How to Play Gudnak, the New LCG by Chaotic Great Games

• April 08 2026, by Ben Blythe
• 7 min reading time

Gudnak is a first of its kind Hybrid Living Card Game (LCG), offering quick, tactical battles on a 3x3 grid using streamlined 20-card faction decks. It’s easy to pick up but packed with strategic decisions that reward skill and creativity. The publisher, Chaotic Great has also done something that no other LCG publisher has ever done by including rare and chase cards in a draftable format. These cards are mechanically the same versions of everything you can buy in the core sets and expansions but have alternate art and unique treatments so collectors will be able to bling out their collection without buying an advantage.

There hasn't ever been a deck builder that gets you the game pieces you need with the ability to draft and collect rare and chase cards.

Gudnak Is a War That Will Last

Chaotic Great is has promised that they'll never offer a competitive advantage to players buying their Gudnak Means War draft packs. That doesn't mean booster boxes have been sitting on the shelf though. Gudnak is a blast to play in limited formats and the alternate treatments look awesome. Gamers Guild has already had to re-order a few times since we picked up the game. 

Right now there are currently three additional expansions that have more neutral cards and all new factions. The long term outlook for the game is really positive. So far Chaotic Great has dropped an expansion about once a year, a business model that indie TCG Sorcery has had a ton of success with.

Since Gudnak has those LCG elements these expansions are not randomized, it literally has everything you need to add new options to your deck right out of the box. If you're looking for a particular card only available in the Rotborn expansion, you just buy the Rotborn expansion and you have it.

What Is Gudnak?

Chaotic Great Games describes Gudnak as a strategic card game, but it combines area control and troop management like a wargame and deckbuilding like an TCG. Unlike past LCGs like Netrunner and A Game Of Thrones, Gudnak offers randomized draft packs with rare art treatments and foils, so limited play is an option as well as constructed play.

 It's a super quick experience like no other. Played on a 3x3 grid with strongholds on opposing sides, you'll use your your customized deck to vie for power siege your opponent till they can't draw any more cards.

Gudnak is deep in it's simplicity and plays super quick so it's easy to grind out several games in an evening. 

How Do I Play Gudnak?

To start layout your gameboard and prepare your deck. We explain how deckbuilding works below, but your Gudnak Core Set comes with several pre-made decks for each of the four factions. For your first game just choose one of the pre-made decks and shuffle it up.

You'll start by drawing a hand of 5-cards, you get one all-or-nothing mulligan. If you decide to use it, simply shuffle your hand back into your deck and draw 5 more cards. Then randomly determine the Active Player. 

Each round of Gudnak begins with the Start Phase where you draw a card unless your Stronghold is under siege then you need to discard a card from the top of your Stronghold (deck). Hopefully for your first turn of your first game, your Stronghold is not under siege, so draw one.

Next is the Action Phase if you're the first Active Player on the first round, you only get one action. Usually you'll get two actions.

You can use your actions to do a few things:

• Draw a Card
• Deploy a Unit
• Move a Unit
• Attack a Unit
• Defend Your Stronghold By Discarding Cards
• Use Abilities on Your Units
• Play Tactics From Your Hand

More specific information regarding actions can be found in the rulebook or on this helpful video. These actions are incredibly simple, which means you're not spending a ton of time waiting for your opponent to move before you get to take your turn.

The game is won when you successfully Siege your opponent's Stronghold and they are unable to discard a card from the top of their Stronghold during the Start Phase. To Siege a Stronghold simply park one of your units at their gate. They'll have to discard cards each turn and won't get to draw any more cards unless they use an action for it. 

How Does Combat In Gudnak Work?

It's delightfully simple. You just compare which unit has the bigger number in the upper left hand corner! Damage does not carry over, so after a fight is done the loser is discarded and the winner stays on the field. In the case of a tie, both cards are discarded.

Now, characters often have passive abilities which will give them bonuses to attack certain card types or classes. This allows level I and II cards to "punch up" and level II and III cards to defend and anchor certain positions.

Of course, the whole time you're setting your units up for success with passive and activated abilities that use Action Points. Tactics cards are also played using Action Points, there's no mana or energy in Gudnak, only your precious Action Points.

How Does Deckbuilding in Gudnak Work? Why Don't I Only Include Powerful Level III Cards?

Deck building is easy, and only consists of 20 cards. You'll first choose a faction and you can choose from any cards in any Gudnak expansion as long as they are aligned with your faction or Neutral.

Once you've chosen your faction, build your deck with the following.

• Choose 5 Heroes, powerful unique cards that have awesome abilities.
  • 1 Level III Hero
  • 2 Level II Heroes
  • 2 Level I Heroes
• Choose 10 Basic Fighters
  • 2 Level III Basic Fighters
  • 4 Level II Basic Fighters
  • 4 Level 1 Basic Fighters
• Choose 5 Tactics Cards

You can't have duplicate Tactics or Heroes and only 2 copies of Basic Fighters. Since you have to include weaker fighters the game's core strategy is about making advantageous trades, by using tactics and favorable matchups to use lower level cards to remove stronger ones.

What About Limited and Drafting Formats?

A common problem with LCGs is that they are notoriously difficult to draft. After all if you have all the cards, there's no way to limit your pool to draft a deck.

Unlike other Living Card Games,  Gudnak also offers draftable booster boxes. All cards in the base game are the same, but with these draftable packs, you have the opportunity to pull more than 100 special treatments of the base cards, including alternate arts and foils. The collectible products don't add any new cards or mechanic so you can play limited Gudnak with your friends then add the cards you pull to your base game decks. 

Gudnak Means War!

Gudnak has strengths from all corners of the game industry, from the strategic placement of tabletop wargames and card drafting of trading card games to the ease of being able to play the game straight out of the box, like other board games. 

We already have a thriving Discord community, and we're launching a Limited escalation league shortly using the Gudnak Means War booster packs! Drop by our stores or our digital community and siege some Strongholds with us!

• Share on:
• WhatsApp
• Deel
• Tweet
• Pin it
• Messenger
• Email

---