Upgrades give your robot access to special abilities, new weapons, defenses, movement bonuses, etc. There are two types of upgrade cards: permanent and temporary. Upgrade cards tell you the Energy cost and effect of the upgrade. Upgrade cards might break the rules of the game with their special abilities. When this happens, the card takes precedence over the rulebook.

Refer to the Upgrade Phase for how to draw and install new upgrades for your robot. If the upgrade deck runs out and you need to draw a new upgrade, shuffle the upgrade discard pile to form a new deck. When an upgrade refers to a Move [n] “card” or a Rotate [Left/Right] “card” etc., it means a specific card from your initial programming deck. Some upgrades refer to a specific maneuver, and not to a specific “card.” In that case, any source of that maneuver will trigger the effect.

Example: Zoop (“Rotate to face any direction.”) does not combo with Power Slide (“After resolving a Rotate Right card, you may move 1 space forward.”). Example: Laser Kata (“After performing a U-Turn...”) triggers on any card that causes your robot to U-Turn, such as the Haywire card “Move 3, U-Turn.” However, if a robot is “rotated to any facing” and it happens to be a U-Turn, that is not a “U-Turn maneuver.” Some weapon upgrades have the wording “instead of firing your robot’s main laser.” This means you may choose to use the upgrade’s effects or you may choose to fire your robot’s main laser. You may only use 1 weapon with such language at a time. If a damaging upgrade does not have this statement, then the upgrade works in conjunction with your robot’s main laser.