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The Helm costs your turn four, their two spells cost two runes more, and Acceptable Losses kills it for two

Issue #466 (a slice of #200), 2026-10-26. Constructed, Duel (485). Rules version 2026-07-16. Card text verbatim from data/corpus_flat.txt; rules pasted from data/Riftbound-Core-Rules-2026-07-16.txt and data/Riftbound-Tournament-Rules-2026-07-16.txt. Read the unopposed clock for the baseline this is measured against.

Subject: helm-empowered-spell-tax, the one-card Calm ENGINE in which VEN-045 Helm of Suppression (Calm gear, E4 + 1 Calm Power, [Empower] E4 + 1 Calm Power) makes every opponent spell cost 1 Energy more, and once Empowered 1 Energy and one Power of any domain more. The entry prices the bill at 8 Energy and 2 Power and says the Power half is the claim. It is right about the bill and about the tax. Walked as a game, going first, under OGN-261 Radiant Dawn against the Fury/Chaos Draven deck of the Decree of Focus play, in the same seats and on the same battlefields. The main line: the Helm takes your whole T4: all eight runes, two of them recycled. On their T4 they take your battlefield A with two spells and an attack, and each spell costs them a rune more: their board drops from 9 runes to 5 where the same two spells would have left 7. A falls, your five units at A die, and it is 3 to 4 after their T4. The control spends the same T4 on two bodies at A instead of the Helm. A defends at 22, nobody attacks, and it is 3 to 3. The cheapest answer is two runes, one recycled: OGN-179 Acceptable Losses (Chaos, E1) kills the Helm, since it is your only gear, for E2 and one Power under the tax. Cast first, it also lifts the tax off the two spells behind it, and their board ends at 6 runes instead of 5.

Why this line. scripts/sequence-pick.mjs --unplayed, re-run on 2026-10-25 at a67d27f, reads 773 entries, 266 with forced-ordering language, 94 in the queue and 3 of them with no play, as the issue measured. This entry is rank 44, a hit on first; the other entry of this slice is rank 76, protective-sands-few-runes-fury. Neither had a play before. Both entered the queue at 0098d17 (#460): run at 3fadb16 the queue was 93 long and neither was in it, and at 0098d17 it is 95 with both. That commit appended the same CORRECTED sentence to a step of each entry, and the sentence says "going first", which is the ordering word the picker matched.

1. Needs

LegendOGN-261 Radiant Dawn (Calm/Order, tag Leona)
Chosen ChampionOGN-238 Leona, Determined (Order, E4 + 1 Order Power, M4), never played
The engineVEN-045 Helm of Suppression (Calm gear, E4 + 1 Calm Power)
The bodiesOGN-210 Daring Poro (Order, E2, M2), SFD-159 Trusty Ramhound (Order, E2, M2), OGN-216 Soaring Scout (Order, E2, M1), OGN-054 Sunlit Guardian (Calm, E3, M3), OGN-052 Stalwart Poro (Calm, E2, M2)
The control's T4SFD-157 Royal Guard (Order, E4, M2), OGN-218 Vanguard Captain (Order, E3 + 1 Order Power, M3)

The entry admits any legend with Calm in its pair. Radiant Dawn is the one for this walk because its text plays no part in it: "When you stun one or more enemy units, buff a friendly unit. (If it doesn't have a buff, it gets a +1 :rb_might: buff.)" Nothing here stuns. Its tag is Leona, so Leona, Determined can be the Chosen Champion, 103.2.a.2: "Must be a champion unit with a champion tag that matches the tag on your Champion Legend."

The Helm is mono-Calm, so a Calm/Order deck admits it, 103.1.b.3: "If a card has a single Domain, then that card is permitted in the Domain Identity that corresponds to the same Domain." Three copies is the cap, 103.2.b: "Your Main Deck can include up to 3 copies of the same named card." The deck runs three; the entry asks for one. None of the cards in this play, on either side, is a Signature card (signature in data/cards.json), and none is in data/legality.src.json or marked [BANNED] in data/corpus_flat.txt.

The card text the play turns on:

2. What the Helm costs, what the tax is, and when it applies

The bill is 8 Energy and 2 Calm Power. The play cost is E4 and one Power of the card's own domain, 135.2.e.6: "Power of a domain corresponding to a card’s own Domain is not represented by a symbol, but appears in these rules similarly to other symbols. Its shorthand is [C]." The [Empower] is E4 and one Calm Power more. A gear goes to base, 149.2: "Gear can only be played to a player's Base unless an effect specifies otherwise.", and it enters ready, 359.2.d: "If it is a Non-Unit Gear, it enters the Board Ready at the player's Base." The [Empower] is an activated ability, 827.1.c.1: "Empower is functionally short for “[Cost]: Empower this. Play only if not Empowered.”" Its cost has no exhaust, so the turn the Helm lands is legal, and a gear's ability waits for your own Main Phase, 151.2: "The Activated Ability of Gear may be executed at any time during the controlling player's Main Phase during an Open State, and not during a Showdown." Once paid the state stays: it is a state of a Game Object on the board, 441.2: "“Empowered” is a state for Game Objects on the board that other game effects and abilities can reference.", and only Disempowering removes it, 442.1: "Disempowering is the act of removing the Empowered status from one or more Game Objects." Nothing in this walk Disempowers.

Where the 8 Energy and the 2 Power come from. A rune adds Energy by exhausting, 164.2.a: "[E]: [Reaction] — Add [1].", and Power by leaving, 164.2.b: "Recycle this: [Reaction] — Add [C].", and 164.2.b.1: "The Power added this way corresponds to the Domain of the Rune that is being Recycled." The recycle has no exhaust in its cost, so an exhausted rune still pays it. Going first you channel to 2, 4, 6 and 8 runes on T1 to T4, so T4 is the first turn with eight. All eight are exhausted for the Energy and two Calm runes among them are then recycled for the Power. A recycled rune goes to the bottom of the Rune Deck, 416.1: "Recycling cards is the action in which a player takes one or more cards from a specific zone and then puts it on the bottom of the corresponding deck.", and comes back only when it is channelled from there again, 430.1: "Channeling is the action of taking one or more Runes from the top of a player's Rune Deck and putting them on the board." So the Helm leaves you with 6 runes, and with nothing else played that turn.

The tax lands on every spell of theirs, the first one too. A cost increase is a step in working out what a card costs, 356.3: "Apply cost increases." The Power it adds is any domain, 135.2.e.5.a: "When required as a cost, [A] can be paid by Power of any Domain." The only way their deck makes Power is a recycle, so every spell they cast under the Empowered Helm takes one rune more off their board than it would have, and one more Energy. The entry's own step 4 says this since its 2026-10-24 correction: there is no free Power floor while their Rune Deck still holds runes. Increases come before discounts, 356.4: "Apply discounts.", and nobody in this walk has a discount.

The tax does not widen your counters, as the entry says. 206: "Effects that need to determine a card’s cost for any purpose always use its printed or copied cost, even if that cost is increased, decreased, or ignored as the card is played." This deck runs no counter, so it does not come up.

Their answers to the Helm are taxed too. A spell that kills it is cast while it is on the board, so it pays the tax. That is why the cheapest answer in §5 is the cheapest one at taxed prices, not at printed ones.

Combat. Damage is read at the end of the showdown, 465.2: "When the Showdown closes, Attackers and Defenders resolve Combat Damage at the Battlefield that was attacked, using their current Might." 465.2.c: "Starting with the Attacker, each player assigns an amount of damage equal to their summed Might among the other's Units." [Tank] goes first, 815.1.b: "I must be assigned lethal damage before any other unit with the same controller as me that does not have [Tank] during the Combat Damage step." Lethal goes to one unit in full first, 465.2.c.3: "Units must have lethal damage assigned to them in full before damage is assigned to a different Unit." A unit dies at its Might, 142.4.b: "Lethal Damage for a Unit is a non-zero amount greater than or equal to that Unit’s Might." Units move from base to a battlefield and back, never between battlefields, 144.4.a: "Units may move from their Base to a Battlefield." 144.4.b: "Units may move from a Battlefield to their Base." A unit is played to base or to a battlefield you control, 355.2.a: "By default, Valid locations include the controller’s Base or a Battlefield the controller controls." Your runes ready only on your own turn, 415.3.a: "A player Readies all non-spell Game Objects they Control during the Awakening Phase on their turn." So after a T4 that exhausts all eight, nothing of yours is up on their T4.

3. Their deck: Fury/Chaos Draven

The deck of the Decree of Focus play linked above. SFD-185 Glorious Executioner (Fury/Chaos): "When you win a combat, draw 1. (You win if only your units remain after combat.)" Its Chosen Champion is OGN-028 Draven, Showboat, never played. Their bodies are OGN-018 Noxus Saboteur (Fury, E3, M3), OGN-010 Legion Rearguard (Fury, E2, M2), OGN-016 Dangerous Duo (Fury, E3, M3), OGN-013 Pouty Poro (Fury, E2, M2) and OGN-171 Mystic Poro (Chaos, E2, M2). Their spells:

Going second, they channel an extra rune on T1, 485.7: "First Turn Process: The player going second channels an extra Rune from their Rune Deck during their first Channel Phase of the game."

4. The turns, going first

Calm/Order against Fury/Chaos. Your battlefield is A, OGN-282 Monastery of Hirana ("When you conquer here, you may spend a buff to draw 1.", and nobody has a buff); theirs is B, SFD-210 Hall of Legends ("When you conquer here, you may pay :rb_energy_1: to ready your legend.", and their legend has no exhaust ability). Your opening four are Daring Poro, Trusty Ramhound, Soaring Scout and Helm of Suppression. Your draws are Sunlit Guardian (T1), Stalwart Poro (T2), Royal Guard (T3) and Vanguard Captain (T4). Their opening four are Noxus Saboteur, Legion Rearguard, Hextech Ray and Cleave. Their draws are Pouty Poro (T1), Dangerous Duo (T2), Mystic Poro (T3) and Monster Harpoon (T4).

The main line plays the Helm and Empowers it in one turn, as the entry's step 2 allows.

turn      runes   your turn                                                 points
T1        2       Daring Poro (E2) to base. None left.                      0
their T1  3       Noxus Saboteur (E3) to base. None left.                   0
T2        4       The Poro walks to A, empty, Conquer: +1. Trusty           1
                  Ramhound (E2) and Stalwart Poro (E2) to A. None left.
their T2  5       The Saboteur walks to B, empty, Conquer. Legion           1
                  Rearguard (E2) and Dangerous Duo (E3) to base. None
                  left.
T3        6       Hold A: +1. Sunlit Guardian (E3) and Soaring Scout       2
                  (E2) to A. One left.
their T3  7       Hold B. Pouty Poro (E2) and Mystic Poro (E2) to base.     2
                  Three left.
T4        8       Hold A: +1. Helm of Suppression (E4 + 1 Calm Power) and  3
                  its [Empower] (E4 + 1 Calm Power): all eight
                  exhausted, two Calm recycled. None left.
their T4  9       Hold B. Hextech Ray (E2 + 1 Fury + 1 any) kills the      4
                  Ramhound; Monster Harpoon (E2 + 1 Fury + 1 any) kills
                  the Daring Poro. The Rearguard, the Duo, Pouty Poro
                  and Mystic Poro (2 + 3 + 2 + 2 = 9) attack A. All
                  three of yours there die; three of theirs die.
                  Conquer A. Five left.

After your T2 it is 1 to 0; after their T2, 1 to 1; after your T3, 2 to 1; after their T3, 2 to 2; after your T4, 3 to 2; after their T4, 3 to 4.

Runes on your board at the end of each turn: 2, 4, 6, 6 after your T4, 7 after their T4 (the Scout's Deathknell). On theirs: 3, 5, 7, 5 after their T4.

Your hand, card by card: 5 after the T1 draw, 4 after the Poro (Ramhound, Scout, Helm, Guardian); 5 after the T2 draw, 3 after the Ramhound and the Stalwart Poro (Scout, Helm, Guardian); 4 after the T3 draw, 2 after the Guardian and the Scout (Helm, Royal Guard); 3 after the T4 draw, 2 after the Helm (Royal Guard, Vanguard Captain). Theirs: 5 after the T1 draw, 4 after the Saboteur; 5 after the T2 draw, 3 after the Rearguard and the Duo (Ray, Cleave, Pouty Poro); 4 after the T3 draw, 2 after the two Poros (Ray, Cleave); 3 after the T4 draw, 1 after the two spells (Cleave), 2 after their legend's draw.

Your T2 and T3: a wall at A. The Poro takes A, which is empty: a non-combat showdown, 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." It is a Conquer, 348.2.a.1: "This results in a Conquer if that player has not yet scored that Battlefield this turn." After T3, A defends at the Poro's 2, the Ramhound's 3, the Stalwart Poro's 3, the Guardian's 4 and the Scout's 1: 13. Their ready bodies on their T3 are the Rearguard and the Duo, 5, so they do not attack. You Hold A each turn, 469.2: "Hold: A player maintains Control of a Battlefield they did not yet Score this turn during their Beginning Phase."

Your T4: the Helm, and nothing else. Eight runes, eight Energy, two Calm recycled for the two Calm Power. Royal Guard and Vanguard Captain stay in hand. A is still 13.

Their T4: two spells and an attack. Their ready bodies in base are the Rearguard, the Duo and the two Poros, 9 Might against 13. Two spells close the gap, in their Main Phase, before the attack. The Ray deals 3 to the Ramhound, which is a 3 with company, and kills it. The Harpoon deals 2 to the Daring Poro and kills it. A now defends at 3 + 4 + 1 = 8 against 2 + 3 + 2 + 2 = 9. You have no rune up to answer anything. Their 9 must kill the Guardian first (815.1.b): 4, then the Stalwart Poro 3 and the Scout 1. Your 8 cannot kill all four, which takes 9: they kill the Duo, the Rearguard and Pouty Poro, and the last 1 goes on Mystic Poro, a 2. Only their units remain: they win the combat, their legend draws 1, and A is theirs, 466.5.d: "Establishing Control results in a Conquer if that player has not yet scored this Battlefield this turn." The Scout's Deathknell channels you a rune, exhausted. 3 to 4. Cleave stays in their hand: a third spell, taxed, would add 3 Might they do not need.

What the tax took. Untaxed, the two spells are E2 and two Fury Power: two runes exhausted, both recycled, and their board ends at 7. Taxed they are E4 and four Power, two of it Fury: four exhausted, four recycled, and their board ends at 5. The tax cost them two runes off the board for the rest of the walk, and two Energy they had spare that turn. It did not stop the attack. Had they cast Cleave as well, a spell the attack did not need, the tax would have cost three: their board at 4 against 7 untaxed.

The control: Royal Guard and Vanguard Captain on T4. The same deal. On T4 the Guard goes to A with its Sand Soldier, and the Captain follows with [Legion] on and two Recruits. That is E7 and one Order Power: seven runes exhausted, one recycled, one left. A defends at 13 + 2 + 2 + 3 + 1 + 1 = 22. On their T4 the same two spells take 5 of it, and their 9 do not reach the 17 left, 12 with Cleave, so nobody attacks. They Hold B: 3 to 3, with A yours, eight units on it, 7 runes on your board and the Helm in hand.

The tax with no spells. If they cast nothing on their T4, the Helm does nothing, as the entry says. They do not attack 13 with 9 and they Hold B: 3 to 3. Your board is then 13 at A on 6 runes; the control's is 22 on 7.

How often this happens. The draw pile is 39 cards, the 40 of Tournament Rules 402.1 less the Chosen Champion. Tournament Rules 402.1: "In a constructed event, players must register a Main Deck of exactly 40 cards (including a chosen champion), 1 Legend, 12 runes, and exactly 3 battlefields each with a unique name." Going first, you have seen 8 cards by T4. A Helm among them is 50.82% with three copies and 20.51% at the entry's one. Going second they have seen 8 by their T4: a Ray and a Harpoon both is 24.20% at three copies each.

5. Breaks to

What the engine did, and the predicate. From their T4 on, every spell of theirs costs a rune more. The predicate is: played by them on their T4 with the 9 runes they have, does it take the Helm off the board?

The scope. A Fury/Chaos deck plays only Fury, Chaos and Fury/Chaos cards (103.1.b), and its Signature cards must carry its legend's tag, 103.2.d.2: "All of the Signature cards must have the Champion tag that corresponds to the Champion Legend of the deck." As in the Decree of Focus play, that is 252 cards folded by name (not a legend, battlefield, rune or token, and not a Signature card with another champion's tag), less the five banned in constructed: 247, of them 154 units, 62 spells and 31 gear.

The candidates. The regex \bgears?\b (case-insensitive, on the data/corpus_flat.txt line) matches 44 of the 247. I read all 44. Eight of them remove a gear an opponent controls; the rest are gear of their own, or cards that make, move or return their own gear. The eight, with the Helm's tax added to each spell:

cardprintedunder the Empowered Helmwhat it does to the Helm
OGN-179 Acceptable Losses (Chaos spell)E1E2 + 1 anykills it, if it is your only gear
SFD-135 Factory Recall (Chaos spell)E1E2 + 1 anyreturns it to your hand
SFD-005 Detonate (Fury spell)E1 + 1 FuryE2 + 1 Fury + 1 anykills it, and you draw 2
VEN-003 Brittle Steel (Fury spell)E2 + 1 FuryE3 + 1 Fury + 1 anykills it
VEN-102 Ravenbloom Prefect (Chaos unit)E3E3, not a spellbanishes it as it is played
OGN-180 Fading Memories (Chaos spell)E4 + 1 ChaosE5 + 1 Chaos + 1 anykills it at your next Beginning Phase
OGN-022 Thermo Beam (Fury spell)E5 + 2 FuryE6 + 2 Fury + 1 anykills it, and every other gear
SFD-147 Downwell (Chaos spell)E8 + 2 ChaosE9 + 2 Chaos + 1 anyreturns it, and every unit and gear

The cheapest answer: Acceptable Losses, two runes, one recycled. "[Action] (Play on your turn or in showdowns.) Each player kills one of their gear." Each player picks one of their own gear. The Helm is your only gear, so it is the one that dies, and they have none. Under the Helm it costs E2 and one Power: two runes exhausted, one of them recycled. Factory Recall costs the same and is worse for them: the Helm goes back to your hand, and you can pay the 8 Energy and 2 Power again.

Cast first, it pays for itself. On their T4 they have 9 runes. Acceptable Losses first, taxed: E2 and one Power. The Helm is gone, so the Ray and the Harpoon cost their printed E2 and two Fury Power. In all that is E4 and three Power: four runes exhausted, three recycled. Their board ends at 6 runes, not the main line's 5, and the attack goes as in §4. A is theirs, 3 to 4, and your T4 bought nothing. Holding Acceptable Losses by their T4 is 50.82% at three copies.

Detonate is the trap. At printed cost it looks as cheap as Acceptable Losses. Under the Helm it is E2 and two Power, so both its runes are recycled, and it hands you two cards, as its text says: "Kill a gear. Its controller draws 2."

Ravenbloom Prefect is the one answer the tax cannot reach. "When an opponent plays a gear, you may banish me to banish it." It is a unit, so it costs E3 with or without the Helm. It has to be on their board before your T4: then the Helm is banished as it is played, before you can pay its [Empower] in an Open State (151.2). You lose the first 4 Energy and 1 Power, and they lose the Prefect. Seeing it, you keep the Helm in hand.

The free answer: cast no spell. The Helm taxes nothing else. If they play bodies and Hold B, as above, it is 3 to 3 and they are on 9 runes to your 6. The control reaches the same 3 to 3 with A at 22 and 7 runes. With no spell cast, the Helm is still a turn behind the control.

6. Verdict

Right about the bill and about the tax, and the tax did not decide the game. The Helm cost your whole T4 going first: eight Energy, two Calm runes off the board. From their T4 on, each spell cost them one rune more. They cast two on their T4 and paid two runes more than untaxed, ending on 5 runes instead of 7. Those two spells and an attack took A, because the turn the Helm ate was the turn that would have put 9 more Might there. 3 to 4 after their T4, against the control's 3 to 3 with A at 22. The cheapest answer is Acceptable Losses, two runes and one of them recycled. Cast first, it lifts the tax off everything after it. The free answer is to cast no spell, and then the Helm has cost you a turn for nothing.

7. Not verified

Runes. I did not deal the channel order. The walk assumes six Calm and six Order runes for you, Radiant Dawn's two domains, in the twelve of Tournament Rules 402.1. The main line recycles two Calm on T4 out of the first eight runes: it fails only when seven or more of those eight are Order, which six Order cannot be, 0 of 495. The control recycles one Order on T4: also 0 of 495. Nothing else of yours costs Power.

Their walk assumes six Fury and six Chaos. Their T4 recycles four runes, two of them for Fury Power, out of the first nine. It fails only when one or no Fury is among the nine, which six Chaos cannot be: 0 of 220. The Acceptable Losses line needs two Fury among the nine as well: 0 of 220.

How likely the answer is. The walk fixes their opening four and their four draws, and Acceptable Losses is not among them. A copy among their first 8 cards of 39, at three copies, is 50.82%. That counts only the one card, not how many a Fury/Chaos list runs.

data/cards.json carries no champion supertype. I read Leona, Determined as a champion unit by her title name and her Leona tag. Their choice to attack A on their T4, and not to on their T3, is the walk's choice of opponent; §5 prices the others. Not walked: going second; the Helm played on T3 and Empowered on T4, which starts the Energy half of the tax a turn earlier and leaves it open to an untaxed Acceptable Losses for E2; the mulligan; 2v2; a rune split other than six and six; a counter in your list, which the tax would not help (206); and the turns after their T4.

Leads