Combo · ENGINE
The Helm taxes the Main Phase and Mystic Vortex taxes the only other window the opponent has — including the [Hidden] card that is otherwise free
Pieces
- Mystic Vortex ×1
VEN-160 · battlefield
During showdowns here, cards with [Reaction] cost 1 Power of any domain more to play. (Hidden cards have [Reaction].)
- Helm of Suppression ×1
VEN-045 · enabler · calm
[Empower] 4 Energy + 1 Calm Power (4 Energy + 1 Calm Power: Empower this. Use only if not Empowered.) Opponents' spells cost 1 Energy more. If this is [Empowered], they cost 1 Energy + 1 Power of any domain more instead.
Payoff
Deck
- Helm of Suppression is mono-Calm and Mystic Vortex is Colorless, so 103.1.b.3 admits any legend with Calm in its pair: OGS-019 Wuju Bladesman - Starter, OGN-255/OGN-303 Nine-Tailed Fox, OGN-257/OGN-304 Blind Monk, OGN-259/OGN-305 Unforgiven, OGN-261/OGN-306 Radiant Dawn, SFD-189/SFD-244 Fire Below the Mountain, SFD-193/SFD-245 Grandmaster at Arms, SFD-195/SFD-246 Blade Dancer, SFD-197/SFD-247 Emperor of the Sands, UNL-189/UNL-230 Bashful Bloom, UNL-191/UNL-231 Wuju Master, UNL-193/UNL-232 Gloomist, UNL-195/UNL-233 Green Father, VEN-139/VEN-189 Rogue Assassin, VEN-145/VEN-192 Curator of the Sands, VEN-147/VEN-193 Eye of Twilight.
Prerequisites
- THE TWO CARDS COVER THE TWO WINDOWS AND THERE IS NO THIRD. 312.2.a gives the non-turn player priority only in Closed States and Showdowns — on your turn in a Neutral Open State they never hold it — so everything an opponent can do on your turn is either a spell (the Helm's clause) or a [Reaction] card in a Showdown (the Vortex's). Together they price both.
- THE HIDDEN PACKAGE IS THE REAL TARGET, AND ONLY THE VORTEX REACHES ALL OF IT. 811.1.b: a hidden card is played 'ignoring its base cost', which is why the project measured the [Hidden] package as paying ZERO to every 'costs N or more' threshold in the pool. The Helm catches a hidden SPELL, because a hidden spell is still a spell; it does not catch the fifteen hidden UNITS. The Vortex catches both, because 811.1.b grants the card [Reaction] and the Vortex keys on that.
- STACKED, AT THIS BATTLEFIELD, AN EMPOWERED HELM PLUS THE VORTEX MAKE AN OPPONENT'S REACTION SPELL COST 1 ENERGY + 2 RAINBOW POWER MORE than printed. On a hidden card that is the difference between free and unplayable, and 356.6 only floors a cost at 0 — it never caps an increase.
- THE VORTEX IS SYMMETRIC AND THAT IS ITS WHOLE COST: your own [Reaction] cards cost a rainbow more in showdowns there too. This is a deck that answers in its Main Phase, not one that holds up tricks. The Helm is not symmetric — it says 'Opponents' spells'.
- IT SCORES NOTHING AND LOCKS NOTHING PERMANENTLY. 054.1's 'can't beats can' is not engaged anywhere here; a tax is a price, not a prohibition, and an opponent with the Power pays it.
- MYSTIC VORTEX IS NOT GUARANTEED TO BE ON THE TABLE: 485.4.a, 485.5, 486.5 and 103.4.c as for every battlefield entry.
- 356.3 IS A LIMIT ON WHAT THIS TAX IS WORTH, AND IT WAS UNCITED (upgrade 2026-09-12, #187 batch 7). The cost steps run in order: **356.3 "Apply cost increases"** and then **356.4 "Apply discounts"**. An increase therefore lands BEFORE every discount, so a tax is the first thing any of the opponent`s reductions eats and is worth its full face value only against an opponent who is not already overshooting. That is a real bound on a denial line and it is invisible if you price the tax alone.
Steps
- Bring Mystic Vortex as one of your three battlefields. It needs no Control: there is no 'you' in its text.
- Play Helm of Suppression (E4 + 1 Calm Power). Its base clause is already live: opponents' spells cost 1 Energy more, everywhere.
- When you can afford it, pay the [Empower] cost (E4 + 1 Calm Power) once. 441.1 makes Empowering the act of rendering the object Empowered and 441.2 makes that a permanent state of the object, so the upgraded tax — 1 Energy + 1 rainbow — never has to be paid for again.
- Fight over Mystic Vortex. Inside any Showdown there, every [Reaction] card costs a further rainbow Power to play, and 811.1.b's free hidden card is no longer free.
- Play your own answers in your Main Phase rather than at Reaction speed, since the Vortex charges you the same rainbow it charges them.
How it ends
engine only — a permanent price on both of the windows 312.2.a gives an opponent on your turn; nothing here scores, nothing here is unbounded, and an opponent with spare Power still pays and acts
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 (docs/phase0/walks/2026-09-07-uncatalogued-cards.md), issue #171 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 #171 — the first entry to use VEN-160, and the first to state that Mystic Vortex is the only card in the pool that makes a [Hidden] card cost anything. The uniqueness claim on the Helm was swept over the corpus (three cost-increase rows in the whole pool: VEN-045, VEN-160 and UNL-219 Vaults of Helia, the last of which taxes its own controller and was refused earlier in this walk). Trap check: no attack, no token, no [Temporary]; the symmetry of the Vortex is stated as a cost rather than buried; 356.6 is cited to make clear it floors costs at 0 and does not cap increases; exactly one battlefield is named, so 485.4.a is respected; produces is empty, as on the other denial entries the vocabulary does not yet cover (issue #157).
Walked against Core Rules 2026-07-16