The players distribute their duel stones onto the nine spaces on the board during the first stage of the game. Each player may have only one stone on each space. Stones with the same value may not be placed on the same space. The bison player begins by placing one of his duel stones on one of the nine spaces. Then the wolf player places two of his duel stones.
Placement then alternates with each player placing two stones.
The wolf player will only place one stone on the last turn of placement. Now every space should contain two stones, one stone from each player. First the location of the duel must be determined. Each player chooses one of his three mask cards and plays it face down. Then both masks are revealed simultaneously.