Riftbound's fifth set of the year, Radiance, is now available, bringing musically inspired card designs and three new mechanics — Disarm, Show Off, and Deploy — that are poised to reshape the competitive landscape of the League of Legends trading card game. The set was recently playable at early Pre-Rift tournaments, offering players a first look at how the new keywords function in practice.
Disarm is the most straightforward of the new mechanics. When a unit with Disarm attacks, it reduces the might of an enemy unit at that battlefield, typically by one. The new green Calm Ahri, Confident, features Disarm and gains a built-in buff when she reduces an enemy unit's might, adding +1 might to herself. The blue Mind Kai'sa, Rebel, also carries Disarm and grants spells Reaction speed during a showdown, making her a promising addition to spell-heavy strategies.
Show Off introduces a layer of information warfare to the game. Cards with this mechanic gain an additional effect if the player reveals a qualifying card to their opponent as it is played. Only four cards in Radiance currently feature Show Off — two units and two spells — and each grants a different effect. The five-cost yellow Order spell Rousing Display, part of the Legend Seraphine's kit, summons four 1-might Recruit Tokens to the base instead of one if the player shows off a card with an energy cost of seven or higher.
Chengran Chai, executive producer of Riftbound, explained that Show Off represents a deliberate trade-off. «You're giving away information in exchange for something, but TCGs are very much a game of information,» Chai said. «If I'm planning a spell-heavy deck, whether you have Defy or not in your hand matters a great deal to me. Show Off basically opens up another dimension to the kind of like, 3D, 4D chess — that's 5D.» Players might intentionally reveal a card to mislead an opponent, baiting them into a play that can be countered.
Deploy is a keyword designed specifically for Gear, allowing players to send that Gear directly to a battlefield. While there, it provides an effect, but it is destroyed if the opponent captures the battlefield it occupies. A new Token Gear called Bomb also features Deploy; when it dies, it explodes, dealing two damage and triggering other Bombs at the same battlefield. Like other deployable gear, Bombs die when an opponent holds their battlefield, but players can destroy them voluntarily to trigger the explosive effect.
Chai believes Deploy will have the greatest impact on the meta. «I think Deploy is probably the one that will disrupt the meta, because historically, you don't think of just going straight to a battlefield,» he said. «And now you have, like, Jarvan IV's E-Q, you have Ziggs just tossing bombs onto battlefields, and it's going to change the way people think about Defending quite a bit.»
Jarvan IV's Legend ability mirrors his signature E-Q combo from League of Legends, allowing players to move a friendly unit to a battlefield when they play a Gear with Deploy there, at a cost of one Power. Orianna's Legend ability converts a friendly Gear into a Gear Unit at the start of the Main Phase, creating opportunities to steal points with deployable Gear. Her Signature Gear, The Ball, also gains Ganking, enabling it to move between battlefields each turn. Chai highlighted Orianna and The Ball as cards he would want to showcase from the set.
Both Show Off and Deploy increase Riftbound's overall complexity, while Deploy and Disarm appear positioned to disrupt defensive Hold strategies. The set's release follows a series of early play opportunities, including Pre-Rift tournaments where participants received a Pre-Rift Player Kit containing a promo card, five booster packs, and a 15-card Seeded deck with a Legend and matching Champion Unit. Players then build a 25-card deck on the fly, often incorporating a third color to enable combos unavailable in standard Constructed play.
Radiance marks the fifth set for the League of Legends TCG and continues the game's evolution with mechanics that reward adaptability and psychological play. The full set is available now, and its impact on competitive play will unfold as players experiment with the new keywords.