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BANNERFALL

a world that refuses to sit still
The rim is quiet.
0 GOLD Not signed in Create a passport Ladder & Houses
1/ 25 turns
SEASON 0
— SOLO
▲
THE MOUNTAIN IS SHAKING
Somewhere in the north.
next turn
ASH0land
0 / 10
SALT0land
0 / 10
MATCH—
SEAT—
MODE—
STATUS—
SYNC—
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WATCHING A REPLAY · NOT YOUR MATCH —
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No board in this file. Every frame is recomputed from the seed and the recorded orders by the same engine that played the match — which is why a whole game fits in one string, why an edited one cannot reproduce itself, and why this scrubber lands on the exact board, not an approximation of it.

The line under the scrubber is a READING of those boards: what moved this turn, by how much, and what caused it, with buttons onto the turns the match hinged on. Every figure in it came off the two boards either side of the turn, so you can step back one and check it. It is not a judgement of how either side played — nothing here knows what a player could see, what they were trying to do, or what the alternative would have cost.

WHICH SQUARE ATTACKS?—

THE GROUND—

Chosen by the seed, so the same seed always builds it.

COMMANDS 3 a turn
STRIKEone raid a turn
BANK unspent Commands carry
YOURS 0
SALT 0
LEVY weight of every Command
YOURS 1
SALT 1
used 0 · left 3 supplied fertility 0
SALT AI · heuristic doctrine
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QUEUED

    Every season the mountain acts, and every season it says why. Predictions are scored against what actually happened.

    REPLAY · THIS MATCH AS ONE STRING
    —
    Recording begins with the match and closes when it ends.
    CHECK A REPLAY SOMEBODY SENT YOU
    Nothing loaded.

    Verifying replays the whole match from its seed and compares the board it reaches with the one the file claims to have ended on. Once it has verified you can watch it: a scrubber over the turns, on the same board and the same 2D or 3D view you play on. Every frame is recomputed from the seed and the orders — the file contains no board at all, which is why it is one line long and why nobody can quietly doctor one.

    Head to head over a blind relay. The server never runs the game — it holds both sides' orders until both have committed, then releases them, and each browser resolves the same turn from the same inputs.

    MODE
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    RANKED RECORD · THIS BROWSER
    UNRATED
    1000rating
    0–0won–lost
    —
    —

    There is no matchmaking here and nowhere for it to live: the relay is in memory, on one server, and holds no accounts. You find an opponent by sending them a match code. Your rating is stored in this browser only — it is not a global ladder, nobody else can see it, and clearing site data clears it.

    MATCH
    Not in a match. The Cinder is playing.
    —
    MATCH CODE · SEND THIS TO YOUR OPPONENT
    Create a match to get a code.
    JOIN A MATCH
    Both browsers must be pointed at the same server.
    WATCH A MATCH
    Not watching anything.

    Read-only, and read-only by construction rather than by promise — there is no seat here to submit with. You will see each turn a moment after both players do, never before. Your own board is put down while you watch and handed back untouched when you stop.

    TURN CLOCK
    —
    The clock runs in every mode.
    DESYNC GUARD
    Idle.
    Both browsers fingerprint the board every turn and the two stamps are compared. The relay is untrusted: your own orders are checked against what you sent, and the Arbiter's event is re-validated here before it is allowed to touch the world.
    RELAY LOG
    idle

    You are playing signed out.

    Everything here works without an account: the whole game, head to head, replays. A passport adds a rating that survives this browser, Gold, the daily Vigil, Livery and a House.

    RANKED

    —unrated

    No pairs played this season.

    A rated result is one seed played from both seats. Nothing is written until both legs are in.

    LIVERY

    Colours your host wears. Cosmetic — two matches identical except for Livery produce the same recording.

      HOUSE

      You hold no House.

      Found or join one on bannerfall.net

      Designer audit console. Two goal-limited AIs propose — deterministic code approves — a human can override safely.

      ARBITER BANS · STRUCK OUT FOR THE WHOLE MATCH
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      —
      AI RUNTIME
      CHECKING
      SALT DOCTRINE
      heuristic fallback
      PLAYER PROFILE · RESOLVED HISTORY ONLY
      no resolved turns yet
      CURRENT READING
      The Arbiter is asleep. It wakes at the end of turn 3.
      DECISION EVIDENCE
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      COUNTERFACTUAL CANDIDATES · SHADOW BASELINE
      no season evaluated yet
      PENDING EVENT
      none
      CONTROLS
      TEMPLATE MEMORY
      no history yet
      THE ARBITER · THE THIRD PLAYER NOBODY COMMANDS

      STRIKE ONE TEMPLATE OUT

      Ten things the mountain is allowed to do. Take one off the table for the whole match.

      —
      Both strikes apply to both players.
      GARENA AI BUILD CHALLENGE · 2026

      BANNERFALL

      A world that refuses to sit still.

      Two peoples fight over a ring of islands.
      Underneath them, the mountain that made those islands is still working — and what it cannot stand is a quiet map.

      ASH · you SALT · the rival CINDER · the world itself
      THE WORLD

      A mountain that makes land, and takes it back

      Far out in a warm sea there is a ring of islands. They were not always there. They were made, one by one, by a mountain that still lives under the water. The people who live there call it the Pyre.

      the Pyre is still working. It pushes new islands up out of the sea. It pulls old ones back down. Ash from its mouth falls on the water and turns to the richest soil anyone has ever farmed. Land here is young, and it is generous, and it does not stay.

      Two peoples share the ring. The Ash came first and learned to farm the ash fields. The Salt came later, by sea, and took the high ground. Neither of them is evil. The problem is simpler than that: there is not enough steady ground for both, and every season there is less.

      the Pyre does not care who wins. What the Pyre cannot stand is stillness — a quiet sea, a settled border, two peoples who have stopped moving. So when the fighting stops, the mountain does something about it.

      ★
      THE BANNER. Somewhere on the ring a fire burns on a stone tower. Nobody lit it. Holding it means good harvests and a claim to the ring — but the Banner is the Pyre's, and the Pyre moves it. Settle into a quiet stalemate and one night the fire goes out and relights in open ground, exactly between you. That is how the mountain starts a war without touching anybody.
      HOW TO PLAY

      Three Commands a turn, the ones you keep, and one comparison

      1THREE COMMANDS A TURN

      Each side is given three Commands a turn, however much land it holds. Only one may be a raid: one Strike a turn.

      • EXPANDclaim empty land next to yours, at Levy strength1
      • FORTIFYadd your Levy — and brace the square this turn1
      • RAIDattack an enemy square next to yours — once a turn1
      2WHAT YOU DO NOT SPEND, YOU KEEP

      Commands you decline to give are banked, up to five. Play two for three turns and the fourth turn can be a six-Command blow.

      A bank is public, and so is theirs. Watching the other side's bank fill is the read: pre-empt them while they are still saving, or spend a Command bracing for what is coming.

      3COMBAT IS ONE COMPARISON
      ATTACKstrength of the square you attack from + your Levy
      DEFENCEstrength of the target + its height + 2 if braced

      Higher attack takes the square — it arrives holding half your Levy, rounded down, and never less than 1 — and the square you attacked from loses 2. Otherwise the attack fails and the defender loses 1.

      BRACING. Raids land before fortifies, so a square you Fortify this turn takes +2 defence against Strikes arriving this turn. Guess where the blow falls and one Command turns it away.

      No dice, no unit types. All of the surprise in this game comes from the mountain, not from luck here.

      4SUPPLY IS YOUR LEVY

      A square only counts if you can trace a path of your own land back to your capital. Cut-off squares earn nothing and lose 1 strength a turn until they are empty.

      The land you can still reach sets your Levy, 1 to 5 — the weight every Command lands with. Cut a supply line and every Command the enemy gives that turn lands lighter.

      5THE GROUND IS NOT THE SAME TWICE

      The board is built from the match's seed, and the seed also chooses the shape of the ground. Where the chokepoints are — or whether there are any — changes what supply, bracing and the Banner are worth.

        The shape is named in the top bar and in the ORDERS panel, and it rides on every replay: the same seed rebuilds the same ground in anyone's browser.

        6THE MOUNTAIN ACTS

        Every 3 turns the Arbiter reads the match and has the Pyre do one thing to the world: an eruption, a sinking coast, a new island, the fire moving, the high ground going cold.

        It always warns you one turn early, and it always says what you did to deserve it. You are never surprised by a disaster you had no chance to prepare for.

        7WINNING

        Reach 10 Banner Points — one for each turn you end holding the Banner — or hold the most land after 25 turns.

        8CONTROLS

        Pick a tool with 1 2 3 and the board lights up every square that tool may be used on. Click one. Click a queued order to remove it, or right-click the square. ⏎ ends the turn.

        When more than one of your squares could carry a raid, you are asked which — with the attack against the defence for each.

        Both sides give orders at the same time, in secret, and everything resolves together. The VERSUS tab plays the same game against a person.