Combo · ENGINE
Existential Dread's [Repeat] aimed at the SAME unit is a bounce — one Herald trigger, and hard removal for three Energy
Pieces
- Eclipse Herald ×1
OGN-059 · payoff · calm
When you stun an enemy unit, ready me and give me +1 Might this turn.
- Existential Dread ×1
UNL-134 · engine · chaos
[Action] (Play on your turn or in showdowns.) [Repeat] 2 Energy (You may pay the additional cost to repeat this spell's effect.) [Stun] an attacking enemy unit. If it's already stunned, return it to its owner's hand instead. (A stunned unit doesn't deal combat damage this turn.)
Payoff
Deck
- Calm + Chaos, so three legend names (103.1.b.2): Unforgiven (OGN-259), Blade Dancer (SFD-195), Gloomist (UNL-193).
- Three Energy and 1 Chaos Power off runes held ready through your own turn, since the whole line is cast on the opponent's turn.
Run play
Prerequisites
- THE CARD IS WRITTEN TO BE REPEATED ONTO ITS OWN TARGET, AND THAT IS THE FINDING. 820.2.a says choices for the additional execution 'do not have to be the same' — a permission, not a requirement — so you may choose the same attacking unit twice. Execution one stuns it. Execution two finds it stunned (423.1.a.1: 'A Stunned Unit can not be Stunned again') and takes the printed branch instead: 'return it to its owner's hand'. One card, 3 Energy and 1 Chaos Power, and an attacking body is gone.
- IT IS THE MIRROR OF eclipse-herald-thwonk-repeat-two-stuns AND THE ARITHMETIC INVERTS. There the [Repeat] must pick a second target and yields TWO Herald triggers; here it deliberately picks the first target again and yields exactly ONE — a stun happened once, so 'When you stun an enemy unit' fired once, for one ready and +1 Might. You are trading the second trigger for hard removal, and that is the whole choice the entry documents.
- WHY THE BOUNCE BEATS THE STUN OUTRIGHT. 423.1.a.2 clears the Stunned status 'during step 3d of the end of turn cleanup', so a stun is rented for one turn; a card returned to hand has to be paid for again and, for a body played from [Hidden] or with an additional cost, that price is paid in full a second time. It is also not a kill, so nothing that keys on a unit dying (Deathknells, `friendly-dies` payoffs) fires for either player.
- The window is the opponent's Combat Showdown: 'an attacking enemy unit' exists only after 464.2.c.3 designates attackers, and 806.1.b puts [Action] inside Showdowns on any player's turn. On your own turn there is no legal target unless you are somehow the defender, which you are not.
- The Herald's ready is dead here for the same reasons as in the Thwonk! entry — 144.1.b, 381, and combat's indifference to exhaustion (464.2.c.3, 465.2.b) — and the +1 Might is the half that lands.
- Priced whole: 1 Energy + 1 Chaos Power for the spell, 2 Energy for the [Repeat] (820.1.c.1 makes it an Additional Cost paid during the steps of playing the spell), three copies a game (103.2.b). Compare a kill spell of the same domain: this one leaves no corpse and costs no Power beyond the first.
Steps
- Have Eclipse Herald on the board and three Energy plus 1 Chaos Power available off runes held ready.
- The opponent attacks; the Combat Showdown opens and their units gain the Attacker designation (464.2.c.3).
- Play Existential Dread (1 Energy + 1 Chaos Power) and pay its [Repeat] cost of 2 Energy (820.1.c.1).
- First execution: stun the attacking unit. The Herald's trigger fires once — ready (dead) and +1 Might this turn.
- Second execution: choose the same unit (820.2.a). It is already stunned (423.1.a.1), so the printed alternative applies and it returns to its owner's hand.
- Combat resolves without it; the Herald defends at 8.
Per iteration
-1 card, -3 Energy -1 Chaos Power, one attacking enemy unit returned to its owner's hand, +1 Might on the Herald this turn
How it ends
engine — one attacking body bounced to hand for 3 Energy and 1 Power, plus +1 Might on the Herald, three times a game; nothing here scores
Sources
Published elsewhere
- Riftbound Core Rules, Last Updated 2026-07-16 (data/Riftbound-Core-Rules-2026-07-16.txt) 2026-07-16
Walked here, in this project
- Hand walk 2026-09-07, issue #169 — matrix families rows 6-18, second pass 2026-09-07 record
How this entry was audited
REFUTE = a refutation pass, with its date and verdict · WOUNDED = the pass found a flaw and the entry was rewritten · BUDGETED = the pass checked the recycle-and-draw ledger · lens = the hunt that proposed it.
AUTHORED 2026-09-07, issue #169, second pass over matrix row 7. Card text verbatim from data/corpus_flat.txt; 103.1.b.2, 103.2.b, 144.1.b, 381, 423.1.a.1, 423.1.a.2, 423.1.b, 464.2.c.3, 465.2.b, 806.1.b, 820.1.b, 820.1.c.1, 820.2.a opened in the Core Rules file. Both cards legal in both formats. Card set OGN-059 + UNL-134 is not an existing uses[] set. No unruled reading — the whole entry is a legal ordering of choices the card itself anticipates, which is the discipline of preferring a sequencing answer to a filed reading.
Walked against Core Rules 2026-07-16