THURSDAY ARENA

A match is best of three rounds. Each round has two parts: a shop, where you spend tokens on bots and food, and then an auto battle against an opponent's board. The first side to win two rounds wins the match. If no side has two wins after round three, the side with more round wins is the winner.

A match that is still even after round three is not a draw: it goes to sudden death.

Your team has up to 3 bots. The bots that you buy stay on your board between rounds, and so do their permanent stat gains. Temporary boosts, such as Potato, reset after each battle.

• Each shop gives you 10 tokens. Tokens that you do not spend do not go to the next round, unless your captain is the Banker, who carries up to 5. Each token you do not spend is one more tower shot.
• The shop shows 3 bot offers and one food. Bots cost 3 tokens or more, and rarer bots cost more (see the table below).
• Reroll costs 1 token and replaces every offer and the food. Freeze an offer to keep it after a reroll and in your next shop.
• Selling a bot refunds 1 token and fires that bot's sell ability, if it has one.
• Move bots left and right to set your battle order. The leftmost bot fights first.
• You need at least one bot on the board to end the shop and start the fight.

Legendary bots are in the shop from season 2. The shop offers each legendary bot half as often as each other bot.

Mythic bots are in the shop from season 3. The shop offers each mythic bot a quarter as often as each other bot, and your team can have only one mythic bot.

In season 6, the shop offers each season 6 bot twice as often as an older bot of the same rarity.

Each bot has a kit: a trigger, such as Buy, Sell, Start of battle, Before attack, Faint, or Knock out, and the effect of that trigger. The Cards page lists every bot and its kit.

Each shop offers one food. Feeding it to a bot costs 3 tokens.

• Apple: +1 attack and +1 health, permanently.
• Honey: when that bot faints, it summons a 1/1 Drone in its place, if a seat is free.
• Potato: +2 attack for this round only. Potato is in the shop from turn 2.
• Honey and Potato replace each other on one bot. A bot cannot take a second copy of the same boost, and the try costs nothing. Apple stacks with all other food.

Battles are automatic. Start-of-battle kits fire first. Then the two front bots hit each other at the same time, and each takes damage equal to the attack of the other bot. A bot at zero health faints, its faint kit fires, and the next bot moves to the front. Before-attack, knock-out, and friend-ahead-attacks kits fire when their trigger happens.

A side with no bots left loses the round. If both sides lose their last bot in the same exchange, the round is a draw. After 40 exchanges the fight stops, and the side with more total health wins. If the health is equal, the side with more total attack wins. If the attack is also equal, the round is a draw.

A match that is even after round three goes to sudden death: one more shop, with your tokens and the season's shop rules, and one more fight against the same rival. The winner of that fight wins the match. If it is a draw, the side with more HP left wins. HP left is the HP of the bots still standing at the end of each fight, added up over the match. If HP left is even, more ATK left wins, and if that is even too, the match is a draw. Pacts cover rounds one to three only, and no relic drops after the third fight.

From season 2, each match gets three random seat rules: one for the front seat, one for the middle seat, and one for the back seat. The round 1 shop shows the front rule, round 2 adds the middle rule, and round 3 adds the back rule. After a rule shows, it stays on for the rest of the match.

A rule applies to the bot in its seat on both teams. The front seat is the leftmost bot, the middle seat is the second bot, and the back seat is the last bot. So with fewer than three bots, one bot can be in two seats. Start-of-battle rules apply before any kit fires, from front to back, your side first.

Each season adds seat rules and keeps the earlier ones. A season 6 match draws its three from all 40 rules of seasons 2 to 6.

From season 3, each bot has a crew: Sales, Ops, Marketing, Personal, or Builders. The card shows its crew as a shape: Sales is a triangle, Ops is a square, Marketing is a circle, Personal is a diamond, and Builders is a hexagon.

When two bots of one crew are on your team, the crew bonus turns on at the start of each fight, after the seat rules and before any kit fires. With 3 bots of one crew, you get the bigger bonus. The shop shows your active crews above your line, and the rival's crews work the same way.

From season 3, each match starts with a pick: three captains, dealt at random for that match. Pick one before the round 1 shop. Your captain helps you for the whole match.

Your rival has a captain too, and it shows from the first fight on. A fight captain acts at the start of each fight, for both teams. A shop captain changes the tokens, the prices, or the offers of each of your shops. Tap a captain in the match to read what it does.

Each season adds captains and keeps the earlier ones. A season 6 match deals its three from all 41 captains of seasons 3 to 6.

From season 4, you can fuse two bots of your line into one. In the shop, tap a bot, tap Fuse, and tap a second bot. They become one Fusion in the first bot's seat, and the other seat opens. Fusing is free.

The Fusion keeps the higher attack and the higher health of the two, plus 2 of each. It keeps the first bot's item and food marks. Its name is both names, and it wears both faces. It counts for both crews, and a Fusion of two bots of one crew counts twice for that crew. A Fusion cannot fuse again, but you can sell it, feed it, equip it, and move it like any bot.

The Fusion's power comes from the crews of its two parents. There is one recipe for each pair of crews.

From season 5, an item can turn on a catalyst. While a Fusion holds an item of the type that its catalyst names, the catalyst replaces its base recipe and gives it a new power. When the item goes, the base recipe comes back. There are 60 catalysts: 16 from season 5 and 44 from season 6.

From season 4, after each of your first two fights, you pick 1 of 3 relics, or 1 of 4 with the Curator captain. You hold up to two, and they act for the rest of the match. Pick before you shop: if you shop without a pick, the first relic is yours.

A fight relic acts on your line in every fight. A shop relic changes your shop for the rest of the match: the prices you see are the prices you pay. Relics stack with your captain, your crews, and your items. Your rival's relics act on its line, as its captain does, and you see them on its plaque.

From season 4, 100 new bots join the shop in two drops of 50. Each one has one of 26 new abilities. The Cards page lists every bot with its ability in full. A Season 4 ability fires only in a Season 4 match, so the fights and replays of the earlier seasons play as they did.

From season 5, each player has an outpost: one tower beside their line. In any shop, pick a blueprint and a seat to build it. Building is free. Your rival has a tower too: a ghost fights with the tower its player built, and the AI builds and grows its own.

From season 6, there are five blueprints: the Desk lamp and the Sprinkler join the Turret, the Clinic, and the Relay. Each match offers 3 of the 5, and your rival builds from the same 3.

The seat of the tower is its lane, on both lines. In each exchange of a fight, after the front bots attack, the tower fires one shot while it has shots left. A shot that hits or weakens goes to the enemy in its lane, and a shot that helps goes to your bot in its lane. When that seat is empty, the shot goes to the front bot.

A tower has 2 shots in each fight, plus 1 for each token you have left when you end the shop. So each token you do not spend is one more shot.

A tower can reach tier 2 from the round 2 shop and tier 3 from the round 3 shop. Tier 2 costs 3 tokens, and you pick one of two paths. Tier 3 costs 4 tokens and goes on down the same path. Each tier has more HP: 6, 9, then 12. Move takes your tower to another seat for 1 token.

Siege hits towers. A tower at 0 HP is stopped and fires no more shots in that fight. Each fight starts a tower at full HP.

From season 5, a dealer comes to each shop with two pacts, or up to three with the Dealmaker captain. Each pact has a boon, which helps you, and a price, which you pay. Sign one of them, or skip them. You can sign one pact in each shop, and each pact once in a match.

A signed pact acts in the shops and fights that it names. A loan gives its boon now and takes its price later. An investment takes its price first and gives its boon later. A trade gives both from now on, and the other pacts give both in the next fight or in this shop.

You cannot sign a pact that takes more tokens now than you have, or a pact that stops your buys while your line has no bot.

From season 5, about one shop bot in 4 comes with a glitch. A glitch gives the bot an upside and a flaw, and its card shows both. A Trial bot shows up only in the first two shops. Your rival's bots can come with glitches too.

In the shop, Debug removes the glitch of a bot on your line, both its upside and its flaw, for 2 tokens. Or keep the bot as it is.

From season 5, some items, relics, captains, and seat rules are trade-offs: an upside with a price. The card shows the upside first, then the price in red, under a half green, half red mark. On the Cards page, the Trade-offs filter shows them all.

Season 5 adds new keywords and new triggers. The Cards page lists every bot with its ability in full. A Season 5 ability fires only in a Season 5 match, so the fights and replays of the earlier seasons play as they did.

Season 6 adds new fight abilities. The Cards page lists every bot with its ability in full. A Season 6 ability fires only in a Season 6 match.

GTM Prospecting

Sales

Poke

43

−3

Copywriter

Marketing

Swipe file

34

Tech Skills Coach

Builders

Pair up

25

InternVet33+2You

Starpass

Marketing

Pass it on

53

−3

Receipt Capture

Sales

Expense it

34

Contest Scout

Marketing

Second entry

25

When you tap Fight, your rival's line flips face up before the fight starts. You see who each captain will hit, and you can still move your Intern.

Tap GO, or the fight starts by itself after 5 seconds. Then you see where your rival's Intern waited.

InternVet33+2

Each round, you and your rival get the same common card as your Intern. It waits behind your front bot: in the face-off, drag it to another bot, or tap it and then a bot.

When that bot faints, the Intern takes its seat as a plain 3/3, before Faint abilities. It stays on the line, so a summon or a come-back can find no free seat.

As each fight starts, the bot your Intern waits behind gets the Intern card's crew boost:

Starpass

Marketing

Pass it on

53

−3

Your captain hits the enemy with the most attack as the line flips, the front-most on a tie. Your rival's captain hits your line the same way.

The crosshair never moves, even if a crew boost changes who has the most attack.

A Bodyguard right behind the marked bot can take some or all of the strike, and the crosshair stays on the marked bot.

The strike lands before Start of battle abilities and hits a Hidden bot too. There is no strike if the marked bot is knocked out first, or with no captain or one that a pact turns off.

From season 6, each day has an Office Day: one rule for the day's rated and practice matches, the same for everyone. A match keeps the rule it started with, and your plaque shows it.

• Anyone can practice without an account. Practice matches are against an AI board and do not change your rating.
• Sign in with X to play rated matches. When you end a shop, the game saves your board as a snapshot. Then you fight the snapshot of another player at the same round, the one closest to your aim. That opponent is your ghost.
• Your aim is your rating plus 23. Attackers win a little more often than equal ratings say, so a board at your aim gives you an even chance. Your last 10 rated results move your aim: after more wins than losses it goes up, and after more losses than wins it goes down, by at most 70 points. Your rating change still comes from your rating and your ghost's rating, so a higher board gives more points for a win and takes fewer for a loss.
• The game looks at every saved board for your round. It uses the first of these ranges that has a board: within 100 rating points of your aim, within 200, within 400, and then any rating. In that range, a board that you have not fought comes before a board that you have fought, and then the closest rating comes first.
• When one player was your ghost in 10 of your last 50 rated matches, the game takes a board of another player first, from any range. A board more than 400 rating points above your aim comes last.
• From season 3, players at 1300 or more form the top table. When you and the owner of a board are both at 1300 or more, that owner can be your ghost in up to 25 of your last 50 rated matches before the game takes a board of another player first.
• After the game picks your ghost, you fight the boards of that same player in the later rounds of the match.
• If no ghost is available for your round, you fight an AI board, and the match is unrated. The result screen shows this.

Each player starts a season at 1000 Elo. A rated match changes your rating by standard Elo with a K factor of 32. A win against a higher-rated ghost gives more points, a loss against a lower-rated ghost takes more points, and a draw counts as half a win. Your rating changes as soon as the match has a result, so if you leave after you lose the last fight, the loss still counts.

Your ghost counts too. When another player fights your board, your rating goes up when your ghost wins and down when it loses, with a K factor of 16, if the two ratings are within 400 points. Attackers win a little more often than equal ratings say, so the expected score gives the attacker 23 extra rating points. So an average match moves the ladder by almost nothing. Each ghost defense also counts in your record: Played, Wins, Losses, and Draws.

From season 3, the top table is the one place where a ghost defense counts in full. When you and the attacker are both at 1300 or more, your rating moves with the same K factor of 32 as the attacker's, not 16. So two top players who fight each other's boards cannot both climb: what one gains, the other loses.

From season 2, SuperGrok is a title for one player: the #1 player of the ladder, when their rating is 1700 or more.

The leaderboard shows the top 100 players of the current season by rating. Each season has its own ratings, and each new season starts every player at 1000.

From season 5, you keep your final place only with at least 10 rated attacks in the last 24 hours of the season. A rated attack is a rated match that you start against a ghost. Ghost defenses, practice matches, and matches against an AI board do not count. When the season ends, players with fewer are listed after all who have 10 or more, by final rating. In the last 24 hours, the leaderboard draws that line and shows how many rated attacks you still need.