Slay the Spire: The Board Game

Welcome to Slay the Spire, a cooperative rogue-like deckbuilding adventure where you craft a unique deck, encounter bizarre creatures, discover powerful relics, and try to become strong enough to defeat the boss at the end of the Act! (p. 11)

Here is how to set up the game:

1. Pick a Character - Each player chooses a character and takes the corresponding player board, mini, starter deck, card rewards deck, and rare rewards deck, shuffling the decks (p. 21).
2. Set Up Board and Decks - Take out the token tray, place cubes on your player board for Energy (3), Block (0), and HP (max), set up the Act I board and map, and shuffle the required adventure decks (p. 21).
3. Reveal the Boss and Setup Combat - Place the randomly chosen Act I Boss face down on the map, set up the boot meeple, draw Neow's Blessing cards for starting rewards, and set up the 1st Encounter to start your first combat (p. 21, 22).

Combat rounds consist of a shared Player Turn followed by an Enemy Turn, repeating until combat ends (p. 12). During the Player Turn, all players take these steps simultaneously (p. 4):

• Start of Turn: Reset your Energy to 3 and Block to 0, draw 5 cards (shuffling your discard pile to form a new draw pile if needed), roll the die to determine monster actions and relic triggers for the round, and trigger any "Start of turn" or "Start of combat" abilities (p. 4, 20).
• Play: Players can play cards, use potions, activate abilities, and discuss strategy in any order they choose (p. 20). To play a card, pay its Energy cost, choose targets and make any necessary decisions, resolve its printed text effects from top to bottom, and then send it to your discard pile (or your play area if it is a Power) (p. 12, 20).
• End of Turn: Trigger any "End of turn" abilities in any order you choose, and then discard all cards remaining in your hand (p. 12).

Following the Player Turn, the Enemy Turn takes place across three phases:

1. Remove Enemy Block - Enemies lose all of their leftover Block tokens (p. 6).
2. Enemy Actions - Starting with the highest row, enemies act from left to right taking one action each, targeting the player in their row (or all players for area attacks) (p. 6, 15).
3. Move Cube Actions - Slide enemy cubes down their tracks according to their behavior patterns (p. 6).

Outside of combat, players move their meeple up the map along chosen paths to encounter Elites, Bosses, standard Encounters, Events, Campfires, Treasures, and Merchants (p. 9, 26).

The game ends based on the following conditions:

• Victory: If players defeat the final Boss of an Act, they win that Act (p. 7). If at least one player survives the final Act, they win the game (p. 13).
• Death: When a character's HP is reduced to 0, they are dead; if a player dies, the party immediately loses the game and must start over from the beginning (p. 6, 7, 11).