12. Liberation

12.1 Structural Distinction from Combat#

Combat is resolved under full information: both players see all relevant values, and an optimal defense is calculable. Liberation is resolved under sealed commitment: the liberating player assigns concealed, and the defending player allocates without knowing the distribution. There is no dominant defense in Liberation — only a better or worse read of the liberating player's intent.

12.2 Step 1 --- Activate Liberators#

The active player Activates any number of Characters and Ground Units they control. The Vox of each Activated card is added to that player's Resource Pool.

Activated cards are public. The liberating player's total Vox for this Liberation is therefore known to both players. Only its distribution is hidden.

A card deployed this turn may not be Activated as a liberator (§10.4).

12.3 Step 2 --- Declare Targets#

The active player publicly declares which permanents they are targeting. They declare which targets, not how much Vox each will receive.

Restrictions:

The number of declared targets may not exceed the number of liberators Activated in Step 1.

The number of declared targets may not exceed the liberating player's total Vox, since every declared target must receive at least 1 Vox (§12.5b).

A permanent you control may not be declared. Liberation is directed outward only. Unlike Combat, where a player may attack their own permanents (§11.1), a player may never target their own permanents for Liberation.

A permanent with Indoctrinated may not be declared.

A Location hosting an opposing Fortified unit (§18.33) may not be declared.

A permanent outside the liberator's Liberation range may not be declared (§12.3a).

12.3a Liberation Range

A liberator may declare a target in its own Band or in an adjacent Band. Empty Bands are skipped as provided in §14.2, and the Space Band is always counted and never skipped. The Space Band boundary (§11.3) applies: from an adjacent Band, only a Capital Spacecraft may be declared in the Space Band.

Liberation still out-ranges Combat by a Band, which keeps it the reach tool; but a liberator must be positioned, and cannot campaign across the Map from home.

Where a liberating player Activates multiple liberators, each declared target must be within range of at least one Activated liberator.

Confluence. A liberating player with a Confluence ability declares it here, together with their targets, before the defending player Activates. Confluence may not be declared later, and once declared may not be withdrawn. See §18.81.

Fast Maneuvers may be played at this point, active player first.

12.4 Step 3 --- Activate Defenders#

The defending player may Activate any number of Characters and Ground Units they control, adding their Vox to the defending player's Resource Pool.

Defenders need not be deployed at or near a declared target. As with liberation, resistance to a campaign is not a matter of physical presence — information travels freely, and a faction may double down on its ethos remotely.

Activated defenders are public; the defending player's total Vox is therefore known to both players.

Garrisoning. In this step the defending player may also declare garrisons. A readied card occupying a declared target may be declared as that target's garrison. Garrisoning does not activate the card.

These are two different defensive tools. Activating defenders is remote, and adds Vox. Garrisoning is positional, and absorbs the liberating player's Vox before it reaches the target (§12.5d). A card cannot do both: activating to add Vox activates the card, and a garrison must be readied.

Defending Vox may be allocated only to declared targets. A player may not place defensive counters on a permanent that has not been declared.

12.5 Step 4 --- Commitment#

The liberating player commits first and in secret. The defending player then allocates in the open. Because the liberating player is fully committed before any defensive counter is placed, the defending player gains nothing by concealment and requires none.

12.5a Concealed Assignment

The liberating player assigns their Vox to each declared target concealed — the amount assigned to each target is hidden from the defending player until reveal (§12.6). The liberating player's total available Vox is public, since Activated cards are face up; only the distribution is hidden.

Assignments are made simultaneously for all declared targets and may not be altered once made.

Any component that records a concealed numeric value per target may be used.

Exception — Confluence. A player who declared Confluence (§12.3, §18.81) assigns their Vox publicly instead, revealing every value at the moment of assignment.

12.5b Allocation Limits

The liberating player must commit at least 1 Vox to every declared target. A player may not declare a target and then ignore it.

The liberating player may not commit more Vox in total than is in their Resource Pool.

The defending player has no minimum and may allocate all, some, or none of their Vox across the declared targets in any distribution.

Unspent Vox is lost at the end of the phase and confers no benefit.

12.5c Defensive Allocation

After the liberating player's assignments are complete and concealed, the defending player allocates their Vox openly, placing counters of their color directly onto the declared targets. The defending player may not place counters on any permanent that was not declared.

12.5d Garrisoned Targets

Where a declared target has garrisons, the liberating player must assign the Vox they commit to that target to its garrisons, choosing the distribution among them. None may be assigned to the target itself while any of its garrisons remains.

For assignment, cancellation and resolution, each garrison is treated as a declared target in its own right, and the defending player may place defensive counters on garrisons as on any declared target.

There is no overflow. Counters assigned to a garrison stay on that garrison and accumulate across turns as normal — or, on a Character, convert to CP loss (§12.8). The target itself becomes reachable only once all of its garrisons are cleared.

12.6 Step 5 --- Reveal and Cancellation#

All concealed assignments are revealed simultaneously. A player who declared Confluence has already revealed theirs; nothing further is revealed at this step.

Sum check. Because the liberating player's Activated cards are public, their total available Vox is known to both players. The revealed values must sum to no more than that total. Any set of revealed values failing this check is illegal and must be corrected before resolution.

On each declared target, counters cancel one for one. Defensive counters in excess of the liberating counters on that target are discarded and have no further effect — they do not persist, and they do not pre-shield the permanent against future Liberations.

A Character's Rank bonus cancels too. On a Character, an RK bonus then cancels that many more liberating counters, once per Liberation: counters placed = liberating Vox − defending Vox − RK bonuses (§7.5). An RK penalty adds that many instead, if at least one liberating counter survived the defence. Liberating points the bonus cancels count as cancelled for Payment (§12.7). A non-Character's RK bonus does not cancel counters; it raises the Rank they must reach (§12.8).

Surviving liberating counters remain on the target as Liberation counters and persist across turns — except on Characters, where they are converted to CP loss at resolution and never persist (§12.8).

Fast Maneuvers may be played at this point, active player first.

12.7 Step 6 --- Payment#

The liberating player pays 1 Currency for each of their own Vox points that was cancelled. Points that landed are free; points that were stopped are paid for.

If the liberating player cannot pay the full amount, they pay as much as their Treasury allows and their Treasury is reduced to zero. Counters that landed still land — an unpayable cost does not void the Liberation. A liberating player whose Treasury is reduced to zero this way awards 1 Story Point at that moment (§16) — overcommitting to a Liberation is paid for immediately, not next turn.

The defending player pays nothing. Their cost was paid a turn earlier, in the tempo of holding cards ready rather than attacking or liberating with them.

12.8 Step 7 --- Resolution#

Resolution differs by target type.

Characters (Rank X). Each surviving Liberation counter on a Character removes 1 CP from that Character. The counters are then removed; they never persist on a Character. If the Character's CP reaches zero or less, it is destroyed under §7.3 and placed in the Depleted Pile. Liberation never flips a Character (§7.7).

CP removed by Liberation is not damage. Effects that prevent, reduce, or redirect combat damage do not apply to it, and triggers keyed to a card receiving damage do not fire. Combat and Liberation both spend a Character's CP, but they are separate channels and are mitigated separately.

All other permanents (numeric Rank). If the number of Liberation counters on the permanent is equal to or greater than its Rank, and is at least 1, that permanent is destroyed. Follow the destruction rules in §11.7. Otherwise the counters remain and the campaign continues on a later turn.

The "at least 1" clause is absolute: a permanent of Rank 0 is never destroyed by a Liberation that placed no counters on it. In practice no permanent sits at Rank 0, because one reduced to 0 or less is destroyed or broken at once (§19.8).

Liberation counters are checked continuously, not only here. A permanent may never carry Liberation counters equal to or greater than its Rank. This is a state-based check (§10.6): the moment it becomes true of a permanent with at least 1 counter on it, that permanent is destroyed, and the destruction rules in §11.7 are followed.

The check is made on the counters that remain on a card once the effect placing them has finished resolving. Within a Liberation that is Step 7, after cancellation (§12.6), so this rule does not pre-empt the sequence above — it restates its outcome.

Outside a Liberation it does real work. Counters placed by a card effect, or by a Crisis Storyline (§22), destroy a permanent exactly as counters placed by a Liberation do. They do not sit inert waiting for a Liberation that may never be declared.

Who destroyed it. A permanent destroyed by a Liberation counts as destroyed by each liberator the declaring player Activated in Step 1 (§12.2). That covers a permanent whose counters reach its Rank, and a Character whose CP a Liberation takes to zero. Card text that asks whether a card, or a card a given player controls, destroyed something — "destroyed by a card an opponent controls", "a card you control destroys" — reads a Liberation kill that way. Text that names combat ("destroys … in combat") still requires combat. Where counters placed by a card effect rather than a Liberation destroy a permanent, the card whose effect placed them destroyed it.

Ruled 2026-10-18. The precise alternative wording, "a Liberation an opponent declared", remains correct and is still used where a card means Liberation only.

When a card flips for any reason, all Liberation counters on it are removed (§13).