Exiles Gameplay: Turn Structure
Let’s take a quick look at the Exiles turn structure.
The game turn has a pretty basic structure. It goes like this:
- Animals and Idiots
- Movin’
- Doin’
- Roundup
The Movin’ and Doin’ phases have their own declare/resolve sub-phases.
Animals and Idiots
Congrats to Josh Huntsman for correctly identifying C.O.W. Boys Of Moo Mesa! You’re a real sack of shit, Josh!
The Animals and Idiots phase is for doing whatever needs to be done with any animal or idiot models on the table. Some scenarios will have a few special rules for animals and/or idiots, but most of the time you can ignore them.
Animals and Idiots is also when the Governor puts new bad guys on the table, and that’s what you’ll use it for most of the time.
Movin’
NOOOOOOO! I’m not even holding my gun!
The most important thing about the Movin’ phase is that it’s timed.
The Governor should start every Movin’ phase by activating a timer, which should be about 20 seconds.
Once the timer starts, players have to do their Movin’ before the timer runs out!
When time is up, STOP!
If you dithered too long, declared the wrong action, or didn’t finish moving a model, well that sucks for you. Leave your model where it is, don’t touch that token on the table, and deal with it.
After the players finish Movin’ their shit, the Governor does all the bad guy stuff.
Finally, all declared actions get resolved before the Doin’ phase.
Doin’
A little too much Doin’ last night, eh? We’ve all been there.
The Doin’ phase is like the Movin’ phase, except it isn’t timed, and now you can kill somebody!
Just like Movin’ phase, players do their stuff first, then all the bad guys.
Effects apply as soon as they hit the table, but any mooks you shade normally get a chance to hit you back before they leave the table.
Roundup
What, you don’t have 100 cow models? Weirdo…
The Roundup phase is for resolving any lingering bullshit that happened in the game turn.
When everything is buttoned up, the Governor takes a few seconds to fiddle with models in the Animals and Idiots phase then starts a new Movin’ timer.
Rinse and repeat.
Game turns take about 90 to 180 seconds, which means you can normally play more than 20 game turns in a 45 minute game. Whoa doggie! That’s fast!
More game turns means you have plenty of time to make up for mistakes, so it doesn’t much matter if you screw up. This is the secret sauce that makes Exiles so awesome.
There’s so much playing going on that it does’t matter if you make a stupid mistake!