Fight Mechanic

During set-up the players remove the Jokers then shuffle the deck, and the Protagonist draws a hand of cards (in Transgender Deathmatch Legend a hand is 9 cards, you can change this number as you see fit). When a fight begins the Facilitator also draws a hand of cards. Then the rules of a fight are as follows.

Rules of a Fight

• Reveal the top card of the deck, this is the Trump Suit
• Starting player puts down a card matching the Trump Suit
• The opposing player must play another card in the same suit
• The move oracle explains what move is being attempted
• The oracle also explains any bonuses trump cards give
• The highest card wins, and claims both cards (the trick) in a winnings pile
• Describe how this situation plays out
• The winning player begins the next trick
• Players don’t draw back up during a fight
• If a player cannot match the Trump Suit they can play any card, but they are considered to have lost the trick and a new Trump Suit card is drawn
• If neither player can match the Trump Suit, the highest card played wins.
• The first fighter to claim a simple majority of tricks is the winner, describe how they finish the fight
• If the Protagonist defeats their opponent they move on from this hex, if the Protagonist was defeated they move directly to one of the Respawn Point hexes.

You can copy the rules of a fight wholesale or modify them. Some of our commentary on the mechanic offers ideas for changes.

(The rules of Transgender Deathmatch Legend were taken from our own one page game BLOOD//RUSH, where two players create and burn through various characters in a fighting tournament. In BLOOD//RUSH you play until all cards are gone, as the ratio of tricks won/lost affects the winning player's draw in the next fight. Given how TDL and other Fight Card games follow a central character, playing out all tricks no longer seemed fun and well paced enough so it was changed to a Best of X.)

Respawn Points and Other Ways of Losing

In Transgender Deathmatch Legend if the Protagonist loses a fight they move to Respawn Point. There are three on the map and each asks how the character got there. From there they go back out and can either take a different route or go back and fight the same enemy again.

Depending on what sort of map you use you may phrase that rule differently.

Alternatively you may find Respawn Points aren't the best way for dealing with lost fights in your game. TDL is a queer power fantasy so we weren't interested in losing a fight being a major setback. If you were interested in other failure options you could have parts of the map blocked off after a lost fight or impose a disadvantage of some kind on the Protagonist. You could have the fight replay immediately instead of moving the player on the map. In certain games it may even be appropriate to have someone create a new character if they want to proceed.

Optional Mechanic: Score Outcome

You might have the Protagonist check the final score and have an effect based on that. In Transgender Deathmatch Legend if it's a close fight (5 tricks won, 4 tricks lost) the Protagonist can reclaim some spent cards or discard weaker cards to draw back up. In BLOOD//RUSH (which used a different set up than Protagonist/Facilitator) the winning player has to discard trump's equal to the number of tricks lost, rewarding the losing player for a close fight. You could use either of those rules or any variations if you wanted the results of a fight to influence the Protagonist's hand.

If you were exploring an advancement system (see the later section on Multi-Session Play) or had the map feature restricted access (see the later section on Map Navigation) You might have either of those things influenced by the score of a fight.

You could also have the score a purely fictional factor, how it reflects the nature of the fight and how people respond to what happened.

Move Oracles

Here is the move oracle from Transgender Deathmatch Legend and the move oracle from BLOOD//RUSH. The trump mechanics are the same in both games but the theming is different, TDL based in pro wrestling move sets while BLOOD//RUSH is all about strikes. You are free to replicate and modify either oracle in your own Fight Card games.

Move Oracle

• Ace - Forearm Smash - Re-draw one card
• Two - Headlock- Start the next trick, even if you lose
• Three - Uppercut
• Four - Big Boot
• Five - Knee Strike - Exchange a card with the Trump Suit card
• Six - Lariat
• Seven - Dropkick
• Eight - Backbreaker
• Nine - Spinebuster - Exchange a card with your opponent
• Ten - Sleeper Hold
• Jack - Suplex - Draw a new Trump Suit card after this trick
• Queen - Neckbreaker - Opponent must play their highest card or a matching 2
• King - Slam

Move Oracle

• Ace - Jab - Re-draw one card
• Two - Hook - Start the next trick, even if you lose
• Three - Low Kick
• Four - Fast Elbow
• Five - Cross Punch - Exchange a card with the Trump Suit
• Six - Spinning Elbow
• Seven - Haymaker
• Eight - Uppercut
• Nine - Spinning Backfist - Exchange a card with your opponent
• Ten - High Knee
• Jack - Jumping Elbow - Draw a new Trump Suit after this trick
• Queen - Twisting Kick - Opponent must play their highest card or a matching 2
• King - Axe Kick

(An initial draft of the oracle in TDL had a greater amount of holds but we realised this started to make roleplaying a fight unapproachable unless you had a greater degree of wrestling knowledge. So we redrafted to mostly emphasise strikes and throws.)

(Could a Fight Card Game use the trick taking mechanic to represent something other than combat? It could focus on performances of some kind, plays in a game of sport or focus on a broader range of responses to a challenge. How would this affect the roleplaying element of the game?)

We'd recommend including an example of play so players can get a sense of how roleplaying out the trick taking game might work. We've included our Example of Play from BLOOD//RUSH here. You can't include it exactly in your own games but it might be useful inspiration.

Ahmed, the player leading the trick leading the trick, plays a Jack of Hearts, a jumping elbow matching the Trump Suit. Ahmed’s character is scrapmetal cyborg brawler called Jane Fury. Her opponent is a focused luchadora called La Hija del Gato. La Hija’s player, Suz, can’t beat a Jack so plays the 3 of Hearts, her lowest card matching the Trump Suit. They decide del Gato goes for a surprise Low Kick but Jane spots it, jumps over and immediately launches into the Jumping Elbow. They draw a new card for the Trump Suit.

Ahmed won so claims the trick and then starts the next trick by playing a 9 of Diamonds. Suz plays a King of Diamonds, meaning del Gato wins the trick. They describe how Jane Fury’s Spinning Backfist connects but La Hija del Gato turns her skin to iron, weathering the blow. Lightning strikes their conductive body and with a mighty electrified Axe Kick she brings Fury to the ground.

Ahmed narrates a small scene reflecting the trump effect of the 9 of Diamonds. Jane stomps the ground in pain. She makes intense eye contact with her opponents and both begin to cry ichor. Fury rises to her feet, having scanned del Gato’s mind. Ahmed and Suz exchange a card, Ahmed picks his while Suz draws at random.

Suit Use

In Transgender Deathmatch Legend the suit indicates two things. The Trump Suit (named the Weather Suit in TDL) controls the weather in a fight, extreme freak weather befitting the schlocky tone. The suit of any card played also adds an optional flavour that can modify a description of an attack.

We considered what else the Suits could represent in other hypothetical Fight Card Games. We thought it could signal a change in fighting style or tactics that is needed to succeed. We also thought you could have the Protagonist playing multiple characters fighting together (either a team working together or a plural character switching between fronters). In these instances what the current Trump Suit is doesn't have to correspond to anything in fiction, it can just be a determiner of success.

(In BLOOD//RUSH the suit doesn't correspond to much, and there's no reason you couldn't replicate that in your game.)

Alternate Trump Rule

While thinking of how else suits could be applied we did think of a different rules approach.

There is no overall trump suit. Instead whichever player leads the trick plays a card of any suit. The opposing player then plays a higher value in a specified different Suit.

• Hearts and Clubs Counter Each Other
• Diamonds and Spades Counter Each Other

Alternatively you could stipulate removing an entire suit before shuffling the deck and have three suits countering each other in a Rock-Paper-Scissors order.

Countering rather than matching a suit might better fit the theme and fiction of your Fight Card Game, though you'd likely need to fiddle around with trump card effects to best facilitate this.