By Barny Skinner

1 Player - 60 Minutes

You can't say what draws you, maybe some force of nature beyond imagining, perhaps simply greed. Somewhere in
the depths, in the gloom beneath, there is something of great value, something you feel certain will change your
fortunes. Death lies before you, but there is no fate you want more. The stairs wind down into the dungeon below,
lit only by torchlight.

By Torchlight is a solitaire 9 card dice-placement dungeon crawl, featuring a choice of 4 characters to play, 4
increasingly difficult levels each with thousands of possible dungeon layouts, 12 different types of monster and 8
different items of equipment. Can you claim the treasure, or will your skull adorn the walls for a future fool to find?

On each Dungeon Level, your Adventurer must find a Key, before escaping down a staircase behind a locked gate.
As well as Monsters to be killed or avoided, each Dungeon Level has a Chest, from which you can gain Equipment to
help you in your quest.

Don't spend too long on each Level, as Monsters will reappear, and your Adventurer will tire. After each Level your
Adventurer takes a moment to rest and improve her skills, ready for the challenges below.

If you can reach the final staircase out of the lowest level, you can claim the mysterious treasure and escape with
your life; if your Health is ever reduced to zero, your Adventurer has been slain, and the quest is over. Still, no great
loss, there are plenty more Adventurers out there.

9 Double Sided Cards

2 Character Cards 2 Equipment Cards 1 Adventure Card

4 Dungeon Cards

Other Components
l 3 Green Monster Dice
l 2 Blue Monster Dice
l 1 Red Monster Dice
l 1 Adventurer Dice of a different colour
l 10 Energy Dice of any colour
l 1 8mm Timer Cube
Page 1
 Character Cards

Each Character Card depicts an Adventurer on each side. At

Move
the start of the game you select one of the four Adventurers
to play as; the other card is not used this game.
Stealth
The card has six Action Boxes corresponding to the six
Actions your Adventurer can take - Move, Stealth, Attack,
Increase Range, Shield and Heal. To determine the Actions
you take each turn you will roll your Energy Dice, then place
Attack each one on an Action Box which has a corresponding Dice
Value, e.g. you can only assign an Energy Dice with a value of
2 to an Action Box with a Dice Value showing a 2. You can
Increase
Range assign as many matching Energy Dice as you wish to each
Action Box, and each will activate the corresponding Action.
Dice
Values Some Action Boxes have the same Dice Value twice or more,
in these case a dice of that value assigned there will activate
Shield the Action multiple times, once for each matching value. E.g. if
you assigned a dice which rolled a 3 to a Move slot with two
Heal 3 symbols, you could Move twice.

The distribution of Dice Values is the distinction between each

Adventurer, and leads to radically different playstyles.

Equipment Cards
Each side of an Equipment Card features 2 pieces of
Equipment. You do not begin the game with any Action Box Dice Value(s) Selection Numbers
Equipment, but may acquire some during the game by
opening Chests. Once per Dungeon Level, when you move
your Adventurer onto a Chest Tile, you roll a dice, and may
select one of the pieces of Equipment with a matching
Selection Number, e.g. if you rolled a 1 you could select
either the Axe or the Potion. When you acquire a piece of
Equipment you slide the card under the left or right of your
Character Card to show the piece of Equipment you now
own. You may only have a maximum of 2 pieces of
Equipment at one time, one from each card.

If you already own a piece of Equipment and reach a new

Chest, you may choose to discard that Equipment if you roll
a different number on the same card, or may choose to
keep the one you have. You do not have to take or discard
Equipment if you don't want to.

Each item of Equipment has Action Boxes, which add more Dice Values to the Action Boxes on your Character Card.
For all intents, your Character Card counts as having those extra Dice Values on the matching Action Boxes.
Equipment therefore increases the flexibility of your Character, allowing you more choice over Energy Dice
placement, and in some cases can mean gaining double effects for Action Boxes which already have the same Dice
Values.

This example Adventurer has acquired

two powerful items of Equipment
during the adventure. The Crossbow
gives a 5 Dice Value to Attack, which
increases flexibility, and an extra 3 Dice
Value to Increase Range. As the
Adventurer already has a 3 on Increase
Range, any 3s assigned to that Action
will now each increase Range by 2.

The Armour adds a 5 to Stealth and a

4 to Shield, similarly giving 4 a
doubled effect on Shield.
Page 2
 Dungeon Cards
Green Rune Floor Stairs From Above Chest Wall

Red Rune Stairs to Below Key Blue Rune

Each side of a Dungeon Card consists of an offset grid of Tiles, depicting part of the Dungeon Level to be
explored. Various types of Tiles exist, with diffect game effects:

Floor Both the Adventurer and Monsters may Move or trace Lines of Sight or Perception freely
over Floor Tiles, from one to an adjacent Floor Tile.

Wall Monsters and the Adventurer may not Move on or trace Lines of Sight or Perception through
Walls.

Stairs From Above The Adventurer starts each Dungeon Level on the Stairs From Above. It otherwise counts as a
Floor tile.

Stairs To Below If the Adventurer Moves onto the Stairs To Below while carrying the Dungeon Level's Key,
you have completed the level. Otherwise counts as a Wall Tile, as the stairway is behind a
locked gate.

Key When the Adventurer Moves onto the Key Tile, she is considered to have picked up the Key
for this Dungeon Level. It otherwise counts as a Floor tile.

Runes Runes mark where Monsters of each of the three colours begin and Reappear, and where
they will Move towards if they cannot Perceive the Adventurer. They otherwise count as Floor
Tiles.

Chest Once per Dungeon Level, when the Adventurer Moves onto the Chest Tile you may roll for a
new piece of Equipment as described in the Equipment Cards section. It otherwise counts as
a Floor tile.

Any other decoration on Tiles, such as bodies, desks, lamps etc, are purely decorative.

IMPORTANT NOTE - Where Dungeon Cards meet, you will have Floor Tiles that are not offset. Movement, Range or
Perception may never take place diagonally where a diagonal exists between Floor Tiles on different cards.
Page 3
 Adventure Card
Dungeon Level Dungeon Level Name AI Track (Green)

Green Monster

Blue Monster

Red (Boss) Monster

Energy Dice (Red)

Time Track

Starting Health (Red) Perception (Red) Range (Red) Shield (Red) Green Reappear Rune

The Adventure Card defines what you will face on each of the four levels of the Dungeon.

Each side of the Adventure Card contains two Dungeon Level sections, on the left and right halves of the card. At
any one time you will only refer to the section for the Dungeon Level you are currently playing.

Each Dungeon Level section details the Monsters you will face on this Dungeon Level. Each Dungeon Level has
Green, Blue and Red Monsters, shown by the Rune next to each picture. These Monsters are represented in the
Dungeon by Dice of the appropriate colour, with the value on top of the dice showing the Monster's current Health.

Each type of Monster has various Stats:

Energy Dice The number of dice the Monster will roll in the Monster Phase to determine its Actions.

Starting Health The starting, and maximum, Health for this Monster.

Perception The number of Tiles away the Monster can Perceive the Adventurer. This is modified by
the Adventurer's Stealth Action.

Range Unlike the Adventurer, the Range at which each Monster can Attack is fixed.

Shield Each point of Shield allows the Monster to block one Hit per Round. Not all Monsters have a
Shield Stat, in which case they cannot block Hits.

Each Monster also has an AI Track, which defines how they will behave in the Monster Phase, and is described in
detail in that section.

At the bottom of the Adventure Card is the Time Track. A cube is placed on the leftmost box of this Track at the
start of the Dungeon Level, and moved one space along at the end of each Round, described the Timer Phase
section.

Designer's Note - The Adventure Card is absolutely rammed with important information, to the point of sometimes
being difficult to use. Ideally this would be spread over two or more cards, but this is unfortunately a limitation of
the 9 card format; in order to make the Dungeon Level details clearer I'd need to lose a card elsewhere, which would
mean either losing one of the Equipment or Character cards, which is a sacrifice I'd rather not make, as I'm trying to
cram as much play variation as possible into the game.

The Adventure Card is included in a larger format on the Reference Sheet for those want to refer to a larger version.

Page 4
 Important Concepts

This page describes several important concepts that will be referred to elsewhere in the rules, mostly around how
Monsters and the Adventurer are able to be aware of and target each other.

Range and Line of Sight

Monster and Adventurer Attacks require Range and Line of Sight.

The Range between the Adventurer and a Monster is the number of Floor Tiles away they are by the shortest route,
with adjacent as Range 1. All Attacks have a Range, and if the Monster and Adventurer are within that Range, the
Attack may take place, as long as it also has Line of Sight.

In order to be in Line of Sight, you must be able to draw a

straight line from any part of the Adventurer's tile to any
part of the Monster's tile, without touching a Wall or
another Monster. You may sometimes wish to use the edge
of the unused Character Card to check Line of Sight.

In this example, the Green Monster is at a Range of 3, and is

in Line of Sight of the Adventurer (the Black Dice). However,
on this Dungeon Level the Green Monster has a Range of 1,
so is not in Range to Attack.

The Blue Monster has a Range Stat of 3, and is at Range 3,

from the Adventurer, but is not in Line of Sight, as you
cannot draw a straight line from any point in its Tile to the
Adventurer's Tile without touching a Wall. It is therefore also
unable to Attack without moving first.

Perception

All Monsters have a Perception Stat, which shows how many Floor Tiles away they can Perceive the Adventurer, i.e.
whether they are aware of the Adventurer's presence and location. Whether a Monster can Perceive the Adventurer
or not determines how they will act in the Monster Phase; Monsters that are able to Perceive the Adventurer may be
able to Move towards and potentially Attack the Adventurer. Monster behaviour is explained in detail in the Monster
Phase section.
The Perception Stat of each Monster is reduced by 1 for
each Stealth Action taken by the Adventurer this Round,
though a Monster's Perception may never drop to lower
than its Range.

Perception is drawn by the shortest route between the

Monster and the Adventurer across Floor Tiles, and may not
be drawn through walls.

In this example, the Green Monster has a Perception of 6,

and the Adventurer has used 1 Stealth Action this turn,
reducing the Monster's Perception to 5. The Monster
therefore cannot Perceive the Adventurer this turn, as she is
6 Floor Tiles away.

Hits

Attacks inflict Hits. Each Hit reduces the Health of the Monster or Adventurer by one, but a hit may be Blocked by
a Shield. Blocked Hits do not reduce Health.

Each Shield Action allows the Adventurer to Block one Hit from a Monster that Round.

Some Monsters have a Shield Stat; this is the number of Hits they will Block every Round, e.g. if the Adventurer
inflicts 3 Hits on a Monster with a Shield stat of 2, its Health will be reduced by 1.

If a Monster's Health is reduced to or below 0, it is Killed; remove its Dice from the Dungeon. Put the Dice aside, as
it may Reappear in the Dungeon later on (See the Timer Phase Section).

If the Adventurer's Health is ever reduced to or below zero, your Adventurer has died, probably slowly and painfully,
and the game is over. No extra lives in this game!

Page 5
 Setup

When you start a new game:

l Select your Adventurer from the Character Cards and place them in from of you, discarding the other card.
l Place 6 Energy Dice next to your Character Card.
l Put the Equipment Cards aside for now, you will need them later.

At the start of each Dungeon Level:

l Randomly generate a Dungeon Map. The process for this is the same for each Level of the Dungeon; take
the four Dungeon Cards, and without looking, shuffle them, while turning and flipping cards at random.
Once they are thoroughly shuffled, flipped and rotated, without looking, lay the four cards out in landscape
2x2 rows. Tidy the cards together to form your Dungeon Level.
l Place the Adventure Card with the current Dungeon Level showing.
l Place the Dice representing your Adventurer on the Stairs From Above Tile, with a 6 on top to show your
current Health.
l Place a Green Dice for each Green Monster on the Green Runes, with the Starting Health value of the Green
Monsters for this Dungeon Level on top.
l Place a Blue Dice for each Blue Monster on the Blue Runes, with the Starting Health value of the Blue
Monsters for this Dungeon Level on top.
l Place a Red Dice for the Red Boss Monster on the Red Rune, with the Starting Health value of the Red
Monster for this Dungeon Level on top.
l Place the Timer Cube on the first space of the Timer Track.

Example Setup for the first

Dungeon Level.

Page 6
 Rounds

A Dungeon Level of By Torchlight is played in a series of Rounds, repeated until you either escape the Dungeon
Level or lose all your Health and die. Each Round contains three phases:

l Adventurer Phase
l Monster Phase
l Timer Phase

Adventurer Phase

In the Adventurer Phase, you roll your Energy Dice and assign them to Action Boxes, then resolve the Actions. At
the beginning of the first Level you will have 6 Energy dice, but this will change as the game goes on.

Roll all your Energy dice. Place each rolled dice on one of the 6 Action Boxes on your Character Card, making sure
you only assign to Action Boxes with matching Dice Values (or where an Equipment Card gives them a matching
Dice Value).
You may now, in any order, take the Actions granted by the Dice on
each Action Box. Remember - if an Action Box has more than one of the
same Dice Value, an Energy Dice of that value will give multiple of that
Action.

The Actions are:

Move For each Move Action, you may Move your Adventurer
to an adjacent Floor Tile. You may never move onto or
through a Wall or Monster.

Stealth For each Stealth Action, you will reduce the Perception
of all Monsters by 1 for the Monster Phase.

Attack For each Attack Action, inflict one Hit on a Monster

within Range.

Increase For each Increase Range Action, the Range of your

Range Attack Action is increased by 1, from a starting value of
1.

Shield For each Shield Action you can block one Hit in the
Monster Phase.
In this example, the Adventurer will take
2 Move Actions, 1 Shield, 1 Increase Heal For each Heal Action, increase your Health by 1, to a
Range and 3 Attack Actions, due to the maximum of 6.
doubled effect of the 2 on this Stealth and Shield are passive Actions that affect the Monster Phase.
Adventurer's Attack Action.

Monster Phase

In the Monster Phase, each Monster in the Dungeon has a chance to act, rolling Energy Dice to decide what they
will do.

Starting with the Monster closest to the Adventurer and working away, resolve each Monster once. If 2 Monsters are
equidistant, you may choose which order to resolve them.

Roll a number of dice equal to the Monster's Energy Dice Stat.

The AI Track for the Monster shows what each Dice rolled will cause the Monster to do; each dice result causes a
particular Monster Action. There are three Monster Actions - Move, Attack and Heal.

This example AI Track shows each dice roll of 1 or 2 will

cause a Move Action, rolls of 3 or 4 will make the Monster
Attack and all 5s and 6s will cause the Monster to Heal.

AI Tracks vary for each type of Monster, and not all

Monsters are able to Heal.

Move Attack Heal

Page 7
 Monster Phase (continued)

Monsters resolve their Monster Actions in fixed orders depending on whether they can Perceive the Adventurer or
not at the point when you roll (see the Perception section).

If the Monster can Perceive the Adventurer, it will resolve Monster Actions in the following order:

l For each Heal Action rolled, increase Health by 1 up to a maximum of its Starting Health.
l Use Move Actions to Move towards being a number of Tiles equal to its Range from the Adventurer and in
Line of Sight, taking as short a path as possible, stopping if it reaches its Range, would step out of Line of
Sight, or runs out of Moves.
l If in Range and Line of Sight, each Attack Action inflicts 1 Hit on the Adventurer.
l Use any remaining Move Actions to Move to being as many Tiles away from the Adventurer as possible,
preferring to get out of Line of Sight if there are multiple possible routes.

If the Monster cannot Perceive the Adventurer, it will instead resolve Monster Actions in the following order:

l For each Heal Action rolled, increase Health by 1 up to a maximum of its Starting Health.
l For each Move Action rolled, move one Tile in the shortest path towards the closest unoccupied Monster
Rune of its own colour, stopping if it reaches one.
l Any Attack Actions do nothing.

(You will note that if the Monster cannot Perceive the Adventurer, is standing on a Rune of its own colour and is at
its Starting Health, it will do nothing, so you may skip rolling and resolving it)

Any Monster Actions left over are lost.

When resolving a Move Action, the Monster Moves to an adjacent Floor Tile. Monsters may not move through Walls,
other Monsters or the Adventurer.. You will sometimes find these rules leave multiple possible shortest Movement
paths for a Monster to take - in these cases you may decide which route the Monster travels.

Once all Monsters have acted (or been skipped), the Monster Phase ends.

Monster Phase Example

In this example, the Adventurer

has 2 Stealth Actions, reducing


the Perception of all Monsters
by 2. Therefore, the Green
Monsters have a Perception of
3, the Blue of 5, and the Red of
4.

Those marked with a green tick

are in Perception Range of the
Adventurer, those with a red
cross are outside of Perception
Range.



We can see straight away that
the bottom Green and Red
Monsters will be Skipped, as
they are out of Perception Range, standing on Runes of their own colour and at
maximum Health.
First to be resolved is the closest Monster, the Green Monster 2 Tiles away from the Adventurer. On this Dungeon
Level, Green Monsters have 3 Energy Dice, so the player rolls 3 Dice and compares the result to the Green AI Track:

This Monster will

therefore take two Move
Actions and an Attack
Action.

Page 8
 Monster Phase Example (continued)

As this Monster can Perceive the Adventurer, it resolves its

Actions in this order:

Heal > Move to Max Range > Attack > Move Away

The Monster has no Heal Actions, so skips that, and resolves

its first Move Action, moving to the Tile Adjacent to the
Adventurer, as the Monster has a Range of 1.
The Monster is now at its maximum Range, so resolves its Attack. As it is in Range and Line of Sight to the
Adventurer, the Monster's Attack Action inflicts a Hit on the Adventurer. The Adventurer has a Shield Action this
turn, which blocks the Hit.

The Monster has 1 Move Action left, which it uses to step

away from the Adventurer. There are three possible options,
all of which are 2 Tiles away from the Adventurer (because
Diagonal Movement is not allowed), so the player may
decide which direction the Monster flees, and chooses for it
to step downwards.

This Monster has now finished resolving its Actions.

The other two Monsters to be resolved are both 5 Tiles away,

so the player may choose the order, and decides to Resolve
the other Green Monster first, which is out of Perception
Range, so will resolve its Actions in this order:

Heal > Move to closest Green Rune

The Player rolls 2 Moves and an Attack for this Monster, but only a single Move is used,
stepping onto the adjacent Green Rune. The other Move and the Attack Action are
wasted.

Last to be Resolved is the Blue Monster, which also has 3 Energy Dice, but Range 3 and
a different AI Track.

The Player rolls a 1, a 3 and a 6,

meaning a Move, an Attack and a Heal.

It first uses the Heal Action, recovering

to 3 Health, then uses the Move Action
to step towards the Adventurer, trying
to get to Range 3. Unfortunately for the
Monster, it only has enough Movement
to get to Range 4, so its Attack is wasted. It has no further Actions remaining, so is finished Resolving.

All Monsters having now been Resolved or Skipped, the Monster Phase is now complete.

Timer Phase

In the Timer Phase, time ticks on, and new Monsters may appear or your Adventurer may tire.

Advance the Timer Cube one space to the right.

If the Timer Cube moves onto a space with a Rune, a Monster of that colour will Reappear in the Dungeon; place a
Dice of that colour on an empty Rune of a matching colour in the Dungeon, with its Starting Health showing. If all
Dice for Monsters of that colour are still in the Dungeon (i.e. none have been Killed), or there are no empty Runes of
that colour, nothing happens.

If the Timer Cube moves past the end of the Track, place it back on the first space of the Track, and remove one of
your Adventurer's Energy Dice for the rest of this Dungeon Level, to represent fatigue. You can only recover any
dice lost this way by completing the level.

Once the Timer Phase is over, remove any Energy Dice from the Character Card and begin a new Round.
Page 9
 Completing a Dungeon Level

If you successfully complete a Dungeon Level by collecting the Key and reaching the Stairs To Below, your Adventurer
locks the gate behind them, and takes a moment to rest and reflect, recovering any lost Energy Dice and gaining an
additional Energy Dice for the rest of the game.

If you have successfully completed the fourth level, congratulations, you are victorious! You have found the mysterious
Treasure, the Sceptre of M-Guf'Yn, a powerful device, yet one which seems oddly unimportant once you finally get your
hands on it.

Otherwise, remove all Monster Dice from the Dungeon, and form a new Dungeon Level as described in the Setup
section, moving on the next level of the Adventure Card, resetting the Timer to the first space.

Difficulty Levels

The rules above comprise Normal difficulty, but if you wish to make the game easier or harder, these are some
recomended changes:

Easy Mode Your Adventurer begins with 7 Energy Dice

Hard Mode Your Adventurer has a Maximum Health of 4

Nightmare Mode Your Adventurer has a Maximum Health of 5 and begins with 5 Energy Dice

Designer's Notes

This game is a spiritual sequel to 9-Bit Dungeon, another 9 Card Dungeon Crawler I released which has a similar random
Dungeon Level design mechanism, but where that game was an 8-bit style random dice-chucking homage to old
Dungeon crawlers like Warhammer Quest, this game aims for a more "realistic" style with more interesting and modern
play mechanics. Hopefully the core "roll then decide" mechanic should give interesting decisions to make, and options
like Stealth mean it's not just about hitting monsters in the face as quickly as possible.

On later Dungeon Levels you'll find you don't have enough Energy Dice to keep some for you and some for the Monsters,
so will need to keep track in your head of how many Dice you have. Sorry, contest limitations!

The AI system went through a lot of versions in development, including a rondel system. I'm pleased with the final result,
which can lead to unexpected behaviours like Monsters fleeing, while hopefully giving each type of Monster its own feel.

Balance is likely way off in this first release - I've not been able to playtest as much as I'd hoped, and will likely be making
changes to Monster Stats and Character and Equipment Dice Values as the contest goes on and I get feedback.

By Torchlight v1.0 - Copyright 2021 Barny Skinner

Designed for the 2021 BoardGameGeek 9 Card Nanogame Contest

Artwork Sources "Make Your Card Game!" Humble Bundle

game-icons.net
deviantart.com/neyjour
fantasticmaps.com/free-stuff
forgotten-adventures.net
galefirerpg.itch.io

Page 10
 Reference Sheet
Adventurer Phase > Monster Phase > Timer Phase
Adventurer Phase
Roll Energy Dice
Assign to Action Boxes with matching Dice Values. Multiple Dice Values give
multiple Actions.
Actions:
Move Move to adjacent Floor Tile
Stealth Reduce Perception by 1
Attack Hit Monster in Range
Increase Range Add 1 to Range (starting Range 1)
Shield Block a Hit in Monster Phase
Heal Recover 1 Health (Max 6)
Monster Phase
Resolve Monsters Closest to Furthest
Roll Energy Dice
Compare to AI Track
Can Perceive Adventurer: Heal > Move to Max Range > Attack > Move Away
Can't Perceive Adventurer: Heal > Move to Own Colour Rune
Timer Phase
Advance Timer Cube
Moved onto a Rune? Monster of that colour Reappears
Moved past end of track? Move to start of track, lose Energy Dice
End of Dungeon Level
Move onto Key then onto Stairs To Below to complete Dungeon Level
If completed Level 4, Victory!
Recover lost Energy Dice
Gain 1 Energy Dice
Create Next Level