Life

Life (ライフ Raifu) is a numeric value that represents the players' Flag's "life".

Mechanics
All players start the game with 10 Life unless stated otherwise by a player's Flag such as Dragon Ein. The primary objective of a is to protect Future Card Buddyfight game your own life while attempting to reduce the opponent's life. When a player's Life becomes 0 they achieve a Lose condition. Reducing the opponent's life to 0 is the most common way to win a Buddyfight.

Reducing Life
The player's life can be reduced through the following methods:
 * Attack damage When a monster or item succesfully attacks a player directly, that player's life is reduced by that monster's current Critical value. Monsters and items can only attack directly when the opponent's center area is open. This is called "dealing/taking damage by an attack".
 * Effect damage: When a card effect that states "deal/take X damage" is resolved, that player's life is reduced by the X amount. This is called "dealing/taking damage by an effect". Example: Penetrate
 * Effects that state "You lose X life" aren't considered effect damage.
 * Paying life: Many effects require paying life as costs to be used. This isn't considered taking damage either. Example: Divine Dragon Creation
 * Your life/your opponent's life becomes X: When an effect that states "Your life/your opponent's life becomes X" resolves, that player's life automatically becames the stated value regardless of it's previous value. This isn't either losing nor gaining life. Example: Darkness Final Mission Card "World End"

Increasing Life
The player's life can be increased through the following methods:
 * Buddy Gift: When yousuccessfully performs a Buddy Call, you gain 1 Life.
 * Card effects: When an effect that states "You gain X life" resolves, your life is increased by that amount. Example: Dragon Dreams.

Gameplay Strategy
The most common way to protect the players' life is to prevent being attacked directly. Some decks do this by calling monsters that are difficult to take down to the center then use effects to prolong that monster's longetivity. These types of decks usually run fewer item cards since their center area ideally shouldn't be open, and/or use items that can attack regardless if the center is occupied or are used for support instead of attacking. The main weakness of these decks is effects that can deal damage even when the center is occupied such as Penetrate.

Other decks instead leave the center area open and defend themselves with a large amount Counter to reduce damage and nullify attacks. These types of decks tend to run more item cards and use effects that activate when the center area is open. They also tend to use monsters with Move to protect the center when necessary. The main weakness of these decks is that they are almost always vulnerable to direct attacks and not always will have enough Counter effects to stop the opponent's attacks.

While normally having a high amount of Life is benefical to prevent losing, many effects in the game require the player to have a certain amount of life or less (Example: Survival Chance) so sometimes it can be better to let the opponent deal damage to use this effects. Likewise, many effects activate when the opponent's has a certain amount of life or lower (example: Gargantua Punisher!!) so it's not recommended to let your life drop too low.