Combo · ENGINE

Shen, Leader of the Kinkou Order under Skyfall — the point arrives on the Conquer too

3 cards · order + fury · verified

Pieces

• Shen, Leader of the Kinkou Order ×1 VEN-138 · payoff · order

  [Shield] (+1 Might while I'm a defender.) When I hold, if there is exactly one other unit you control here, you score 1 point.

• Skyfall of Areion ×1 SFD-030 · engine · fury

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

  My hold effects are also conquer effects, and vice versa.

• Red Brambleback ×1 UNL-029 · engine · fury

  [Accelerate] (You may pay 1 Energy + 1 Fury Power as an additional cost to have me enter ready.) Your conquer effects for conquering here trigger an additional time. When I conquer, [Buff] a friendly unit. (Give it a +1 Might buff if it doesn't have one.)

Payoff

Deck

• Legend domains must cover Fury (Skyfall, Brambleback) and Order (Shen) — OGN-253 Hand of Noxus, SFD-187 Void Burrower, UNL-187 Piltover Enforcer.

Prerequisites

• ONE RED BRAMBLEBACK IS BOTH THE MULTIPLIER AND THE CONDITION, WHICH IS WHY THE COUNT IS FIXED AT TWO BODIES. Shen needs 'exactly one other unit you control here' — 383.2.a.1 makes that part of the Trigger Condition, checked when the trigger is placed — and Brambleback is exactly that one unit while also doubling conquer effects. A SECOND Brambleback would raise the multiplier to 3 and simultaneously break Shen's condition to zero. Skyfall is a gear (137), so it never enters the count.
• THREE POINTS ON THE TURN YOU TAKE THE BATTLEFIELD. Skyfall makes Shen's hold effect also a conquer effect, and Brambleback's 'Your conquer effects for conquering here trigger an additional time' then applies to it: 1 + 1 = 2 executions of 'you score 1 point' (194.1.c Gains under R2 = A, outside 470's cap), plus the Conquer's own Score of 1. Three. CORRECTED 2026-10-26 (#472, the follow-up PR #471 listed for #464): three only with both bodies present at the Conquer, and after a combat a dead one is not. 383.4.c.2.a: 'The Conquer Abilities of Units are put on the Chain as Pending Items after the Unit(s) these effects correspond to are present at a Battlefield when a player gains control of it and gains 1 Victory Point from Conquering.' 365.1: 'Passive Abilities of Permanents are typically only active while on the Board.' The defender picks the deaths: 465.2.c: 'Starting with the Attacker, each player assigns an amount of damage equal to their summed Might among the other's Units.' With 465.2.c.3: 'Units must have lethal damage assigned to them in full before damage is assigned to a different Unit. Example: If a player has 5 damage to distribute among four 3 Might units, they may not choose to assign 2 damage to one of the units and 1 damage to each of the remaining 3. They must assign at least 3 damage to one, and the remaining 2 to another.' Shen attacks at 7 + 2 = 9 ([Shield] counts only on defence, 814.1.c) and the Brambleback at 4, 13 in all. Against a garrison of summed Might G with no damage marked and nothing else changing Might in the combat, the defender choosing the deaths that cost most, the Conquer scores: an empty battlefield, since nobody fights (316.8.b.1: 'Showdowns that occur as a result of a player moving to an empty Battlefield are a stand-alone Phase and do not create a Combat.'), 3; G 1 to 3, 3; 4 to 12, 1 (the defender kills the Brambleback, which takes both the multiplier and Shen's 'exactly one other unit'; from 9 it may kill Shen instead, for the same 1); 13 or more, 0 (both sides die, or the garrison survives, and 466.5: 'If no Showdown or Combat is staged at this location, the player with Units remaining here Establishes Control if they didn’t already control this Battlefield.'). Re-derived on 2026-10-26 from the rules above.
• AND TWO EVERY HOLD AFTER IT. On a Hold nobody is conquering, so Brambleback's clause does not apply — its condition is the act of conquering here, not the category of the effect. Shen's trigger fires once: 1 point plus the Hold's own Score. The entry publishes both numbers rather than the better one.
• Against shen-kinkou-sentinel-hold (3 a turn, Mind/Order, two bodies) this is 3 on turn one and 2 a turn after, in a Fury/Order shell — worse on rate, better on tempo, and it is the only Shen line that pays on the turn the battlefield changes hands. Against shen-kinkou-svellsongur-hold (9 in one Hold) it is not close; that one is the BURST and this is the cheap version.
• Shen defends at 7 + 1 ([Shield]) + 2 (Skyfall's Might Bonus, 137.3) = 10, and Brambleback at 4 with [Accelerate] to arrive ready. Killing Brambleback costs Shen his condition as well as the multiplier, so the opponent has one clean answer and it is the cheaper body. CHECKED 2026-10-26 (#472, the follow-up PR #471 listed for #464): holds, and the combat makes it sharper: a garrison of 4 summed Might kills the Brambleback in the Conquer itself, so the 'one clean answer' needs no card (the three-points notable).
• Cost, counted whole: Shen 6 Energy + 2 Order Power, Brambleback 4 Energy + 1 Fury Power (plus 1 Energy + 1 Fury Power if you pay [Accelerate]), Skyfall 3 Energy to play and 1 Energy + 1 Fury Power to [Equip]. 14 Energy and 4 Power.
• The Conquer itself may be bloodless: 348.2.a.1 makes the Showdown at an open battlefield a Conquer with no combat and no Attacker designation, so 807.1.d / 383.4.e / 461 never bite and neither body has to fight.
• A BLOODLESS CONQUER IS NOT A FAIT ACCOMPLI, AND 46 OF THE 47 ENTRIES CITING 344.2 DID NOT SAY SO (added 2026-09-12, #187 batch 25). **316.8.b.1.a**: during a Non-Combat Showdown *"units controlled by a different player may become present at the Battlefield where the Showdown is"*, which converts it to a COMBAT Showdown in the following cleanup - so the opponent can turn your uncontested walk-in into a fight. 316.8.c is the permission (a Showdown is a Window of Opportunity for [Action] and [Reaction] cards). **The answer set is THREE CARDS, swept on the ACTOR rather than on the destination**: `OGN-173 Ride the Wind` (Chaos, E2+1), `OGN-262 Zenith Blade` (Calm/Order, E3+2) and `SFD-184 Relentless Pursuit` (Fury/Body, E2+1) - twelve printings move a friendly unit, and nine of them send it to base or need a body already there. They span three identities, so **no identity is safe**; and `OGN-262 Zenith Blade` is the worst to walk into, because it STUNS your body on the way in, and 423.1.b removes a stunned unit`s contribution to the damage step while 423.1.c keeps its full Might as the price to kill it - one 3-Energy card takes the unit and the battlefield. **[Ambush] is not a fourth answer**: 822.1.b needs a battlefield where the player already has units, and the defining feature of that board is that they have none there. **THE REMEDY IS A COUNTERSPELL, AND A FIRST VERSION OF THIS NOTABLE SAID SOMETHING FALSE THAT IS WITHDRAWN HERE (corrected within the hour, 2026-09-12).** It said that because all three answers are [Action] and 358.4 admits an Action card only as the card that CLOSES the state, the attacker - who holds Focus by 345 and priority by 335.1 - could shut them out by playing any cheap Action card first. Every step is true and the conclusion is false, because **a Showdown is a LOOP, not a single window**: 346 - *"When the last item on the chain resolves and the turn returns to an Open State during a Showdown, Focus passes, and the next Player gains both Focus and Priority"* - with 347.1.b and 347.2.a. Closing the state buys a lock-out lasting exactly that CHAIN; when it resolves the Showdown reopens, Focus passes TO THE DEFENDER, and they play their answer into an open Showdown after all. **The real sequence**: walk in, take Focus, **PASS** (acting first gains nothing); they play the answer, which closes the state as it is played; **you COUNTER it**, since 358.4`s other half now admits only [Reaction] and all eleven of the pool`s counters are Reaction, and 425.1.c refunds them nothing; all players then pass in sequence, 347.2.a ends the Showdown, and 348.2.a with 348.2.a.1 give you Control and the Conquer. The cheap counter is `OGN-045 Defy` (Calm, E1 + 1 Power, *"counter a spell that costs no more than 4 Energy and no more than one rainbow"*), which covers all three answers; `OGN-064 Wind Wall` is the unconditional one. **So the protection narrows to pairs containing CALM** - it is not the one-Energy insurance any deck can buy.

Steps

1. Attach Skyfall of Areion to Shen (3 Energy, then 1 Energy + 1 Fury Power to [Equip]). His hold effect is now also a conquer effect.
2. Walk Shen and exactly one Red Brambleback to the battlefield you intend to take — no third body, or Shen's condition fails.
3. Conquer it: win the Combat there (466.5.d), or with no enemy garrison take the Showdown at the next Cleanup (344.2, 348.2.a, 348.2.a.1). CORRECTED 2026-10-26 (#472, the follow-up PR #471 listed for #464): the Showdown route is unaffected. Winning the Combat scores three only against a garrison of 1 to 3 summed Might; 1 from 4 to 12, 0 from 13 (the three-points notable).
4. Shen's trigger is now a conquer effect for conquering here, so Brambleback makes it fire 1 + 1 = 2 times: 2 points, on top of the Conquer's own Score. Three this turn.
5. Every Beginning Phase after, you Hold it (315.2.b.2): the Score is 1 and Shen's hold effect fires once for 1 more. Two a turn, for as long as the garrison stays at exactly two units. CORRECTED 2026-10-26 (#472, the follow-up PR #471 listed for #464): two only if the Brambleback survived the combat. If it died, Shen stands alone and his condition fails, so each Hold is the Score alone, 1.

Per iteration

+3 points on the Conquer, +2 points per Hold thereafter CORRECTED 2026-10-26 (#472, the follow-up PR #471 listed for #464): against an open battlefield or a garrison of 1 to 3 summed Might; against a garrison of 4 to 12 it is +1 on the Conquer and +1 per Hold (the three-points notable).

How it ends

engine — 3 the turn the battlefield changes hands, 2 a turn after; it never reaches 8 in one event

Sources

Walked here, in this project

• Walk of the unwalked partners of the 66 proven synergy rules, rules skyfall-hold-conquer-bridge, red-brambleback-conquer and blue-sentinel-hold 2026-09-06 record

Walked against Core Rules 2026-07-16

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