Combo · ENGINE

Grand Duelist off the Arena Bar — a free rune for pushing one body over five

2 cards · body + order · verified

Pieces

• Grand Duelist ×1 SFD-205 · payoff · body/order

  When one of your units becomes [Mighty], you may exhaust me to channel 1 rune exhausted. (A unit is Mighty while it has 5+ Might.)

• Arena Bar ×1 OGN-124 · engine · body

  Exhaust: Buff an exhausted friendly unit. (If it doesn't have a buff, it gets a +1 Might buff.)

Payoff

Deck

• Body + Order: Grand Duelist is itself the legend and the Arena Bar is mono-Body (103.1.b.3).
• A friendly unit at Might 4 that does not already carry a buff.

Prerequisites

• 709 IS AN EVENT AND IT IS THE WHOLE CONSTRAINT. 'A Unit "becomes Mighty" at the moment its Might changes from being less than 5 to being 5 or greater', and its own second example says a Might-5 unit that gets +1 does not become Mighty. So the Arena Bar's buff only pays the Duelist when it lands on a body at exactly Might 4 — and 702.2.a keeps the buff there, so that body can never trigger it again.
• The ceiling is therefore the number of DIFFERENT unbuffed Might-4 bodies you can present, one a turn, not the number of turns. 702.3 caps a unit at one buff, so the Arena Bar cannot re-cross a body it has already buffed. This is the same shape as friendship-fiora-worthy-mighty-ready's cap, reached from the Duelist's side instead of Fiora's.
• The rune arrives EXHAUSTED, so it is not that turn's Energy: 315.1.b readies it at the next Awaken. It is worth 1 Power immediately if you want it, because 164.2.b is 'Recycle this: [Reaction] — Add [C]' with no exhaust in its cost — at the price of sending it to the Rune Deck (161.2.b). And 430.3 caps the whole line at what the Rune Deck still holds.
• Different from the catalogued pairing on purpose. grand-duelist-fiora-mighty-crossings runs this legend with SFD-180 Fiora, Worthy and two more cards, where Fiora converts the same crossing into a READY and the Duelist into a rune. This entry is the two-card floor: no Fiora, no Order Power per crossing, and the Arena Bar's buff is free where Fiora's ready costs 1 Order Power each time.
• arena-bar-fiora-untap already pairs the Arena Bar with Fiora; this is the Arena Bar with the LEGEND, which costs no card slot at all.

Bodies no card supplies

Have a friendly unit at Might 4 with no buff on it — a body that has moved this turn is the natural target, since the Arena Bar requires an exhausted one

Steps

1. Play the Arena Bar (E3). It is gear, so 143.4 does not exhaust it and it can fire the turn it lands.
2. Have a friendly unit at Might 4 with no buff on it — a body that has moved this turn is the natural target, since the Arena Bar requires an exhausted one.
3. Exhaust the Arena Bar: buff that unit. 703 gives +1 Might, taking it from 4 to 5.
4. 709's event fires — it has become [Mighty]. Exhaust Grand Duelist and channel 1 rune exhausted.
5. 315.1.b readies both the Arena Bar and the legend at your next Awaken. Repeat on a DIFFERENT unbuffed Might-4 body, since the first one keeps its buff (702.2.a) and can never cross again.

How it ends

engine only — one channelled rune per turn while you still have unbuffed Might-4 bodies to cross, bounded by 702.3, by 709's event and by the Rune Deck (430.3). 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
• Issue #161 (GitHub) 2026-09-06

Walked here, in this project

• Hand walk 2026-09-06, issue #161 — the CAUSE/TRIGGER matrix, family slice rows 40-47 (docs/phase0/walks/2026-09-06-finisher-feeders.md §18) 2026-09-06 record

Walked against Core Rules 2026-07-16

Match a deck list against the whole catalogue