Kinda lost as to the rules..

[Axe]

I am trying to figure out the rules to this game. Why is it, some times a spark will fall under the fireman and smoke appears, and thats it. Yet another time the exact same thing happens but it blows up and kills them. i dont get it.

I understand smoke hit with fire blows up, and mass smoke can blow up a room. But almost all my guys dye from one spark no previous smoke and suddenly dead.
Is there some site that gives the rules on fire behavior a bit more in depth then the tutorial in this game. As everything i have read doesnt seem to go into length on the subject and its very important.

[Boresight]

You can download easy to understand rules in the files section of Fire Rescue on the Board game geek website.
Basically...

Smoke appearing on an empty space = smoke (fire if adjacent to fire)
Smoke appearing on Smoke = fire
Smoke appearing on Fire = explosion
Fire appearing on Hazmat = explosion (hazmat becomes a hotspot)
Fire appearing on a Hot spot = flare up

You also have shock waves where the fire travels along fire paths.

[nix_bb]

Thank you for reaching out.

We've had a few requests to expand the in-game guide. In response we are moving the guide to the pause menu and replacing it with an extended tutorial that will explain the fundanmentals more clearly.

In the mean time Boresight has a nice summary of the fire rules. (@Boresight Thank you)
And the game does strictly adhere to the boardgame rules so that will help as well.

If you're still getting stuck or something is unclear, please let us know here so that we can help you out and make sure it's covered in the new tutorial.

[Serneum]

I had similar issues, but it may have been purely graphical. It seemed like somtimes the ember would land on an empty spot and either go straight from nothing to fire or explode. The basic tutorial let me know to expect what Boresight stated, so it seemed odd when embers behaved differently. Again, it could easily be that I'm playing at minimal graphics and the game still being a bit slow, so maybe it's just that the ember landed somewhere other than where I thought it did.

[zedexguy]

I play with minimal graphics and I haven't seen the embers behave differently from what to expect from the rules. I agree, it's possible you just misjudged where the ember ended its chaotic path down, especially if frames were dropped.

Originally posted by Serneum:

It seemed like somtimes the ember would land on an empty spot and either go straight from nothing to fire or explode.

An ember can never land on an empty spot and cause an explosion. But it can go straight to fire, skipping smoke. To reword what Boresight said:

• An ember landing on an empty space adds smoke there
  
• An ember landing on a smokey space turns the smoke into fire
  
• An ember landing on a firey space will cause an explosion, which will add fire in four directions (or damage, if there's a wall in the way)

But after the above, any smoke that's next to fire becomes fire. This can cascade until there is no more smoke next to fire. So an ember landing on an empty space can add smoke, and if that space is next to fire, the space would immediately be set on fire.