The battlefield. You see the fight from behind your party, elevated. Enemies start far away (top of the field) and advance. Fighters hold the front; your Ranger and Mage strike from range behind them.

1. Move (free). Click a hero (token or panel), then click a highlighted green hex — up to 3 hexes, once per round. Where you stand matters: melee needs adjacency, bows reach 6 hexes, spells 5. Attacks from behind get a flank bonus — watch your facing (the golden arrow), and theirs.

2. Skills (free, 1 per hero). The buttons on each hero panel. Skills roll real dice — Slash is 1d8 + STR + weapon — and every roll appears in the combat log. Some skills have cooldowns.

3. Cards (cost Energy). Party powers played on top: bursts, blocks, buffs, poisons. 3 Energy per turn. Cards ignore range — they're heroics, not footwork.

4. Your hand is like poker. Draw 5 at combat start, keep unplayed cards, draw 2 each round (hand limit 8). Played cards go to the discard, which reshuffles when the draw pile empties. Exhaust cards are gone after one use.

5. End Turn. Enemies advance and act (intent is telegraphed above their heads — "advancing" means they can't reach you yet). Then a new round: skills refresh, +3 energy, draw 2. Beware: some battles have a second wave.

The dungeon floor. Between fights you explore a top-down map. Walk your party (◈) into a lit room to enter it — cleared rooms sit behind you, the way ahead is fogged, and only the final goal (👑 boss / 🌤 way out) shows through the dark. Some rooms you can read on sight — 💀 elites, 🪙 merchants, 🔥 camps — but a ❓ room hides its contents until you step in, and some spring an ambush. The room you enter is the room you'll fight in.

The room & cover. Every fight has a shape — an open chamber, a rounded cavern, a choke corridor, a pillared hall — and terrain: boulders and pillars you can't walk or shoot through. Put stone between your Mage and an archer and they can't be targeted at all (🛡 out of sight); stand just beside cover and ranged hits land for less (🌿 partial cover). Melee is never blocked by cover — but walls force everyone to funnel, so hold the choke. The mini-map (upper-left) names the room you're in.

Attacks of opportunity. Breaking away from a melee fighter gives them a free strike — on both sides. Park your Warrior in their path; don't stroll your Mage past an orc.

Fluid mode (⚙ settings). An experimental real-time mode: every phase (~2s, adjustable) all units act on their own — your heroes follow their class instincts (fighters tank, casters kite) and you steer the battle by playing cards and calling skills between phases. Pause anytime.

Keyboard controls (toggle in ⚙ Settings). 1–5 select a hero (the 5th key selects an optional henchman when one is fielded), arrow keys step them one hex at a time (each step spends 1 of 3 move points), Q/W/E/R fire the selected hero's skills 1–4, Z X C V B N M , play hand cards 1–8 (each card keeps its key all turn). A skill or card with exactly one legal target fires instantly; with 2+ it arms aiming — Tab/arrows cycle the highlighted target, Enter (or the card's own key) fires at the highlighted one, Esc cancels. Digits 1–5 are party-only: aiming at a party member, a digit picks that hero directly (same numbering as hero-select); aiming at an enemy, digits do nothing — use Tab/arrows or a click. Space/Enter ends the turn, A auto-plays. The mouse always works too.

The Bestiary (📕 in the Hall) catalogues every foe you've bested — beat one in combat to unlock its stats, actions, and traits. Rumor speaks of foes no dungeon map lists.

Camps & upgrades. At a 🔥 Camp choose ONE: Rest (heal 30%), Train (permanently upgrade a card — gold glow, "+" name), or Feast (pay gold: heal AND +5 max HP). The merchant also sharpens cards for a price. A guaranteed camp sits right before the boss.

Death is forever. A fallen hero's tagged cards burn with them, the party Rallies (+25% damage, 3 turns), their deeds go in the Book of Heroes, and a new recruit awaits at the Tavern.