One Deck Dungeon by Chris Cieslikgames in One Page by Steve Lewis

One Deck Dungeon by Chris CieslikGames In One Page by Steve Lewis

Published by Asmadi Games, 2016 v1.0 pub3/1/18

In One Deck Dungeon, you will be trying to clear a deck of dungeon cards three times and reach the final boss. As you work through the deck, you will roll dice to engage in combat and face perils that can be added to your character’s supply of items, potions, skills, or XP. Ideally, you will have conquered enough challenges (and survived their consequences) to build up a strong enough character before you reach the final boss.

To set up, choose a character card and a dungeon/boss card; return the rest to the box. Cover the dungeon card with the turn reference card so that only the top row is showing. Place one potion cube on the reference card. Shuffle the deck of encounter cards (with a door on the back); place the stairs card at the bottom of the deck. Stack the level cards in order, with level 1 on top.

Each round of play consists of two phases. In the first phase, you will always spend two units of time. To do so, take the top two encounter cards, and discard them face up.

In the second phase, you may either explore or enter a room. To explore, draw cards from the top of the encounter deck and place them (still door-side up) on the table until you have a total of four encounter cards (you may have still have cards face-up or face-down from previous turns). The round immediately ends.

To enter a room, turn over a door card to reveal the encounter on the other side (or select a card you’ve already turned over). If you are revealing this card for the first time, you may choose to engage in the encounter, or flee; if the latter, the round ends immediately. If you are re-entering a card you already revealed, you must engage in the encounter.

There are two types of encounters: combat and perils. When entering into a combat encounter, apply the special ability listed at the top of the card (if any). In a peril encounter, choose one of the two options to try to overcome (applying the effects for your choice, if applicable). You may choose to use the heroic feat, listed on your character card, to gain extra black dice to roll; these “heroic dice” can be used as any color. Then, take one die from the supplyfor each of the stat symbols on your character card (top-left corner), plus any additional symbols granted by items or level bonuses. In a peril encounter only take the dice of the color associated with the option you chose. Roll the dice, and attempt to place them on the challenge boxes on the encounter card and the revealed squares of the dungeon card (peril encounters on left, combat encounters on right). For challenge boxes that are only one square large, place a die of the same color of an equal or higher value on that box; for double-wide boxes, place as many dice as needed to total or exceed the value on the box. Challenge boxes with green shields must be covered before any other boxes can be covered. During this step, you may use skills granted by cards, you’ve kept, or exchange any two dice for a black die with the value of the lower die. After placing dice, you suffer the consequences of any challenge boxes left uncovered; hourglass tokens force you to spend more time (discard a door card per hourglass), and hearts give your character damage tokens. If you have the same or more damage tokens than shown on your character card (plus items), the game is over, unless you use potions to heal.

If you survived the encounter, decide how to use the card. If you keep it as an item, tuck it under the top-left corner of your character card; the extra symbols showing can be used for more dice during encounters. If you keep it as a skill, tuck it under the bottom of your card; these skills can be used during encounters. Your items and skills are limited by your current level card. If you keep an item as XP, tuck the card under the level card so the diamond symbols at the top are showing. If you reach the number of XP shown on the level card, you may remove those cards to advance to the next level, allowing you to have more items and skills, an extra potion token, and a heroic die for all encounters. If you keep the card as a potion, tuck the card under the turn reference card, and gain an extra potion token. Potion tokens can be spent at any time to use the power of any potion you’ve discovered.

When you reach the stairs card of the encounter deck, you may no longer draw cards. If an action would cause you to spend time, instead place a damage token on the stairs card for each time spent. When there are three damage tokens on the stairs, remove them, and place one damage on your character card. You may descend at the end of any round while the stairs card is visible, or immediately after revealing the stairs while spending time at the start of a round. When you do, reveal the next row of the dungeon card, and shuffle the encounters discard pile plus any doors in play (open or closed) to form a new deck, again placing the stairs card at the bottom.

After descending from the third floor, you have an encounter with the dungeon’s boss. Turn the dungeon card over to reveal the boss. Draw and roll dice, use skills and potions, place dice, and resolve consequences for uncovered challenge boxes as before. Then, add a damage marker to the boss card for each skull symbol you covered in the roll. If the total number of damage markers is equal to or more than the health shown on the boss, you win the game. If you do not, begin another round of combat until either you defeat the boss or the boss defeats you.

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