THE MUSIC DECK
THE MUSIC DECK
  • Overview
  • Rules
  • Cards
  • Genres
  • Rarities
  • Collection
  • Catalog
  • Track Lists
  • Battles
  • Career
  • Glossary
  • Charter
ObjectiveComponentsCard AnatomyTrack List BuildingSetupSlotsCratePlay PhaseTurnsScoring & StacksWinningGlossary
Game

Rules

How to play The Music Deck, start to finish — objective, cards, track list building, and how a DJ battle is won.

Objective
  • Bring a track list preset — both DJs load one into the DJ battle.
  • Grow your own DJ Vibe— fill deck slots with songs, build stacks, and trigger synergies. There's no shared gauge to fight over.
  • Reach 1,000,000 DJ Vibe first — and you win.
Components

A track list is built from two card types:

  • Song — the core collectible.
  • Synergy — lets you move to a genre your current Playing Songdoesn't permit.

Songs can appear as variants — remix, cover, live, acoustic, and more — which stack onto their base song without costing an extra deck slot. Each DJ tracks their own DJ Vibe score, starting at 0 and climbing as the match plays out.

Card anatomy

Every card exposes four stats that stacking, synergy, and matchup rules read from during resolution:

  • Song Vibe — a 50-120 score reflecting how broadly the song connects with the audience. A few special songs fall below 50 or above 120, anywhere in the full 0-200 range.
  • Intensity — pop, soft, experimental, or hardcore, set by the card's genre or subgenre.
  • Advantage / Weakness — the genres this card is strong or weak against.
  • FX box — an FX name and effect description printed on every card, applied during Resolve effects alongside stacks and matchups.

Your own DJ Vibe gates which intensities you can play: below 100 DJ Vibe, only Pop cards; below 1,000, Pop and Soft; below 10,000, add Experimental; below 100,000, all four — including Hardcore.

Full frame breakdown with all variant art: Cards — Anatomy.

Track list building
  • Assemble a track list — before battling, put together exactly 60 cards.
  • Build and name multiple track lists — no limit on how many you keep.
  • Save a track list preset — freeze a lineup configuration for a given battle context.

Builder and full spec: Track Lists.

Setup
  • Load track list presets — both DJs bring one into the battle.
  • Reset DJ Vibe— each DJ's DJ Vibe is set to 0.
  • Start on the MP3 Player — the base gear tier, 1 deck slot.
  • Resolve opening Queue and first DJ — draw 7 cards each before turn 1 begins.
Slots

Your gear — how many deck slots you have — is gated by your own DJ Vibe, and upgrades mid-battle as it climbs:

  • MP3 Player — 1 deck slot, below 100 DJ Vibe. One deck means nothing to transition between, so cards are played straight away.
  • Turntables — 2 deck slots, below 1,000. Your first real transitions.
  • Controller — 3 deck slots, below 10,000.
  • Full Rig — 4 deck slots, from 10,000 onward.
Crate

Cards you no longer control leave into your own Crate. A card lands there when:

  • Discarded from your Queue — you choose to discard it.
  • Card effect — an effect sends it there directly.
  • Transition phase — cards transitioning out of a deck slot move to the Crate, along with any Synergy card you played last turn.
Turn structure

Each turn follows a fixed order:

  1. Draw — draw 1 card into your Queue.
  2. Transition phase — cards transitioning in become Playing Songs; cards transitioning out, and any Synergy card played last turn, move to the Crate.
  3. Play phase — cue a Song card into an open deck slot, or play a Synergy card.
  4. Resolve effects — stacks, synergies, and matchup modifiers are all applied here.
  5. End phase — score: each of your Playing Songsthat isn't Silenced adds its Song Vibe to your own DJ Vibe.

Fuller visual walkthrough: Battles — Game turns.

Play phase

During the Play phase, you may:

  • Cue a Song card — move it from your Queueinto an open deck slot. It doesn't play immediately: it starts transitioning in, and enters play as a Playing Song at the next turn's Transition phase. Exception: with only one deck slot, there is nothing to transition between, so the card is played immediately.
  • Play a Synergy card — move to a genre your current Playing Songdoesn't normally permit, for this turn only.
Scoring & stacks
  • Score at End phase — each of your Playing Songsthat isn't Silenced adds its Song Vibe to your own DJ Vibe.

All of this nets into a shift applied to your own DJ Vibe each turn.

Stat reference: Battles — Card attributes. Full advantage/weakness matrix per genre: Genres — Associations.

Winning

The battle ends the instant either DJ's own DJ Vibe reaches 1,000,000 — that DJ wins on the spot, with no fixed turn count and no waiting for a track list to run out.

Glossary

Core, battle, and card terms only. Venue and career terms live in the full Glossary.

DJ — You. The name for a player of The Music Deck, everywhere in the game — collecting cards, building track lists, battling, and climbing a career. In a battle, each DJ loads their own track list and tracks their own DJ Vibe score.
DJ battle — A match between two DJs, played out in turns until one DJ's own DJ Vibe reaches 1,000,000.
Track list — A DJ's built list of exactly 60 cards, assembled from their collection outside a battle and loaded into one.
Deck slot — One scoring slot in a DJ battle. Your slot count is gated by your own DJ Vibe: 1 below 100, 2 below 1,000, 3 below 10,000, 4 from 10,000 onward.
Gear — The name of each deck-slot tier, upgrading mid-battle as your own DJ Vibe climbs: MP3 Player (1 slot), Turntables (2), Controller (3), Full Rig (4).
Track list preset — A saved, named track list configuration (cards and stacks) loaded before battle instead of rebuilding from scratch.
Queue — The cards a DJ holds and can play from, drawn from their track list. Starts at 7 cards (opening Queue) and gains 1 card each Draw step.
Crate — Each DJ's own discard zone. A card lands here when discarded from your Queue, when a card effect sends it there, or during the Transition phase — cards transitioning out of a deck slot, and Synergy cards played last turn, move to the Crate.
Transition phase — The turn step, right before Play, where cards transitioning in become Playing Songs, and cards transitioning out (plus any Synergy card played last turn) move to the Crate.
Stack — A group of linked cards that occupies one deck slot.
Supplementary stacked card — A linked card in a stack beyond the strongest base card; adds +15% to that stack's value.
Song family — A song and its variants (remix, live, acoustic, etc.).
Variant — A version of a song.
Synergy — A card type that lets you move to a genre your current Playing Song doesn't permit.
DJ Vibe — Each DJ's own score, from 0 to 1,000,000. Reaching 1,000,000 first wins the battle. Also gates which card intensities you can play and how many deck slots you have.
Song Vibe — A 50-120 score printed on each card, reflecting how broadly the song connects with the audience. Distinct from a DJ's own DJ Vibe score; a few special cards fall below 50 or above 120, anywhere in the full 0-200 range.
Intensity — A card's power tier — pop, soft, experimental, or hardcore — set by its genre or subgenre. Your own DJ Vibe gates which intensities you can play.
Pop — The first and always-available Intensity tier a card can carry.
Soft — The second Intensity tier a card can carry, unlocked as your own DJ Vibe climbs.
Experimental — The third Intensity tier a card can carry, unlocked as your own DJ Vibe climbs.
Hardcore — The fourth and highest Intensity tier a card can carry, unlocked as your own DJ Vibe climbs.
FX — The name and effect description printed in a card's FX box, required on every card and applied during Resolve effects alongside stacks and matchup modifiers.
Advantage / Weakness — The genres a card is strong or weak against; applied as matchup modifiers during resolution.
Playing Song — A song card currently occupying one of your deck slots, contributing to scoring and matchups each turn.
Silenced — A Playing Song whose genre is weak against one of the opponent's Playing Songs. A Silenced song doesn't add its Song Vibe to its DJ's DJ Vibe during the score step.