Hearts' Game (Guide)

Late PoSI Content and Onwards

Hearts' Game Summary
Locked Limited-Length Activity
Setup				Progress				End
1/5 A				7+ A				1 A
Progress Details			Raise Poisoner's Progress to 8 before Elusiveness of your Target. Same payout, win/lose.
Items Inputs/Outputs Boosting Dangerous Gains 20 Shadowy Gains 20 Persuasive Gains 20 Watchful Gains 20 Outputs Bessemer Steel Ingot Salt Steppe Atlas Puzzling Map Partial Map Map Scrap Intriguer's Compendium Leviathan Frame Elemental Secret Starstone Demark Brass Ring Whirring Contraption Scrap of Ivory Organza
Raw EPA						4.73

Hearts' Game is a murder-themed, Knife-and-Candle-adjacent pastime for high-level players. The first component was released on April 13, 2023. Play involves managing a team of miscreants with murder-monikers to poison a chosen target, with a number of restrictions to ensure good sportsmanship and fair hunting.

Because of the nature of Hearts' Game, Any generalisation in this guide should be taken to include "Unless otherwise stated" given the frequency of exceptions. This is to clarify the core mechanics of the game and to make the exceptions more prominent .

Current Season: Duplicities

Getting Started

To be eligible, a player must first become a Tier 2 PoSI and reach 200 Dangerous (with equipment). The card to gain entrance to the activity will be drawn immediately, and succeeding in a Watchful check at Watchmaker's Hill lead you to The Gamekeeper's Cottage, Renovated in Watchmaker's Hill.

Your first Round is a tutorial, with a smaller set of available Accomplices and a lower requirement for victory. With some luck and planning you should be able to win the first round.

A Note

The single most important thing to remember about Hearts' Game, before any talk of strategy, is that every action, succeed or fail, makes progress toward a reward. Winning and losing rounds does not affect this progress. Put another way, it does not matter if you win or lose! Yes, failing checks is hardly pleasant, and there are unique one-time rewards for amassing enough victories in particular ways, but all that is unimportant in the grand scheme.

The majority of this guide assumes you will be playing to win, but victory is by no means required, or even likely. The key point is that even with relatively low modified stats, one can profit as a casual murder-game player!

Mechanics of Play

First, you assemble a team of Accomplices (three, unless you recruit the King of Motley). The Accomplices you may choose from are determined by the RNG, using card mechanics. The cards you draw cannot be discarded, so you must pick one of the Accomplices presented. Your hand is discarded after each choice, so your decision should not be influenced by which other cards you have drawn. Lodgings do not affect hand size here, which is limited to four cards at a time.

After you choose your team, you begin a Round. During a Round, you cannot leave The Alleyways of London and cannot change equipment. A Round will probably take between ten and twenty actions; due to the progress of Elusiveness of your Target, the longest possible Round is probably around 25 actions.

During a Round, you play Cards that are unlocked by your Accomplices and attempt to reach 8 Poisoner's Progress either before or on the same action that you reach 8 Elusiveness of your Target. When at least one of these qualities reaches 8, the Round ends.

You may keep the team of Accomplices that you have selected for up to ten consecutive Rounds, which is called a Run. Winning at least 7 Rounds out of 10 in a Run earns a Trophy. Wins are also grouped by Seasons, and some equipment from the Page of Quills cannot be purchased without at least 7 victories within the current Season.

While aborting a Round that is still in session is possible, it will be counted as a loss and will not allow you to pick a different team. To do so you need to reach the conclusion of a Round by raising either of its progress qualities to 8 and choose to Separate from your accomplices. You will also be forced to assemble a team again after a Run ends. You also cannot pick a different team if you choose to take a break after a Round, since doing so will only allow you to resume play when you return.

The Season changes every month, on the first Tuesday of the month. When the season changes, your current run will be stopped prematurely, so be careful starting runs late in the season!

Qualities

In Hearts' Game, the progression of a Round is influenced by two positive and three negative qualities:

Poisoner's Progress

• Progress tracks how close you are to winning the round. You win when Progress reaches level 8 (36 CP).

Generated by offensive actions and reduced by the current level of Tolerance to a minimum of 1. Maximising this quality is your goal in Hearts Game.

Poisonous Preparation

• Preparation is gained from support actions and are a requirement for advanced actions.

Some of these options require only 1 level of Preparation; others require as much as 8. Preparations are not consumed and can be considered an investment towards more powerful actions in later Turns.

Elusiveness of your Target

• Elusiveness tracks how close you are to losing the Round. You lose if Elusiveness reaches level 8 (36 CP) before Progress does.

Elusiveness does not decrease and can be considered the round's ticking clock. From the third turn onwards, all actions have a chance to increase Elusiveness by 3 CP with the probability resulting from the following equation: (turn number - 2) / 7. Therefore Elusiveness will end the game after 17 ±3 rounds as shown in the graph below.

Likelihood of Elusiveness Gain

Elusiveness of your Target Chance per Turn
Turn	3	4	5	6	7	8	9+
Chance %	14	29	43	57	71	86	100

Graph of likely Elusiveness value in CP per turn

Poison Tolerance of Your Target

• Tolerance is a building resistance to your Poisoner's Progress, reducing Progress value by the Tolerance level to a minimum of 1.

After the first turn, each action you take has a chance to increase Tolerance by 2 CP with probability resulting from the following equation: (turn number - 1) / 12. Most actions that generate Progress CP have their effectiveness reduced by Tolerance. Some actions are guaranteed to increase Tolerance, and only one accomplice can decrease it.

Likelihood of Tolerance Gain

Poison Tolerance of Your Target Chance per Turn
Turn	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	10	11	12	13+
Chance %	8.33	16.66	~25	33.33	41.66	~50	58.33	66.66	~75	83.33	91.66	100

Graph of likely Tolerance Level per turn

Counterplay

• Counterplay adds negative autofire cards to your deck.

Offensive Basic actions and Failures on Advanced Actions grant 0–1 Counterplay, which are "cashed out" on negative autofire cards. These cards decrease Progress, increase Elusiveness and Tolerance, and, at high enough levels, can give An Overplayed Hand, a Burden which will make winning significantly harder. Counterplay events do not count towards turn count and can be considered to happen between turns.

Action Types

Each Accomplice unlocks two cards, and each card has an Basic Action and an Advanced Action.

Basic Actions

• Require no Preparation
• Require no Stat Challenge
• When raising Preparation raise it by 1
• When raising Progress raises Counterplay.

Advanced Actions

• Require Preparation
• Require a Stat Challenge
• When raising Preparation raise it by 2
• Always raises Counterplay on a failure.

Both cards for an Accomplice test against the same quality. With a few exceptions, challenges against Main Stats have a Broad difficulty of 200 and challenges against Advanced Skills have a Narrow difficulty of 12.

Class generalisations

See the General Strategies section below for discussion on accomplice roles and individual accomplices. However, in general:

• Pages

Pages generate some Progress without requiring much Preparation. They do not generate Preparation.

• Knights

Knights generate Preparation. With Preparation, Knights can generate Progress or decrease Tolerance. The Knight of Nobility also allows two other Knights to check Glasswork.

• Queens

Queens are primarily for support, combining giving preparations with other varied mechanics, such as clearing a hand or granting a multi-purpose Boon.

• Kings

Kings can generate large amounts of Progress, given sufficient Preparation. Some Kings can generate Progress without Preparation, while others can generate their own Preparations.

• Priests

Priests provide a Boon which can make other Accomplices more effective. They can also generate Preparation, Progress, and clear hands.

• Fools

The Fool is a rat in a Master's cloak. It behaves similarly to a Knight, but is also affected by all Priest Boons.

Rewards

Victories

Winning a Run (by winning at least 7 Rounds out of 10) earns a Trophy, a vanity Curiosity item with no uses beyond showing off on your profile mantelpiece. Some of the equipment rewards require both Victories and Exploits; in this case victories are counted over the course of an entire season as opposed to over the course of a single run.

Economic rewards

When cashed out with the Page of Quills, a single Exploit is worth between 4 and 5. Some of these options only become available once you have overcapped your highway stats; see Raising Attribute Caps (Guide).

Action	Item	Cost ( Exploits)	Value	Value / Action
The large wooden box	Soothe & Cooper Long-Box	11	62.5 50 and 3 x Favours: The Docks	N/A
The assemblage of ticking brass	Brass Ring Whirring Contraption	5	18.5	3.08 EPA
A consignment of steel	100 x Bessemer Steel Ingot	14	(50)	6.67 BSI/A
An illicit secret	Mortification of a Great Power	18	(62.5) 825	(3.25 EPA) 45 /A
The dusty book	Salt Steppe Atlas 4 x Puzzling Map 4 x Partial Map 5 x Map Scrap	25–32	123	3.73–4.73 EPA
The curious antique book Dangerous Gains 20	Intriguer's Compendium	65	312.5	4.73 EPA
The huge fossil ribcage Shadowy Gains 20	Leviathan Frame	65	312.5 Skeleton Value	4.73 EPA
The battered journal Persuasive Gains 20	Elemental Secret	65	312.5	4.73 EPA
The Correspondence-marked stone Watchful Gains 20	Starstone Demark	65	312.5	4.73 EPA
An antique scarf	Scrap of Ivory Organza	80	312.5 4125	3.85 EPA 49.1 /A

Unique equipment

These are the capstone rewards for Heart's Game, and as such they have more strenuous requirements than just spending exploits. Each can only be obtained once.

General Strategies

Drafting Tips

First and most importantly: drafting is random. Do not come in with a specific idea of what build you would like to have. If you are looking for a specific team (for example for Distinctions), accept that you may have to draft, fail, play one round with the team, and then disband it. The good news is that bad RNG has no effect on profit, so the only thing you lose here is a handful of actions. If you're looking to get a Trophy in a given season, you may have to draft a non-optimal team, try them for a round, and then disband and try again. I do recommend actually giving a shot during your one required round though: you may find an unexpected strategy!

There are a few things to keep in mind when doing your gacha pulls for Accomplices:

1. Skill and outfit management. This will be explained more in its own section.
2. Flexibility. Especially for your first draft, try to keep your options open. You want to pick characters with Supportive options first.
3. Utility. An important thing to realise is that you do not have to fully utilise every part of a character's kit just because they're on your team. It is extremely viable to only use some of a character's options and never play others in a given run.
4. Strategy and role. The game divides characters in terms of the classes of Page, Knight, King, Queen, Priest, and Fool, but this can actually be unhelpful for our purposes. Instead it's more useful to think of accomplices as fitting in three different roles: Progressers, Supports, and Synergists.

Accomplice Roles

In terms of drafting, it helps to think in terms of the metagame roles for Accomplices:

• Progressers are Accomplices which directly make Progress. The Page of Roots is a good example: his cards do nothing other than increase Poisoner's Progress.
• Supports are Accomplices which don't deal damage directly, but enable others to do so. There are two subtypes:
  • Prep supports, who build Preparations to allow other accomplices to use their stronger options. The Knight of Skin is the archetypal example here, able to build multiple Preparations in a single action or make progress at the same time.
  • Deck supports, who help you manage the cards in your hand. The Queen of Loins is the archetypal Deck Support character, unable to make real progress herself but able to clear your hand and help with Preparations.
• Synergists open up team archetypes that are otherwise not viable on their own. The Accomplice: Knight of Nobility is a good example, as she turns two other Accomplices, the Knight of Disintegrities and the Knight of Talons, into Glasswork users, opening up an entirely new skill to the game.

These classifications are not 1:1 to the actual game: the Page of Lures, for example, can act as both a Progresser and a Synergist since he consumes Preparations. These are not classes which characters fall into: rather, they are roles a character can fulfill on your team.

Here are a handful of generic team archetypes that it can help to keep in mind during drafts.

Archetype	Roles	Strategy
Dual-Damage	Progresser Progresser Support	Generally the goal here is straightforward: use the Support to build Preparations, and then use the other cards to attack the enemy. Usually one or both Progressers will be Pages since they can get away with only a small number of Preparations.
Hybrid Damage	Progresser Progresser/Support Hybrid Support	Similar to the dual-damage comp, some accomplices can both build Preparations and deal respectable damage. Usually the hybrid damage-dealer will be a Knight, but not always.
Carry	Progresser Support Support	The preferred setup for many Kings, this is a backloaded setup where two units set up for a much stronger unit to win the game in just a few heavy hits.
Hyper Offence	Progresser Progresser Progresser	This one is a strange build and will be smacked around by Counterplay quite a bit: extremely not recommended for Embalming runs. But certain combinations can actually make respectable progress with no Preparations and no skill checks whatsoever. It doesn't matter if you get hit with that nasty Burden if you were never rolling against your skills anyway, after all!
Wildcard	Synergist Synergist Support	Some builds rely on one character's unique gimmick very heavily and are built around it. You may be collecting Priests for the Fool of Audacities or collecting Boons for King of Ambivalences.

Here is a cheat sheet for what each Accomplice can offer in terms of archetypes for when you are drafting. Remember: it is not necessary to fully utilise every Accomplice's kit. It is perfectly viable, for example, to take a King solely for their ability to build Preparations and never actually use their damage-dealing options.

Accomplice	Stat	Max Prep	Progress	Prep support	Deck Support	Synergy
Page of Lures	Watchful	2	Strong attacks that consume Poisonous Preparation	None	None	Requires a teammate to build Preparations, ideally two per action. Weaker than other Accomplices if Preparations runs below 2.
Page of Papers	Persuasive	3	Steady progress with 2-3 Preparations.	None	None	Just a straightforward DPS.
Page of Roots	Kataleptic Toxicology	3	Slightly weaker Progress but resistant to Tolerance, even checkless.	None	None	Always increases Poison Tolerance of Your Target. Checkless options are not affected by Tolerance at all.
Page of Teeth	Dangerous	2	Strong Progress even checkless but very affected by Tolerance.	None	None	Needs Poison Tolerance of Your Target kept low.
Page of Inversions	Shapeling Arts	2	Strong Progress even checkless but very affected by Tolerance.	None	None	Needs Poison Tolerance of Your Target kept low.
Page of Gambits	Shadowy	3	Increases Progress Poisoner's Progress as well as Elusiveness semi-randomly, and one rare "success" can instantly end a run.	None	None	A straightforward damage-dealer for gamblers.
Knight of Flames	Watchful	2	Only small, fixed amounts.	Both cards have Poisonous Preparation options	None	Can reduce Poison Tolerance of Your Target and so pairs well with late-strikers and characters that need it kept low.
Knight of Livers	Shadowy	4	Expensive and mediocre progress but can build Prep at the same time	Can give 2 Poisonous Preparation at a time	None	Great at building Preparations
Knight of Ribs	Dangerous	4	One decent checkless option, 4 Prep options are strong.	One card gives one Preparation.	None	Wants Prep support
Knight of Skin	Watchful	3	Can do mediocre progress while building Preparations	No free checks, but gives 2 Preparations at a time.	None	Great at building Preparations
Knight of Talons	Kataleptic Toxicology	4	Decent Prep for decent damage with easier checks	Checkless Preparation available on both cards	None	Can use Glasswork instead with Knight of Nobility.
Knight of Disintegrities	Shapeling Arts	4	Decent Prep for strong damage	Checkless Preparation available on both cards	None	Can use Glasswork instead with Knight of Nobility.
Knight of Nobility	Glasswork	4	Expensive and mediocre progress but can build Prep at the same time	Can give 2 Poisonous Preparation at a time	None	Great at building Preparations. Can open Glasswork as an option for play with good accomplice draws.
Queen of Loins	None.	None.	One very bad checkless option	Can build Preparations with checkless options on both cards	One card can clear your hand.	Just a generally strong support.
Queen of Cod	Shadowy	2	None	One card can give 2 Preparations at a time	One guaranteed card draw at the start that is then dismissed for the rest of the round and gives a general-purpose Boon, the Ace of Queens. This card can also clear your hand one time only with some Preparations.	Cod is the only Accomplice who actually reduces your deck size.
King of Knuckles	Dangerous	5	Strong options which get more powerful with high Elusiveness	None	None	Something of a late bloomer.
King of Roses	Persuasive	6	Needs high Prep and one option scales with ever more preparations	None	None	Ideally prefers both of his partners to be able to build Preparations to build up to a win with only a couple of extremely strong hits.
King of Spines	Shadowy	7	Very high Prep requirement, very strong attacks in return	One checkless option on one card gains prep	None	Ideally prefers both of his partners to be able to build Preparations to build up to a win with only a couple of extremely strong hits.
King of Tallow	Kataleptic Toxicology	8	Very high Prep requirement, very strong attacks in return	One checkless option on one card gains prep	None	Ideally prefers both of his partners to be able to build Preparations to build up to a win with only a couple of extremely strong hits.
King of Ambivalences	Shapeling Arts	5	High progress that scales with every Ace, but also increases Counterplay	Checkless Preparations on both cards	None	Grants Ace of Ambivalences, which can be useful if you have the other Shapeling Arts Accomplices in your party. Wants at least one other Ace-giving accomplice, or else his damage options are not worth playing.
King of Motley	Persuasive	7	High progress that scales with number of Accomplices you have	Can build Preparations on both cards with checkless options.	Thoughts and prayers.	See the section on his Distinction for a full analysis. His damaging options are not really worth using in a standard run, instead use him to build Preparations. Given how expensive his options are, he needs at least 5 total accomplices to be worth using as a main damage dealer, ideally more.
Priest of Briars	Persuasive	2	None	Can build Preparations 2 at a time	One card can clear your hand	The Ace of Kings is a nice bonus but the Preparation and hand clearing options are strong for nearly all accomplices, making his utility far from limited to King runs.
Priest of Magpies	Watchful	4	Can give small checkless Progress and mediocre Progress on one card for Preparations	Cannot build Preparations, unlike the other two Priests.	Grants Ace of Pages and can be consumed to clear your hand on one card	Magpies is sadly underpowered and situational currently, being relegated only to builds where a Page is your main damage-dealer and you have some other way of building Preparations. The Ace reduces difficulty rather than increasing progress gained, which can help players whose wardrobe is rather thin.
Priest of Smiths	Dangerous	3	Can give decent Progress with Preparation	Checkless options build Preparations	None	The Ace of Knights is a very nice boost to builds with Knight Progressers.
Fool of Audacities	Persuasive	4	Decent progress that increases when paired with Priests	Checkless options build Preparations	None	Grants Ace of Fools, which does nothing, and actually benefits more from all Priests than their intended targets. With Smiths and Briars, the Fool does King-level Progress with only Knight-level prep.

Outfit Preparations

It can be useful to maintain a dedicated "flex" outfit slot for Hearts' Game. After you have drafted your team but before you begin your first round, take a moment to consider. Whose attribute check options are you actually planning on using to inflict damage? These are the ones whose attributes you should prioritise, since you will be playing their cards the most. Try not to have more than one or two of these on a team or you will spread yourself very thin.

This is obvious but it bears making explicit: Failing skill checks in Hearts' Game increases your chance of losing, though it's important to stress you make the same profit regardless. You can recover from a handful of failures without too much difficulty, but the clock is against you: you will accumulate Counterplay from your failure and Elusiveness and Poison Tolerance will accrue without you having made corresponding progress. In order to try to be consistent, try to keep your main accomplice's skill checks at or above 90%, and 70-80% is acceptable for the others. These are just tips, though: Hearts' Game is about experimentation and you may find different outfits schemes work better for you, so this is just provide as a rule of thumb to start out with.

Other important considerations:

• Highway stat checks generally require 334 points to succeed. You will likely not be able to hit this for two stats, but depending on your gear you may be able to hit around 300 for two which is 90%, an acceptable level of risk.
  • For Pages, the Priest of Magpies reduces the maximum to 300.
  • Hearts' Game is a great use for Second Chances in the endgame; you will rarely encounter skill checks more difficult than these. A 70% chance to succeed with a Second Chance is equivalent to a 90% chance to succeed without one. This should only be done with options you only plan on playing a few times, such as A duel in the old style, as otherwise it gets expensive quickly.
• Advanced Skills require reaching 17 in the skill to maximise (19 with Embalmer's Mark) to guarantee. They hit 90% at 16 (18). That likely means using almost all of your equipment slots for this one stat, and may be fully impossible for newer players of the game.
  • For Pages, the Priest of Magpies reduces the guaranteed breakpoint by 2 points to 15.
  • Even if you cannot consistently pass Advanced Skill checks, these accomplices can still be useful, albeit not as a main Progresser. The advanced skill Kings and Knights can all provide Prep support, the Page of Inversions can give you a nice checkless head start on Progress, and the Page of Roots can help push you over the finish line since his checkless options are unaffected by Poison Tolerance.

Playing The Game

Now that you've drafted your Accomplices and adjusted your outfit, it's time to actually play! Here's some general play tips:

• Your base deck has six cards in it, five if you're running with the Queen of Cod. Counterplay cards are slowly added in as Counterplay increases and are about half as likely to be drawn as a standard card in your deck.
• This means that effectively, you only ever have to actually play four cards in your deck, because you can hold two in your hand and draw. Thus, the general strategy is to figure out what the two worst cards in your deck are at the point in the game you're at, and hold them in your hand. Play your other cards one at a time. As a rule of thumb:
  • Early on, hold damaging cards in your hand and draw for Supports to build required Preparations, gather Aces, and so on. Then you can fire a large opening volley as soon as you hit the necessary threshold.
  • Later, hold the Support cards in your hand. This way when you draw you will draw the Progress cards over and over again.
• If you have them, play hand-clearing cards as soon as your hand has two other junk cards for maximum efficiency.
• Some builds may occasionally end up with three undesirable cards in their hand. This isn't a big deal if it happens a couple times in a run, but if you find yourself losing multiple Rounds because of it, you should rethink your strategy and perhaps draft new Accomplices.
  • If you have to play an undesirable card, the checkless option is likely better than risking a failure on the check option, but be wary of Counterplay.
• Tips for managing Hearts' Game: Counterplay:
  • Counterplay accrues from two main sources: checkless progress options and failures. Avoid playing the former unnecessarily and avoid the latter with proper outfit management, and you can mitigate much of your risk.
  • Don't underestimate it. The Counterplay autofire cards only adjust the qualities a marginal amount, but while that isn't a big deal with Elusive or Poisoner's Progress an increase in Poison Tolerance early on can make a round unwinnable.
  • Try to avoid hitting Counterplay 5 if possible, as An Overplayed Hand can be a very nasty burden to deal with. It's not a death sentence to your run by any means, but it does make defeat more likely.
  • Hand management strategies for dealing with Counterplay:
    • Instead of holding two cards in your hand, instead when you draw you should play everything in your hand that doesn't give you Counterplay before you draw again (though don't play Preparations options if you don't actually need them, as then you're just running out the clock with no benefit). This maximises your chance of drawing non-Counterplay cards because of how deck maths works.
    • If you already have some Counterplay and want to avoid hitting 5, draw cards one at a time until you get a few Counterplays, which will reduce it with the more manageable tweaks to Elusiveness and Tolerance. Obviously, be sure to avoid playing options which give more Counterplay!

Strategies for Distinctions

See Hearts' Game (Guide)/Distinctions for in-depth strategic discussion.