The ring
Sixteen cells form a ring, numbered clockwise from 01 in the top-left corner: 01 to 06 across the top, 07 to 09 down the right, 10 to 14 back along the bottom and 15 to 16 up the left. Cell 01 is the warden's office. Every run starts there, and nothing is ever held in it, so the other 15 cells hold the prisoners. The lantern marks where the warden stands.
A day on the block
- Patrol. Each morning offers three destination cells from the next six clockwise from the warden. They glow on the ring and appear as cards under it. A destination can be a locked cell, which opens when the warden arrives, a cell whose inmate you already know, or the warden's office. You can't see inside a locked cell until it opens. You must patrol before anything else.
- The office. When the warden walks to the office, choose one: Instigate puts a new special event on a random cell, behind a locked door or beside an inmate (2 when the board has none), and Bestow raises 1 random inmate on the block a tier.
- Consume. Once a day, after the patrol, and only the inmate in the warden's cell can start it. Double-click a highlighted target to consume it, or click it once to preview the bite and again to confirm. The eater then goes on eating while it has a valid target: after each bite you pick its next meal, even when there's only one, or stop the chain, as the game's Cancel button does. The eater keeps what it gained. The log and the recap under the ring show every bite as icons.
- Replace. Once a day, replace the inmate in the warden's cell with a brand-new random one. It can come out stronger or weaker. No other cell's inmate can be replaced. A day has a Replace or a consume, not both: either one uses up the other.
- End the day. The next morning, prey marks grow, ripe nests hatch, and new destinations are drawn. A recap of the day you just finished appears under the destination cards.
When an inmate is consumed or sent off, its cell seals again. The next time that door opens, someone new is inside.
The food chain
Both sides must share a rarity: Mammoth eats Lion, Lion eats Wolf, Wolf eats Rat, and Rat eats Mammoth, and Mammoths also eat Wolves and Lions also eat Rats, as players' games show. No beast eats its own kind unless you hold the Skewered Rat Heads, which lets Rats eat Rats.
Rarity
Normal, Magic, Rare, Legendary, Supreme, Rainbow. A consume raises the eater one tier, then re-rolls its beast, so check its new matchups before the next meal. An inmate that reaches Rainbow leaves its cell for the vault and opens the Warden's Treasure. You can keep raising more Rainbows for the rest of the run.
Special events
Some sealed doors carry an event badge. When your patrol opens one, the event appears and you choose to accept or skip it. Doors opened any other way use up their event without triggering it.
- Chain reaction
- Your next patrol walks clockwise from the warden to the chosen destination and opens every sealed door on the way.
- Execution
- The inmate in the opened cell removes every inmate on the block that it can eat and that has a lower rarity. It gains one tier for each.
- Behind Closed Doors
- The inmate in the opened cell becomes a Supreme of the scarcest beast on the block (none counts; a tie is settled at random). It triggers no other effects.
- Ravenous Appetite
- A random inmate of the lowest rarity on the block gets 5 tries at +1 tier, each with a 50% chance.
- High-Risk Convict
- A random locked cell opens with a Legendary or better inmate inside. It triggers no other effects.
- Crow Whispers
- The next 4 locked cells clockwise from the warden show the rarity of the inmate inside. Their beasts stay hidden until the doors open.
- Taste of Freedom
- 3 random locked cells open. They trigger no other effects.
- Extra Portion
- Up to 3 random inmates rise a tier (all of them, with fewer on the block).
- Usurpation I
- 1 random inmate rises a tier. Usurpation I then leaves the special events and Usurpation II joins them, and one appears behind a random locked door at once.
- Usurpation II
- 2 random inmates rise a tier (its card hasn't been seen yet).
- "Treasure" Hunt
- Every locked cell holding a Normal or Magic inmate shows its rarity (a "?" portrait), so the locked doors left dark hold Rare or better. Its card has only Confirm.
Special events (the game calls them Prison Incidents) turn up behind random locked doors, each kind in the pool equally likely, and their badge shows at once. Most runs start with one, and new ones keep appearing: some mornings, after a patrol, and after a Consume or Replace. An event can also wait in an open cell beside its inmate; walking in sets it off.
Markers
- Tusk
- Belongs to a cell. Replace that cell's inmate while the warden stands there, and four random inmates on the block each gain a tier. The mark stays until the cell empties.
- Prey
- A Lion marks a same-rarity inmate it can eat. On each of the next three mornings both gain a tier. The mark ends if either leaves the block or changes beast.
- Scratch
- A scratched door shows the rarity inside. A Wolf of that rarity can consume the occupant through the door, whatever its beast, and gains +3.
- Rat nest
- A sealed nest hatches a Rare Rat on the morning two days after it appears. Opening the door before then destroys it.
Objectives, tools and the Warden's Treasure
Every drill starts with a pick of three random tools, as the live game does: take one, and it lasts for the whole run. Each run also draws a random objective, shown with the run's goal: King of the Caged (at least 1 inmate's rarity reaches Supreme) or Prison Walk (move 18 tiles: every cell the warden walks counts). Meeting it earns a tool: pick one of three, and it lasts for the rest of the run. So a Supreme earns a tool only in runs whose objective is King of the Caged. The live game has more objectives, and what they pay isn't known yet, so every objective here pays a tool.
Each Rainbow that reaches the vault opens the Warden's Treasure: pick one gift, which takes effect at once. In the Lab you can change how many tools a drill starts with, or switch rewards off for pure rules practice.
The trainer
Press Trainer at the top to show it beside the block while you play. It works in every situation: patrols, events, consumes, Replaces, tools and gifts.
- Recommended. The trained strategy's pick appears at once, with its reason and the lesson training found for that kind of decision. The recommended cell or button is marked on the board.
- Live check. Every option you have right now is played out hundreds of times from the current position. Everything you can't see is re-rolled each time, so it never peeks behind a door, and the trained strategy makes every later choice. Options are ranked by Rainbows vaulted by the end of the run. Each option is compared with the best on the same dice, and once the check finds a clearly better move, that becomes the recommendation. Consume options also show their exact chain odds.
- Grades. Each move you make is graded against the live check of the position before it: the best move, close to the best (within the margin of error), or what it cost. The panel keeps a tally for the run.
For the big picture before you play, read the strategy guide. To get advice on your own board in the live game, open the board analyzer: set every cell and your tools, and it recommends the move the same way the trainer does.
There's no AI involved: the strategy is a set of scoring rules whose weights were tuned over millions of simulated runs. Its main lessons: consume whenever you can (unless it would break a prey mark, which gives free tiers every morning), replace a low-tier inmate in the warden's cell (Normal and Magic; Rare too when you have tools) when no consume there is worth more, since a day has one or the other, accept Chain reactions, Behind Closed Doors, Ravenous Appetite, High-Risk Convict, Crow Whispers, Taste of Freedom and the Usurpations, accept an Execution when it gains more than it removes, and keep opening doors. A Wolf or a Rat waiting at a tier feeds two of the four beasts a chain's eater can re-roll into, a Lion or a Mammoth one, and a Mammoth, a Rat and a Lion or a Wolf together keep any chain going. Held from day 1, the best instruments were the Elephant-Foot Maul, the Blood-Stained Trap and the Iron Crown of the Prison King, and the Severed Iron Maiden with Hangman's Noose turns most Replaces into Rainbows. The Squirming Iron Box hurt the most, then the Forged Key and the Gaoler's Execution Axe, and the Iron Pestle, the Searing Branding Iron and the Short-Chained Shackles came out level with no instrument.
Practice values
The live game's exact odds, daily limits and some timing details are not public. This simulator uses stated practice values for them. You can change the drill values in the Lab. Riots, followers, loot and combat are not simulated.