Combo · ENGINE
Speed, not size: Magma Wurm makes every Tentacle walk the turn it is minted, which is the bottleneck a token engine actually has
Pieces
- Magma Wurm ×1
OGN-011 · engine · fury
Other friendly units enter ready.
- Illaoi, Prophet of the Great Kraken ×1
VEN-109 · payoff · chaos
When you play me or when I score, play a 1 Energy Might Tentacle unit token from Bilgewater. I have +1 Might for each token unit you control.
- Up from the Deep ×3
VEN-100 · engine · chaos
Play two 1 Might Tentacle unit tokens from Bilgewater. [Flow] 3 Energy (You may play this from your trash for its Flow cost. Then banish it.)
Payoff
Deck
- Fury + Chaos. Computed over the 94 legend base codes in cards.json, that is five legend names: OGN-251 / OGN-301 Loose Cannon (Jinx), OGS-017 Dark Child - Starter (Annie), SFD-185 / SFD-242 Glorious Executioner (Draven), UNL-185 / UNL-228 Bloodharbor Ripper (Pyke), VEN-143 / VEN-191 Master of Shadows (Zed). Nothing here is Signature (103.2.d.2).
- A battlefield worth walking into. This engine's product is bodies that can move on arrival; it does not itself score.
Prerequisites
- THE BOTTLENECK IS THE WALK, NOT THE COUNT, AND THAT IS WHY MAGMA WURM AND NOT A WIDER GENERATOR. The project's #48 token walk established it: of the 49 cards that create unit tokens, most put them at your base, and 143.4 makes every unit enter exhausted, so a swarm minted this turn cannot go anywhere until your next Awakening (315.1.b). Magma Wurm's 'Other friendly units enter ready' is the alteration 143.4.a permits, and it applies to every body, so two Tentacles minted in the Main Phase walk into a battlefield the same Main Phase (144.4.a) — and 144.3 moves them as ONE game action with a shared destination (144.3.a) and simultaneous exhausts (144.3.c).
- 'ENTERS READY' IS NOT A READY, AND THE DIFFERENCE IS EXACTLY ONE STANDARD MOVE. 415.1 defines Readying as marking a Game Object ALREADY on the board, so nothing here gives an exhaust back; what it buys is that 144.2's exhaust can be paid at all on the turn the body appears. On the opponent's turn it is worth nothing — 144.1.b forbids the Standard Move in a Closed State and combat does not read exhaustion (464.2.c.3, 465.2.b) — which is why this entry is written for tokens made in YOUR Main Phase.
- THE ARITHMETIC, WITH THE QUANTITIES DECLARED. Illaoi's play trigger is one Tentacle; each Up from the Deep is two, and [Flow] makes each copy two castings — 829.1.b is 'functionally short for "You may play this from your trash for its flow cost. Then banish it"' and 829.1.b.1's delayed replacement is the cap, so three copies are SIX castings and TWELVE Tentacles over a game. With five Tentacles standing, Illaoi is M9 ('+1 Might for each token unit you control'), and every one of them arrived able to move.
- AND ILLAOI'S SECOND TRIGGER IS A SCORE, NOT A PLAY. 'When you play me or when I score' — 469 defines Scoring as a Conquer or a Hold, so she mints another Tentacle every time she takes or keeps a battlefield, with 470 allowing one Score per battlefield per turn and 485.4 putting two on a Duel table. That is up to two extra bodies a turn for no card.
- WHAT THE ENGINE IS NOT, SAID PLAINLY. A 1-Might token dies to one point of damage (143.2.a: 'nonzero damage marked on it equalling or exceeding its Might'), and OGN-133 Flurry of Blades is a 1-Energy [Reaction] that deals 1 to ALL units at battlefields — it kills every Tentacle simultaneously for any number of them. The pool's fix is UNL-077 Soul Shepherd's 'Your token units have +1 Might', and Soul Shepherd is MIND, which 103.1.b puts outside a Fury/Chaos identity. So this entry buys SPEED and cannot buy survival; soul-shepherd-illaoi-tentacle-wall is the same token engine in Mind/Chaos buying the opposite thing, and the two cannot be combined.
- COST. Magma Wurm E8 + 1 Fury Power is a whole turn on its own and she must land before the tokens do, since her static is read as they enter. Illaoi E6. Up from the Deep E3 a casting, and its [Flow] cost is 3 Energy again.
- WHAT REFUTES IT. (a) Magma Wurm says 'OTHER friendly units', so she never readies herself and enters exhausted like anything else. (b) Tokens are not cards: 185 and 186.1 keep every dead Tentacle out of the trash, so nothing here recycles or reanimates them. (c) The tokens are born at your base or a battlefield you control (355.2.a), never at the enemy's — walking in is still a move that applies Contested (190.3.a.1) and can open a Combat they are far too small to win.
Steps
- An earlier turn: play Magma Wurm (E8 + 1 Fury Power). 143.4 makes HER enter exhausted — 'other friendly units' excludes her.
- A later Main Phase: play Illaoi, Prophet of the Great Kraken (E6). Her play trigger mints a 1 Might Tentacle, and Magma Wurm's static has it enter READY (143.4.a).
- Play Up from the Deep (E3): two more Tentacles, also ready.
- Standard-Move the whole batch into a battlefield as ONE game action (144.3, 144.3.a, 144.3.c; 144.4.a). Each pays its own exhaust (144.2 / 420.3.a).
- Later, play Up from the Deep again out of your trash for its [Flow] cost of 3 Energy (829.1.b); it is banished afterwards (829.1.b.1). Two more ready bodies.
- Every time Illaoi scores — a Conquer or a Hold under 469, capped by 470 and 485.4 — she mints another Tentacle, and her own Might is 4 plus the number of token units you control.
Per iteration
two ready bodies per casting that can walk in the same turn, a third on every Illaoi score, and +1 Might on Illaoi for each of them
How it ends
engine only — twelve Tentacles a game from three [Flow] copies (829.1.b.1 banishes each after its replay) plus one per Illaoi score; nothing here scores by itself
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
- Synergy rule magma-wurm-mass-ready (data/synergies.json) 2026-09-06
- Hand walk 2026-09-07 (docs/phase0/walks/2026-09-07-rules-second-pass.md), issue #170 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.
HAND-WALKED 2026-09-07 (issue #170), from the proven rule magma-wurm-mass-ready (50 partners, 49 uncovered, one entry). VEN-109 Illaoi and VEN-100 Up from the Deep were both in zero entries. The pairing is chosen against the project's own #48 finding — the bottleneck of a token line is the walk to the battlefield, not the count — and Magma Wurm is the widest answer to it, since 143.4.a lets her static reach every friendly unit rather than only tokens. The entry states its own ceiling: 1-Might tokens die to OGN-133 Flurry of Blades whatever their number, and the pool's only fix (UNL-077 Soul Shepherd) is Mind and therefore illegal beside Fury/Chaos. Legend list computed from cards.json (fury + chaos over the 94 legend base codes), not typed. Card text verbatim from data/corpus_flat.txt. Citations opened and read: 103.1.b, 103.2.d.2, 143.2.a, 143.4, 143.4.a, 144.1.b, 144.2, 144.3, 144.3.a, 144.3.c, 144.4.a, 185, 186.1, 190.3.a.1, 315.1.b, 355.2.a, 415.1, 420.3.a, 464.2.c.3, 465.2.b, 469, 470, 485.4, 829.1.b, 829.1.b.1. Ban check: OGN-011, VEN-109 and VEN-100 carry no [BANNED marker. Arithmetic against its own declared quantities: three [Flow] copies are six castings and twelve Tentacles; five standing tokens put Illaoi at M9. Trap check: Magma Wurm excludes herself ('other friendly units'); 'enters ready' is not a ready (415.1) and buys exactly one Standard Move, worth nothing on the opponent's turn (144.1.b); tokens never reach the trash (185, 186.1); no [Temporary], no [Repeat], no buff. Depends on no unruled reading.
Walked against Core Rules 2026-07-16