2025 was loaded with TCG releases. Not only have new expansions hit baked-in fanbases like Magic: The Gathering, Yu-Gi-Oh!, Flesh and Blood, and One Piece; fresh to tabletop offerings have struck the market like the newly introduced Gundam TCG, and the League of Legends spin-off, League of Legends: Riftbound.
Unlike other ‘combat-based’ Trading Card Games, Riftbound delivers a premium objective-based experience with an objective for TCG players to hit the tabletops with. League of Legends: Riftbound’s focus on delivering an excellent game system surpasses the ‘just another LoL spin-off’ label and introduces compelling gameplay that stays true to the source MOBA multiplayer title while becoming its own beast outright. With the release of Spiritforged, League of Legends: Riftbound proves it’s far more than a gimmicky spin-off and holds its own as a full-fledged TCG.
What is Riftbound?
League of Legends: Riftbound is a Trading Card Game based on taking battlefields and defending them from opponents, much like the team-based gameplay of the popular MOBA title played by millions. While the MOBA video game requires teams to destroy the opposing team’s Nexus (while defending your own), Riftbound tasks players with conquering battlefields and keeping them until you secure eight points (or 11 in team-based/free-for-all formats) and declare victory.
“League of Legends: Riftbound proves it’s far more than a gimmicky spin-off.”
While other card games are focused on defeating your opponent (or opponents), Riftbound defers to a more strategy-centred approach that utilizes battlefield tactics to secure victory, breaking the mould on the traditional health points-based approach. Think of an objective game type like King of the Hill or Capture the Flag instead of Team Deathmatch. You don’t beat opponents down in Riftbound so much as you out-maneuver them to win, making this Riot Games offering stand out in the sea of 2025 TCG releases.
While it sounds simple enough, Riftbound has so many moving pieces that it is easy to pick up but hard to master. Much like the base League of Legends experience, in Riftbound, you select your playstyle by picking a Legend, and you’re stuck with that choice for the game. Your chosen Legend straddles the Legend Zone on the game mat and determines the player’s Domain Identity.
This sets limits on card variation within each deck. There are currently six Domain Identity basic runes in Riftbound: the Fury rune, Calm rune, Mind rune, Body rune, Chaos rune and Order rune. These are denoted by colours. For balance, League of Legends: Riftbound restricts each Legend to only two rune colours, which also serve as the main source of energy and power.
The number of runes you have in play determines how many cards you can afford to play against your opponent. Each player gets two runes each turn at the start of their turn. This design is expanded by the two-deck system Riftbound uses. Players have a 40-card main deck and a 12-card rune deck to draw from, which reduces the luck involved in keeping a deck consistent.
To pay a card’s cost, you can exhaust any runes to cover the required number, also called the Energy Cost. To meet colour requirements for a cast, also called the Power Cost, you must recycle a rune, exhausted or not, to pay. Recycle means “put this on the bottom of the deck,” and it serves as another way to pay card costs.
I am a painfully Iron-ranked League of Legends player, so I am still a little salty about some memories from playing the MOBA. While Riftbound uses iconic Legends from League of Legends, you can pick up and enjoy the game without any prior knowledge of the source material. I learned and played Riftbound with a member of my weekly TCG group. He has no knowledge of League of Legends or Arcane, but the presentation, strategy and potential for setting up devastating plays kept us at the table for hours.
A Stellar Presentation
One of the main challenges for newcomers to trading card games is the steep learning curve most require. I am happy to report that we understood the rules and core systems in 10 to 15 minutes and felt comfortable within an hour. Riftbound also has only two main sets available right now, so the learning load for new players is about as low as it will ever be.
The presentation on each card makes it hard to believe this collaboration between Riot Games and UVS Games is their first product together. Some TCG players abandon a game the moment poor card stock touches their hands, but Riftbound uses stock that feels good and remains flexible. The two main card types that make up the player’s decks, the main deck and the rune deck, have different coloured backs to make them easy to tell apart.
While other TCGs build their power source into the main deck, Riftbound uses a cleaner approach to paying card costs, and it works well in practice. UVS has experience with UniVersus, but this is Riot Games’ first tabletop TCG. Legends of Runeterra has no physical component. Even so, the team has delivered a strong first effort.
Each card is crafted with source material in mind, and since the first set, Origins, reused many high-quality assets from League of Legends and Legends of Runeterra, with some of the most well-known artists being established Riot Games illustrators, keeping everything produced in-house.
Card artwork is pronounced and shows iconic characters from the entire League of Legends universe, including the well-regarded animated Netflix original Arcane. For collectors, special editions of Legends and Champions can be found in booster packs that will make opponents drip with envy.
Riftbound, Now Spiritforged
Since Origin’s release in 2025, Spiritforged has charged onto the tabletop with a wealth of new Legends, Champion cards, and keywords that have not only boosted the original set’s utility but changed the game in a forward way that keeps the usability of Origins. While power creep is inevitable, Spiritforged feels like a genuine next step without providing a stiff balance change that makes previous cards useless.
There are three main card types in Riftbound, and Spiritforged didn’t add more. There are Units, Spells and Gear players can deploy to the battlefield that can increase their odds of winning. While players do field a Legend at the start of the game, you can also deploy a chosen Champion next to that Legend to play on the active battlefield. The chosen Champion has limitations; the name of the Champion must match your main decks’ Legend (for example, the Jynx, Loose Cannon Legend can only be matched with a Jynx chosen Champion).
Unlike Magic: The Gathering’s popular commander format, once the card hits the trash (the official name for Riftbound‘s discard pile, for real) it can’t be played from the zone again. Players are allowed to have three cards of each design in their deck (including the chosen Champion), so, although the chosen Champion is limited, it serves its purpose in a vacuum. Spiritforged introduces new keywords that change the way the three main spell types function, making it feel like a true expansion.
In addition to the Ganking keyword, which lets players change battlefields without returning to base, Spiritforged introduces Repeat, Equip, Quick-Draw, Weaponmaster and Inactive to the Rift, adding new playstyles to the tabletop. To streamline matches further, Riftbound units use a single Might value to reduce mid-game arithmetic. The change stays easy to follow and keeps the focus on gameplay instead of stopping to do math.
Spiritforged also strengthens existing Legends such as Leona, Radiant Dawn. The Repeat keyword lets you play spells more than once, which can expand synergies in Origin-based decks. The new Thwonk! spell has a Repeat cost, and with Leona, Radiant Dawn, it can buff multiple units while stunning multiple enemies. It shows Riot Games and UVS Games are not treating Riftbound as just another TCG. The teams are adding meaningful tools for players who gravitate toward a favourite Legend, including Leona mains, to use on the tabletop in Spiritforged.
One More Game!
After learning the rules and dropping into a 1 vs 1 game using the two starter decks that released with Spiritforged, one thing became immediately clear: Riftbound isn’t just a pretty face, it’s a blast to play. The two-deck system (a Main Deck and a Rune Deck) works well in practice and never feels overwhelming. This allows players to focus on tactics and the battlefield first, and colour choices and payment second.
My deck was the Mech-synergy Legend, Rumble, and my opponent dropped Fiora, Grand Duelist, into battle. To not overcomplicate things, we didn’t add or subtract anything from either deck to keep the playing field levelled. Rumble strengthens all of your Mech Units that are actively defending a battlefield. Fiora’s more offensive approach sees her Channel (play one extra) a Rune exhausted when a Unit becomes Mighty.
Both starter decks were built with synergy in mind, and they’re constructed with playable card lists. Rumble has many Mechs that work well together, and Fiora’s Champion cards promote violence. Both decks even come with each Legend’s signature spell (a card that can only be used with the named Legend in play). Each game starts with players selecting their battlefield for the game, and the effects included on each field can make you or break you during a match. Your deck should contain three battlefield cards, and one is selected per player at random to begin the game. I thankfully selected Minefield, which forces the conquering player to discard the top two cards of their deck into the trash.
While that sounds horrible in practice, the Rumble starter deck uses ways to recycle cards from the trash (like the included Assembly Rig Gear card), and while that boon is small, making an opponent discard their cards for defending could force a real game changer out of the game.
Serious Strategy
When I deployed the six-might Ferrous Forerunner, I was able to conquer Minefield easily enough, and was forced to discard two cards. When my opponent came to my controlled battlefield with a 10-might Fiora, Peerless Champion, a Showdown occurred. During a Showdown, players can play any cards that have the Reaction keyword on them in response, or play a Hidden Card that is already on the battlefield. The Hidden keyword allows you to place a trap underneath a battlefield and play it later when actions happen on that battlefield. I luckily had played a Hidden Wages of Pain before my opponent’s turn, so when a buffed (and doubled might) Fiora came for the throne, I lost the first Showdown.
On my turn, I activated Wages of Pain to remove Fiora on Minefield from the battlefield without exhausting any runes, since her Might dropped back to three on my turn. That let me return to Minefield without spending resources because Ferrous Forerunner’s Deathknell ability, which triggers when the unit dies, gives me two Mech unit tokens with three Might each. Players earn points only by holding a battlefield for a full turn or by conquering it. In this case, I earned a conquer point and removed a major threat with one well-timed spell. These moments are when Riftbound becomes a different experience, as you can play cards on the chain and outmanoeuvre your opponent to gain the upper hand.
“Riftbound stands out with strong card design, beautiful artwork and mechanics.”
On the other hand, Fiora, Grand Duelist does not go down easily, and the new Equip cards can add significant power to your units. The new B.F. Sword can be equipped to buff a unit by plus-3. That can make a two-Might unit meet Legend Fiora’s condition with the equipment in place and help her build resources to overpower an opponent. Unfortunately for my defensive Mech deck, Showdowns have a drawback. If the defending player succeeds, the units on the battlefield remain worn out for the rest of the turn.
In Riftbound, there is no designated combat step. The Action Phase lets players take turns openly, which allows attacks on battlefields as many times as a player wants each turn. This design helps reduce the chance of repeated misplays.
Riftbound’s open Action Phase is a game-changer. This focus on letting the player play how they like can provide some seriously big upsets later on in-game and can force a player to save resources for later. Earlier in the game, I allowed my opponent to defeat my two might Forecaster (although I had a Hidden Reaction to play) so they could be forced to discard on their next turn. While this does forfeit a point to my opponent, it can seriously damage their next Action Phase if a strong card gets put in the trash.
Near the end of the game, with the score tied 6-6, I conquered Sunken Temple using Breakneck Mech. I then played Bubble Bot to ready Breakneck Mech again. Breakneck Mech’s built-in Ganking ability, which allows a unit to move to another battlefield, let me take over Minefield with the same unit. That gave me two points and won the game.
Normally, you cannot score the final point by conquering a battlefield. It is usually earned by holding a battlefield for a full turn. However, if a player conquers all battlefields in a single turn, they can also win that way.
League of Legends: Riftbound has proven its mettle. Dozens of new trading card games seem to launch each year, but Riftbound stands out with strong card design, beautiful artwork and mechanics that go beyond reducing life points to zero. It also stays true to its source material. League of Legends: Riftbound puts gameplay first, and “one more match” will likely become a familiar line on TCG nights.
League of Legends fans will have a field day (or PTSD from skill issues like myself) checking out the artwork of their favourite Legends, and Arcane fanatics will be delighted to know that Jynx and Jayce have their own cards (with Vi coming to Riftbound in Unleashed). Although I feel like I only scratched the surface with what Riftbound offers after only its second set release, I’m hooked. As a decades-long fan of many Trading Card Games, Riftbound offers a special experience from other popular TCGs and is a must-try for TCG fans of every calibre.
