Riftbound rules
Riftbound card types: units, spells, gear, legends, runes and battlefields
Riftbound has six card types. Units, gear and spells form your Main Deck, runes your rune deck, and legends and battlefields start in play. Units and gear are permanents.
The explanation
Every Riftbound card has one of six types. Units, gear and spells make up your Main Deck, and runes make up your rune deck. Your Champion Legend and your battlefields aren't in either deck: they start the game in play and stay there.
Units and gear are permanents, which means they stay on the board after you play them. A spell does what its text says and then goes to your trash. Runes stay on the board too, but they aren't permanents, because they aren't Main Deck cards. Legends and battlefields aren't permanents either.
Units are your fighters. A unit's Might is what it adds to combat, and damage equal to its Might kills it. You play a unit to your base or a battlefield you control, and it enters exhausted. Gear normally goes to your base and enters ready. Equipment is gear you attach to a unit, which adds its Might bonus and effect text to that unit.
Champion units and Signature cards are tied to a legend by its champion tag. One champion unit is your Chosen Champion, which starts the game in your Champion Zone. Tokens, like a Recruit unit or Gold gear, aren't cards at all: effects create them during play.
Main Deck cards have a cost, paid with energy and power from your runes, as runes, energy and power explains. Deck building covers what goes in a deck.
What the Core Rules say
- 133.4.a.1
- An umbrella sub-category encompassing Main Deck Game Objects that remain on the board after being played.
- 133.4.a.2
- Unit and Gear are permanent types.
- 133.4.b.1
- A sub-category encompassing Main Deck cards with the spell type, which do not remain on the board after being played.
- 133.5.a.1
- A sub-category encompassing cards with the rune type. These are channeled rather than played. They remain on the board after being channeled, but they are not permanents, as they are not Main Deck cards.
- 133.6.a.1
- A sub-category encompassing cards with the battlefield type. They are not played or channeled. They start the game on the board.
- 133.6.b.1
- A sub-category encompassing cards with the legend type. They are not played or channeled. They start the game in the Legend Zone and cannot typically leave it during play.
- 143.2
- Might: The combat statistic of a Unit. Used to determine a Unit's contribution to Combat, as well as when it is Killed by damaging effects.
- 143.4
- Units enter the Board exhausted.
- 149.1
- Gear enter play Ready.
- 149.2
- Gear can only be played to a player's Base unless an effect specifies otherwise.
- 150.2
- Equipment have effect text and a Might bonus.
- 185
- Tokens are not cards.
Quoted word for word from the Riftbound Core Rules, updated October 9, 2026
Common questions
What are the card types in Riftbound?
There are six: units, spells and gear, which go in your Main Deck; runes, which make up your rune deck; and legends and battlefields, which start the game in play. Champion and Signature aren't card types but supertypes, and tokens are game objects that cards create.
Core Rules 103.3, 154, 161, 133.6.a.1, 133.6.b.1, 133.7, 133.7.a, 133.7.b, 180
What's the difference between a permanent and a spell?
Permanents, meaning units and gear, stay on the board after you play them. A spell does what its text says, then goes to its owner's trash. By default you play spells on your own turn outside showdowns, unless they have Action or Reaction.
Core Rules 133.4.a.1, 133.4.a.2, 133.4.b.1, 157, 155, 806.1.c.1, 813.1.c.1
What do the numbers on a Riftbound card mean?
The number in the top-left corner is the energy cost, and the domain symbols in that corner are the power cost. A unit's Might is in its top-right corner. Equipment also has a Might bonus in its lower-right corner, which it adds to the unit it's attached to.
Core Rules 131.2.a, 131.3.a, 143.2.a, 137.1, 137.3
Where can I play units?
To your base or to a battlefield you control, unless an effect lets you play one somewhere else. Units enter exhausted, and moving costs exhausting the unit, so a new unit can't move until it's readied, unless it entered ready with Accelerate.
Core Rules 355.2.a, 355.2.b, 143.4, 143.4.a, 144.2, 415.1.b, 416.3.a
How does gear work in Riftbound?
Gear is a permanent you normally play to your base, and it enters ready. Its activated abilities can be used in your Main Phase outside showdowns, unless they have Action or Reaction. Unattached gear at a battlefield is recalled to your base in the next cleanup, unless it has Deploy, which lets gear be played to a battlefield and stay there.
Core Rules 133.4.a.2, 149.1, 149.2, 151.2, 806.1.c.2, 813.1.c.2, 149.3, 830.1.b, 830.1.b.3
How does Equipment work in Riftbound?
Equipment is gear with the Equipment tag. Pay its Equip cost to attach it to a unit you control: the unit gets its Might bonus and effect text, and the Equipment's printed rules text stops working while it's attached. Quick-Draw Equipment can be played as a Reaction and attaches to a unit you control when you play it. If the unit leaves the board, the Equipment detaches and stays where the unit was, then goes back to your base if that's a battlefield.
Core Rules 150.1, 150.2, 818.1.b, 435.1.c, 435.1.d, 435.1.e, 819.1.d, 719.5, 436.4.b, 436.4.a
What are champion units and Signature cards?
Both are tied to a legend by its champion tag, such as Jinx. Champion units are units with the Champion supertype, and the one you pick as your Chosen Champion starts the game in your Champion Zone. Signature is a supertype any card type can have, like the spell Super Mega Death Rocket!, and a deck can hold 3 Signature cards in total.
Core Rules 133.8.b, 133.7.a, 133.7.b, 103.3.a.2, 108.3.b, 103.3.d.1
What does a Champion Legend do?
It sets your deck's domains and starts the game in your Legend Zone, where it stays: legends can't be killed or moved, and they aren't permanents. Legends have abilities too, like Loose Cannon's extra draw when your hand is low, or Fire Below the Mountain's exhaust for power to spend on gear.
Core Rules 176.1, 133.6.b.1, 107.4.d, 174.3, 174.4, 175, 174.6, 174.7, 174.8
What are battlefields in Riftbound?
Battlefields are where units fight and where you score points. They start the game on the board and stay there: they can't be played, moved or killed, and they aren't permanents. Whoever controls a battlefield controls its abilities. Each player brings three to a game.
Core Rules 133.6.a.1, 170.2.a, 170.3, 170.4, 171, 190.6.a, 194.1.a, 194.1.b, 487.4.a, 491.4.a
How do tokens work in Riftbound?
Tokens are game objects that cards create during play, like a 1 Might Recruit unit, or a Gold gear you kill and exhaust for one power of any domain. A token follows the rules for its type, has no domain and counts as costing 0. If it leaves the board for your trash, hand or any other zone except the chain, it stops existing. Anything can stand in for a token, so the printed token cards are optional.
Core Rules 180, 187.1, 187.5, 185.2.d, 185.3.a.1, 185.3.b, 186.1, 181
Example: Equipping a Long Sword
Long Sword is Fury Equipment with a +2 Might bonus and Quick-Draw. It costs 2 energy and one Fury power, and Quick-Draw lets you play it as a Reaction. When you play it, it attaches to a unit you control, so your 2 Might Legion Rearguard becomes a 4 Might unit. If the Rearguard dies at a battlefield, the Long Sword detaches and stays there, then it's recalled to your base in the next cleanup.
From Riftbound Core Rules
Official rulings
Riot's own words, from its rules articles.
If I play Turn to Dust on an attached Equipment, will the Equipment die in the Beginning Phase?
Attached Equipment only have their printed rules text made inactive per rules 718.2. and 135.4. This means that any granted rules text will still be active; granted Temporary will trigger and kill attached Equipment and granted Deflect will add
Any Rune to the cost of enemy spells and abilities that target them.Can Rumble, Hotheaded choose a Mech token to recycle? If he does, where does it go?
We’ll be clarifying in a future rules updates that tokens “inherit” the recycle destination of their type(s), so a token that’s a unit or gear is recycled to your Main Deck just like any other gear. It then vanishes, as tokens do any time they leave the board, but it still counts as “the unit you recycled” and Rumble can check its Might.
Orianna, Lady of Clockwork presents some unique rules scenarios for the game, including what happens to an Equipment that becomes a unit. We decided on the simplest answer: units can’t be attached to other game objects. If an attached game object becomes a unit, it detaches immediately.
Core Rules: Radiance Patch Notes (Effective October 16, 2026)