Each player commands a lord or lady from an established noble house who has traveled to the king's annual tournament to expand their influence with the crown and to earn favors and patrons for the coming year. You must balance your efforts between sponsoring knights (who may yield you honor and glory) and managing the subtle manipulations of the king’s court after each day’s battles. Lavish the powerful with gifts, ply the gullible with a tapestry of empty promises, publicly humiliate your rivals, or back the people’s champion in the arena -- nothing matters except royal favor, and if your enemies are dragged down in the process, well… they knew the risks. King's Tournament is a card-driven game that sets a random assortment of unique knights onto a play mat styled after a single-elimination tournament. Gameplay centers around the ebb and flow of two recurring phases: the action- and auction-based Festival Round and the card dueling-oriented Tournament Round. Festival Rounds are play-or-pass affairs wherein players use actions, cards, tokens, and written abilities to sponsor knights, sabotage their foes, or benefit from the tournament in more subtle ways. The Tournament Round follows, during which the knights battle one another using their printed attributes and special maneuver cards played by their patrons. Victorious knights advance further down the bracket, and a new Festival Round begins afterward. Play continues until a single knight has been crowned the tournament's champion, at which point players compare the favor tokens earned over the course of the game. Bonuses are doled out for reaching certain conditions, and the player with the most favor tokens is then declared the winner.