quests marked with a * removed from the deck and the 12 gold stage 1 quests (randomized) added to the bottom of the deck. Once this deck runs out, do not continue to replenish the quest cards with stage 2 quests. The cost of some market cards is reduced. If there is number in a green circle on the card below the normal market cost, use this number as the card cost instead. The champion titles are not used. Adventurers can still attain 4 th level, and doing so awards 1 extra prestige point when scoring bonus points at the game s end (for a total of 5 points instead of 4). Bonus tiles are also not used. After the end of turn 8, any quests not completed are failed (with failure points awarded), bonus points are scored and a winner is determined as in the full game. Tips Pay attention to the quest token rewards of quests. Some quests offer multiple quest tokens and some don t offer any. If all the quests you take don t offer any quest tokens back, you will run out and be forced to pay a lot to the merchant to acquire more or use one of your level 4 adventurers to make a charming champion. Pay attention to the number of adventurers you have in your pool and how many adventurers your active quests will require to complete. If you have 2 adventurers in your pool and 2 of your active quests will require the addition of an adventurer next turn to progress to the next leg, don t take another quest this turn unless you have some way of increasing your adventurer pool. Try to avoid placing workers in the corners of the mine. While you may think it is good that no other player can jump over your worker and get resources from it, it also means that that worker will sit there and increase your total worker count for the rest of the stage, unless you re able to form a union around it. Pay attention to how many turns are left in the game when acquiring The Endless Dungeon or some of the longer quests from stage 3. If the number of steps in the quest is larger than the number of turns left, that means the quest will automatically fail at the end of the game.
Lastly, despite the fantasy theme, this is a game of investment and management. You will find the most success when you have all your adventurers and resources working for you at all times to bring in more resources and other rewards. If you don t manage your quests appropriately, however, you can easily overextend yourself and start failing quests, which results in a bad return on your investment. This game is all about finding the proper balance to your investments to maximize your returns without over-extending. 2013 Isaac Childres