Combo · ENGINE

Power Nexus × Blue Sentinel × World Atlas — the Gold pays the Nexus

5 cards · mind · verified

Pieces

• Power Nexus ×1 SFD-214 · payoff

  When you hold here, you may pay 4 Power of any domain to score 1 point.

• Blue Sentinel ×2 UNL-087 · engine · mind

  [Shield 2] (+2 Might while I'm a defender.) Your hold effects for holding here trigger an additional time. When I hold, [Add] 1 Power of any domain at the start of your next Main Phase. (Abilities that add resources can't be reacted to.)

• World Atlas ×2 SFD-086 · resource · mind

  [Equip] 1 Mind Power (1 Mind Power: Attach this to a unit you control.)

  When I hold, play two Gold gear tokens exhausted.

Payoff

Deck

• Any Mind legend: World Atlas, Blue Sentinel and Time Warp are all mono-Mind and Power Nexus is colorless (103.1.b.1, 103.1.b.3). All 15 two-domain pairs are printed as legends, so the only Domain Identity question is whether the union is at most two domains — here it is one.

Prerequisites

• THE ARITHMETIC, WITH THE QUANTITIES DECLARED. K = 2 Sentinels, so each hold effect at the Nexus fires 1 + 2 = 3 times. Atlas A: 3 firings × 2 Gold = 6. Atlas B: 6. TWELVE Gold per Hold, which is exactly the 12 Power the three Nexus firings ask for (3 × 4). Plus the base Hold's own point (469.2, 471.1) — 4 points per Beginning Phase, self-financing, with no rune spent at all.
• THE GOLD IS ONE TURN BEHIND, AND THAT IS WHY THE ENGINE PRIMES RATHER THAN STARTS. 187.5 gives Gold '[Reaction][>] Kill this, [exhaust]: [Add] [A]' — an exhaust in the cost — and both Gold sources print 'exhausted'. 315.1 Awaken is a PHASE BEFORE 315.2 Beginning Phase, so Gold created by a Hold enters after the readying has already happened and is dead that turn. The first Hold scores 1 and banks 12; from the second Hold on it is 4 a turn. world-atlas-sentinel-gold and eminent-benefactor-sentinel-gold both carry this same correction.
• RENATA GLASC, INDUSTRIALIST DOES NOT REMOVE THE ONE-TURN OFFSET HERE, WHICH IS THE FINDING THIS ENTRY ADDS. R25 = A makes 'Your tokens enter ready' beat the Gold's printed 'exhausted', so it is tempting to think this turn's Hold-Gold pays this turn's Nexus. It cannot. The Nexus reads 'you may pay [A][A][A][A] TO score 1 point' — a cost in the instructions immediately following the 'you may' that opens the effect — so 383.3.b makes it the BASE COST of the Triggered Ability and 383.3.b.1 requires it 'be paid in order to finalize the Triggered Ability to the Chain'. Every trigger of one Hold is simultaneous and 383.3.d has the controller place them all on the Chain before any resolves, so at the moment a Nexus trigger is finalized no Atlas has resolved and no Gold exists yet. (Contrast 205, whose worked example is 'you may pay [4][C]. If you do, kill a unit here' — that separate-sentence form IS a game action at resolution. 383.3.b's own example, Ekko's 'Recycle me to ready your runes', is the infinitive form the Nexus uses.) She is also Order and this line is mono-Mind, so she would cost the identity too.
• THE POWER IS MADE WITH NO PRIORITY, WHICH IS LEGAL. 167 empties the Rune Pool at the end of your turn, so the Beginning Phase starts empty, and 335 gives nobody priority there. 429.3 covers it anyway: 'Activated abilities that Add resources and have the Reaction tag can be activated at any time that spells or abilities require resources be paid', and its second worked example is explicitly a player with 'no window of priority' paying an applied cost; 429.3.a adds that such an ability 'immediately finalizes and resolves'. Gold's ability carries [Reaction]. power-nexus-sentinel already stands on the same paragraph for rune recycles.
• THE SENTINELS' OWN POWER IS A SEPARATE, MAIN-PHASE BUDGET AND IT SURVIVES 167. Each Sentinel's 'When I hold, [Add] [A] at the start of your next Main Phase' is itself a hold effect and is multiplied too: 2 Sentinels × 3 firings = 6 rainbow. 316.2 orders the Main Phase's Outstanding Tasks: 316.3 'Each player's Rune Pool empties' is FIRST, 316.4 'At the start of Main Phase game effects take place' is SECOND — so the six arrive after the sweep and are spendable. 135.2.e.5.b lets [A] pay a Power cost of any Domain. This entry does not spend them; power-nexus-sentinel-renata-mastermind and power-nexus-atlas-sentinel-time-warp are the two entries that do.
• R2 = A IS LOAD-BEARING. The Nexus says 'score 1 point', which 194.1.c makes a point Gain by Triggered Ability rather than a 469 Score, so 470's 'only Score once per Battlefield per turn' does not cap the three firings. 471.1.a.1 adds that 'points Gained from sources that are not Conquer are not beholden to' the Final Point restrictions of 471.1.b, so the eighth point lands from a Nexus firing without the 'Scored every Battlefield' clause biting.
• THE BATTLEFIELD IS NOT GUARANTEED. Power Nexus must be the battlefield in play: 485.4 'Battlefield Count: 2' with 485.4.a (each player provides three, one is used) and 485.5 'randomly selects' in a Duel, 487.5 the same in Skirmish, 486.5 chosen in Match. 103.4.c and Tournament Rules 402.1 forbid bringing two of the same name, so copies are not a way around the draw. And 190.1 makes a battlefield you provide start UNCONTROLLED, with 190.6.d blanking its 'you' until you take it — establishing Control (466.5) is part of the cost.
• THE EQUIP COSTS ARE REAL AND ARE COUNTED. Two Atlases are 6 Energy + 2 Mind Power to play and 2 more Mind Power to attach ('[Equip] [Mind]'), two Sentinels are 8 Energy + 2 Mind Power. 818.1 makes Equip an Activated Ability, so attaching is never playing and nothing triggers off it.
• IT IS A DIFFERENT LINE FROM world-atlas-sentinel-gold, NOT A RESTATEMENT. That entry stops at the Gold and its own terminatesIn says 'it converts through Power Nexus (SFD-214: pay four runes on Hold to score 1) or through any Power sink' — the conversion was never authored. It also runs K = 1 (8 Gold, 2 payments); this entry runs K = 2 because 12 Gold is the exact fit for three firings. Its notable[4] had already spotted the pairing and priced it at K = 1.
• THE FOUR RAINBOW DOES NOT HAVE TO BE BANKED, AND THIS ENTRY`S FUNDER IS AN OPTIMISATION RATHER THAN A REQUIREMENT (citation upgrade 2026-09-12, #200). 383.3.b makes the cost a BASE COST paid at finalization and 312.2.c withholds priority until every pending chain item finishes finalizing, which is why this catalogue concluded the Power had to be on the board already and reached for an Add-on-trigger card. **Priority is not payment.** 444.2.c: *"Players may activate abilities that Add resources with the Reaction keyword at any time that they are instructed to Pay resources. Those abilities finalize and resolve immediately, ignoring normal restrictions."* 164.2 gives every Basic Rune TWO abilities and both carry [Reaction], so 444.2.c reaches them; 164.2.b`s cost is the RECYCLE and not an exhaust, so a rune already tapped for Energy still pays; 164.2.b.1 Adds Power of that rune`s DOMAIN, which 135.2.e.5.a then makes legal against a rainbow cost (*"When required as a cost, [A] can be paid by Power of any Domain"*). So the Nexus is fundable out of runes in EVERY identity at four runes a point, and the Gold or Sentinel Add this entry uses is simply CHEAPER - see `power-nexus-rune-recycle-any-identity`, which walks the bare version.
• 204.3.a IS THE FIRST AND CLEANER SOURCE FOR THIS, AND IT CARRIES THE WORKED EXAMPLE: "When Costs within Instructions appear as the first part of the effect in triggered abilities, the cost is taken to be the base cost of the triggered ability. It must be paid to finalize the triggered ability", with Riot's example being Overzealous Fan - "When I defend, you may kill me to move an attacking unit to its base" - and the note that "in order to finalize the ability to the chain, its controller must kill Overzealous Fan". 383.3.b says the same thing later in the book. The companion is 204.3.b: a cost appearing in a SPELL, in an ACTIVATED ability, or in a LATER part of a trigger's effect is paid on resolution instead, which is the 205 "pay X. If you do, Y" family and the reason the two look alike on the card and behave differently on the chain.

Steps

1. Establish Control of Power Nexus (190.1 — a battlefield you provide starts uncontrolled) and stand both Blue Sentinels on it, each wearing a World Atlas.
2. First Beginning Phase holding it: 315.2.b.2 Holds it, the base Hold scores 1, the two Atlas triggers fire three times each for twelve Gold, and the Gold enters exhausted (315.1 Awaken has already run).
3. Next turn, Awaken readies the twelve Gold (315.1.b).
4. Beginning Phase: the Hold places three Nexus triggers, two Atlas triggers ×3 and two Sentinel triggers ×3 on the Chain. As each Nexus trigger is finalized, kill four Gold for four rainbow (429.3, 429.3.a) to pay its base cost (383.3.b.1).
5. Score 1 for the Hold and 1 for each of the three Nexus firings: four points, and the Atlas triggers have already banked twelve fresh Gold for the next turn.

Per iteration

+4 points, +12 Gold, −12 Gold, +6 rainbow Power at the next Main Phase start; no rune spent

How it ends

engine — 4 points per Beginning Phase in steady state, financed entirely by the Gold the same Hold makes for the turn after; 8 points in two turns, but with an opponent turn in between

Sources

Published elsewhere

• RiftJudge Q10155 — Blue Sentinel multiplies its own hold trigger (fan judge database, not official) 2026-05-08

Walked here, in this project

• Hand walk 2026-09-06 2026-09-06 record
• Issue #155 — Engine × payoff: converting the 197 ENGINE streams into points (candidate 1's Power ledger, left open by the hunt) 2026-09-06

Walked against Core Rules 2026-07-16

Match a deck list against the whole catalogue