Madcap Comics Battleground - Rulebook

Current version: 1.6 Last updated: 2026-06-28

1. What is Madcap Comics Battleground?

Madcap Comics Battleground is a turn-based fighting game you play in your browser. You pick one comic book hero, the game picks an opponent, and the two fight a series of rounds until one of them drops. Dice decide how each move lands, and after every round you get a short written account of what just happened, so the fight reads like a comic.

The game is a single one-on-one mode. You choose a character, you choose what they do each round, and you try to knock the other character out. There is nothing to install. If you are playing for the first time, a short how-to-play guide walks you through the basics before your first fight.

There are two ways to play. Casual matches run instantly in your browser for free practice, any time, with no stakes. Ranked matches are server-resolved and earn Credits, move your rating, and count toward your record. The difference is covered in detail in section 5.

Your opponent. In a ranked match your opponent may be a real signed-in player, a synthetic bot when no like-rated real player is available, or a ghost - an absent real player's full character roster piloted by an AI stand-in. A ghost opponent is shown with a Ghost badge on their card. When you fight a ghost, only your own rating moves; the ghost's owner is unaffected.

Guests and accounts. You can play without an account. Guests see the full roster and can fight any character in casual play, but nothing is saved between sessions. Create a free account to keep your owned characters, earn and spend Credits, track your ranked record, and build your collection over time. Ranked matches require a signed-in account.

2. Characters

You fight with a single character. There are 24 to choose from, drawn from across the comics world. Each one has a themed card showing their colours, a background pattern, their class, and their rarity. No two cards look alike, but they all belong to the same game.

Stats

Every character has seven stats. Each stat is rated on the rank scale (see Ranks). Your stats decide three things: how hard you are to take down, how likely your moves are to land, and how much they hurt.

Fighting is combat skill and technique. It is the most common stat used to land a basic attack.

Agility is speed, reflexes, and acrobatics. It powers evasive and acrobatic moves.

Strength is raw physical power. It is the muscle behind heavy hits.

Endurance is toughness and stamina. It sets your starting health.

Reason is intelligence and tactics. It powers analytical and planning moves.

Intuition is instinct and awareness. It powers moves that rely on reading your opponent, and gives a small edge on initiative each phase.

Psyche is willpower and mental strength. It powers moves driven by sheer force of will.

Ranks

Stats are not numbers. Each one sits on a ladder of named ranks, from weakest to strongest. The higher the rank, the better that stat performs.

The ladder runs: Feeble, Poor, Typical, Good, Excellent, Remarkable, Incredible, Amazing, Monstrous, Unearthly, and several "Shift" and "Class" ranks above that. In the current game your characters sit in the Excellent to Amazing part of the ladder, so those are the ranks you will see most.

Health

Your health is set by your Endurance rank at the start of the fight. The tougher you are, the more punishment you can take.

You lose the fight the instant your health hits zero. Some characters can heal during a fight, but healing can never push you above your starting health.

Condition

Your condition tells you how badly hurt you are. It is worked out from your current health as a share of your starting health, and it updates the moment your health changes.

You are Healthy while your health is at 75 percent or above. You are Bloodied once it drops into the 40 to 74 percent range. You are Critical below 40 percent.

Being hurt makes you less reliable. While Bloodied, your moves are slightly harder to land. While Critical, they are harder still. A few characters have powers that get stronger, not weaker, when they are badly wounded, so being Critical is not always the disaster it sounds.

Classes

Each character belongs to one of five classes. The class is a quick summary of how they fight.

Tank characters soak up damage and keep standing. Assassin characters hit hard and fast but are fragile. Support characters lean on tactics, buffs, and weakening the other side. Powerhouse characters trade on heavy strength and staying power. Wildcard characters are unpredictable and rely on tricks and willpower.

Rarity

Every character also has a rarity: Common, Rare, Epic, or Legendary. Rarity is a flavour label that hints at how iconic and how powerful a character is. It does not change the rules of a fight.

3. Leagues

A league groups characters by power level so that fights are fair. The current game uses one league, Enhanced. This covers peak humans, enhanced soldiers, and lower-end superhumans. Every character you can pick belongs to it.

Other leagues for far stronger and far weaker characters are not part of the game yet.

4. Divisions

A division sets how many characters fight on each side. The current game uses one division, Solo: one character against one character, head to head.

Larger divisions, where you would field a team, are not part of the game yet.

5. How a Battle Works

A battle is a sequence of rounds called phases. There are up to ten phases. The fight ends the moment one character reaches zero health, so most battles finish well before phase ten.

Match types

Casual is instant, free practice. You pick a character, the game picks an opponent, and the whole fight runs in your browser. Casual costs nothing to start. It earns no Credits, does not change your ELO rating, and does not count toward your permanent win/loss record. There is no time pressure: take as long as you like between phases. Casual is the best place to learn characters and try new tactics without any stakes.

Ranked matches (the game calls them structured matches) are server-resolved. You commit your move for each phase, the server resolves the phase once both sides have committed, and the result is verified and permanent. Ranked matches earn Credits, move your ELO rating, and count toward your win/loss record. You may hold at most three ranked matches in progress at the same time. Ranked matches require a signed-in account.

Move clock

Each phase of a ranked match has an eight-hour deadline. The time remaining is shown in the match view. If you do not commit your move before the deadline passes, the server auto-plays the phase on your behalf and advances the match. Casual matches have no clock.

Phase flow

Each phase runs in four steps.

Commit. Both sides choose at the same time. You pick your primary action for the phase and, if you wish, arm a defensive interrupt (see Interrupts). Neither side can see what the other has chosen yet.

Reveal. Both sides' choices are shown.

Initiative. Each side rolls for initiative to decide who acts first. See Initiative below.

Resolve. Both committed actions resolve in initiative order. The first fighter's effects land before the second fighter rolls. There is no winning by striking so fast that your opponent cannot move. A defeat check happens once, after both sides have acted. If the phase is simultaneous (see Initiative) both blows land at the same instant, and a mutual knockout is possible.

After both sides resolve, you read a short written account of what happened. The account tells you who acted first and, if an interrupt was armed, exactly why it fired or did nothing.

Initiative

After both sides reveal their committed actions, each fighter rolls a ten-sided die (a d10). The fighter with the higher Intuition rank adds +1 to their result. If both fighters have the same Intuition rank, neither gets the bonus.

The fighter with the higher total acts first. If you have armed a Defensive interrupt this phase, your roll takes a -1 penalty, reflecting the tempo cost of bracing for an attack.

A tied total means the phase is simultaneous. Neither fighter goes first: both committed actions resolve at the same instant, so both blows land even if one would have dropped the other. A mutual knockout is possible on a simultaneous phase. Should both fighters reach zero health at the same moment, the winner is decided by whichever fighter had more health remaining before the final blow; if that is also equal, higher Intuition decides. There are no draws.

Phase names

Each phase has a name that sets the mood of that stage of the fight.

Phase ten is the Final Gambit. If both characters are still standing after nine phases, the tenth is a last stand. If neither is knocked out by the end of it, the character with more health remaining wins.

Guard

On any phase you can choose to Guard instead of attacking. Guarding braces you and cuts the damage you take that phase in half. It is always available, no matter how hurt you are, so you always have something safe to do.

6. Abilities

Each character has a six-slot kit: a Standard Strike, a Secondary Strike, one or more Signatures, a Defensive ability, a Tactical ability, and a Passive. Each slot is described below.

Standard Strike

A Standard Strike is a basic attack. It is always available, every phase, with no usage limit. It can do more than just deal damage; a good roll often adds an effect such as slowing or off-balancing your opponent.

Secondary Strike

A Secondary Strike is also always available with no usage limit. It is a different kind of attack from the Standard Strike and always deals a different damage type. Some opponents are softer against one type than the other, so picking the right strike matters.

Signature

A Signature is the character's most iconic power. Signatures are limited: each one can be used only a set number of times per battle, so you have to pick your moment. Some characters have more than one Signature. Each Signature spells out exactly what it does on a weak, solid, or great result.

Tactical

A Tactical ability is a limited-use move focused on positioning, disrupting the opponent, or setting up a follow-up. Uses are tracked per battle just like Signatures.

Defensive

A Defensive ability is the ability you arm as an interrupt. You do not choose it as a primary action; instead you arm it at the Commit step alongside your primary action. See Interrupts for how it fires and what the result means.

Passive

A Passive is always on. You never choose it; it simply changes how that character fights for the whole battle. Passives do things like add a permanent bonus to a stat, kick in when you reach a certain condition, change how an event resolves, or heal you a little at the start of each phase.

7. Interrupts

An interrupt lets you defend against a predicted attack before it lands, without giving up your own action.

Arming an interrupt

At the Commit step you can arm your Defensive ability alongside your primary action. To arm it you name the slot you expect your opponent to use: Standard Strike, Secondary Strike, Signature, or Tactical. If you know a specific ability the opponent has used before (it will appear in the resolved phase history), you can instead name that exact ability for a more precise match.

Arming costs -1 to your initiative die roll this phase, whether or not the interrupt fires.

Your Defensive pool holds three uses for the whole battle. A use is spent only when the interrupt actually fires.

When an interrupt fires

On Reveal, the game checks whether your prediction matched your opponent's committed primary action. If the slot you named matches (or you named the exact ability and it matches), the interrupt fires and rolls immediately against your Defensive ability's stat. The colour it rolls determines how much it blunts the incoming attack.

If your prediction was wrong, the interrupt does nothing and no use is spent.

Damage type and eligibility

Each Defensive ability lists the damage types it counters at full strength. If the incoming attack carries a different type, the interrupt still fires but rolls at two rank steps lower. Some damage types are simply outside what a Defensive ability can handle; against those the interrupt is ineligible, it does nothing, and no use is spent.

Your primary action still resolves

Arming an interrupt does not replace your primary action. Both still happen. The interrupt fires against the incoming attack; your own committed action then resolves in initiative order as normal.

What each side can read

The Standard Strike is always public to both sides. Until you have scouted your opponent, that is the only slot either side can read and brace against. Once you gain intel on your opponent (see Scouting and Intel), you can predict and brace against their broader kit.

Your opponent reads you the same way. Until the opponent's character has used a reveal ability against you, they can only read and brace against your Standard Strike.

Scouting and Intel

Intel is information about your opponent beyond the always-public Standard Strike. It does not appear automatically. You gain it by using a character ability that carries a reveal effect. Not every character has one; check your kit before the match if scouting is part of your plan.

When you gain intel, the opponent's card in the match view shows an Intel panel. What you can see there depends on the scope the reveal ability unlocked: for example, a reveal that uncovers "abilities" shows you the opponent's full kit; one that uncovers "stats" shows their seven stat ranks. You can open your own ability cards and the opponent's revealed abilities from the match screen at any time.

Your opponent uses reveal abilities to scout you under the same rules. The information advantage is available to both sides.

Arming against a specific ability. Once an opponent has used a specific ability in a resolved phase, that ability appears in the phase history. You can arm your interrupt against that exact ability (rather than just its slot) by selecting it in the interrupt panel. A specific match fires only when the opponent commits that exact ability, making it more precise than a slot prediction.

8. The Dice System

Every action is settled with dice. The game rolls a hundred-sided die, written as a number from 1 to 100. How that roll is read depends on the rank of the stat you are using: a higher rank turns more of the possible rolls into good results.

Roll 1: to-hit

The first roll decides whether your action lands and how well. The result is read as one of four colours.

White is a fumble. The action fails completely and nothing else happens. Green is a partial success: it works, but not cleanly. Yellow is a solid, clean success. Red is a critical success, the dramatic best case.

A White result ends the action there. No further roll is made.

Roll 2: resistance

If your action lands (Green or better) and it would deal damage, a second roll is made to see how well your opponent shrugs it off. This is the resistance check, described in section 9. It can reduce or even cancel the damage before it lands.

Each ability already states how much damage and what effects it produces on a Green, Yellow, or Red result, so the colour of your to-hit roll tells you which outcome you get.

Colour band table

This table shows which rolls produce which colour at each rank. A higher rank shifts more of the range into Yellow and Red. The numbers are the highest roll that still counts as that colour; "00" means a roll of 100.

Higher ranks exist on the ladder, but no character in the current game rolls above Monstrous, so the ranks beyond this point never come up in play.

Impact band table

Most abilities state their damage directly. A few instead deal damage based on a rank, using this table. The amount depends on the rank and on the colour of the to-hit roll.

9. Resistance Profiles

Damage comes in six types: physical (blows and blades), energy (heat, cold, and electricity), mental (psychic force, fear, and illusion), sonic (sound), toxin (poison and disease), and environmental (falls, pressure, and suffocation).

Every character has a resistance rank against each type. When an attack that would deal damage hits you, the game rolls a resistance check against your rank for that damage type. The colour of that roll decides how much gets through. Note that here a strong result is good for the defender.

Any damage type a character has no special rating for counts as Typical, the ordinary human baseline.

Some attacks pierce armour: they lower your effective resistance rank for that hit before the roll is made. A few abilities also deal damage over time; that lingering damage ticks at the start of each of the next phases and is not reduced by a resistance roll.

10. Economy

Credits are the in-game currency. You earn them through ranked matches and spend them to unlock characters.

Earning Credits

Casual matches earn no Credits. Credits come from ranked matches only.

The first time you win a ranked match on any given UTC day you earn an extra 15 Credits bonus on top of the standard 20. The bonus resets at midnight UTC and applies once per day regardless of how many ranked wins you get that day.

Character costs

Each character has a Credit cost shown on their card. When you spend Credits to unlock a character, they join your permanent collection and you can field them in any future battle.

New players start with 200 Credits and choose one free starter character from a short list: Red Arrow, Huntress, Luke Cage, or Catwoman. You keep the starter and your opening Credits to spend on whoever you want next.

Signed-in play

Signed-in players can only field characters they own in ranked matches. Guests can pick any character for casual play, but nothing is saved when the session ends. Ranked matches require a signed-in account.

11. Progression

Your player profile tracks everything that carries over between sessions.

Rating

Every player starts with an ELO rating of 1000. Each ranked match moves your rating up or down. A win against a higher-rated opponent moves your rating up more than a win against a lower-rated one; the reverse is true for losses. The game uses a standard K=32 formula.

Tiers and Divisions

Your tier is derived from your rating. You are Unranked until you finish five ranked placement matches. Once placed, your tier is one of six bands.

Each tier except Icon has three divisions: III (lower third of the band), II (middle third), and I (top third). Your current tier and division are shown on your profile and on the rankings screen.

Collection

All the characters you own appear here. Each shows their stats, abilities, and Credit cost for anyone who does not own them yet.

Record

Your profile tracks your ranked wins, losses, and your current win streak. Casual matches are free practice and do not count toward your permanent record.

Credits

Your current Credit balance and a running total of Credits earned.

Sign in or create a free account to start building your profile. Guests can play casual freely but nothing is saved when the session ends.

12. Seasons

The game runs in 30-day seasons. A live countdown to the end of the current season is shown on the rankings screen, along with your total rating change within that season so far.

When a season closes, the final leaderboard is archived, and two things happen:

Soft rating reset. Every real player's rating is pulled halfway back toward the middle (1000), so the next season is a fresh-ish climb while your relative standing carries over. The formula is: new rating = 1000 + (old rating - 1000) / 2. So a 1600 becomes 1300, an 800 becomes 900, and a 1000 is unchanged.

Placement Credits. Players who have completed their placement matches earn a one-off Credit payout by their final rank among real players (bots do not count and do not earn): 1st = 500 Credits, 2nd-3rd = 300, 4th-10th = 150, the rest of the top quarter = 75, and any other placed finish = 25. Your payout is shown in the "last season" line on the rankings screen.

When the next season begins, the rankings screen shows your placement from the season that just closed.

13. Community Voting

Community voting is not part of the game yet.

14. Madcap Comics Shop

There is no shop link in the game yet.