Glossary

Short definitions for the terms this site uses, with links to the pages that carry the full rules. Every entry has its own anchor, so /glossary#pierce goes straight to Pierce. Entries are meant to be read one at a time rather than top to bottom, so each one links out on its own and repeats links other entries already use.

A to Z

How This Site Writes Game Terms

A few conventions run through every page here, and they carry meaning:

• Keywords, keyword abilities, and keyphrases are bolded: Bold, Pierce, Revenge, the Void expands. A bolded word is a defined game term; the same word unbolded is ordinary English.
• Traits are not bolded automatically, unlike keywords: Herald, Chaosbringer, Melee, Titan Master. A page may still bold one for emphasis. The same goes for Station, Attack, Defense, and Health.
• Battle icons are written as their emoji, 🟧 🟦 ⬛️ ⬜️ 🟩, never as color words in running text.
• Card names with a subname are written Name // Subname: Bumblebee // Trusted Lieutenant. A name never carries two //; when a stratagem’s subname is itself a character’s full name, that name uses a comma instead of a //.
• Stars are a count, never a cost: a character has a star count, not a star cost. Official designers asked that players not read stars as a budget being spent, and this site follows that.
• Release names are italic in prose: World|Strike, Waste|Lands, War|Void.

Cards and Zones

Action

A battle card played from hand for a one-time effect, then put in the scrap pile. Each player may normally play one Action per turn. See the Turn Sequence.

Battle card

Any card in your deck: Actions and Upgrades. Battle cards carry the battle icons flipped during a battle. See How to Play.

Character card

A bot on your team. Most have two modes, bot and alt, printed on the two faces of the card, and flip between them. Characters carry a star count, Attack, Defense, and Health, and can also carry traits and abilities. See Building a Team and Deck.

Chain card

A battle card that lets you play another copy of itself in the same turn, so copies stack in one slot or one sequence. Attack Drone, Focus Fire, Extra Padding and War of Attrition are the best-known. See Actions Within Actions.

Deck

Your battle cards, at least 40 in standard play. Battle cards flip from the top of the deck during attacks and are drawn from it each turn. See Building a Team and Deck.

KO area

Where knocked-out characters go. A character is KO’d when its damage equals or exceeds its Health; some abilities trigger on a KO, such as Revenge and Bounty. See Damage and Knockout.

Rolling Action

A permanent Action introduced in Waste|Lands: it stays on the battlefield and can be activated after taking time to spin up rather than resolving once.

Scrap pile

The discard pile. “Scrap” as a verb means put a card there. When the deck runs out, the scrap pile is shuffled to form a new deck. See Shuffling Your Deck.

Secret Action

An Action played face down, revealed when its text says to. An unrevealed Secret Action goes to the scrap pile at the end of the opponent’s turn. See How to Play Secret Actions.

Star card

A battle card with a star count (★). Stars on star cards count toward the team’s star total alongside characters.

Stratagem

An optional card that modifies a named target on your starting team, at a star count. Which targets qualify is defined under Stratagem Targets.

Team

Your character cards, plus any star cards and stratagems, built to a star limit: 25 stars in standard play, 35 in Primus. Some cards raise a player’s limit above that.

Upgrade

A battle card attached to a character. There are three kinds, Weapon, Armor, and Utility, and a character can hold one of each. See Upgrade Play.

The Void

An optional resource system introduced in War|Void: cards with the Void expands place chaos counters on your Void, and Heralds and Chaosbringers spend them with Channel. See the FAQ.

Play Terms

Attack, Defense, Health

A character’s three numbers. Attack minus the defender’s Defense is the damage dealt; Health is how much damage a character can take before it is KO’d. Modifiers from icons and Upgrades adjust Attack and Defense during a battle.

Battle

One attack: attacker and defender chosen, battle cards flipped, damage dealt, then post-attack effects. Details in the Attack section of the rules.

Battle icons

The colored icons on battle cards, resolved as they are flipped: 🟧 adds Attack, 🟦 adds Defense, ⬛️ gives Pierce, ⬜️ flips two more cards, and 🟩 lets you swap a card after the attack. Full text under Battle Icons.

Body mode

On a character built to carry a Titan Master, the face that does the job bot mode does on an ordinary character. The character still begins the game in alt mode and flips to body mode; the head rides it in either mode, and deploys as its own character when the body is KO’d.

Chaos counter

The counters that accumulate on the Void and are spent by Channel. Placed by the Void expands.

Combine

Several characters forming a single larger character, such as Devastator or Volcanicus, using their combiner cards, introduced in Wave 2. A combiner counts as a character on your starting team for stratagem purposes.

Damage

Marked on a character with counters and kept between turns. Damage that equals or exceeds Health knocks the character out. See Damage and Knockout.

Effective health

The damage an opponent has to deal to clear a character or a team, rather than the Health printed on the cards. It counts a Titan Master head’s own body once the character it was riding is KO’d, and ignores overkill, since damage past a character’s remaining Health is wasted. Community designers put a well-built starting team between 30 and 40, and treat anything above 35 as above the curve.

Flip

Two meanings. A character flips between bot and alt mode, usually once per turn. During an attack, each player flips battle cards from the top of their deck to add icons to the battle. See Flip Battle Cards.

Head mode

The face of a Titan Master card that attaches above a character in body mode and grants it a bonus. The card’s other face is a small bot mode, played when the host is KO’d, even if it was your last character; that bot mode can’t flip.

Hybrid icon

A battle icon introduced in Wave 5 that carries a color and a trait symbol. It only counts if the battling character has the matching trait.

Station

A type of ability introduced in Waste|Lands. A character can enter a Station and generally stays there until all characters untap, gaining what the Station grants. Often found on Junkion characters; see Factions.

Star count

The ★ printed on a character, star card or stratagem, counting toward the 25 stars a team is allowed. Not a cost: nothing is spent, and a star count is compared against what else could fill the slot.

Tap and untap

Turning a character sideways to show it has attacked or used a tap ability. When all your characters are tapped, they all untap together. See Tapping and Untapping Characters.

Wide and tall

The two shapes a 25-star team can take. A wide team fields more, smaller characters and attacks more times a turn; a tall team fields fewer, larger ones and survives longer. Most cards favor one shape, and a format where only one is worth building is usually a sign something needs looking at.

Triggered ability

An ability that happens when its condition is met (“When this attacks…”). When several trigger at once, the active player orders theirs first. See Triggered Abilities and Handling Multiple Triggered Abilities.

Keywords

Keywords are bolded wherever they appear. Numbered keywords sometimes add together and sometimes do not; Duplicate Keywords has the rule for each.

Bandit

🟦 icons flipped by a defending character with Bandit have no effect. A Junkion keyword that pairs with Bandit battle cards; see Junkions.

Bold X

Flip X more battle cards when attacking. Bold values add together.

Bounty

An ability used when the character deals enough attack damage to KO an enemy. The Mercenary signature keyword; see Mercenaries.

Brave

Enemies attack this character if able. It governs which character an attack targets, not which character attacks. The inverse is Stealth.

Channel X

A keyword action for Heralds and Chaosbringers: spend up to X chaos counters from the Void for an effect. Numbers do not add together. Introduced in War|Void; see Unicron.

Drifter

🟧 icons flipped by an attacking character with Drifter have no effect. The other Junkion keyword, with its own supporting battle cards.

Focus X

Just before flipping battle cards, look at the top X cards of your deck and scrap any of them. Focus values add together into a single look.

Oppress X

While this character is battling, reduce all characters’ Bold and Tough totals by X. Oppress values add together.

Pierce X

Deal at least X damage when attacking, up to the attacker’s Attack value, regardless of the defender’s Defense. Granted by the ⬛️ battle icon. Pierce values add together.

Plan X

A keyword action: look at the top X cards of your deck and put them back in any order. Numbers do not add together.

Revenge

An ability used when the character is KO’d. The Decepticon signature keyword; see Decepticons.

Safeguard X

An undamaged character with Safeguard X can’t take more than X damage at once. Safeguard values add together, and a higher number is weaker. The Autobot signature keyword; see Autobots.

Stealth

Enemies attack other characters if able. The inverse of Brave; a character carrying both is neither, and the attacker may choose any available target.

Tough X

Flip X more battle cards when defending. Tough values add together.

The Void expands

A keyphrase on War|Void cards that places chaos counters on your Void.

Traits and Factions

Battle Master

A trait on small characters that have a bot mode and an Upgrade mode but no alt mode. Because there is no alt mode to begin in, a Battle Master starts the game in bot mode and can’t flip; when it is KO’d, its Upgrade side is played. Spelled as two words, whatever other sources use.

Dissolution

A trait from War|Void printed on stratagems rather than characters. The stratagems naming Megatronus the Fallen // Original Sinner carry it, and his cards count and relocate them by that trait.

Faction

The allegiance a character belongs to: Autobots, Decepticons, Mercenaries, Quintessons, Junkions, Unicron, or none. Each faction has a signature keyword. See Factions.

Herald and Chaosbringer

The two Unicron-aligned traits from War|Void. Non-Herald characters commonly generate chaos counters; Heralds and Chaosbringers spend them with Channel. See Unicron.

Team

Also a trait: a named group such as the Dinobots, Wreckers, or Sentinels whose members share a trait that cards can reference. Distinct from your team of characters.

Trait

A word printed on a card that other cards can refer to: Melee, Ranged, Specialist, Leader, Titan Master, Weaponizer, Car, Plane, Herald, Chaosbringer, and many more. Traits have no rules of their own. Most sit on characters, but a few are printed on other card types, among them Tentacle, Me Grimlock, Dissolution, and Vehicle. A stratagem may name a trait as its target.

Formats and Legality

ABR lists

The Allowed, Banned, and Replaced lists that together define the organized-play card pool. See the Ban List, and Why Cards Are Banned or Replaced for the reasoning behind each entry.

Casual play

Any game outside organized play. Its one rule: everyone at the table agrees beforehand, including on the card pool. See Formats.

Full Constructed

transformerstcg.org’s primary format, using the full Allowed card pool. See Formats.

Harmony

An event modifier, not a format: the event’s normal card pool plus one or more named Public Beta releases. See Formats.

Limited

Formats where you build from a provided pool of cards rather than a collection: Sealed Deck, Booster Draft, and Turbo. See Formats.

Primus

A casual multiplayer format for three or more players: 35-star teams, singleton decks with Signature cards, and player tiles. See Primus.

Proxy

A stand-in for a card you don’t own a printing of. Allowed in casual play by agreement; in competitive play it must look like an established printing. See Tournament Rules.

Raid

Cooperative play against a shared enemy, historically the Unicron Raid. Casual and outside the supported card pool today. See Formats.

Replacement card

A community-era card that replaces a specific older card in the pool; the original is on the Replaced list and the replacement is what you play. The Jumpstarter Update Booster collects them.

Store Constructed

A Constructed format limited to cards obtainable as physical product today. See Formats.

Two Lwosers

A casual format built around the game’s most neglected stratagems, played with two decks. See Two Lwosers.

Releases and Development

1C Open

Short for One Community. An early Allied Crossplay initiative offering the wider community fixes for problems in the original Hasbro and Wizards card pool, with credit waived: a group that adopted a 1C Open card was free to use it without crediting Allied Crossplay for the solution. The post-cancellation scene was split between groups with little habit of working together, and the offer was meant to get shared problems solved across those lines. Candidates were tested in live play before adoption, and Hand of Adaptus and Mecha Star were both certified that way. See Why Cards Are Banned or Replaced.

Certified Community Release

A seal transformerstcg.org grants any fan release, its own or another group’s, that meets its published standards for public development, independent design, balance, artwork sourcing, and stewardship. Awarded at release or afterward, never to an unreleased version, and it can be withdrawn. See Certified Community Release Program.

Goodies Starter Deck

transformerstcg.org’s annual starter product, free to download and print, built as an entry point to the current game. See Releases and Downloads.

Hexcode

The short code that identifies a specific card printing in transformerstcg.org lists; the Store Constructed Allowed list is indexed by it. See Formats.

Jumpstarter Update Booster

The release that collects the community-era replacement cards so an older collection can be brought up to date in one go. See Releases and Downloads.

Gold

A release that has gone gold has announced that its 1.0 is happening and that the process from there to release is immutable. Going gold does not move a release’s version number or change how it may be played; numbering moves at the 1.0 announcement, and until release the set is handled as it was before. World|Strike went gold on December 31, 2020 and released eleven days later.

Org Wave

A numbered Wave published directly by transformerstcg.org. Earlier community Waves keep their names until transformerstcg.org remasters them, at which point they are republished as Org Waves; Monster Menagerie became Org Wave 7 that way.

Pre-alpha and alpha

Development stages before Public Beta, run privately within the development team rather than in public. Not part of the supported card pool and not legal in organized play under any modifier. See Formats.

Print-and-play

Free downloadable card files meant for home printing. Every transformerstcg.org release is available this way on Downloads.

Release Candidate

The stage after Public Beta and before release, entered when the team is satisfied a release can ship. A serious finding can produce a further candidate or send the release back to Beta, so reaching one is not a promise of release. For legality and printing it is treated exactly as Public Beta. See Formats.

Public Beta

A release that is playable and in the supported card pool but not final, tested in public so that feedback can still change the cards. Legal in casual play, and in organized play only under the Harmony modifier. See Formats and Meaningful Public Beta.

Remaster

A republished edition of an existing release with corrected text, updated art or layout, and the current template, published as an Org Wave.

Wave

A numbered main release. Waves 1 through 5 are official Wizards of the Coast releases; later Waves are community releases numbered in sequence. See Releases.

Organized Play and Community

Aequitas

The elected community rules committee that answered rules questions from 2020 to 2022. Its roundups are preserved under Rulings.

Allied Crossplay

The 2020 to 2023 partnership between Team Bayformers, The Ark, and other groups that shared a card pool and play environment. See History.

Black Hole

The archive at the center of the Tabletop Simulator Table that preserves historical fan releases for casual play. Inclusion there is not legality.

Competitive information asymmetry

A situation where some competitors hold privileged access to gameplay information the wider field does not have, such as unreleased cards, private testing results, or submitted decklists. transformerstcg.org answers it with competitive lockouts. See Guidance on Ideals 1 and 5.

Competitive lockout

The restriction placed on anyone with meaningful private design access or privileged event information: they keep playing, and none of their results count toward standings, qualification, ranked event wins, or leaderboard points. Six months at minimum, a full season for full-Wave designers, permanent for the game director, and the event itself for an organizer holding privileged information about it. Where more than one applies, the longest governs. See Guidance on Ideals 1 and 5.

Encounter

A numbered event within a Tournament Season.

Energon Invitational

Wizards of the Coast’s official championship, last held in December 2019.

Garrus-9

A temporary suspension used through Tournament Season One and into early Season Two: a card turning up too often in competitive events was sent to Garrus-9 for one to three events, the length scaling with how many times it had been sent before. Reversible by design, and some cards served a sentence and came back for good. Its last recorded action was in January 2023, and nothing announced its retirement or replaced it. See Why Cards Are Banned or Replaced and Waste|Lands Tournament Season Two.

Negative play experience

A card or pattern that makes games unpleasant to sit through even when it is beatable: solitaire turns the opponent only watches, bookkeeping no card asks for, arithmetic that slows a round down. The official era recorded it as an aggravating factor; the community era treats it as a sufficient reason on its own.

Omega Invitational

The community world championship, held in 2022 as the climax of Season One and modeled on Wizards’ Energon Invitational. See History.

Team Bayformers

The Bay Area group that produced World|Strike and Waste|Lands and became transformerstcg.org in December 2023. See Team Bayformers.

Tournament Organizer

The person running an event, who sets its format, modifiers, and time limits. Abbreviated TO. See Tournament Rules.

Tournament Season

A run of online events under one card pool, named for the release it supports: World|Strike Tournament Season One, Waste|Lands Tournament Season Two.

Acronyms

Shorthand players use for cards and terms that come up constantly. The full form is what this site writes in prose.

C

Common, the base rarity, printed with a card’s collector number. Battle cards carry the letter on its own, as in C 043/081. Character cards add a T for Transformer and number separately, CT T46/T52; stratagems number with an S, C S22/S30. See also U, R and SRT.

DAD

Despite Any Difficulty, a card from the ATP fan release, and now also Die Another Day, the Org Wave 9 Secret Action built as a homage to it: when one of your characters defends and you flip battle cards, it gets +1 Defense until end of battle for each different color among the icons you flipped, up to +4. The acronym carried over with the homage, down to the card’s own lookup code, c/dada. See Welcome, Alpha Trion Protocols players.

MoM

Master of Metallikato, the Wave 5 Action that gives one of your attacking characters +1 Attack until end of battle for each different color among the battle icons you flipped. It is the card that made mixed-icon decks worth building, and DAD is its defensive counterpart.

OPBL

Optimus Prime // Battlefield Legend, the Wave 1 character card. Players shortened it early and the acronym stuck, so decks and matchups are still described by it.

PtA

Press the Advantage, the Wave 2 Action that gave an Autobot +2 Attack and took 2 Defense off an enemy Decepticon. It pushed Decepticons out of competitive play until Wizards of the Coast banned it in October 2019, the second ban in the game’s history, and it is Replaced today by United Against Tyranny. See Why Cards Are Banned or Replaced.

PTT

Peace Through Tyranny, the Wave 1 Action that let you KO one of your own characters of 6 ★ or more to take an extra turn. One of only four double-icon cards in Wave 1, which is why it was replaced rather than banned: Replaced by Take the Shot in July 2021, keeping the two 🟧 icons and dropping the extra turn. See Why Cards Are Banned or Replaced.

R

Rare, one step above U. Battle cards are coded R, as in R 010/064, and character cards RT, Rare Transformer, as in RT T20/T46.

S

Stratagem, the prefix on a stratagem’s collector number. Stratagems are counted in a series of their own rather than alongside a wave’s battle cards and characters, so a common stratagem reads C S22/S30. The rarity letter in front of it works the same as on any other card. See C.

SecCheck

Security Checkpoint, the Wave 1 Action that made each player reveal their hand and scrap all Upgrades from it. Symmetrical on paper and one-sided in play, since only the player casting it knew it was coming. The other of the two double-icon Wave 1 cards replaced in July 2021: Replaced by Lie in Wait, keeping the two 🟦 icons. See Why Cards Are Banned or Replaced.

SRT

Super Rare Transformer, the top rarity, above R, and carried by character cards. SRTs were the pull players opened boxes hoping for, among them Wave 4’s Optimus Prime // Galactic Commander and Wave 5’s Windsweeper // Air Defense.

U

Uncommon, one step above C. Battle cards are coded U, as in U 023/081, and character cards UT, Uncommon Transformer, as in UT T18/T46.