Rules

Objective

You drive an autonomous combat robot in a contested zone called Sector 2. Rounds are slow and tactical: positioning and information win fights, not fast aim.

There are three game modes, picked on the setup screen (the host picks for a room):

• SKIRMISH: one life. The round ends when one team destroys every enemy robot, or when time runs out, and then the team holding the most sectors wins
• CONTROL: hold the comms towers. Every second your team holds a tower it earns a point; when time runs out the team with the most points wins. A destroyed mech is not out: it respawns at its own base a few seconds later with full parts and ammo. The score is not shown during the round, only at the end, so keep fighting
• SIEGE: take the enemy base, sector by sector. Your team can only capture a sector that touches one it already holds (your base counts), so the two cells next to your base come first, then the centre or a corner, then a cell next to the enemy base. Hold one of those and the enemy pad is open: stand inside its ring and a clock runs; 45 seconds uncontested and the round is yours. One mech is enough. A defender stepping into the ring stops the clock, and it bleeds back down while nobody is attacking, so a broken push can be picked up again. Lose the sector next to the enemy base and their pad closes again: the clock stops and bleeds until you hold one. Standing at a tower you cannot take yet does nothing for you, but it still blocks the other team from capturing it or resupplying there. Both bases work the same way, so both teams push at once and meet in the middle. A destroyed mech respawns at the tower your team holds nearest the enemy base, or at your own base when you hold none, and always at your base while your pad is under attack. Each fall waits longer: 8 seconds the first time, then 16, 24 and 30 from there on. The open enemy pad hands attackers ammo like a held tower does, while nobody defends it. The radar darkens the sectors you cannot take yet, and the line under the clock says BASE EXPOSED when the enemy holds a sector next to your base and ENEMY BASE OPEN when you hold one next to theirs. At the clock, most sectors held wins

Rounds run 10 minutes. At 2 minutes remaining you get a warning and the clock turns red. Equal sectors or equal points at 0:00 are a draw. A forfeit button in the pause menu lets you quit early, scored as a loss.

In CONTROL and SIEGE a mech that has just respawned carries a spawn shield: no damage lands on it for a few seconds, or until it walks out of the circle it spawned in. Camping a spawn does not pay. In SIEGE a shielded defender does not stop the enemy's clock; it has to drop the shield and fight.

In CONTROL and SIEGE a mech whose legs are destroyed can self destruct instead of crawling home: SELF DESTRUCT in the pause menu, or hold X on a keyboard. It costs you: the respawn takes 12 seconds instead of 8 (in SIEGE, 4 seconds more than your wait would have been), and you come back at your base, not at a tower your team holds. Bots do the same when their legs are gone and they have nothing left to shoot with.

Sectors and towers

The arena is a 3x3 grid of sectors. The two opposite corners are home bases and can never be captured. The other 7 sectors each contain a comms tower, placed at a random spot every match.

• Capture: stand near a tower until it flips to your team
• Contested: if an enemy is also in range, the capture stalls until one side leaves or dies
• Recapture: towers can always be taken back, and the enemy AI will try

A captured tower shows ownership on its flag, beacon, and cabin stripe, visible from across the map. Towers are solid to mechs, but the base is open: shots and sightlines pass under the deck between the legs.

Radar and eyesight

Information is the core resource. Sector control gates radar only, never eyesight:

• If an enemy is close enough to see and not blocked by terrain, you see it, no matter who owns the sector
• Enemies appear as radar contacts only in sectors your team controls; lose the tower and those contacts vanish
• When an enemy walks into a sector you hold, you hear a tick and that sector flashes on the radar with a ring around the new contact, at most once every few seconds however many cross
• A short local sensor perimeter is always on, so nearby enemies stay on radar anywhere
• Radar is the only thing that sees through walls: an enemy behind a building shows as a blip with no marker in the world
• The radar shows what your team knows, not the truth: sectors you do not hold read as neutral whether they are empty or enemy held. Enemy captures are only visible by eye, from the tower's flag and beacon
• Losing your sensors component shrinks your local perimeter, but tower intel is unaffected: it comes from the towers, not your mech

Weapons and damage

Your mech carries two weapons, one per arm, fired independently. Pick them on the loadout screen before each round; the same weapon on both arms is allowed, and all weapons are available from the start.

• Sniper: long range precision, one heavy shot at a time
• Rifle: long range, lighter and quicker
• Cannon: mid range punch
• Machine gun: mid range hose with a scatter; the belt goes fast
• Grenade thrower: close range area damage
• Flamethrower: a 25 metre stream, walk in close

Damage is by component: legs, arms, sensors, and core take hits separately and stop working when destroyed. Crippled legs slow you, a dead arm stops firing, dead sensors shrink your radar, and a destroyed core is the end of your mech.

Base

• Stand near your own base to repair, capped at 50% of the damage you have taken
• Ammo resupplies at base with no cap, and more slowly at any tower your team holds: stand inside its circle while nobody contests it

Controls

Standard first person controls. Desktop: mouse aims, W/S walk, A/D strafe, left and right click fire each arm, Esc pauses. Touch: left stick to move, right stick to aim, L and R buttons to fire, AIM for precise arrow-key style aiming. Your legs automatically follow where you aim while you move.

Invert mouse and volume options are on the loadout screen. The full control reference is in the manual.

Single player and multiplayer

• Single player: AI squadmates fill your team so sides are even, at the team size (1v1 to 3v3) and with the STAY CLOSE or SPREAD OUT strategy you pick before the round. In SKIRMISH, if your mech is destroyed while a squadmate is still fighting you can spectate them and let the round play out (their result is yours), or accept defeat on the spot; alone, your death is the loss. In CONTROL you respawn
• Multiplayer: up to 6 players in one room, peer to peer. The host's browser runs the match; joining is just typing the room name. In SKIRMISH your death does not end the round: you watch from your wreck until a whole team is down. In CONTROL you respawn. The host leaving ends the room for everyone