It's a Beer'n'Peanuts Arena-Combat Dice-Chucker for 2-4 Friends!

80's styled ultra-violence!

Pan-dimensional fight promotion!

Genetically engineered warriors attempting to dismember each other!

Alien STDs!

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NEXUS is About Having Fun

This is achieved by antagonizing and competing with your friends through bloody, brutal, and often fatal combat. There is nothing co-operative about it, but you will find camaraderie in the hopelessness of trying to command these giant meat-bags called Helots to execute your orders. In NEXUS you play the part of a coach/fight promoter commanding these genetically engineered warriors to kill each other in arenas aboard giant space barges. And as you do, both the crowd and arena are indiscriminately trying to kill everyone involved. Sounds fun, right?!

The NEXUS: Arena Combat System was built from the ground up for fun. We took our favorite gaming mechanics and worked backwards from there to keep the table full of excitement and laughs. You will find your favorite elements from boardgames, RPGs, and even casino gambling all-rolled-up into this 12" x 12" box of lowbrow humor and gory chaos!

When choosing your lanista, keep in mind that each one has a varying command, influence and deception value.

Command will give your helot extra movement or actions.
Deception forces an opponent to make bad decisions.
Influence will give you access to bribes, and other nefarious deeds.

First, take a look at its trait bonuses. Each helot also has their own special motivation feature, along with a list of unique trait abilities. These features and abilities are what make every helot motivation unique!

From floor saws that tear through flesh to crates filled with weapons, each barge is outfitted with different hazards and obstacles that are looking to indiscriminately kill your helot. A truly savvy lanista, will be familiar with them all!

Use your power and influence as a lanista, to give your helot the edge in the bout. It isn't cheating, these influence cards merely represent a lanista’s pre-bout business arrangements.

Spend your command points to instruct these ignorant meat-puppets to do your bidding. Move!! Attack!! Grapple!! Stop Bleeding!! They may not always listen, but they'll give it their best shot!

In NEXUS, it isn't all about the last helot standing. Throughout the course of the bout players will earn cred coins by winning over the crowd! But, what if none of the competing lanistas can earn enough cred to impress the crowd? Then the bout is a draw, and you are all equally pathetic losers!

About Us

D-Verse Publishing, LLC was founded by Jason Goike and J. Scott Rumptz in 2017 with the intention of creating high quality games with nostalgic roots. They began work on “NEXUS”, their debut title, as childhood friends in the late 80’s. Growing up in Detroit on a steady diet of RPGs and board games, Jay and Scott are now bringing talented artists together from across the globe to create vibrant, immersive, and imagination-driven game worlds. With expansions already in the works, NEXUS is the first of many planned titles.

Check out our story so far here.