Riftbound: Deck Tech - Cheating Rek'Sai

Rek'Sai is one of the most unpopular Legends in set 2 in the East. Still, her archetype is pretty unique, which makes her extremely fun. She might not be too competitive, but with the list we'll see below, you may steal a few wins from other tier-2 lists and will certainly surprise your opponents in skirmishes.

Before we begin, however, let me introduce myself. My name is Total, and I used to cast Legends of Runeterra tournaments professionally. I covered all the official tournaments, including Worlds, and I am known for creating deck guides for LoR as well. Now, I am a part of the Riftbound community!

Deck code:

CMAAAAAAAEAQAAAHAAAAAAIBAAANMAICAQAAACAMDPJACBYDAABQUEU3AGSADLYBXQAQEAQAAARSKAIDAAKQEAYAACOQFIYCU4BAEAYADXZQCAQBAAAOAAIBAMAA4AIBAMAACAABAMAB2

The main idea behind this deck is to conquer early on so that you can use your Legend's effect. With The Candlelit Sanctum or Void Hatchling, you'll manage the top cards in your deck so that you can, when it's time to reveal cards with your Legend's effect, activate the key units you revealed more consistently.

This list is hard to pilot because you need to conquer at the beginning of your turn without spending too many resources. Only then will you be able to pay for the card you'll play with your Legend's effect.

Besides Void Hatchling, this deck plays four other cards that are essential in this combo.

One of them is Void Drone, which you can play for 1 energy with your Legend's effect. Void Rush basically does the same as your Legend's effect, but it doesn't force you to conquer a battlefield and also discounts the cost of the unit you revealed and chose to play by 2.

The most important of the four cards is Undertitan. When you reveal it, it gives you 2 energy that you can then use to play it or to play another card you revealed with it.

This list struggles a lot if you don't have anything to conquer battlefields or if your opponent manages to dominate both of them and prevents you from conquering them. You'll also need a small amount of luck, as you'll struggle if you draw the cards above instead of revealing them with your Legend's effect.

As a result, this deck is not that consistent or the best choice for competitive settings. For smaller tournaments, however, like Nexus Nights and Skirmishes, you can use it to steal a few wins from unaware players that are also playing tier-2 lists.

The fact that this Legend is yellow and red is quite interesting, as these colors allow us to combine heavy control tools with aggressive cards in this list.

Drag Under, for instance, goes really well with this Legend's effect. It is a removal that can destroy the opponent's strategy in the mid game.

Currently, there are no decent, cheap yellow cards that interact directly with your Legend's effect or this theme in general. So, we added the only ones that make sense for this strategy: Daring Poro and Honest Broker.

This card is slightly counterintuitive. It has Accelerate and Assault, but you should keep it in your base always because of its aura effect.

From personal experience, you shouldn't really play it with Accelerate unless you can't activate your Legend's effect in any other way.

Its Accelerate will be useful in the late game, when you need to play units like Darius or Ferrous Forerunner and they need to be ready. Rek'Sai - Breacher will mostly set up your late game, but she can also save you if your hand is really terrible.

The Candlelit Sanctum is what makes this entire deck work. As we mentioned, you must use this battlefield to "filter" the top cards in your deck so that you can play the cards that interact with your Legend's effect.

Reaver's Row is a great way to protect your units, and, in general, it can save you from a few enemy removals as you play.

Vilemaw’s Lair is great against Miracle Rhasa decks. This battlefield encourages these lists to not dominate both battlefields because, in Vilemaw's Lair, any unit becomes vulnerable to your attacks.

Early Game

The main idea early on is to mulligan after your 2-cost units and send back any Void card apart from Void Hatchling.

Use Daring Poro or Honest Broker to conquer a battlefield early on and start summoning card after card with your Legend's effect.

Ideally, you should always spend as few resources as possible when you conquer battlefields so that you can pay for the top units in your deck and put them in play.

Like so, you'll hoard cards in your hand throughout the match and will have a considerable amount of resources in the mid to late game.

Mid Game

This deck "cheats" by discounting the cost of units like Void Drone, and, indirectly, Undertitan. So, in the mid game, you'll often have a board with "late game" units. Still, there are some important strategies you must consider playing at this time to take advantage of the many cards you'll have in hand.

The first one is the Get Excited! + Immortal Phoenix combo. You can discard Immortal Phoenix with Get Excited! and, when this spell resolves, and if you kill a unit with it, you can automatically use Immortal Phoenix's effect to bring it back from your trash pile.

Vayne - Hunter is another ridiculously strong card that allows you to retake control of the game after your opponent clears the board.

Usually, Ferrous Forerunner shows up at this time through your Legend's effect. This is a solid unit that won't force you to lose any tempo when you put it in play, even if it ends up removed.

End Game

Other aggressive decks often play support spells to end the game or some card that readies an allied unit. This deck does none of that.

The main strategy is to snowball since the very first turn and mow down the opponent in the mid game.

This list will struggle to end the match in the late game because it doesn't play many combos that let you conquer battlefields twice. That's why playing Darius - Trifarian as a finisher is critical. It is the only card in this list that can ready itself.

Saving a few low-cost cards, like 1 Blood Rush or any other cheap unit that makes sense in the late game, is also important. This way, you'll be able to activate your Darius's effect.

This deck struggles against any deck centered around removals or that prevents you from conquering a battlefield early on. So, Draven, Ezreal, Kai'Sa, and Annie are all terrible matchups.

Considering these lists can slow you down considerably and prevent you from using your Legend's effect, you'll hardly come back into the match once they get going.

Slower decks, like any yellow list, and decks centered around Gear and combat, that is, decks that don't play many removals, will struggle against Rek'Sai, though.

Against yellow decks, don't worry too much about losing units to enemy removals. Focus on conquering battlefields instead. Decks centered around combat, like Jax, Irelia, orange or green lists, usually can't defend both battlefields, so you'll be free to focus on one of them.

That goes for aggressive holding strategies as well, like Ahri.

Minotaur Reckoner deals with Miracle lists because they will get stuck once you play this card. The opponent will have to conquer battlefields one unit at a time. Or, occasionally, you'll be able to lock down their entire board and prevent their units from returning to base.

Against the Odds is also great against Miracle because it protects your units from attacks involving multiple units.

Salvage is a standard meta card to deal with Gear decks in general, like Irelia, Viktor, Ornn, and Jax.

If you read this far, thank you! I hope you had fun and enjoyed reading this article.

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See you next time!