Riftbound Radiance Preview Week 1: 23 Cards

Five days into Preview Season, Riftbound: Radiance is starting to look like a card list. The finished card images shown since the Regional Qualifier in Los Angeles, gathered in one place by StarCityGames, include three of the set's nine Legends, its first Signature printings, and cards carrying all three of the mechanics that leaked from Riot's PAX West demo table in September.

We read every card in that round-up whose collector number and rarity gem can be made out. 23 of them are now in our database, each with its own page, and they fill the galleries below. Card text quoted here is read off the cards, with the energy, power and exhaust symbols written out in words. Where we say what a card might be good at, that is our read, and we say so. The dated log of every reveal is on the live Radiance tracker, and the Radiance set page lists every card as it arrives.

The week at a glance

Ekko, Ziggs and Orianna: three Legends in print

Ekko, Boy Who Shattered Time (Fury/Mind, 139/167, Rare) is the one Legend whose ability Riot had already described, in its first-look article in August, and the printed card matches it. Ekko has Empower for one energy and exhausting him, usable only while he is not Empowered. Then: "Disempower me, exhaust: Reduce the cost of the next unit you play this turn by 2 energy and 1 power and give it 'Kill me at end of turn.'" You charge Ekko on one turn and spend the charge on a later one to play a unit early, and that unit dies when the turn ends.

Our read: the cost is steep unless the unit does its work on the way in. A unit with a "when you play me" ability keeps that value after it dies. And his own Champion Unit, Ekko, Ingenious, asks you to return a friendly unit to its owner's hand as an additional cost. Returned before the turn ends, a discounted unit would not be on the board to die. Whether that loop is worth two cards is exactly the kind of thing Preview Season can't answer yet.

Ziggs, Hexplosives Expert (Fury/Chaos, 141/167, Rare) makes bombs: "1 energy and 1 power, exhaust: Play a Bomb gear token to a battlefield." The card's reminder text defines the Bomb. It has Deploy, and when it dies it deals 2 to an enemy there and kills your other Bombs there. His signature spell, Hexplosive Minefield (2 energy, Epic, an Action), kills any number of your Bomb tokens, then at the end of the turn plays that many back onto a single battlefield.

Read the Bomb's text twice, because it chains. One Bomb dying kills the others at the same battlefield, and each of those deals 2 as it dies. And because every Bomb has Deploy, an opponent who holds a battlefield with your Bombs on it sets them all off. Hexplosive Minefield is what turns a spread of Bombs into one stack that goes off together. Ziggs also has a Signature printing, 169*/167, art by Kindlejack.

Orianna, Lady of Clockwork (Calm/Mind, 145/167, Rare): "At the start of your Main Phase, you may pay 1 to choose a friendly gear. It becomes a unit gear with Might equal to its Energy cost until you choose another gear with me." The more a gear costs, the bigger the body. Radiance has already shown a 6-energy gear (Dockside Lock-Up) and a 9-energy one (Zero Point Inflection). What "unit gear" means in the rules — whether it can move, and what happens to its gear abilities — Riot hasn't published yet. Orianna's Signature, 171*/167, is by Anh Dang.

With Seraphine's Starry-Eyed Songstress, officially revealed on 24 September, that is four of the nine Legends in print. The fifth Legend shown so far is K'Sante's Pride of Nazumah, covered here. Riot hasn't formally counted him among the nine.

Deploy, Show Off and Disarm are real

In September a fan photo of Riot's PAX West demo reference card showed three unreleased mechanics. Our write-up of the leak treated them as unconfirmed, because a demo card is not a printed one. Now all three are on finished cards, and the reminder text matches the leak almost word for word. The one real change is a name: the leak spelt it Showoff, and the cards print SHOW OFF, two words.

Deploy — "Play this only to a battlefield. When an opponent holds here, kill this." Both Deploy cards so far are gear, as the leak said. Pillaged Armory (Body, 1 energy, Common) gives a friendly unit a Buff when you play it and whenever you conquer there. Dockside Lock-Up (Order, 6 energy, Epic) banishes a unit there when you play it, and when you hold there you can kill the Lock-Up to play the banished card, ignoring its cost. Its printed aside, "Tokens aren't cards", means a banished token has no card to play back. The card says a unit, not an enemy unit, so it can also park one of your own for later. How playing the card works when the unit was your opponent's is a rules question Riot hasn't answered yet.

Show Off — "As you play this, you may reveal a unit from your hand or pick a friendly unit." The leak's "listed criteria" turn out to be printed straight after the keyword. Primordial Roar (Body, 4 energy, Uncommon) shows off a unit. If you did, it deals damage equal to that unit's Might to a unit, so the spell is only as good as the biggest unit you can show. Rousing Display (Order, 5 energy, Uncommon) shows off a card with Energy cost 7 or more. It plays two 1-Might Recruit unit tokens to your base, or four if you showed off. The difference between the two is worth noting: Roar does nothing without the show-off, while Display is still a spell without it, just a smaller one.

Disarm — "When I attack, give an enemy unit here -1 Might this turn." Like Assault, it takes a number. Disposal Expert (Chaos, 4 energy, 3 Might, Common) has Disarm 2, and enters ready if you control no other units. Kai'Sa, Rebel (Mind, 5 energy, 5 Might, Rare) has Disarm, and while she is in a showdown your spells have Reaction. That settles one argument the leak post left open. Anonymous text for a Kai'Sa card circulated in September beginning with the word "Disarm", and seemed to use it for something else. The printed card has Disarm as a keyword with exactly the demo card's meaning, followed by a separate ability.

The galleries on the leak write-up and on each mechanic's guide (Deploy, Show Off, Disarm) now fill with these cards on their own.

The Champion Units

Seven Champion Units arrived this week, and several tie back to the Legends above.

• K'Sante, Dauntless (Calm, 4 energy, 4 Might, Epic) has Shield, and when he attacks or defends he doubles the Shield of a unit you control there that turn. K'Sante's Legend, Pride of Nazumah, gives a unit Assault equal to its Shield. Every K'Sante card so far is about Shield.
• K'Sante, Courageous (Body, 5 energy, 4 Might, Rare) is the base printing of the card first seen as HEARTSTEEL's overnumbered 178/167: Accelerate, Shield 2, and channel 1 rune when he holds. It confirms the HEARTSTEEL K'Sante works like the other five HEARTSTEEL cards: an overnumbered printing of a card in a set's base run.
• Ekko, Ingenious (Mind, 3 energy, 4 Might, Rare) costs you a friendly unit returned to its owner's hand, and has Ganking.
• Evelynn, Consuming (Body, 5 energy, 5 Might, Epic) has Ambush, and whenever you play a card from face down she readies and gets +1 Might for the turn. Cards played face down are Hidden cards, so she pays off a Hidden deck. Her alternate art, 090a/167, is credited to Dark Glow (黯荧岛).
• Heimerdinger, Academy Instructor (Order, 6 energy, 5 Might, Rare): while he is at a battlefield, any unit token you would play to a location can be a 3-Might Mech token instead. The card says a location, not a battlefield, so Rousing Display's Recruits, which go to your base, look like they qualify: four 1-Might tokens become four 3-Might Mechs.
• Seraphine, Not Alone (Order, 5 energy, 1 Might, Epic) has been in collectors' hands since the T1 Worlds collection; now it has a number and a rarity in the set itself. She plays a 1-Might Recruit token when she enters or becomes exhausted, and gets +1 Might for each other exhausted unit you control. Her Legend's cost-reduction asks you to exhaust three friendly units.
• Kai'Sa, Rebel is covered under Disarm above.

Everything else from the first week

• Clocktower Guardian (Mind, 8 energy, 8 Might, Epic): Predict 3 when you play it and whenever it holds, and a Deathknell that banishes the top card of your Main Deck and lets you play it, ignoring its Energy cost.
• Zero Point Inflection (Mind gear, 9 energy, Epic): whenever you play a card, draw 2. When you draw with 9 or more other cards in hand, you discard your hand, kill it, and choose an opponent, who scores 1 point. It is a draw engine with a limit you have to manage.
• Momentary Companion (Chaos, 4 energy, 4 Might, Common): Hidden, and if you play it when it isn't your turn it gets Temporary, so it dies at the start of your next Beginning Phase, before scoring.
• Rakelstake (Battlefield, 165/167, Uncommon) is Radiance's first battlefield: for each player, the first time they play a unit or gear there each turn, they Predict.

The chase printings: an alternate art and three Signatures

Radiance's base run stops at 167, the denominator printed on every card. This week showed both kinds of chase numbering. A letter marks an alternate art of a base card: Evelynn, Consuming 090a/167, with a gold Showcase gem. An asterisk marks a Signature printing, with the artist's signature on new art: Ziggs 169*/167 by Kindlejack, Orianna 171*/167 by Anh Dang, and Seraphine's Legend 174*/167 by Anna Nikonova. The variant glossary explains the tiers.

In earlier sets, Signature Legends came in pairs: an overnumbered printing, and a signed version of it with the same number plus an asterisk (Origins' 303/298 and 303*/298, for example). Seraphine's pair is now complete on our side: the 174/167 over-number Riot revealed on 24 September, and its signed twin, 174*/167. Unsigned 169/167 and 171/167 printings of Ziggs and Orianna would fit the same pattern, but neither has been shown, so neither is in our database. When singles are listed, the asterisk is what separates the two, and our price matching reads it.

What isn't in our database yet, and why

Three more cards in the same images are described here but not catalogued. We add a card only when its collector number, rarity and text can all be read. In these images, one of the three can't.

• Ahri, Confident — Calm, 4 energy, 4 Might, with Disarm and "When you reduce the Might of an enemy unit here by 1 or more, give me +1 Might this turn." Her collector number and rarity gem are smeared.
• Invigorating Bloom — a Calm gear that gives a friendly unit +3 Might when played, and draws a card when you exhaust a friendly Mighty unit and the Bloom. Its energy cost and collector number are cropped out.
• Supernova — Mind, 9 energy, 059/167: "Deal 10 to a unit. Draw 2." The rarity gem is unreadable.

The round-up also shows two tokens, a Bomb (Ziggs') and a Mech (Heimerdinger's). Our catalogue lists cards, not tokens.

What we still don't know

• The rest of the Legends. Jarvan IV is named but not shown, Evelynn's Legend text is unpublished, and three Legends are unannounced.
• The new set mechanic. Riot's redacted contents list promised one. Whether it is one of these three, or something not yet shown, Riot hasn't said.
• Rules detail. What a "unit gear" is under Orianna, and how Dockside Lock-Up plays an opponent's banished unit, wait on Radiance's rules update.
• Prices. None of these cards can be bought yet. Each card page starts comparing store prices as listings appear, most likely from the Pre-Rift events on 16–22 October. Until then, Radiance pre-order prices compares sealed product across stores.