Suit Powers
| Pyramid {{solo ? "(Zombie)" : ""}} power | Suit | Territory power | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| {{summaries[index].pyramid[0]}} ({{summaries[index].pyramid[4]}}) {{summaries[index].pyramid[1]}} | {{summaries[index].pyramid[3][0]}}{{summaries[index].pyramid[3][1]}}{{summaries[index].pyramid[3][2]}} | {{summaries[index].card[0]}} {{summaries[index].card[1]}} |
In most cases, your pyramid must be pointing directly at an orthogonally adjacent pyramid or card to affect it. To affect its own card or other pyramids on the same card, a pyramid must be standing upright.
Zombies sense/orient towards the closest human pyramids, or the Excuse. Zombies only collide with zombies from other hordes; they will not push humans away. Zombies can mutate any other zombie but prefer to mutate their own.
There is a population limit of 3 pyramids per territory, which may only be violated while in motion or by special rules.
You may not reorient your own target pyramid after an action.{{solo ? " Zombie targets do sense after same-horde actions." : ""}}
You may create a pyramid in a wasteland.
You may take negative actions against your own pyramids or territory.
The difference between the orient suit power and the orient action is the ability to orient multiple and/or enemy pyramids.
The difference between exchanging with the deck and the draw action is the ability to discard cards first, and (usually) the number of cards drawn (not to mention the option of exchanging cards with another player). Cards are drawn at random.
The difference between moving and pushing a target pyramid is the direction of motion; moving is in the direction the target is pointing, but pushing is in the direction the minion is pointing. Also, you may push a pyramid into the void but not move it there. If not upright, a minion can push itself; this is equivalent to a move. An upright minion can push a pointed target; this moves the target away from the card in the direction it is pointing.
A pyramid can move or be pushed across a void.
When a pyramid grows or shrinks, the previous size is returned to the player. If the new size isn't available, the action cannot be taken. Shrinking (from one pip) to zero is allowed; the pyramid is returned to the player.
When a territory is improved or downgraded, the previous card is discarded. You may downgrade a Location to an Ace or destroy it; downgrading an Ace always destroys it. Destroyed cards are also discarded. A pyramid left floating in the void is returned to the player.
If moving, picking up, or destroying a card would disconnect the board, the action is still allowed; the isolated card(s) remain on the board.
It is permitted to improve or downgrade the Excuse. (See the Arcana for more details.)
You may omit some powers when using a Personality with multiple powers, but any restrictions on the order of using its suit powers still apply.
Generally speaking, you cannot do anything to a territory if there are any enemy pyramids on it. Your own pyramids remain in place when you move or remove a card from under them. If they are then in the void, they are returned to your supply.
Terms
The Decktet
Decktet cards have zero or more of six suits: {{suit}}.
The suits always appear in that same suit order from top to bottom on the cards; the order matters in this game.
Aces and Crowns have one suit, rank cards have two suits, and Pawns and Crowns have three suits each. The Excuse has no suit, and is a sort of Decktet joker.
The card distribution of one deck is six Aces, three cards each of ranks 2–9, six Crowns, four Pawns, four Courts, and one Excuse (45 cards total).
Cards have zero, one or (rarely) two out of the three types: Location (,), Event (.) or Personality. Aces and the Excuse do not have a type. While the type is usually clear from the name of the card, there are also small type symbols on the cards and card lists available to guide you in this regard.
The Decktet comes in two versions, classic and Capital. They differ only in the names of the cards; you can choose which names you want to see, if any, in the card lists below.
Zarcana-type Games
Looney pyramids come in three sizes, small, medium, and large, which are marked with one, two, or three pips, respectively. They are pointy, and can be stood upright. (They can also be stacked, but stacking is not used in Zarcana-type games.) A trio is a set of three pyramids, one of each size.
A space is any place on the board where cards and pyramids may be placed. Spaces are adjacent if they share an orthogonal side with each other. Spaces are never adjacent diagonally.
A territory is a space that contains a card. An occupied territory has pyramids on it, and a controlled territory has only one color of pyramids on it. A non-enemy territory is either unoccupied (empty) or controlled by the player concerned.
A wasteland space is a space that is not a territory, but is adjacent to one.
The void is any space beyond the wasteland, a space that is adjacent only to wasteland spaces. Pyramids and cards cannot be played here, and any pyramid located in the void is destroyed. However, pyramids may travel through the void to a wasteland or territory beyond it.
When a pyramid is destroyed, it is returned to the player for reuse.
A pyramid on the board may point in any of the four cardinal directions (that is, parallel or perpendicular to the cards), or they may point straight up. To orient a piece is to change its direction to another legal direction. A pyramid pointed in one of the four cardinal directions is pointing at the nearest adjacent space in that direction, whether wasteland or territory, and at any pyramids in that space. It also targets itself. An upright pyramid is pointing at the current space, itself, and any pyramids sharing that space.
A player's minion is one of their pyramids on the board that is eligible to take an action.
Rules
{{solo ? "Zombie " : ""}}Darcana is a game for {{solo ? "one or two players and two to six zombie hordes" : "2–6 players"}}. The goal is to control {{solo ? "the center of the board" : "nine points worth of territory through a final round"}}.
Darcana is a reimplementation of Dectana intended to be more like Gnostica. If you're familiar with Dectana or other Zarcana-like games, click here to read about the differences:
The suit powers in Darcana are similar to those of Dectana, except that Knots and Moons are more like one another than themselves. This change was made on account of the importance of suit order in Darcana.
Card type (Location, Event, Personality, or none) is significant in Darcana (beyond their point value), but not in Dectana.
The available suit powers vary by card type in Darcana; they are not always a choice of any single suit off the card as they are in Dectana.
Cards in Darcana are worth 0 to 3 points depending on type, rather than their rank value as in Dectana. The game ends by declaration of sufficient points as in Gnostica, not with a special discard as in Dectana.
Orientation rules are generally as in Gnostica, not as in Dectana or Zarcana somewhat more restrictive than in other Zarcana-like games, because orientation is now a card power.
The previous territory card is discarded after growing or shrinking as in Gnostica, not stacked as in Dectana and Zarcana.
Darcana has a smaller hand limit (4) than Dectana or Gnostica (6).
Darcana has a Doppleganger, as in Zarcana, but you may omit it for a less chaotic game.
Setup
{{solo ? "Zombie " : ""}}Darcana requires a Decktet per {{solo ? "human player or per three zombie hordes" : "three players"}}, plus four trios of Looney Pyramids per player {{solo ? "or zombie" : ""}} color.
To begin, remove The Excuse(s) from the deck(s) and place one {{solo ? "per human player" : ""}} in the center of the playing area. Shuffle the rest of the deck, deal three cards to each {{solo ? "human" : ""}} player, and deal four {{solo ? "or seven" : ""}} more cards face-up adjacent to the four sides of {{solo ? "each" : "the"}} Excuse. It is traditional to lay these out t-boned, with the short sides against the long sides:
For more players, deal a larger initial board, filling in two corners for three or four players, and all corners for five or six players:
or 
or 
Choose a start player by a means that seems fair to you; for example, the least experienced Darcana player, or through a complicated Gnostica-style auction.
Place the zombie hordes in the void to the north, south, east, and/or west of the Excuse. If using only two hordes, they should be staged opposite each other. If using two Excuses, use an even number of hordes divided evenly between the two.
Zombie Rules
A human goes first. Zombie horde and human turns alternate (e.g., human, horde 1, human, horde 2, human, horde 1, etc.). If necessary, use a turn marker to keep track of which horde is ravening next.
Zombie hordes do not have hands; they draw from the deck in certain cases but discard immediately.
Zombie construction and movement is always towards the Excuse or clusters of human player pyramids, as far as is inhumanly possible. In particular, a move that would take a zombie pyramid off of the Excuse but not onto a human-occupied territory does not count as a possible move for the zombies.
Zombie hordes prefer to remain confined to their own regions (though they may be pushed out by humans or other zombie hordes). Imagine the board divided up by lines separating north and south, or north, south, east, and west, or something similar plus a line dividing the two excuses, depending on your setup and number of hordes. Any wasteland space or territory on these imaginary lines is fair game for two hordes, but otherwise they should stick to their regions.
{{solo ? "Human " : ""}}Actions
On each turn, the {{solo? "human" : "current"}} player takes one action, invoking one of your pyramids on the board. If you have no pyramids there (most notably, on your first turn), you must place one small pyramid on any empty territory or wasteland space. Otherwise, choose one of the following actions:
- Activate a card on the board that you occupy, using the pyramid or territory power of a (permitted) suit of the card in combination with your pyramid on that card.
- Apply the pyramid or territory power of a (permitted) suit of a card from your hand, in combination with a pyramid of your choice on the board, then discard the card.
- Draw up to the hand limit.
- Orient one of your pyramids.
You may also pass.
Some cards allow you to repeat action 1 or 2 with another suit on the card, in which case you may select a different minion on the same card or (for action 2 only) one on a different card.
After your action, discard down to the hand limit (4 cards).
Zombie Actions
Zombies only take pyramid actions; they do not alter extisting territories in any way. Zombies can activate cards on the board that they occupy, or apply suits from a drawn card to a pyramid on the board.
The foremost pyramid of a horde is the one closest to their Excuse; if there's more than one, it is the biggest one of those. If a condition is required, such as pointing at a human's pyramid for a Shrink action (which in the zombies' case is called Eat), then it is the closest, biggest pyramid that does so.
The zombie order of suit/action preference is:
{{zsuit.name}}
The horde takes the first of the following actions that it can, but no more. If it cannot take an action, it passes.
- If this horde has no pyramids on the board, it draws a card and places the card and a small pyramid in the wasteland space closest to the Excuse but still within the horde's region (most notably, on their first turn). This is the only way that zombies create territory.
- If this horde has a pyramid on the board that can Eat, Shamble or Spawn by using a suit on its current territory, the foremost such pyramid does so.
- Otherwise, the current zombie horde draws a card and takes a pyramid action available from that card. If there is a choice and the horde can do more than one of the actions, it chooses according to the zombie order of suit preferences.
- If the horde cannot take an action with the card, then the foremost zombie pyramid that can Sense (that is, reorient to a more desireable target) does so. Even if it cannot, the turn ends.
Zombies may take multiple actions with a Personality card, but they do not take any special Personality actions.
If there is an ambiguity or tie when taking a zombie action, the zombie horde prefers to be closer to a larger group of pyramids, or, if it's still ambiguous, larger pip counts, or the Excuse, or if it's still ambiguous, higher valued cards (because they attract a tastier class of humans). The same applies to orienting (Sensing) zombies, except that in cases of doubt, zombies tend to flock and orient in the same direction as already-oriented zombies.
Endgame
The game ends after at least one shuffle, when a human player controls an Excuse, and all his pyramids on the board are on spaces orthogonally or diagonally adjacent to that Excuse, with none of his pyramids stranded outside of this safe area and no zombies in the safe area. For a two-player game, you need not save both Excuses nor any of the other player's pyramids.
Announce it if you control nine points worth of territory. You hold the Garnet Crown. (Multiple players can hold the Garnet Crown at once.)
The game ends when a holder of the Garnet Crown retains 9 points of territory at the end of his next turn. The tiebreaker is number of pyramids (or failing that, pips) on the board.
There is no penalty for failing to announce one's possession of the Garnet Crown (you can still win by holding it unannounced), nor for losing it (the game merely continues).
Variants
For an introductory game, omit the special Personality rules and treat the Excuse like an unsuited Ace (instead of a doppleganger).
For less potential chaos, remove any Personalities dealt into the initial board. Don't discard them; place them at the bottom of the deck.
In a pinch, you can play with only three trios per player{{solo ? " or zombie horde" : ""}}.
For a shorter game, play to 7 points instead of 9.
You can add one card to the base layout per each extra player above 2, rather than using the symmetric setups shown above.
For a distribution more like a Tarot deck, use a double Decktet but remove four Events and six Personalities at random. Don't remove Events that are also Locations (
{{card.rank}}
{{ renderName(card.name, card.cname, classic, capital) }}).
Arcana
- Aces are worth zero points. They may still be Created or used for their suit power. When Growing them, they must be replaced by a Location.
- Locations are worth one point, unless they are also Events. Locations use only their top suit power(s), never the bottom one, and use only one suit power regardless of the number of suits present.
- Events are worth two points. Events may use any of their suit powers, but like Locations they use only one suit regardless of the number of suits present.
- Personalities are worth three points. Personalities may use all of their suit powers, but only in suit order, unless otherwise indicated by a special Personality power.
Crowns that are Personalities ( {{card.rank}}
{{ renderName(card.name, card.cname, classic, capital) }}) may use their single suit power twice.
- The Excuse functions like the Doppleganger in Zarcana, taking on the powers of the top card on the discard pile (whether it is still on the board or is played from a player's hand). Before there is a discard pile, this card has no suits, no powers, and no point value. (This can also occur after shuffling.) It is worth whatever the top card on the discard pile is worth. Improvements or reductions to the Excuse are governed by its current value; when (re)building an Excuse, it is also governed by the current value of the top card on the discard pile. If the discard pile is empty, the Excuse is worth zero points and may be built or improved like an Ace.
Crowns that are Events ( {{card.rank}}
Special Personality Rules
You may opt to use any Personality normally (as if taking a card activation action per suit), even when playing with the special rules.
When a Personality is played from your hand, you may divide the individual suit powers between several pyramids on the board. When the Personality is a territory, you may divide them between your pyramids on that card. In addition, any of your own pyramids affected by previous suit actions may use the remaining suit powers. For example, if a pyramid moves away from the Personality territory, or a friendly pyramid is pushed away, it may use the remaining suit powers from its new location.
{{person.rank}}
{{ renderName(person.name,person.cname,classic,capital) }}: {{person.rule}}
Credits
via Zarcana's reimplementation as Gnostica by John Cooper, Jacob Davenport, Kory Heath, and Kristin Matherly, and of Dectana, a 2–5 player Zarcana-type game for the Decktet by Ryan Hackel; full rules are available at his site. The suit images shown here are from cards released under a Creative Commons License by P.D. Magnus. Some diagrams were made using the Decktet diagram kit by Daniel Wilcox. The background texture is "Skulls" by Adam, from Subtle Patterns.