Combo · ENGINE

Janna and the Overzealous Fan — cancel the Combat Damage Step by emptying the attackers

3 cards · chaos + calm · verified

Pieces

• Overzealous Fan ×1 SFD-128 · engine · chaos

  When I defend, you may kill me to move an attacking unit to its base.

• Janna, Savior ×1 SFD-053 · engine · calm

  [Reaction] (Play any time, even before spells and abilities resolve, including to a battlefield you control.) When you play me, heal your units here, then move up to one enemy unit from here to its base.

• Corrupt Enforcer ×1 SFD-123 · payoff · chaos

  When I move to a battlefield, discard 1. When I win a combat, draw 1.

Payoff

Deck

• Legend domains must cover Calm and Chaos: OGN-259 Unforgiven, SFD-195 Blade Dancer or UNL-193 Gloomist. None carries a ban marker.
• You are the Defender — this line runs on the opponent's turn, at a battlefield you already control.

Prerequisites

• THE DEFENDER'S TRIGGER RESOLVES FIRST, AND THAT IS A RULE. 383.4.f defines Defend Triggers as firing 'when a Unit or Player gains the Defender designation for the first time during a combat'; 464.2.e.1 puts the Defending player's triggers on the Combat Chain LAST ('The Attacking player, who has Focus, places Triggered Abilities on the Chain first, followed by all non-Defender players in Turn Order, followed by the Defending Player'); and 340.1 resolves 'The newest Finalized Chain Item' first. So the Fan's evacuation happens before the attacker's own 'When I attack' triggers resolve, and by 359.3.f.2 those then read 'here' on an attacker that has already gone home.
• AND THEN THERE IS NO DAMAGE STEP AT ALL. 465.1: 'If both Attacking and Defending units remain at this battlefield, the following Tasks become Outstanding' — with the single attacker gone the condition fails and 465.3 cancels the outstanding tasks. 466.3.b makes the attacker the loser and 466.3.a makes you the winner. There is no Conquer: you already controlled the battlefield.
• WHAT IT DOES NOT BUY, AND THIS IS THE ENTRY'S OWN LIMIT. 466.1.a.2 inserts '3d. Recall Attackers present at the Battlefield if Defenders are still present' into the Combat Cleanup, so surviving attackers go home anyway. The evacuation removes nothing the cleanup was not already going to send back; what it buys is taking NO DAMAGE. And against two or more attackers, removing one leaves 465.1 satisfied and the damage happens as normal.
• JANNA'S SPEED IS THE HALF THAT IS HARD TO REPLACE. 813.1 makes Reaction a Permissive keyword, 813.1.b grants 'all abilities and permissions of Action', and 806.1.b gives permission 'to be played or activated during Showdowns, even when it is not the Controlling player's turn'. 355.2.a already makes a battlefield you control a valid location, which is what her reminder text restates. She costs 3 Energy + 1 Calm Power and leaves a 3 Might body; the Fan costs 2 Energy and dies.
• THE PAYOFF CORRECTION. Issue #58 offered UNL-201 Voidreaver ('When you win a combat, gain 1 XP') as a payoff — but Voidreaver is a LEGEND (Body/Chaos), so it cannot sit in a Calm/Chaos deck and be its payoff at the same time (103.1.b.1). SFD-123 Corrupt Enforcer is the Chaos unit that does the same job, and its own 'When I move to a battlefield, discard 1' is a real cost that the entry declares rather than hides. The card says 'When I win a combat', which 466.3.a only defines for a PLAYER — Riot supplies the unit-level reading in its own reminder text on the identical wording: UNL-114 Nidalee, Cat Form prints '(I win if I remain after combat.)' and SFD-185 Glorious Executioner prints '(You win if only your units remain after combat.)'. With 465.1 failing, the Enforcer remains and the attacker does not, so both readings pay.
• THE ARITHMETIC WITH THE QUANTITIES DECLARED. ONE evacuation per card. With the maximum 3 Janna + 3 Fan (103.2.b) the ceiling is six evacuations across a game, one per attacker per combat — it is a tempo line, never a lock.

Steps

1. On the opponent's turn a single attacker moves into a battlefield you control. 450 and 190.3.a.1 make them apply Contested; 464.2.c.1/c.2 make them the Attacker and you the Defender.
2. 464.2.c.3 designates your units; the Fan's 'When I defend' trigger becomes pending and 464.2.e.1 puts it on the Chain after theirs.
3. It resolves first (340.1): kill the Fan, move the attacking unit to its base. Or, instead, play Janna at Reaction speed to that battlefield (813.1.b, 806.1.b) and use her trigger.
4. 465.1 no longer holds, so no combat damage is dealt in either direction (465.3).
5. 466.3.b makes the attacker the loser and 466.3.a makes you the winner; Corrupt Enforcer's 'When I win a combat' draws a card.
6. 466.1.a.2 would have recalled the attacker anyway — what you bought is that nothing of yours took damage.

Per iteration

one attacker removed from the damage step per card, no damage taken, and a card off the win-a-combat payoff

How it ends

engine only — it wins combats without damage; it scores nothing by itself, because you already control the battlefield

Sources

Published elsewhere

• Riftbound Core Rules, Last Updated 2026-07-16 (data/Riftbound-Core-Rules-2026-07-16.txt) 2026-07-16
• Movement lens — issue #58 (GitHub) 2026-09-06

Walked here, in this project

• Hand walk 2026-09-06 2026-09-06 record

Walked against Core Rules 2026-07-16

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