Mechs vs. Minions rules refresher

Read the refresher

Working together as a team of Yordles, you win by completing the objective in the current Mission's Dossier, which might involve the Bomb, Crystal Shards, or Rumble's Boss Mech. You do it by drafting Command Cards and programming them into your Mech's six slot Command Line. Your Mech then carries out those commands in order every turn while you stomp and blast the Minion horde.

For setup, lay out the Map Tiles exactly as the Mission Dossier shows, in the right orientation, and add any new pieces from that Mission's envelope. Team Gears start at zero every Mission, so the Minion Kill track is empty and no Gear Ring is on the Team Gear track yet. Each player chooses up to two Schematic Cards to bring along. They must belong to the Yordle you're playing and be unlocked so far, and they start facedown. Use the Doom Tracker however the Mission says, for example for the Bomb's health or the Boss's health. In Boss Missions, all four Rune Shields start up, so put the Rune Coins on the Runes track to show that. To pick the first First Player, roll the Rune Die and check the matching arrow on the Crystal Compass, then hand that player Zhonya's Minuteglass. In any Mission after the tutorial, the very first draft is a Double Draft.

Now the flow of play. Each round has a Player Phase, then a Minion Phase, and in some Missions a Danger Phase. The Player Phase starts with the First Player hosting a draft. Then everyone programs their cards at the same time. Finally, everyone executes their Command Lines, starting with the First Player and going clockwise. In the Minion Phase, Minions move, then new Minions spawn, then Minions attack. In the Danger Phase, Mission dangers like the Lava Wall or the Boss take their actions. Once all phases are done, the First Player role and the Minuteglass pass clockwise, and a new round begins.

Here's how the draft works. The First Player deals five Command Cards faceup, flips Zhonya's Minuteglass, and picks one. Players then pick one at a time clockwise until four cards have been taken. With four players that's one card each. With fewer players, some people get more than one. If the sand runs out before four picks, shuffle the unpicked cards and deal out the remaining picks randomly. Discard whatever is left. You must draft a card, though you can scrap it for no effect. The Double Draft deals ten cards instead, and players pick in turn until each has two, no matter how many people are playing.

Each drafted card must be either slotted or scrapped right away. You can't save cards for later. To program a card, put it on any undamaged slot. Cards of the same element can stack in one slot, always placed on top, up to three high. The four elements are Fire in red, Electric in yellow, Metal in blue, and Computery in green. The top card is the active one, and its Power equals the number of cards in the stack. You can't choose a lower Power level. If you add a fourth matching card, discard the bottom card, so the stack stays at Power three with the new card on top. If you play a different element onto a slot, discard everything already there. Once cards are slotted, they stay fixed in place and order.

The only way to change that order is scrapping, and you can only scrap cards fresh from a draft, never ones already slotted. Scrapping a Fire or Metal card repairs one Damage Card from your Mech. If that card was Slot Damage, any Command Cards underneath work again. Scrapping an Electric or Computery card lets you swap the contents of any two undamaged slots.

When you execute, go from slot one through slot six, skip empty slots, and follow every card. There are three kinds of commands. Attack commands deal one damage to their targets, never move or turn you, and never hurt other Mechs or the Bomb. Move commands always take you forward, keeping your facing. The exception is Omnistomp, which can go forward or to either side but never backward. You must move unless something impassable blocks you. Turn commands work by Power: Power one turns you left or right, Power two also lets you turn around, and Power three can even spin you all the way back to where you started. You can never skip a Turn. Adjacent means sharing an edge, never diagonal. When a card gives a numeric range, count spaces including diagonals.

Moving onto a Minion stomps it, which kills it. Any Minion dies from one damage. Every kill goes on the Minion Kill track, and every fifth kill earns a Team Gear and clears the track. When Team Gears reach the number on the back of a Schematic, flip it faceup and it becomes usable. Using it doesn't spend Gears. Hack Schematics are used once and discarded, Boost Schematics have ongoing effects, and Slot Schematics sit in your Command Line and execute every turn. At fifteen Team Gears, everyone unlocks the Overdrive ability printed at the bottom of their Command Line.

Moving into another Mech or the Bomb pushes it ahead of you, and you can push a whole line of them. If any piece in the line can't move, the whole move fails. You can't push the Boss. Towing needs a single card with two moves, like a Speed card or a Move at Power two or more. Two separate one move cards won't do it. Towing drags an adjacent Mech or the Bomb one space into the space you just left, and it keeps its facing.

Damage never kills your Mech. Instead, you draw one Damage Card per damage and resolve each one fully before drawing the next. Glitch cards take effect and are discarded. System cards have ongoing effects, so keep them by your Command Line. For Slot Damage, roll the Number Die and cover that slot with the card, replacing any older damage already there. That slot then executes the Damage Card as if it were a command, and you can't program onto it. If damage moves you next to a new Minion, that Minion doesn't damage you again. Besides scrapping, you repair one damage each time you move onto a Repair Pad, even if you were pushed there.

A few cards are easy to get wrong. Chain Lightning first hits a target directly or diagonally in front of you, then chains to a target diagonally adjacent to the last one hit. At Power two it chains two more times, for up to four targets, and at Power three it chains four more times, for up to six. Fuel Tank is a Fire Turn. Whenever you're about to take damage, you may detonate it: you ignore that damage, scrap the whole stack, and deal one damage to everything in range, with the range growing with Power. When Skewer kills a Minion, park that Minion on the card. It's still counted as a kill, and it blocks one later point of damage.

In the Minion Phase, move the Minions closest to the objective first. Minions can't push anything, can't move off the board, and can't enter occupied spaces, except spaces holding Crystal Shards. Minions spawn only in empty spaces, often on Rune Spaces, and a Mech standing on a Rune Space blocks spawning there. When Minions attack, each one adjacent to a Mech or the Bomb deals one damage. Resolve damage player by player, starting with the First Player, since one player's damage can remove a threat before it reaches the next player.

Terrain adds more twists. Massive Boulders block movement and Ripsaw attacks, just like the board edge. On an Oil Slick, pieces slide until they hit something. Stepping onto a Lava Pool stops your move and deals one damage, and running into a Spike Wall also deals one damage. After either, keep executing your Command Line. Rune Gates let you through only with a matching Move card: Speed for yellow, Omnistomp for green, Blaze for red, and Skewer for blue. Otherwise, a Mech must step on a matching Rune Space to switch the gate off. The gate turns back on as soon as a Mech passes through. You can carry one Crystal Shard at a time by stepping on it. If you take damage while carrying one, you drop it first, in a direction rolled with the Rune Die and the Crystal Compass.

The Bomb gets pushed and towed like a Mech. It loses one health each time it stomps a Minion, lands on a Lava Pool, or is pushed into a Spike Wall. The Boss is a two by two Mech that acts only in the Danger Phase. It runs its four slots in order, using the default ability printed on any empty slot. Then the First Player draws two Boss Command Cards, programs one, and discards the other. While a Rune Shield is up, the Boss takes no damage from attacks of that element. Stepping on a matching Rune Space drops that shield, and it comes back on as soon as the Boss takes one damage of that color.

The Mission Dossier tells you exactly how each Mission is won and how danger escalates. Some ways to lose are always true. If the Bomb's health runs out and it explodes, the Mission fails. If any Boss slot reaches Power three and is executed, the Doom Cannon fires and you lose. Against the Boss, you win by draining its health on the Doom Tracker to zero. Everyone wins or loses together as one team.

A turn, played out

It is mid Mission, there are 3 of you, and you hold Zhonya's Minuteglass as First Player. Your Mech stands facing north. In the 2 spaces directly east of you sit 2 Minions in a row. The Minion Kill track shows 3 kills, the team has 2 Gears, and one of your facedown Schematics has a 3 on its back. Your Command Line: slot 1 is empty. Slot 2 holds 2 Fuel Tank cards, a Fire Turn at Power 2. Slot 3 holds a Speed card, but a Slot Damage card covers it, so right now that slot runs the Damage Card instead of your Speed. You deal 5 Command Cards faceup: Fuel Tank, Blaze, Speed, Skewer and Chain Lightning. You flip the Minuteglass and take Fuel Tank. It goes on top of slot 2, so that Fire stack is now 3 high, Power 3. The player to your left takes Chain Lightning, the next player takes Skewer, and with 3 players the fourth pick comes back to you. Speed is tempting, but you cannot program onto the damaged slot 3, and you cannot hold a card for later. So you take Blaze and scrap it. It is Fire, so it repairs one Damage Card. You remove the Slot Damage from slot 3, and the Speed underneath works again. The leftover Speed is discarded. Everyone programs, then you execute first. Slot 1 is empty, so you skip it. Slot 2, Fuel Tank at Power 3, lets you turn left, right, around, or spin all the way back. You must turn, and you turn right, to face east. Slot 3, Speed, is a single card with 2 moves, so you go forward twice, stomping the first Minion, then the second. Your kills take the track from 3 to 5. The fifth kill earns a Team Gear and clears the track, so the team now has 3 Gears. That matches the back of your Schematic, so you flip it faceup, ready to use, and spending it costs no Gears. Then the player to your left executes their Command Line.