Dark Rituals: Malleus Maleficarum – Kickstarter Exclusive Stretch Goals

Expansion for Dark Rituals: Malleus Maleficarum

Dark Rituals: Malleus Maleficarum – Kickstarter Exclusive Stretch Goals Rulebook

Table of Contents

New Demons

The Stretch Goal box includes several new Demons. With the exception of Golus, they follow the same rules as Haborym and can be used as a substitute for Haborym in any Encounter.

To give each Demon a different personality, they have different abilities and attributes and also different Demon decks. To create an eight card deck for a new Demon, use the six cards that bear the Demon's name and the two cards from the core game that have the infinity symbol in the lower left corner.

As you become more experienced using the Demons, feel free to select any mix of Demon cards to create a Demon with new behavior.

Golus

Golus is the most different and fun Demon to use. We recommend that you do not use Golus until you are familiar with the Demon rules. If you have ever wanted to ride a cosmic being across your game board, now you have the chance.

Golus Deck: Golus is played with the six card deck consisting of the cards marked Golus.

Rider: Witches and Heroes can mount Golus and become the Rider. Only the Rider can control Golus. Golus is slightly more attuned to Witches climbing on top and will resist Heroes slightly. Add the following Actions and Reactions when Golus is in play.

Witch Rider, 1: If Golus has no Rider, a Witch in the same Area as Golus can mount Golus.
Witch Rider, 1: When the current Rider dismounts, a Witch in the same Area as Golus can mount Golus.
Hero Jockey, 2: If Golus has no Rider, a Hero in the same Area as Golus can mount Golus.
Hero Jockey, 2: When the current Rider dismounts, a Hero in the same Area as Golus can mount Golus.
Dismount, 1: The Rider dismounts and is placed in the same Area as Golus.

If a Character Dismounts, they cannot immediately use the Reaction to Mount Golus. Only a different Character can jump on.

If multiple Characters are trying to use the Reaction to mount Golus, give preference to a Witch when the Witch Master is Active and to a Hero when the Heroes are Active.

Controller: The cards controlling Golus say that either the Rider controls Golus or the Rider dismounts and Golus is inactive.

When the Rider controls Golus, the Actions are taken as part of the Rider's turn and Stamina is paid from the Rider's pool of Stamina. Any Actions taken with Golus are counted as being taken by the Rider. So if Wolgar is the Rider (with a full control card), Wolgar can make Golus Attack and then Wolgar can Dismount; this counts as two Actions with Wolgar. The Stamina for both Actions comes from Wolgar's pool.

Attacking the Rider: Ranged Attacks are made against the Rider normally. Normal Melee Attacks are also allowed, imagine Characters leaping or climbing up to make the Attack. In addition, Melee Attacks can be used to Dislodge the Rider. Melee Attackers gain the following Reaction:

Dislodge, 0: When a Melee Attacker causes 1+ Wounds to the Rider, cancel the normal Attack effects and force the Rider to dismount instead. The Rider takes 1 Wound and is placed in the same Area as Golus.

Attacking Golus: Golus can only be Attacked when there is no Rider. Golus will always Defend and no-one exhausts Stamina.

Bampf

The Bampf Card is not a Demon Control Card. This single KS Exclusive card does not get shuffled into a Demon Deck. If all players agree to use it in your Campaign, place it face down within reach of everyone, where its Demonic powers can taunt the players.

This card can be played once per Campaign, by either the Heroes or the Witch Master, at any point in an Encounter. However, the Aura of Evil must be 5 (max) for the Witch Master to use it, and a Hero's Alchemy must be 4 (max) for that Hero's Player to play it. This is not an Action and costs no Stamina.

Say the name of a Demon three times and flip the card. The Demon is drawn to your locale by the magical energies circulating from the confrontation. The Player that invokes the Demon places it in the same Area as a Summoning Circle.

Do not use a normal Demon Deck. Instead your opponent(s) get to construct a slightly customized deck using the following rule: Create an eight card deck for that Demon, using the six cards specific to the Demon and any two other cards selected by the side that did not summon the Demon. When selecting these two cards, you may include cards that bias the deck in your favor.

Who knows exactly how the Demon will behave? Playing the Bampf Card may be just what you need if you take this last ditch attempt to affect the game.

Teleport

Some cards introduce a new type of movement, Teleporting, or Porting for short. When moving this way, ignore all impediments. You may Teleport away from Enemies, even if you cannot Evade them. You may Teleport through walls as if they were not there.

[Image caption: Kenzu's Alchemy Book.]

Some Spells only allow the Character to Teleport a limited distance, measured in Areas. Measure the distance along any path you choose, include through walls and Areas filled with Agile Enemies that would prevent normal Move/Evade Actions.

General Champion Upgrade Cards

[Image caption: A General Champion Upgrade Attached to Gerald.]

Four General Champion Upgrade cards are included in the Stretch Goals box.

The Champion system is fully explained in The Witches' Sabbath, which contains four Champion Upgrade cards for the four core Heroes. The General Champion Upgrade cards allow any Hero to use the Champion system and fight in The Witches' Sabbath Encounters. Simply match a General Champion Upgrade card to a Hero using the Hero Class Icon and then follow the Champion rules in The Witches' Sabbath.

Combining Expansion and Stretch Goal Content

With some caveats, you are free to use any combination of game content in any Encounter. We suggest:

You play the Core Game a few times to become familiar with the rules and capabilities of various components.
Substitution of like for like is the simplest way to use new content and is a good first step. For example, swapping one Hero for another of the same class, one Witch for another, one Creature for another, etc.
You can create larger decks by combining cards from many sources, but make sure you are aware of the implications. For example, adding lots of Creature Summoning cards to the Witchcraft deck will make it easier to draw Creature Summoning cards. It is up to you to decide if you like what that changes in your games. If you don't Summon many Creatures, you may find this deck frustrating.
Treat both sides equally. For example, if the Witch Master carefully selects Witches, Creatures and Minions whose abilities create good combos, then the Hero Players should not simply select Heroes at random, they should also looks for synergies.
The Witch Master has many different Characters that can be used and it may be easy to be overwhelmed. If you use one of each type of Minion, you may find it difficult to remember all their abilities, making it hard to use them effectively.
The Witch and Demon in the Witches' Sabbath are strong Characters. Be aware of this when substituting them into Encounters without Champions. Similarly, the Champions are strong, so be careful using them against regular Witches and Demons. It's best to use Madra and Voskor with the Champions.

Customization Kit

The Dark Rituals Customization Kit can found in the download section of the Dark Gate Games website.

Mini-Maps and BGMapEditor

This kit includes 4 zip files that can be added to the Board Game Map Editor to allow you to create mini-maps for your custom Encounters.

You will need to download and install the free, third-party application BGMapEditor.exe first. It can be found on Source Forge:

https://sourceforge.net/projects/bgmapeditor/

You can add the zip files from the menu, Packs/Add. You do not need to unzip these files or copy them to a special location yourself. They will show up as 4 separate Map Packs, but objects from the separate Map Packs can be combined into one mini-map image. You only need to Add the Map Pack you want to use.

Encounter Template

A simple MS Word file, "DRMM - Simple Encounter Template.docx" has been included, which you can use to help organize the description of your Encounter in the same way we do in the Encounter section of the rule book.

Feel free to edit the file in any way or to present your Encounter differently.

Card Customization Kit

The Card Customization Kit contains many files to help create new cards for the Game.

Card Templates: These files are the blank cards themselves. Some are png files with transparent windows; paste these templates over your image and it will show through. Others are jpg files where you will need to cut the image to size and paste it over the template.

Icons: There are many files containing the icons used on the cards. You should be able paste these onto the cards with little need to resize them.

Fonts: Our cards use the Blood Crow and Franklin Gothic Medium Condensed fonts. If you have these fonts, your cards will look even more authentic.

Editor: There are many graphic editing applications that manipulate these files, include GIMP, which is free:

https://www.gimp.org/downloads/

We recommend you sleeve your cards to help with shuffling, etc.

FAQ And Errata

Q. What does the ✸ symbol on some cards mean? A. A Hit. For example, The Wounded Heart adds 1 Hit to the Attack Value.

Q. After Saving a Burning Witch or after a Hero Revives, what happens to the Wounds assigned to the Character? A. All Wounds are discarded.

Q. When a Hero is Defeated and therefore Stunned, what happens to its Wounds? A. They are removed.

Q. Some spells mention free Actions. What does free mean, exactly? A. There is no Stamina cost for the Action and it does not count as one of the two Actions a Character can take when they Activate.

Q. Some Encounters, for example Encounter 2: Captive Witch, have special tokens blocking normally open pathways. Can the Heroes make a Ranged Attack through these blockades? A. No. They block all access to Characters behind the blockade unless otherwise stated.

Q. Which side of the Militia card should I use? A. The side where Defense costs 2 Stamina.

Q. Is "Favored Spell" really a Reaction? What is the trigger? A. This is an Action, the wrong icon is on the card.

Q. Chalcosoma's Defense uses the Yellow Attack Dice. Does Chalcosoma's Defense damage the Attacker? A. The ID Sheet has the incorrect dice icon. The yellow icons should be green icons. Chalcosoma Defends normally.

Q. Is there a mis-pack for the Thrall Stretch Goal? I have the Thrall card, but no minis. A. The Thrall card is not a Stretch Goal, it was a free gift for returning The Order of Vampire Hunters backers. Returning backers can use their Thrall minis from The Order of Vampire Hunters with this card to create an extra set of Minions. If you do not have a Thrall mini, feel free to use any minis in your collection as a proxy.

Witch vs. Witch Encounters

Pekka turned to Hagatha. "You know, I see Skriga and Ikrek whispering all the time. Ikrek is even eating fish now! What should we do? Banish them?"

"No, sic 'em."

An Introduction

The Witches are always bickering amongst themselves. Welcome to the Witch Master vs. Witch Master Encounters for Dark Rituals: Malleus Maleficarum, where you will recreate two of these petty arguments.

This is a new way to play the game. If you enjoy these two Encounters, it will be easy for you and a friend to use these rules to create other Witch vs Witch battles; it's a game within a game.

We hope you all enjoy this option. However, it requires some modifications to the rules that you will need to apply on the fly and is therefore more suitable for experienced gamers.

You will need an Attacking Hordes pledge (plus the stretch goals) to have enough Witches to play the two Encounters described here.

If you have more content, you can freely substitute different characters into these encounters. Try to keep the Forces balanced.

In addition, both sides will need a Misery and Exhausted Stamina Board. There is only one of each in the core game, so we have included images of the boards with permission for you to print them for personal use.

General Concept

These games will play based on the Witch Master vs. Heroes rules, but there will need to be some changes:

Game Effects that Target the Heroes and Serfs will be redefined.
Demons are under full control of their Witch Master. You will not use the Demon Deck.
Plagues still reduce your opponent's Stamina, but in a simpler manner.
Actions related to Botanical Tokens and Alchemical Ingredients have been added.

All rule changes are explained in detail below.

Rule Changes

Targeting Heroes: Many game effects, especially those on cards, Target Heroes. Effects that Target the Heroes will now Target any Witches or Demons.

Targeting Serfs: Similarly, some effects Target Serfs. Game Effects that Target the Serfs will Target any Creatures and Minions.

Targeting the Legion of Darkness: If an effect Targets a Character from the Legion of Darkness, for example a Witch, it can Target a Character of that type on either side. You will find new ways to use cards/abilities that would normally affect your own Characters or your opponent's Force, and vice versa.

Plagues: Plagues reduce your opponent's Stamina, but in a simpler manner. Simply Lock the amount of Stamina shown on the card, ignoring the Stamina source. As normal, place the Plague Card near the Dashboard of the Witch that cast the Plague. If that Witch is Defeated, the Plague is cured and the Locked Stamina is returned. You may find it convenient to store the Locked Stamina on the Plague card.

Botanicals: All members of the Dark Legion are attuned to magical energies and can easily gather and use Alchemical Ingredients. Treat the Alchemical Ingredients as a shared resource pool for each Force. There is no need to track which Character has which card. Note that there are a few other uses for the Alchemical Ingredients, for example Defeating the Screaming Skulls. Every Character gains:

Pick Up Botanicals, 1: Draw Botanical Cards as described for the Heroes.
Luck, 0: After any dice roll, either yours or your opponent's, discard any 3 Alchemical Ingredients to re-roll one, some, or all dice. This Reaction can only be performed once per Player for any dice roll. Further, a Player cannot combine Luck with a different re-roll ability for that dice roll.

Using Demons: If you are playing with Demons, you will not use the Demon Deck. Demons are under the full control of their Witch Master. Further, the rules for Witches are extended to Demons. For example, when a Demon is Defeated, replace it with a Burning Witch Token. The Burning Demon can be brought back into play with the Save Burning Witch Action. Note, this applies to all general rules; the Dashboard of the Demon Character does not change, so they will not be able to perform some Actions, Summon Minion, Save Burning Witch, etc. These Actions are beneath them.

Home Base and Summoning Circles: There are 3 Summoning Circles in both of these Encounters. One is in the starting Area for one of your Witches. This is the Force's Home Base and they may always use this Summoning Circle. A Force has limited access to the other two Summoning Circles when used to Summon Minions, Creatures and Witches: you may only Summon to the other Summoning Circles if you have a Character in that Area. When using the Summoning Circle for other purposes, for example any Witchcraft Card, you have access to all of them.

First Player: Randomly decide who goes first. Switch the first player at the end of the Round.

Forces: The Encounters list all the Characters on each side. Not all these Characters are on the Map when the Encounter begins and Characters in the Reserve must be Summoned to bring them into the game. You may not Summon Characters that are not in this initial Force, with the exception of Creatures, which are Summoned with Witchcraft cards as normal. Defeated Minions are added to the Reserve and can be Summoned again. Defeated Witches (and Demons) can be Saved.

Spoils of War: You only get rewards if you are involved in Defeating your Opponent's Characters. You do not have to actually Defeat the Character yourself, just be part of the game play. For example, if you cause your opponent's Witch to Attack and Defeat their own Minion you get the spoils. You never get any rewards for Defeating your own Characters. The Rewards are:

Defeat any opposing Character: Increase the Aura of Evil by one level and place a Soul Token on the next available space on the Soul Track.
Defeat any opposing Witch (or Demon): Take the Rewards and also place a Token on the Sacrifice Track.

Exhaust Limit: Some spells cause a Hero to Exhaust all remaining Stamina. When applied to a member of the Dark Legion, any effect that Exhausts Stamina is limited to a maximum of 8 Stamina.

The above changes enable the majority of spells and other powers to be used in the Witch vs Witch Encounters. However, you may find a few Witchcraft spells that have no effect. Treat this as bad luck caused by the fickle powers of magic. Remember you can discard cards when you refill your hand at the end of the Round. Similarly, if you add Creature Summoning cards to the deck or substitute Characters in the Encounters for other Characters you wish to use, ensure that their powers are usable in this alternative game system.

Example Card Changes

This section shows some examples of how the existing cards work in this game mode.

Portal is normally cast on a Hero, so now it works on a Witch or Demon. It is not a Summon Action, so you are free to use any of the three Summoning Circles. Finally, since you can target any Witch or Demon, you could even cast it on one of your own Characters! Perhaps it will be worth taking a Wound to Teleport one of your Witches to another Area.

There are no keywords to switch on Shared Pain, but remember that you can target any Minion, including your opponent's. So instead of being a healing spell that is a double-edged sword, this can be used as a combined healing/offensive spell.

Encounter 1: Stolen Treasures

"Where's my scroll? That was the first spell I ever created! It never worked, but still, it's precious!" Skriga is beside herself. "Ikrek must have stolen it!"

"My lovely gem stone! There is no jewel as beautiful on Neemoss. Where's it gone?" Ikrek is overwrought. "Skriga was always jealous of my gems. She must have it!"

"Oh god, not again," mumbles one of the minions. "Those stupid witches have dropped their things again. We better find them before trouble really start."

Skriga's Starting Force: Skriga, Pekka, and 2 Condemned.

Skriga's Reserve: 1 Condemned and 3 Draugr.

Ikrek's Starting Force: Ikrek, Hagatha, 1 Ravenous and 1 Barbarous.

Ikrek's Reserve: 2 Barbarous and 2 Ravenous.

Witch Master's Stamina: Each Witch Master starts with 30 Stamina.

Witch Master's Misery Board: Place four Plague Reward Tokens at 2, 4, 6 & 8 Souls.

Special Rules and Objectives

The Minions try to calm the situation by finding the lost items and carrying them to their owner. All Minions gain:

Pick Up Treasure, 1: A Minion can pick up a lost Treasure in its Area.

Only Skriga's Minions can Pick Up the Rock. Only Ikrek's Minions can Pick Up the Scroll. If the Minion is Defeated, it Drops the Treasure.

Return the Rock: If Skriga's Minion carries the Rock into the same Area as Ikrek, they calm the situation slightly. Place a Token on Skriga's Sacrifice Track.

Return the Scroll: If Ikrek's Minion carries the Scroll into the same Area as Skriga, they calm the situation slightly. Place a Token on Ikrek's Sacrifice Track.

Win Conditions

Place two tokens on your Sacrifice Track.

Encounter 2: Red vs. White

"The white crystals are stronger!" yells Hagatha. "No, it's the red crystals we need! Blood is stronger than ice!" screams Skriga. "You're just scared of ice after being trapped in that Fjord. White!" "Red! Red!" "Let's just destroy all the crystals," mutters a Mortus.

Skriga's Reserve: Pekka, 3 Ravenous and 3 Draugr.

Hagatha's Reserve: Ikrek, 3 Mortus and 3 Condemned.

Witch Master's Stamina: Each Witch Master starts with 33 Stamina.

Witch Master's Misery Board: Place four Plague Reward Tokens at 2, 4, 6 & 8 Souls.

Special Rules

The Minions try to end the argument by destroying the crystal in the central Altar. All Minions gain:

Pick Up Crystal, 1: A Minion can pick up a Crystal in its Area.

Only Skriga's Minions can Pick Up the White Crystals and only Hagatha's Minions can Pick Up the Red Crystals. If the Minion is Defeated, it Drops the Crystal.

When a Minion carries a Crystal into the central Altar Area, all Crystals of that color are immediately Destroyed. Remove them from the game.

Destroy the White Crystals: If Skriga's Minions destroy the White Crystals, they calm the situation slightly. Place a Token on Skriga's Sacrifice Track.

Destroy the Red Crystals: If Hagatha's Minions destroy the Red Crystals, they calm the situation slightly. Place a Token on Hagatha's Sacrifice Track.

Remember rules and cards referencing Witches are applied to Demons but the Actions available to Demons are still just those on their Dashboard. Among other things, this means that Demons will not stop to Save Burning Witches.

You start with more Stamina that in Encounter one, but you will lose 5 Stamina if you Summon the Witch from your reserve. Manage your Stamina and Force carefully.

Win Conditions

Place 3 tokens on your Sacrifice Track.

Additional Components

The double-sided punch boards effectively give you the two copies of the Witch Master's Misery Board that you need to play the Witch vs. Witch Encounters. You can keep track of your Stamina as simple piles of Stamina Tokens on the table top. However, if you would prefer to use Exhausted Stamina Boards as normal, here is an image you can print and use.

[Page 21 of the source is a printable Exhausted Stamina Board image with no text layer; it is not transcribed.]