These rules have been translated and localized directly from the ‘Persona VS’ rulebook. These translations are unofficial, and not associated with SEGA, ATLUS, or Banso.
In Persona VS you play as one of the heroes from the Persona series, making use of various Personas and abilities. Your goal is to reduce your opponent’s HP to “0” before they do the same to you!
What is a Persona?
Personas are an incredible power individuals use to face life’s hardships. They are commonly referred to as “the other self.”
Contents and Game Setup
Each copy of Persona VS should include the following:
3 Player cards (1 for each protagonist from Persona 3, 4, and 5)
1 Persona 5 deck (40 cards) 001-025
1 Persona 4 deck (40 cards) 026-050
1 Persona 3 deck (40 cards) 051-071
2 sets of “Turn Summary” cards
- To start a game, each player needs to first pick their Player card and the corresponding deck. Both players need to put their Player Card in the play area, and add their matching starter Persona (the Persona card with a VS symbol in the bottom right) to their hand. Both players then shuffle their decks.
2. Both players then draw from their decks until they have 5 cards in their hand, but don’t look at the cards until turn order has been decided.
3. Both players set their starting HP to 30. Life can be tracked with a note pad or digitally on a phone.
4. Determine who goes first. You can play “Rock, Paper, Scissors,” roll dice, or use whatever method both players agree on.
The game is over when one of the following conditions is met:
-A player’s HP is reduced to “0”
-A player cannot draw the required number of cards to fill their hand in the Draw Step
When a match is over, the winning player may flip their Player card over and read the epilogue written on the back. ATLUS kindly asks that you do not share the epilogues on social media to keep the stories a surprise for other players.
GAME STEPS
Similar to the video games, this card game is also turn-based. The current turn player goes through 3 different steps in a specific order. Once they’ve finished all 3 steps, the turn is passed to the opposing player.
The 3 steps are:
Planning Step > Skill Step > Draw Step
Planning Step
The Planning Step is where a player prepares their field for their Skill Step. You can do several actions during the Planning Step, as long as the conditions for those actions can be met.
A. Summoning a Persona (Playing a Persona card from hand)
B. Fusing a Persona (Combing 1 or more Personas on the field into a stronger one from hand)
C. Changing Personas (Swapping your main Persona with one of your sub-Personas)
D. Playing a Supporter (Playing a Support card from hand)
A. Summoning a Persona
You can play a Persona card from your hand by discarding cards from your hand equal to that Persona’s cost. The cost is the number in the top left corner. You can also send Persona cards already in your play area to the discard pile to pay for the cost. Sending an in-play persona will only count as 1 tribute, unless an effect says otherwise (ex. You can play the 3-cost “Alice” by sending an “Arsène” you already control to the discard pile and discarding 2 more cards from your hand).
Main Personas and Sub-Personas
Each player is allowed to control 1 main Persona and up to 2 sub-Personas. All Personas come with a mix of abilities and skills. Abilities are in white boxes, and can be used as long as the ability conditions are met, regardless of being on a main or sub-Persona. Skills are in black boxes, and can only be used by main Personas in the Skill Step unless a player has entered a “1 more.”
Main Personas are also used to determine weaknesses when attacking or being attacked. You can see what type of skill a Persona is weak too in the top right corner of the card and on the left side of the card, right above its skill/ability text.
All skills have a damage type listed to the left of the skill name.
Persona VS currently uses 5 damage types:
(I wasn’t able to find the image files used in the original, and decided to go with the original “Persona 5” element icons. The rasterized icons were done by my friend, Trevor Verges. You can find more of his work at his website.)
Main Personas are played in the play area directly below the Player card. Sub-Personas are placed to the left and right of the main Persona.
B. Persona Fusion
To fuse, take a Persona card from your hand and place it on top of another Persona card in your play area. You must still pay the play cost on the card you wish to fuse into to successfully fuse it. A fused Persona gains all the abilities and skills of its fusion materials, so make sure you place your new Persona so that you can still see the skill and ability text on its previous incarnation. You can fuse any number of Personas you control into a single new Persona.
Be careful, though. If your opponent is able to remove your fused Persona by either sending it to the discard pile or returning it to your hand, all Personas stacked underneath it are sent to the discard pile.
C. Changing Personas
During your Planning Step you can swap your main Persona with one of your sub-Personas.
D. Playing a Support Card
Support cards can only be played from your hand. They have various strong abilities to aid you and disrupt your opponent. There is no limit to how many Support cards you can play in a single turn.
Support cards have blue backgrounds and can only be played during the Planning Step (unless an effect would say otherwise). Some Support cards have “10 HP or less” effects. If your HP is 10 or lower, the effect of the card becomes the text inside the black box instead of its normal effect in the white box.
The Skill Step and React Cards
The Skill Step is where you can attack your opponent using your Personas’ skills. There are 3 parts to the Skill Step:
Skill Declaration: You announce the skill you intend to use
>Declaration React: The opposing player may activate a single React card if they choose.
Skill Resolution: Damage and effects from that skill are applied
>Resolution React: The opposing player may activate a single React card if they choose.
Moving to the Draw Step: Combat has ended and you move to the next step.
React cards have yellow backgrounds. All React cards have text at the top of their text box indicating when they can be played. Some React cards have “10 HP or less” effects. These work the same as they do on support cards.
1 More
If you hit your opponent’s weakness during the skill step then you will trigger “1 more.” In “1 more,” you go back to the start of the Skill Step and can declare another attack, except this time you can also use skills from your sub-Personas.
“1 more” can only be triggered once each Skill Step, and all parts of the skill step still happen as they normally would.
The Draw Step
The turn player draws cards from their deck until they have 5 cards in their hand (ex. if a player only has 2 cards in hand at the start of the Draw Step, they will draw 3 cards).
If a player has 5 or more cards in their hand at the start of the draw step they will not be allowed to draw any cards.
Once the Draw Step has finished, the turn is passed to the other player and they begin their Planning Step.
Additional Rules
-You must always start the game with your Player Card’s matching (VS) Persona.
Persona 5 – Arsène
Persona 4 – Izanagi
Persona 3 – Orpheus
-You cannot control 2 Personas with the same name.
-You cannot fuse a Persona into another copy of itself.
-If you lose your main Persona due to an effect, you must replace it with a sub-Persona. If you have no sub-Personas, the turn will continue without you having a Persona.
-“Santaniel,” “Izanagi-no-Okami,” and “Thanatos” are very powerful Personas. An additional cost must be paid to summon or fuse them on top of their already steep summoning cost. Each requires the player to discard an additional Persona with a specific name from their hand or field. In this case, these specific cards can even be discarded from a fused Persona the player already controls. You can remove the named card, and only the named card, from the stack of a fused Persona and discard it to summon or fuse into one of these ultimate Personas!
-If a Persona with the same ability as another Persona is fused, those abilities will stack.
-A skill cannot be changed once it has been declared. If a React card would force your main and sub-Persona to change, the original skill will still resolve as normal.
-If multiple effects would change the damage of a skill, the turn-player may resolve those effects in whatever order they see fit. The only exception is React cards, which always resolve first.
-“1 more” will not trigger on a weakness hit if no damage is done (ex. damage is negated or lowered to 0 by a React card or Persona ability).
-If a card is discarded, it will always go to the discard pile of the original owner.
-It is okay to mix-and-match the decks as you wish. The only requirement is having the matching (VS) card for each Player card. A deck cannot have more than 2 copies of a card with same name. Please have fun with your own custom games of Persona VS!