MARS IS UNDER ATTACK. THE RESEARCH STATION IS MOSTLY INSURED.

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BLACKSTAR BUREAU // MOBILE LINKFIELD COMPANION

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THE OLD WORLD, KEPT ON REEL

PICTURE REELS: 05; NASA / LOCAL CACHE
AUDIO PROGRAMMES: 02; MUSIC + STORY
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MARS 2020 · 15 SECOND LOOP PERSEVERANCE PARACHUTE DEPLOYMENT NASA/JPL-CALTECH · LOCAL CACHE

AUDIO PROGRAMME 1812 OVERTURE READY.

MUSIC

STORIES

VOLUME 58

HOW TO PLAY

DEVELOPMENT RULES REFERENCE

This is a complete mechanic checklist for the current Base Command build. It is intentionally dense so rules can be checked while cards, enemies, missions, and UI are still changing.

Objective

Defend the Martian base until the mission attacker queue is exhausted and all attackers on the board are destroyed.
You lose if base health reaches 0.
You win when no attackers remain in the mission queue or on the board.
Final score is awarded only once, when victory is confirmed.

Board Geometry

The battle board is an 8 by 8 tactical grid.
The central 2 by 2 cells form the command base.
Range is distance to the base: range 1 is closest, range 3 is the farthest active approach.
A sector is one approach side around the base; tutorial copy may call this a lane.
A segment is one 4 × 4 board quarter: NW, NE, SE, or SW. Base and blocked cells are excluded from effects.
Each cell can hold one enemy miniature at a time.
The base has four shield quadrants, one for each defended side.

Turn Flow

Play any number of available unit, support, or fieldwork cards, or fire the cannon if it is charged.
Use discard points to swap unwanted cards immediately.
End the turn when finished.
Enemy statuses tick, then enemies advance unless frozen or incapacitated.
Breaching enemies hit the shield or base, then are consumed.
New enemies spawn unless spawn is skipped.
The cannon gains 1 charge step, temporary turn statuses expire, spent hand slots refill, and discard points increase.

Enemy Movement

Most enemies advance 1 cell toward the nearest base square per enemy phase.
Fast enemies can cross multiple cells in one activation.
Incapacitated enemies skip one activation instead of moving.
Frozen turns stop enemy movement for the whole enemy phase.
Some enemies can replicate or use future lane and trap rules.

Base Shields

The base has 4 shield quadrants, one for each central base square.
A normal shield blocks one breaching attacker, damages that attacker for 1, and is consumed.
An overcharged shield blocks one breaching attacker, damages it for 2, remains active, then loses overcharge on the next turn tick.
If that quadrant's shield is already down, a breach damages base health instead.
Shield repair cards restore destroyed shields before overcharging active shields.

Base Health

The base starts with 10 health.
Unshielded breaches deal damage equal to half the attacking enemy's remaining health, rounded down.
An attacker reduced to 1 health breaches for 0 damage and is still removed.
Base health does not regenerate automatically.
Support cards can repair base health directly or repair shields first, depending on the card.

Central Cannon

The cannon charges over held turns: power 1, then 3, then 5.
Firing empties the cannon to 0; it begins recharging at end of turn.
The cannon can target enemies at range 1 through 3.
Burning Barricades block cannon fire against ground attackers, but not aircraft.
DOUBLE THE FALL doubles the next cannon shot once.

Hand And Cards

The hand has 3 unit slots and 3 support slots; fieldworks live in up to 2 board-tool bays.
Held cards persist across turns.
Only played or discarded unit/support slots refill at end of turn.
Board-tool bays do not refill like hand cards: one fieldwork is available by default, while Efficient Logistics opens a second bay; persistent fieldworks remain until triggered, destroyed, demolished, or the level ends.
Discard points start at 1, increase by 1 each turn, and cap at 2.
Discarding swaps that slot immediately for a new card of the same rail type.

Unit Cards

Unit cards are persistent card instances with current HP, max HP, rank, stats, perks, shields, range, and attached upgrades.
Playing a unit card targets one reachable enemy and resolves an engagement.
Unit cards are spent after attacking and refill later like other spent slots.
Unit cards start at Rank 1 and can advance through Rank 4 after kills or a rank-up support effect, applying the next stat profile.
Surviving upgraded units keep their attached upgrades while the card remains in hand.
Defeated units keep current implementation state unless a specific effect changes recovery or refill behavior.

Engagement Stats

Attack is the number of blows a combatant can make.
Firepower is base damage per blow.
Evasion reduces incoming hit damage.
Health is the amount of damage a combatant can take.
Damage per normal blow is firepower minus target evasion, floored at 0.

Engagement Resolution

The attacking unit swings first each exchange.
The defender retaliates if still alive and able to attack.
Combat stops when either combatant reaches 0 HP or all blows are spent.
Misses deal 0 damage.
Critical hits add bonus damage and ignore evasion.
Unit shields and temporary HP absorb damage before unit HP.

Ranges And Targeting

Each unit card lists the enemy ranges it can attack.
Global range effects let all units attack anywhere for their duration.
Support cards can target a single enemy, a segment, a range band, the full board, or a unit card in hand.
Invalid targets are rejected without spending the card.

Terrain And Line Of Fire

Terrain Works constructs a Burning Barricade on one legal cell, or demolishes one existing destructible barricade.
You may complete 1 terrain action per turn and have at most 3 player-built barricades active.
Terrain cannot be constructed on the base, reinforcement cells, permanently blocked cells, objectives, deployment cells, or underneath an attacker.
Movement and direct fire use the same 8-direction path toward the closest base cell, including diagonal steps.
Barricades block ground movement and direct ground-to-ground unit or cannon fire. Area, segment, range, orbital, splash, and status effects ignore terrain.
Aircraft ignore terrain for movement. Attacks to or from aircraft also ignore terrain.
A ground enemy whose next path cell is blocked must bash the barricade: the terrain is destroyed, the enemy takes 2 damage, does not move, and ends its activation.
Enemies never walk around terrain. Placing a barricade directly in an enemy's next path is legal.

Support Effects

Attack supports deal damage, poison, strip shields, strip perks, incapacitate, push, or execute enemies.
Base supports repair health, repair shields, overcharge shields, skip spawns, or modify cannon behavior.
Doctrine cards are passive perks. They are not support, unit, or fieldwork cards, and they cannot be lost once unlocked or assigned.
Fieldwork cards are their own card family. They arm sentries, mines, watchmen, or exact-cell terrain works; persistent fieldworks stay played until triggered, destroyed, demolished, or the level ends.
Upgrade supports attach stats, perks, shields, range, ranks, and special engagement hooks to unit cards.
Discovery supports inspect support-card options and replace the spent source card with the selected card.

Statuses

Poison deals damage during enemy-phase status resolution and then counts down.
Incapacitation consumes enemy activations until expired.
Temporary unit HP lasts until the next engagement damage calculation.
Overcharged shields expire during turn-status ticking.
Global range effects count down after the enemy phase.

Perks And Hooks

First Strike delays the defender's first blow unless both sides have it.
Heavy Weapons ignores evasion on the first blow.
Protection cancels the first incoming damage instance.
Squad Leader, Fury, Behemoth, Overload, Ion Weapon, Luck, and special hero hooks are represented through shared perk and upgrade paths.
Some unit upgrades trigger on deploy, pre-engagement, post-engagement, death, or victory.

Attacker Types

Attacker types are data records with stats, HP, movement, tags, sprite/model data, and optional special behavior.
BLACK-STAR INITIATES are the baseline attacker.
Killer Krabs are fragile replicators.
Ridge Skimmers move faster than normal.
Twinfin Darts are aircraft with high evasion and firepower.

Deck Building

The full catalogue contains deckable combat cards plus mission-defined siege unit cards.
A custom loadout has a separate eight-card Unit Roster and sixteen-card Support Deck. Two different fieldworks, one doctrine, and one base weapon sit outside those 24 combat cards.
The two fieldworks form a random sealed-crate kit. A base has one receiving bay by default; Efficient Logistics opens a second bay.
Each card has its own deck limit.
Only one hero card may be selected in a custom deck.
Mission deck policy can allow custom decks, use the starter template, or supply a fixed mission deck.

Scoring

Gain 10 points per enemy health removed.
Gain 50 points per destroyed enemy.
Each destroyed enemy raises the multiplier one level until the x5 ceiling.
A destroyed friendly unit drops the multiplier by one full level.
On victory, gain 200 points per base-health point remaining.
On victory, gain 300 points per active shield remaining.
On victory, gain 150 points per turn under mission par.
Campaign grades establish a lifetime payout for each level: 1 star pays 500 credits, 2 stars 750, 3 stars 1,000, and a flawless score 1,500. Replays pay only the improvement over the previous best.
Buying Unit ranks, extra deck slots, or other optional services diverts credits from card acquisition; those choices intentionally lower the collection percentage supported by campaign earnings.

Current Dev Caveats

Friendly units currently persist as card instances rather than standing on the board.
Unit-card rank, HP, and upgrade persistence are live; compact rank/perk icon polish remains.
Custom decks are browsable, editable, persisted, and used in battle when valid.
Enemy hero AI, sector-changing enemies, concealment spawns, and some advanced enemy perks are future work.
This screen is a mechanics reference for development, not final player onboarding.

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