A downloadable game

Download NowName your own price

HAVE AT YOU! is a GM-less tool designed to spark thrilling one-on-one combat at your table, with mechanics inspired by martial arts movies, 2D fighting games, and real-life fencing.

All you need is a partner and two standard decks of playing cards. You win when your opponent runs out of cards or gets pushed out of the arena!

HOW TO PLAY

Each player gets their own deck of cards.

Both players shuffle their decks and draw 4 cards to create their starting hand.

Each round, both players:

1. Play a card, facedown, from their hand

2. Draw the top card from their deck

3. Reveal and resolve the cards they played

The first player to discard their final card or get pushed out of bounds loses!

A note from the designer:

While this game uses terminology and concepts from fencing, it is certainly no "fencing simulator." This is partly because most people don't know very much about fencing, but also because fencing is an extremely complex and subtle sport! Think of this game as a way to generate dramatic duels, not a method of modeling a realistic fencing match.

StatusReleased
CategoryPhysical game
Rating
Rated 5.0 out of 5 stars
(21 total ratings)
AuthorThe Nerdy Paper Games of Rob Hebert
GenreAction, Role Playing
Tagscards, fencing, Frogs, playing-cards

Download

Download NowName your own price

Click download now to get access to the following files:

Have At You v4.pdf 8 MB

Comments

Log in with itch.io to leave a comment.

Love this ! Combat has always been my least favorite thing in tabletop, so this is very exciting.
I do have one question about damage and discarding cards: 
Say for example I have 4 cards in hand, and I must take 10 damage. I decide to discard a 6 and 4, leaving me with 2 cards in hand. Am I now playing with only 2 as my hand size, or do I draw back up to 4 at any time ?

Hi Sdocquir! In that instance, you would continue to play with 2 cards. 

Under the standard rules, you don’t “draw back up” once you’ve taken damage; it unnecessarily lengthens the game.

However, if you like having more cards in your hand, you can play with alternate rules. Instead of discarding when you take damage, track successful strikes with a point system. First person to 3 points wins (or reskin the points as HP or Hearts or whatever for your setting).

Hope that helps, and let me know how it goes!

I'm loving everything about it. You know, these rules could be taken over the top with an excellently illustrated set of cards of frogs and rapiers. I would, most assuredly, purchase a print copy if it existed, perhaps even a few so I could hand them out to compatriots of like mind. Well done!

Thank you so much for the kind words! Stay tuned, as I might be kickstarting some decks with updated art real real soon :D

This looks fantastic!  The art is so good.

Thanks, Tim! I appreciate the compliment :)

"Frog and Toad Stab Shit" is a great look.

This could easily be MOSAIC Strict - very elegant (appropriately so!).  Super fun mini-game that could dovetail nicely with ANY game.  Really brilliant design!

Thank you so much for the kind words, Michael!

I was looking for something like this for so long! Thank you for making it!
As an aside: are these rules open for hacking/modified inclusion in other projects and, if so, what are the requirements/restrictions on it?

(+1)

Thanks, Raul! You can hack/modify/use this system for your own stuff so long as you include appropriate attribution (eg, a link to this page) and get my permission beforehand. Which... uh, I hereby give you. Go forth with the Frogmother's blessing!

Excellent artwork and slick card-system, really fun!

Frogs are best at fight! This is the cutest little tool I've seen. I love toolkit games because they let you expand on other rules-lite games when you need a little more structure.

(1 edit)

Very cool system ! It reminds me of the RPS in Torchbearer. It's very hackable (suits : media, national politics, economy, police). What would it look like to play a skirmish this way ? (etc.)

err. : the sample table displays a -2/+2 for red and blue when it should be a -1.

typography : The I character could be replaced with a 1 without losing much.

Thank you, DeReel! Good catch, I've uploaded a new version with the arena strip fixed.

I will be also be adding an addendum for "translating" the system to settings/conflicts exactly like what you mentioned, so stay tuned!