Gear and [Equip]
Gear is a card that isn't a unit and doesn't fight. You play it to your base and pay its Energy cost, like a unit. It enters ready.
Most gear is Equipment. It has an [Equip] cost, paid in Power. Pay it on your own turn and the gear attaches to a unit you control. The unit gets the gear's bonus: here, +2 Might.
- Doran's Blade: 2 Energy to play, then [Equip] [Body] to give a unit +2 Might.
- Armed Assailant: a unit with [Weaponmaster].
- Gear goes where its unit goes. If the unit moves, the gear moves with it.
- If the unit leaves the board, the gear stays behind, loose. If it was left at a battlefield, it goes back to your base on its own (unless it has [Deploy], below).
- [Equip] only works on loose gear (gear that isn't attached to a unit). You can't pull gear off one unit to give it to another.
- A unit with [Weaponmaster] equips for free as you play it: no [Equip] cost, whatever its Domain.
[Deploy] gear works differently. It's played to a battlefield, never to your base: any battlefield, even one your opponent holds or one nobody holds. It stays there on its own (it isn't sent back to your base), and it can be moved by effects that move gear. But if an opponent holds that battlefield, it's killed.
- The Ball: [Deploy] gear. Play it straight to a battlefield.
You play The Ball ([Deploy]) to Battlefield A, which your opponent holds. Where is it, and what can happen to it?
Your unit with Doran's Blade dies. What happens to the Blade?
Doran's Blade is on your unit A. You pay [Equip] to put it on unit B. Does that work?
You're on 6 and need both battlefields: the Poro (2) at A and the Chompers (3) at B. Your Herder is a 3 and your Diplomat a 2, and you have one Blade (+2). Who should get it?
Make your guess, then play the drill to find out.
Words from this lesson
- Equipment
- Gear with an [Equip] cost that attaches to a unit to help it.
- [Deploy]
- This gear is played to a battlefield (any one), stays there, and is killed when an opponent holds that battlefield.
- [Equip]
- Pay the cost to attach this gear to a unit you control. It only works on gear that isn't attached.
- [Weaponmaster]
- When you play this unit, you may attach one of your Equipment to it for free.
From the Core Rules (2026-10-09): 148 — Gear · 818 — Equip · 821 — Weaponmaster · 830 — Deploy · 462 — loose gear at a battlefield is recalled