🌱 Beginner Guide - First Steps & What to Do First

Three systems, in this order: promotion, seals, and Treasures. Promotion is the game — two recruits merge into a captain for a single Treasure, two captains become a governor, and every deck is a promotion tree with the empire's strongest card at its top. Seals are the ruler's power you pick before the match and use every turn. Treasures are the currency that pays for promotions. Learn how these three interlock and every other decision — empire, deck, pacing — becomes legible.

• Start with the Ottoman empire — its plan (promote, conscript, siege) is the most direct expression of the core mechanic.
• Pick the Tughra seal — the signature pick matches the deck the game expects you to build first.
• Deploy recruits early; promotion needs two bodies of equal rank standing together.
• Bank a Treasure before you need it — the official example prices a captain at one Treasure.
• Protect the root of your tree: the opponent will try to cut it before you climb.

Every deck is a promotion tree, and every opponent is trying to fell yours while climbing theirs. This means trades are never just trades: a trade that removes one of your captain's two future merge partners is worth more than it looks, and a trade that spends your board while their tree stands is worth less. Beginners lose by fighting for the board; the game is fought over the ladder.

The tournament moves you to the next empire after each victory, defeat does not end the campaign (the same rival returns), and your attempt count is written into the Book of Conquest. When five empires have fallen, a sixth challenger appears — hidden for the whole tournament, with its own cards, seals and rules. The campaign guide covers the road; the empire pages cover each rival's plan.