Rulebook

*See also: Errata and changes, Glossary*

This information was retrieved from the Wayback Machine's archive of eve-ccg.com.

## Introduction & Background

The world of EVE is the world of the future – our future! As the game begins, mankind has spent millennia going through a vicious cycle of destruction and success. It has led to millions of settlers being cut away from civilization and stranded in a galaxy, far away from planet Earth – its history now faded in the mists of time. In this new world, five distinct human races have emerged as the primary contestants for power. These are the Amarr, Minmatar, Gallente and Caldari races which are playable in this Core Set, and the fifth are the mysterious Jovians.

Each race relies on the success of progressive corporations to increase their overall influence in the galaxy. A corporation’s natural affinity for garnering wealth and power, and its single-mindedness when it comes to reaching goals, make it the most efficient tool when struggling for power. And some would even say they are the most efficient tool to govern...

### Your Role

You are a CEO of an aspiring corporation. As the game begins you control a single starbase, a steady income and you have access to a market from which you can buy whatever is in supply. The ace up your sleeve is the secret knowledge of valuable outer regions which can yield the fortune you need to build up your corporate empire and defeat the opposition.

Your weapons are absolute power over your employees and other corporate assets. Plan the progress of your corporation well by constructing your deck of cards carefully. Rest assured that your opponents – the CEOs of rival corporations – have their strategy planned. In EVE, business is war, and the only thing that matters is winning.

### The Game Concept

You must produce a steady income by claiming outer regions of space and harvesting their rich resources. Enhance your starbase and defend it from incoming threats. Build a fleet of spaceships and send them on missions to reduce your opponents’ income, steal their resources, destroy their ships and ultimately destroy their starbases.

### Victory Conditions

If all your opponents’ starbases have been destroyed, or if you have met an alternative victory condition, you win the game. If you are supposed to draw a card when none are left in your deck, you lose the game.

### THE MOTHER OF ALL RULES!

**If the rules text on a card contradicts these game rules, the rules on the card take precedence.**

## Game Flow

Each turn consists of a number of phases. Players alternate playing through each of the phases during their turns. All phases during a turn must be finished before the next player can start his turn. The turn sequence below lists all the phases. For your convenience, the phases are also listed on every starbase.

### Setup phase

#### **Duration Step**

Your news cards that have Duration I, II, III or IV are physically rotated clockwise so that the next duration tab is turned upwards. When the countdown expires, the news is destroyed. News that have Duration ∞ are not rotated and stay in play.

#### **Assembly Step**

Your ships that have Assembly I, II, III or IV are physically rotated clockwise so that the next assembly tab is turned upwards. When the countdown expires, the ship is fully assembled in your dock and ready to be deployed. Ships with no assembly tabs come into play fully assembled.

#### **Income Step**

Add together the total ISK income of all cards you control and collect that amount of ISK from the bank.

#### *Example Setup Phase:*

***Duration Step >** Elysha has a Stubborn Mechanic (news) in play. It has Duration IV, but is currently at Duration I. This means that its duration has expired, and should be placed on the scrapheap. The card’s ability immediately stops being in effect.*

***Assembly Step >** During her last turn, Elysha played Omen (ship). She now rotates her Omen from Assembly II to Assembly I, meaning that her ship is only one more round from being ready. During Elysha’s next assembly step, her Omen is fully assembled and docked.*

***Income Step >** After adding together the 2 ISK Elysha gains from her starbase, 1 ISK from Veldspar (location), and 1 ISK from controlling Metropolis (outer region), Elysha collects 4 ISK from the bank.*

**Important:** At the beginning of your turn, you may opt to forfeit all ISK gained during your income step this turn to draw a card instead.

### Draw Phase

Draw one card from the top of your market. In a two player game, the player who goes first must forfeit his or her draw phase in the first turn. In a multiplayer game, ignore that rule. If you are supposed to draw a card when none are left in your market, you lose the game. This is the only phase in which players cannot play any news cards or use any abilities.

### Management Phase

During your management phase, you may do any or all of the following as many times as you want, and in any order:

#### **Play a card from your hand**

Pay the card’s price and put it into play. Locations can only be played if there is a region currently in play that you can play them in. Ships come docked into play, and await assembly if needed. News cards that require one or more targets can only be played if there is a legal target in play. Starbase structures come into play attached to your starbase.

#### **Play an outer region**

Pay the outer region’s price and put it into play. You can only play an outer region if there is no other copy of that outer region already in play.

#### **Upgrade your starbase**

Pay the upgrade price and flip over your starbase.

#### **Dock or undock a ship**

Move a ship from dock to your home region or from your home region to dock.

#### **Warp a ship**

Deactivate a ship’s command and move it from one region to another. If you warp a ship into an enemy controlled region, your ship has attacked that region and cannot execute any of its abilities, activate any of its commands, or warp again during this management phase.

#### **Activate a ship’s command**

Rotate a ship so that the tab of the desired command is turned upwards. Ships that are docked or attacking cannot activate their commands. The ship gains the corresponding ability that is described on the card until the command is deactivated (if the command power changes, change all references of that number in the ability accordingly). When you warp a ship or wish to switch its commands, you must deactivate its current command. A command can stay active through multiple turns if not deactivated.

#### *Example Management Phase:*

*Elysha plays a Velator (ship) for 1 ISK. Since the Velator does not need to be assembled, it comes into play ready and docked.*
*Then she spends 5 ISK to play Veteran’s Premature Retirement (news), which sends an enemy Kestrel (ship), that was previously guarding Moon of Ndoria (outer region), to its owner’s hand.*

*Since the Kestrel was the last ship in that region, it is now uncontrolled. Elysha can fearlessly undock the Velator, warp it to Moon of Ndoria, and claim it.*

**Important:** If you have not warped your ships into any enemy regions when your management phase is over, you have made no attacks, and there is no battle phase. Proceed directly to the end phase.

### Battle Phase

If you attacked one or more enemy regions by warping your ships to them during your management phase, all attacks must be resolved with a series of battle phases before the end phase can begin. All attacks must be resolved separately, region by region, and one at a time. The attacker chooses which attack is resolved first. When it is done, he continues on to the next attack until they have all been resolved. All attacks on home regions must be resolved before resolving attacks on outer regions. It can take multiple battle phases to solve a single attack!

A battle phase consists of five steps. The attacker must decide first, before the defender, what to do when two actions need to be decided simultaneously (such as whether to withdraw ships or what targets to choose):

#### **Begin Battle Step**

(I) Resolve all effects that are played at the beginning of a battle phase.

#### **Withdraw Step**

(II) Players may withdraw any number of their ships to their dock or to any regions that do not have enemy ships in them.

#### **Target Step**

(III) Players designate targets for each of their ships (the attacker goes first and announces targets for all his ships before the defending player announces targets for his ships). You may choose not to target anything with a ship, in which case the ship deals no damage during the damage dealing step.

#### **Damage Dealing Step**

(IV) All ships deal damage simultaneously to their designated targets. If a ship receives damage that is equal to or greater than its shield, the ship is destroyed and placed on its owner’s scrapheap.

#### **Result Step**

(V) When attacking a home region, all attacking ships that are still in the region now deal their damage to the starbase, even though they have already dealt damage to defending ships. If the damage is equal to or greater than the total starbase shield, the starbase is destroyed and its owner has lost the game.

The outcome of steps I, II, III and IV decides what happens next:

a) If at least one defending ship has left the battle during this battle phase, start a new battle phase. If this was the last defending ship, the attacker still starts a new battle phase in this region and may use it to withdraw.

b) If all the defending ships survived this battle phase, the attacking ships must immediately withdraw.

**Important:** All shields are fully recharged at the end of each phase - damage does not carry over from one battle phase to the next.

#### *Example Attack:*

*Elysha has a Heron (ship) and a Kestral (ship) with an active ambush command defending Stain (outer region). Ian attacks it with an Incursus and a Tristan.*

*Ambushing ships get to deal their ambush damage during the withdraw step and Elysha decides to deal it to the Tristan. Now she needs to deal 1 more damage to the Tristan during this phase to destroy it.*

*During the target step, Ian targets Elysha’s ships, each with one of his ships, and Elysha targets the Tristan with her Heron and the Incursus with her Kestrel.*

*During the damage dealing step, all the ships are dealt damage that is equal to or greater than their shields, and are destroyed. This leaves Stain uncontrolled.*

### End Phase

If you have more than 7 cards in your hand when all other phases have been completed, you must discard card(s) until you are holding 7. This completes your turn, and the player to your left can begin his or her turn.

## Advanced Rules

### Abilities

All abilities appear in the rules text. There are numerous different card abilities; many of them are unique and available to only one card. There are three categories: pending abilities, executed abilities, and continuous abilities.

Pending abilities start with ‘when’ or ‘at’. It means that when the required circumstances arise, the ability is played on the pile.

Executed abilities are played by you, as many times as you want. They all have a colon ‘:’ in their text. The price is stated first, then the colon, and then the ability’s effect.

Continuous abilities are constantly in effect, for as long as they are in play.

Some ship’s abilities start with a bold word followed by a number and a description of the ability. This means that if the number is changed by some other card, all the numbers in the description change accordingly.

Command abilities, such as patrol and mining, only apply when that command has been activated. These abilities are treated just like any other abilities.

### Controller v.s. Owner

It is important to clarify the difference between the use of the words ‘controller’ and ‘owner’.

You are always the owner of all the cards in your deck, whether they have been played or not. Nothing in the game requires you to relinquish ownership of your cards, but cards in play can often switch controllers!

This normally happens when a player loses control over an outer region as well as the locations that have been played there. He may own all locations along with the outer region, but when he loses control of it, the benefits they gave him are transferred to the region’s new controller.

If a player warps a ship into an outer region already controlled by another player, the control of that region does not shift until all defending ships have been eliminated.

### "You"

The words ‘you’ and ‘your’ on all cards always refers to its controller. For example, if you have just played an outer region that says “Draw an extra card during your draw phase”, this does not apply to you until you have taken control of the region by warping a ship into it.

### Player Initiative

The active player has initiative and takes the first action during each phase, including playing a card, using an ability, upgrading a starbase, etc. When a player has used his initiative, it passes on to the next player who might, for example, want to play a news card or an ability during that phase. The initiative passes on at the end of each phase and each step, so everyone has a chance to play a news card or an ability.

### The Pile

When many things are happening at once, the order in which these events are resolved becomes very important. When a player plays a card or an ability, it is placed on the pile (figuratively speaking) and awaits to be resolved. That player may then add any amount of news or abilities on the pile before passing the initiative to the next player.

Then that player can add news cards or abilities on the pile, or pass. The initiative moves around the table clockwise until all players have passed consecutively. The pile is then resolved from top to bottom.

If an effect removes (destroys) another effect lower in the pile, then that effect is immediately removed and will not be resolved.

The following is placed on the pile: cards, abilities and outer regions that are played, starbases that are upgraded, and damage that is dealt.

#### *Example 'Pile' & Player Initiative*

*Elysha has only a single Executioner (ship) in Metropolis (outer region). Ian tries to reduce her income by attacking the region with his Slasher (ship), hoping that Elysha will either withdraw her ship, or that the ships will destroy each other, thus leaving the region uncontrolled.*

*Elysha does not withdraw. They both order their ships to target the opposing ship during the target step and move on to the damage dealing step.*

*Now the damage goes on the pile (3 to the Executioner and 2 to the Slasher), Since Ian is the attacker, he gets a chance to add something to the pile. He adds nothing and passes the initiative to Elysha. She adds a Stubborn Mechanic (news) to the pile, which targets her Executioner.*

*The initiative then passes back to Ian, who adds nothing to the pile. Elysha adds nothing either, so resolution of the pile begins.*

**Important:** You cannot add new effects to a pile while it is being resolved.

### Sacrifice

You may only sacrifice a card that is in play and is controlled by you, and only when a card or an ability permits you to do so. A sacrificed card goes to the owner’s scrapheap, as if it has been destroyed. If an ability tells you to sacrifice a card, you choose which card to sacrifice unless stated otherwise.

### Target

If the word ‘target’ appears in an ability or on a news card, it can only be played if it has a legal target. The legal target is defined on the appropriate card.

When choosing targets for your ships during the targeting step in a battle phase, the only legal targets are enemy ships in the same region. If your ship’s ability requires a target, that target is not to be confused with the target that the ship deals its damage to.

### Duration and Assembly

If a news card has a duration tab in its rules text, it means that the ability that follows comes into play when the appropriate duration tab is turned upwards. The ability stays in play for as long as the news card is at that duration tab.

#### *Example Duration & Assembly:*

***Ian’s 8th turn >** Setup phase > Ian plays Forsaken Ruins (news). The card states that all ships in target outer region are to be returned to their controller’s home region, and that no ships can warp into that outer region for as long as Forsaken Ruins stays in play. This news card has Duration III. Ian also plays a Bestower (ship) this turn. Bestower has Assembly II and therefore stays in his dock.*

***Ian’s 9th turn >** Setup phase > The countdown on both of these cards starts ticking. Ian now rotates the Forsaken Ruins card clockwise so that its second duration tab, Duration II, turns upwards. Then he rotates the Bestower so that its second assembly tab, Assembly I, turns upwards. He decides not to do anything else this turn and saves this turn’s ISK income for a rainy day.*

***Ian’s 10th turn >** Setup phase > Ian now rotates the Forsaken Ruins card clockwise so that the last duration tab, Duration I, is turned up. Since there are no more assembly tabs on the Bestower, it is ready but still located in the starbase dock. During his management phase, Ian is able to undock his Bestower.*

***Ian’s 11th turn >** Setup phase > The duration of the Forsaken Ruins card has now expired, and the card is placed on Ian’s scrapheap. That allows all players to again warp ships into the outer region that Forsaken Ruins was ‘blocking’.*