Rules
Objective:
There are 2 ways to win a game of Mischief and Malice:
Collect 4 Relic Cards - The first player to collect 4 Relic cards wins! Relics are earned by defeating your opponent’s creatures, defeating Malignants, or through other Mischief card pulls.
Deck Elimination – If your opponent runs out of cards and can no longer power their remaining creatures, they are eliminated from the game. The last player standing wins!
Creature and Energy Cards:
In Mischief & Malice, creatures rely on energy cards to use their abilities and attack. There are currently 6 energy types, each with its own play style, allowing you to build a deck that suits your strategy. Some energies and creatures also come with unique abilities or assists based on their type.
Malice Deck Cards:
Creature Cards:
The most important part of your Malice deck are your creature cards! If your opponent runs out of creatures or cannot power any that remain, you win the game!
Energy Cards:
Creatures are unable to attack or use their abilities without energy cards. A creature is considered active once it has an energy card for each type in the upper right corner of its card. Each energy card is only counts as 1 of the required energies to power the creature. Universal energies can be used to provide any type, but you may only have one universal energy in each energy lane.
Bench Effects:
Bench effects are placed on the bench and are activated by any energy type. Their field assist wont activate until they have the required amount of energy, as indicated by the number of energy symbols beneath their name. Bench energies may also be used as universal energies in any energy lane. If used as an energy card, bench effects do not have any energy assists.
Areas of the Mischief & Malice Battlefield:
Areas of the Mischief Playmat:
Gameplay:
How to Win:
Be the first player to earn 4 Relics.
If your opponent has no cards in their deck and cannot activate a creature with the cards they have left.
Setting Up:
Shuffle all Malice decks, Mischief decks, and Relic Decks.
Flip a coin or roll a die to choose which player gets to go first.
Draw 6 cards from your Malice deck.
Make sure you have at least one creature and one energy card (or bench effect) in your hand. If you do not, show your hand, reshuffle, and draw 6 more cards from your deck. Repeat until you have at least one creature and energy card in your hand.
Parts of a Turn:
On your turn you may do the following in any order:
a. Place one creature card on the field or bench. You may place two on the first turn only. b. Place up to two energy cards on the field or bench, but they must be in separate lanes. c. Move a bench creature to the field with all of the bench energy or by itself. d. Choose which energy is active on any fully powered creature. e. Attack. You may not attack on your first turn of the game.
You end your turn by drawing cards from your deck until you have 6 in your hand. If you already have 7 or more cards in your hand, just draw 1. If you have 10 or more cards in hand, you must void a card from your hand if you want to draw 1 at the end of your turn.
Turn Actions:
Do Any of These in Any Order:
a.) You can place one creature from your hand onto any open field spot or the bench (you may place 2 creatures on your first turn only). If you do not have any creatures on the field, you must place one there. If you have no creatures in your hand, on the field, or on the bench, reveal your hand and then flip cards over from your deck until you find one and place it on the field. The rest of the flipped cards are then shuffled back into your deck.
b.) Place up to two energy cards on the field or bench, but they must be in separate energy lanes. If you place an energy card in the bench lane and then move the bench energy with its attached creature to a field spot, you may not also place an additional energy onto the energy lane it was moved to. However, you can place another energy onto the now empty bench energy lane. Basically speaking, the 2 energies you placed on your turn can not ultimately end up in the same energy lane.
c.) Move a bench creature to an open spot on the field. You can choose to move either all of the bench energy or no energy with the creature. You may only move the bench energy with the creature if it is moving to a field spot with an empty energy lane.
d.) Choose the active energy on a fully powered creature. When a creature has all of its required energy, it becomes fully powered and is now an active creature. Once a creature is active, you can choose which energy card to designate as its active energy. You will only be able to use the energy assists of the active energy attached to a creature until the creature perishes or a card tells you otherwise. You can commit an active energy by turning the other energy cards in the lane sideways. Once the active energy is chosen, its energy lane locks and no other energies can be added to it. If a card causes an energy to be removed from a locked lane and the attached creature is no longer active, the lane then unlocks until the creature is active again. However, if the card removed was not the active energy, the active energy remains and cannot be changed once the creature is active again.
e.) Attack. You may attack your opponent, but not on your first turn of the game.
For a creature to be able to attack, it must be active. A creature is active once it has all of its required energies to attack.
Once a creature is active, its creature abilities also activate and must be used at the time indicated by the ability tag. The diagram below shows when each ability tag is used.
Before a creature’s first attack, you must choose its active energy (if you have not already), even if you do not want to use its energy assists yet. Unlike attack assists, you may choose which turns you would like to use that creature’s energy assists.
You end your turn by drawing cards from your deck until you have 6 in your hand. If you already have 6 or more cards in your hand, just draw 1. If you have 10 or more cards in your hand, you have to discard a card from your hand if you want to draw 1 from your deck.
Attacking:
Once a creature is fully powered with its required energy, it is able to attack! You may use 1 of your creatures to attack 1 other creature (either on your own field or your opponent’s) each turn. You cannot attack on the first turn of the game.
A few steps are needed to determine your attack’s damage.
Make sure that the creature you are attacking with is fully powered (active). If its active energy has not yet been chosen, you must do so before you can attack with that creature!
Say which creature you are choosing to attack. You can attack any creature on your own field or your opponent’s field, but a creature may not attack itself! The one exception is if your creature is afflicted with glow.
It is now time to see how much damage your attack does! The steps must be taken in the following order:
Creature Abilities and Energy Assists:
Creatures have unique abilities labeled on their cards that fall into the categories below. No creatures may use any of their abilities until they are active and abilities that modify their attack do not stack between turns unless otherwise stated.
Energies also have assists that can optionally be used when attacking with the attached creature. These assists are labeled on each energy card and follow the same labeling and usage as the format above for special, attack, defense, and perish. Like creature abilities, energy assists do not stack between turns, unless otherwise stated.
Abilities that are only applied on the first attack, defense, special, etc. are identified with the word “FIRST” above the ability label. Abilities and assists that require a condition to be moved are identified with the word “LIMITED” above the ability label. If a creature type is above an energy assist label, the effect only applies if it is powering a labeled type of creature.
Benched Creature:
Each player is permitted to have up to 1 benched creature at a time. Placing a benched creature counts as the player’s 1 creature placement per turn. If desired, a player may use 1 of the 2 energy cards they can place per turn to power their benched creature; however, this creature cannot attack or be attacked until moved onto the field. Some creatures have bench abilities that are only active on the bench. If a player already has a creature on the bench at the start of their turn, they may also choose to void it and place a different creature on the bench in its place (all energy remains in lane). This also counts as their one creature placement per turn. Once a player has placed down their desired creatures and energies for the turn, the benched creature and all of its associated energy cards (if present) may be moved to any empty field spot with a vacant energy lane (unless the bench had no energy on it when the creature is moved, in which case it can be may be moved to an empty creature spot with preloaded energies). Bench energy lanes are limited to a maximum of 6 energies, while the creature energy lanes are limited to 5.
Attacking and Energy Commitment:
No players are permitted to attack during their first turn of the game. During your turn, after adding any new creatures or energy cards onto the field (if necessary/desired), you may choose to attack 1 creature of your choice once with 1 of your active creatures. You are permitted to use this attack on 1 of your own creatures, but a creature cannot attack itself unless otherwise stated.
When using a creature’s attack for the first time, the player must choose 1 energy card from that creature’s lane to commit as that creature’s active energy. Only the active energy’s assist is able to be applied to that creature’s attack, defense, etc. Once chosen, it is placed overlapping the other energy cards in the lane, which are subsequently flipped over. At this point, that creature’s energy lane and active energy become locked: no other energies may be placed in the lane and neither player may flip over the inactive energy cards while the lane is locked (even once the active energy has been fully used). While a player is required to commit a creature’s active energy during that creature’s first attack if they have not already done so, they are also permitted to choose and commit the creature’s active energy (once fully powered) during any of their turns prior to attacking with the creature for the first time. Finally, any applicable Relic effects are applied last to the attack. You may only apply an energy assist during 1 turn of your choice unless the energy is providing the creature with its primary energy (the one found in the larger circle), in which case the energy assist may be used the number of times shown in that circle (see diagram). While players are always required to use creature abilities when applicable during/before the attack, defense, etc., unless otherwise stated, active energy assists can be used at their applicable time during any turn(s) of the player’s choosing. When the active energy has been used its maximum number of times, it is tapped by turning it sideways, indicating that it has no uses left. At this point, only perish assists may still be used.
During every attack, the energy assist is applied first (when chosen and applicable), followed by the creature’s abilities. Afflictions are applied afterward (described in the Affliction section below). Each creature deals the amount of damage equal to its base attack power (unless that value has been altered by an energy assist, creature ability, affliction, Relic, etc.).
When any card or affliction forces a creature’s health or damage to be halved, this is always rounded down for odd numbers (with the exception of 1, which remains 1), unless otherwise stated. Some creature abilities or energy assists allow your creature to be immune to its next attack. This is denoted by turning the creature card upside down while it is immune.
If a player does not have an active creature to attack with or chooses not to attack during their turn, they must discard 2 cards from hand instead.
In the rare instance that a player has no creature on their field to attack during an opponent’s turn and the opponent has an active creature to attack with, this is counted as an automatic perish for the opponent and they are thus rewarded with a Relic. In this instance, since no actual creature was voided, no Mischief card is drawn. If a player is ever unable to or chooses not to attack an enemy creature during their turn, they must void 2 cards from their hand instead. At the end of every player’s turn, they must draw from their deck until they have 6 cards in hand. If a player already has 6 or more cards in hand at the end of their turn, they draw 1 card from their deck. While there is no hand limit, no player is permitted to draw this extra card at the end of their turn if their hand size exceeds 9 cards, unless they void a card from their hand first before drawing.
Energy Types and Afflictions:
Each energy represents a creature type. If a creature is powered by a red and a blue energy, then that creature is both a havok (red) and crystal (blue) creature type. Additionally, some energy cards enable players to use those types to cast color-based afflictions onto creatures. This status is represented by placing its corresponding token onto the afflicted creature. The following detail the affliction types and their effects on the afflicted creature:
Additionally, a creature may only have 1 affliction at a time. If an already afflicted creature becomes cast with a different type, this new affliction replaces the previous affliction, with the exception of Malignancy, which cannot be replaced. Therefore, no afflictions can be cast onto a creature with Malignancy.
Afflictions also have the ability to alter a creature type. For example, Alloy is normally a crystal and life creature; however, if it is afflicted with bliss, it also becomes a bliss creature. Alloy still necessitates a crystal and life energy to become active, but if it has not yet attacked and chosen its active energy (thereby locking its energy lane), the player may also optionally power it with an additional bliss energy, which may be chosen as its active energy when attacking. In this case, because Alloy is now also considered a bliss creature, Portrait of Protection could be chosen as the active energy and applied up to 3 times. However, if Alloy loses this affliction at any point (by reaching the 20 health maximum or acquiring a different affliction), he is no longer able to use the active energy’s assists.
Defeating a Creature:
Once a creature’s health reaches zero (most often from attack), the creature perishes and is placed into the void along with its active energy (if it was fully powered when defeated). If the creature was fully powered, but no active energy had been chosen yet, an attached energy of the opponent’s choosing is voided when it perishes. If the perishing creature is not active, no energy cards are voided when the creature perishes. All cards in the void are to be placed face up. The remainder of the energy cards in the perished creature’s lane are then returned to that player’s hand.
If a player perishes an opponent’s creature with 1 of their own, they are rewarded with a Relic card. Perishing their own creatures, affliction-based perishes, self-destructing creatures/abilities, and perishes resulting from Chaos cards or Malignants do not earn either player a Relic. Some creatures/energies have abilities that result in residual damage or an automatic perish to the attacker. In the case where both the target and the attacker perish, the attacker takes precedence and is therefore the one credited with the defeat. Additionally, if a player perishes 2 or more opposing creatures on one turn, they are only rewarded with 1 Relic. The first 2 Relics a player earns are chosen from the gold Relic pile. The third Relic a player earns is chosen from the rose gold Relic pile. Obtaining a 4th Relic wins that player the game, so the player may choose it from either pile.
Any time a creature is defeated in a manner that earns a player a Relic, their opponent must pull a Mischief card, place it face up on the Mischief space, and follow its instructions; these may be beneficial or detrimental to that player. A coin toss will determine from which player’s deck the Mischief card is pulled: heads result in the player pulling the Mischief card from their own pile, and tails their opponent’s. Just as they do not count towards or against a perish streak, if a creature perishes as the result of a Chaos card instruction, a Malignant, via self-destructing bonuses or as a residual of attacking the opponent, no Mischief card is drawn as a result of that creature perishing. There are 3 types of cards in the Mischief deck:
Challenge Cards:
Challenge cards contain mini-games that require players to follow a special set of rules or allow players to compete for rewards, ranging anywhere from card draws to Relics. Many of these challenges take place over a specified number of turns of regular gameplay, which follow the normal turn-based rules. In this scenario, if a player perishes an opponent’s creature before the end of the final turn of the challenge, the challenge card is then nullified and placed into the void, the perish still results in a Relic, and the player whose creature perished will draw another Mischief card as usual.
Any challenge card that results in a tie will be determined by a tie-breaker. In this case, each player must show one creature card from their hand. The person whose revealed creature has the highest health is determined to be the winner and that creature is sent to the void. All other players may place their revealed creatures back into their hands. If any player reveals no creature, it will result in an automatic loss for that player. In the event that both creatures have the same health, the winner is determined by which creature’s attack is higher. If both are the same, neither player is declared the winner, and the Challenge card is voided.
Malignants:
Some cards in the Mischief Deck contain Malignants (our version of a boss). If a Malignant is drawn, each player must take turns attacking that Malignant (starting with the player that drew the Malignant card). The same rules of gameplay for turns apply, except no player may attack another creature or have any effect on their opponent’s creatures until the Malignant reaches a health of 10 or lower. If a player is unable or chooses not to attack the Malignant on their turn, they do not void the normal 2 cards from hand when passing an attack but instead must deduct 5 health from their creature with the highest health on the field. If 2 or more creatures are tied for the highest health, they may pick which of those to deduct the 5 health from.
If a Malignant is at 10 health or lower at the start of a player’s turn, that player may attack both the Malignant and their opponent and must use the same creature for both attacks. Energy assist uses for these attacks are independent and using them on both attacks would require 2 energy uses. If a player chooses to pass on attacking the Malignant, they may not attack the opponent on that turn either and must still deduct 5 health from the creature with the highest health. Perishing an opponent’s creature(s) during a Malignant battle does not result in a Relic or a Mischief card pull. If a player loses 2 creatures during a Malignant battle on 2 separate turns (perishing 2 or 3 on the same turn only counts as 1), it is deemed an automatic loss and their opponent receives the Relic. Otherwise, the player or team that delivers the final blow to the Malignant earns a Relic card. At this point, the Malignant battle concludes and the winning player may not attack their opponent after, even if the Malignant was at or below 10 health at the start of their turn.
When a Malignant is defeated, no Mischief cards are drawn. The gameplay then resumes with the turn of the player or team that lost the Malignant battle.
Relics:
All Relics have conditions on them. These conditions are not affected by creature or energy assists. Relic conditions fall into 3 categories, which can be found in the upper-left corner of the card.
1. Your Choice – These Relics allow the player to choose if they want to apply that Relic’s condition each turn (when applicable).
2. No Choice – The conditions on these Relics must be followed on every applicable turn.
3. One-Time Use – The conditions on these Relics can be used only once on a turn of that player’s choice.
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