MOONRIFT: PROTOTYPE EDITION

Under the full moon, a rift tears open. Creatures pour into our world. You are an Ætherkin, magic wielders who can bind these beasts and will them to battle for the surrounding lands.

But you're not alone. Another has arrived to stake their claim of power. In this magical land grab, only one can reign. Will it be you?

In The Box:

• 16 Cryptid cards
• 1 Moon Phase tracker
• 1 Bonus card

Card Anatomy

Setup:

• Shuffle the cards except the Moon Phase Tracker.
• Deal 5 cards to each player. These form the players’ starting hands and are kept secret.
• Place the remaining 7 cards face-down as the draw pile in the center of the play area.
• Define the 4 sides of the draw pile as “Territories” (dimensional weak points) and the 4 corners as “No Man’s Land”.

• Establish a common discard pile area.

Start of Turn:

Active player advances the Moon Phase tracker one step clockwise (Full > Waning > New > Waxing), except on the first turn of a game, in which case it starts on Full.

Action Phase (Choose up to two different actions):

• Draw a card from the draw pile.
• Place a card from your hand onto an empty space on the board.
• Move one of your cryptids to an adjacent empty space.
• Initiate a battle with an adjacent opponent’s cryptid.
• Swap the positions of two of your adjacent cryptids.
• Sacrifice a card in play (put it in the discard pile) and replace it with a card from your hand.

Battle Phase (if chosen):

• Attacker’s Strength is compared to Defender’s Stealth, and Attacker’s Stealth is compared to Defender’s Strength.
• If the current Moon Phase matches a cryptid’s Lunar affinity, its controller can add +1 to either Strength or Stealth.
• Apply any relevant special abilities.
• If still tied, the attacker wins.

Supporting Cryptids:

If either the attacker or defender has another friendly cryptid adjacent “behind” their opponent, they can sacrifice that card to add its Strength or Stealth to their own as an additional tie-breaker.

The losing cryptid is removed from the board and placed in the common discard pile, OR can retreat to an adjacent empty space if available.

The winning cryptid takes the place of the losing cryptid on the board.

End of Turn:

If the active player has more than 5 cards in hand, they must discard down to 5.

Discard Pile

IF the draw pile is empty at the beginning of a lunar cycle (the Full Moon), shuffle the discard pile and start a new draw pile.

Dimensional Purge:

If a player has 3 of the 4 cards for a particular moon phase in play (on the board), and the opponent has the last of that moon phase’s cards, the player with the three can force the last matching card to the bottom of the draw pile.

Winning the Game:

The game ends immediately if a player achieves one of the following:

• Controls all 4 Territories (by occupying them with their cryptids).
• Removes all of the opponent’s cryptids from the board.
• Has the most cryptids in play when the Moon Phase tracker completes 6 full cycles.

Special Abilities:

• Predator: +1 Strength when attacking
• Nullifier: Cancels the opponent’s special ability during battle
• Shapeshifter: Can change its Lunar affinity for the duration of a battle
• Camouflage: +1 Stealth when defending
• Lunar Sway: Can shift the Moon Phase forward one phase before a battle
• Doppelganger: Can copy the ability of the cryptid it’s battling