Docs & Rules is the durable home for the decisions that should not live only in a chat or a card effect. Use it for the rules a player will read and the design documents your collaborators need to make consistent cards, components, and artwork.
Create the right kind of document
Open Docs & Rules and choose New. Give the document a title and, optionally, a type that matches its job. ShuffleKit supports documents for:
- Theme and Lore
- Rules and Keywords
- Card Types, Sets, and Distribution
- Art Style Guide
- Resource System and Balance Rules
You can change a document's type, or its project, later from the buttons beside its title. The type is an organizing label and places no limit on what the document holds. A rules document can link to a keyword document; a set document can explain how its cards use a resource system. Split a document when readers need a different audience or a different revision cadence.
Organize by project and type
The page opens on All Documents, a grid of cards showing each document's title, type and last-changed date. Use the Type and Project buttons (Filter by type, Filter by project) to narrow a busy library; each menu has a clear option, and on a phone both sit in the filter menu at the top. Open a document and the list moves to a narrow column on the left with a Search docs... box and a + for a new document. Create rules in the same project as the cards and components they govern. That shared project context is what makes the workspace navigable when the game grows beyond a single deck.
For an existing draft, use Import. Docs & Rules accepts .md, .markdown, .txt, and .docx files, and you can pick several at once; each becomes its own document. Filter to the target project before importing when possible so the new documents are attached to that game from the start. To take a document out again, open it and use Export for a Markdown (.md) or Word (.docx) file.
To delete a document, point at its card and click the bin in the corner, or click the bin beside it in the list on the left. ShuffleKit asks you to confirm before it deletes anything. A deleted document cannot be brought back, so export anything you might want again before you press Delete.
Write and format
Open a document to edit it; it saves as you type. The title at the top is editable too. The toolbar under the title bar has:
- Bold, Italic, Strikethrough and Inline code;
- Heading 1, Heading 2 and Heading 3;
- Bullet list, Ordered list, Blockquote and Horizontal rule;
- Insert image, which uploads a PNG, JPG, WebP, GIF, SVG, AVIF or BMP file into the document and your image library;
- Undo and Redo.
Markdown you paste is converted into formatting, and text you copy out comes as Markdown. Keyboard shortcuts for all of this are in Keyboard Shortcuts.
The title bar holds the rest: Type and Project menus, Export, Shufflo and History. The back arrow returns to the full list. If a teammate is editing the document, a chip beside the title says so (or Open in another tab when it is you, elsewhere), and the document is read-only for you until you press Take over. If someone else saved it while you were typing, a Changed elsewhere chip pauses saving so neither version is lost: Reload takes their version, and Save as copy keeps yours as a new document.
A practical rules-doc structure
Start with a short statement of the game objective, then write the turn or round sequence. Define each keyword once, include examples for exceptions, and keep unresolved questions visibly marked for the next test. Link cards by their exact names so your team can find them in Cards.
Use separate design documents for things players should not see yet: rarity/distribution, a faction matrix, balance targets, image direction, or a card-type contract. That lets the public rules stay readable while the project retains its working notes.
Revise with help, then keep history
Open a document and press Shufflo in its title bar to open the assistant beside it with that document in view (on a phone it opens as a sheet). The panel reads Let's write something, offers three suggestions such as expanding a section or adding a FAQ, and works like the Cards panel described in Shufflo AI. Ask it to improve a passage, find contradictions, write a concise summary, or rewrite wording for a player-facing rulebook. Shufflo edits the document directly and saves a version of it first, and it can also write a new document when you ask for one. Read the changed text in context before you move on, especially numbers, timing words, and exceptions.
Use the document's History button when you need to compare or restore earlier wording. It opens Version history for the document. Save snapshot records the current text, with an optional label. The list shows your snapshots by default; Filter shows other kinds too (All versions, Status changes, Pre-import, Pre-restore, Pre-AI edit and Auto-saves). Select a version to preview it, then Restore this version and confirm. The back arrow returns to the editor. It is especially valuable after playtests: record the observed problem, revise the rule, and preserve the older version so you can tell whether the change solved the right issue.
Connect documents to the rest of the game
Before a playtest, make a short rules version that players can follow without you narrating every turn. After the session, update the balance or keyword document, then carry those decisions into the card data and layouts. For game-level discussion before writing, start with Shufflo Ideator.
