Combo · ENGINE

The Might Bonus that widens the sweep is the same one that raises the gear kill — Stare Down into a Demolitionist wearing two Equipment

6 cards · body · verified

Pieces

• Stare Down ×3 UNL-107 · engine · body

  Choose a friendly unit and a battlefield. Move all enemy units at that battlefield with less Might than the chosen unit to their base. Gain 1 XP.

• Noxian Demolitionist ×1 VEN-080 · payoff · body

  When I conquer, you may kill a gear with Energy cost no more than my Might.

• Boneshiver ×1 SFD-118 · enabler · body

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

  When I conquer, channel 1 rune exhausted.

• Hunter's Machete ×1 UNL-096 · enabler · body

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

  [Hunt] (When I conquer or hold, gain 1 XP.)

Payoff

Deck

• All four cards are mono-Body, so ANY legend whose two domains include Body runs the line (103.1.b.1). Nothing here is Signature (103.2.d.2).
• An enemy battlefield whose garrison is entirely under 5 Might, and one enemy gear worth removing.

Prerequisites

• ONE NUMBER, TWO JOBS. 434.1.d — 'The Top-Most Card has its Might modulated by the Might Bonus of all cards Attached to it' — with 137.3 and 477.3.d, stacks Boneshiver's +2 and Hunter's Machete's +2 on a printed Might of 1: the Demolitionist is M5. That 5 is simultaneously Stare Down's sweep threshold (choose HIM and every enemy body under 5 goes home) and the Energy ceiling of his own kill ('a gear with Energy cost no more than my Might'). Nothing else in the entry has to be paid for twice. A Might Bonus is not a 702 buff, so 702.3's one-per-unit cap is silent and both Equipment stack.
• THE EQUIP COSTS ARE ONE RUNE AND ONE RUNE PLUS AN ENERGY, AND THEY ARE PAID ONCE. 818.1 makes Equip an Activated Ability with a cost (818.1.b) and 818.1's Equip is never a play, so no 'when you play' trigger fires from it. Hunter's Machete asks for a single Body rune, Boneshiver for 1 Energy plus a Body rune. Both stay attached; nothing here re-attaches.
• THE KILL CEILING, MEASURED. Sweeping the corpus for 'kill a gear' returns eight cards. Six of them either kill unconditionally at spell speed (SFD-005 Detonate, VEN-003 Brittle Steel, SFD-032 Disarming Rake, SFD-160 Zaun Punk, SFD-077 Rocket Barrage) or on a play trigger with a fixed 1-Energy cap (SFD-074 Pickpocket). Only two are conquer effects: OGN-056 Adaptatron (Calm, E4 M3, 'When I conquer, you may kill a gear. If you do, buff me' — no Might threshold at all, but a buff that 702.3 places only once, and an identity that forces a Calm/Body legend) and this one. The Demolitionist's advantage is that he is mono-Body, costs E2, and scales: at M5 he covers every Equipment in the pool bar the largest, and the two cards that scale him are the same two that widen the sweep.
• WHY THE CONQUER IS BLOODLESS, AND WHY HE DOES NOT HAVE TO BE THE YARDSTICK. Stare Down chooses a friendly unit and a battlefield as two independent choices, so if a bigger body is available it can set the threshold instead and the Demolitionist merely has to be PRESENT when Control is gained — 383.4.c.2.a puts a unit's conquer ability on the Chain because it 'are present at a Battlefield when a player gains control of it'. After the sweep, 323.6 strips the opponent's Control at the Cleanup, the battlefield is open (170.11.c), the bodies walk in as one action (144.3, 144.4.a), 323.9 stages no Combat, 323.8 and 323.12 open a Showdown, and 348.2.a / 348.2.a.1 make it a Conquer.
• THREE TRIGGERS ON ONE CONQUER. 434.1.c appends both Equipment's [Effect] text to the Demolitionist's own Rules Text, so the single Conquer fires: kill a gear costing 5 or less (his own text), channel 1 rune exhausted (Boneshiver), and gain 1 XP (Hunter's Machete's [Hunt], which 823.1.b makes 'both a Conquer and a Hold effect'). Plus 1 XP printed on Stare Down.
• COST AND CEILING, WITH THE QUANTITIES DECLARED. Setup: Demolitionist E2, Boneshiver E3 + [Equip] E1 and a Body rune, Machete E3 + [Equip] a Body rune — 9 Energy and 2 Body Power. Recurring: 2 Energy per sweep. 103.2.b caps the spell at three, 470 at one Score per battlefield per turn and 485.4 at two battlefields.
• WHAT REFUTES IT. (a) The kill is 'you may', and it needs a gear to exist — against a gearless list the Demolitionist contributes nothing but a body. (b) 428.1 makes killing 'the action of a Permanent going to the trash from the board', so a gear TOKEN is not a legal choice in the sense that matters: 185 says tokens are not cards and 186.1 makes them cease to exist on leaving the board, so killing a Gold token costs the opponent nothing they had not already spent. (c) An enemy body at 5+ Might survives the sweep and turns the Showdown into a Combat (323.9) that the M5 Demolitionist is not built to win.

Steps

1. Earlier turns: play Noxian Demolitionist (E2), Boneshiver (E3) and Hunter's Machete (E3). [Equip] both to him — 1 Energy and a Body rune for Boneshiver, a Body rune for the Machete (818.1, 818.1.b). He is now M5 (434.1.d, 137.3, 477.3.d) and carries both [Effect] texts (434.1.c).
2. This turn, Awaken readies him (315.1.b). Main Phase, Neutral Open State (144.1.a).
3. Play Stare Down for 2 Energy, choosing the Demolitionist (M5) and the enemy battlefield. Every enemy body under 5 moves to their base; you gain 1 XP. The victims are not targets (355.10.d).
4. The Cleanup strips the opponent's Control (323.6); the battlefield is unoccupied and uncontrolled (170.11.c).
5. Standard-Move the Demolitionist in (144.4.a; his exhaust is the cost, 144.2 / 420.3.a). Contested applies (190.3.a.1, 450).
6. The next Cleanup stages a Showdown and no Combat (323.8, 323.9); 323.12 opens it; 348.2.a and 348.2.a.1 make it a Conquer, 471.1 pays the point.
7. 383.4.c.2.a fires all three appended conquer triggers: kill an enemy gear of Energy cost 5 or less, channel 1 rune exhausted, gain 1 XP.

Per iteration

one point, one enemy gear of up to 5 Energy destroyed, one rune channelled and 2 XP, for 2 Energy and one exhaust

How it ends

engine only — three sweeps a game (103.2.b), one Score per battlefield per turn (470), two battlefields in a Duel (485.4)

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 stare-down-empties-the-garrison (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

Walked against Core Rules 2026-07-16

Match a deck list against the whole catalogue