How to build a deck.
Similar with other Bandai Card Games, a Gundam CG deck is built with 50 cards from up-to 2 different colours. A maximum of 4 copies for each card with the same ID to be included.
Since the game-play will proceed with the number of resources you have in your field so it is important to check the distribution of Level/Cost of Unit Cards that you put into your decks.
So, a Gundam Card Game Deck would include:
- 50 Cards (Unit, Pilot, Command, Base)
- 10 Resource Cards
- Token (Ex Resource) Cards.
Prepare the Game and Play (Basic Steps)
- Decide you go first or 2nd by Rock-Paper-Scissor.
Then shuffle your deck as usual, place your deck into deck area and Resource Cards into Resource Deck Area.
Draw 5 cards from top of your deck as a staring hand, if you don't like them, you can do mulligan once. (Since we need some lower cost cards to play in early turns so we better choose the hand with those cards.)
Next is to place 6 cards from top of your deck into SHIELD area, then place 1 Ex-Base to your BASE area. And the go-2nd player places a Ex-Resource card into their Resource area. (so at the 1st turn of the 2nd player, he has 2 Resource cards to play).
Now Play The Game:
The phases are: Start Phase -> Draw Phase -> Resource Phase -> Main Phase -> End Phase
- Start Phase: Set all cards active
- Draw Phase: Draw a card at top of your deck. The 1st turn of go-1st player also allow to draw a card.
- Resource Phase: Place a Resource card from your Resource deck into Resource area.
- Main Phase: Play cards.
Example of a Unit card, [GD01-015] Ball. Lv1/1 Cost.
In able to play this lv1, you need to have at least 1 Resource Card in your resource area. To pay the cost to summon this card into the field, you must rest 1 Resource card.
Another example, you can play an Aile Strike Gundam (Lv5 / 4 Cost) in your turn-5 if you are go-1st player or turn-4 if you are go-2nd player. Because at that turn, you should have at least 5 Resource cards in your Resource area. And again, you will need to pay 4 cost (rest 4 of your active Resource Cards) to summon (deploy) it.
But you may accumulate the Resource cards faster by using cards effects, so you can also deploy this card earlier than the turn that I mentioned in above sentence.
(Unit Card can't attack on the turn they are deployed, except for the case when they got to paired with their respected Pilot in that turn, it is called Link Unit, once paired, it gains "Rush". Example: Unit: Char's Zaku II and Pilot: Char Aznable)
Important: If you have 11 or more cards in your hand at the end of your turn, discard cards of your choosing until you have only 10 cards in your hand.
Any Pilot can pair with any Unit, and only 1 pilot may be paired with 1 Unit.
For the Ex-Resource card of go-2nd player, it will be removed from the board after it's used. This is quite interesting point, you can keep it with you through the game so you can increase 1 level of the card that are allowed to play, or you rest it to pay cost then remove it.
A Base Card can be deployed even when a Base is already in play. In that situation, the Base already in play is destroyed. Use Base cards effectively to improve your battle odds.
Winning and Losing the Game: 1. When either player receives battle damage from a Unit while they have no cards in their Shield Area, that player fulfils the condition for defeat. 2. When either player has no more cards in their deck, that player also fulfils the condition for defeat.