Actions, Reactions, Priority and Focus - Riftbound's chain and interaction explained

While the Riftbound's speed system can be thought of as a bit weird, once you strip away all the nomenclature, it's all going to be crystal clear.

I'll aim to explain how to play your spells correctly in practical terms, so you can confidently play at your next Nexus Night. While this piece is written with beginners in mind, it's always useful to brush up on fundamentals.

I'll start off by explaining the three speeds and how they compare to each other, but also delve into the focus and priority system.

Without further ado, let's jump into it!

The Three Speeds

There are three separate 'speeds' at which spells are played, namely slow speed, Action speed, and Reaction speed. Slow speed is the default and, unless stated otherwise, this is the speed at which you'll play your spells. For both Action and Reaction speed, it will be clearly indicated on the card.

It's created very logically as a gradual progression, as each speed includes everything the previous one did and builds on top of it. Therefore, slow speed is the most limiting, Action speed does what slow speed does and a bit more, and Reaction does what Action does and a bit more on top as well.

Now, with that simple framework explained, let's get into those specific speeds with card examples.

Slow Speed

You can cast Slow speed spells on your turn only when nothing is happening, so to speak. In practice, it's going to be played when you are *not* in a showdown and when nothing is waiting to resolve and the chain is empty. You do have numerous windows to play them, as you can do it right after you draw, but also after one or two showdowns. The only limitation is that at the moment of casting the slow speed spell, nothing is happening - no showdown and nothing currently on the chain.

As you can see from the design of Falling Star, nothing explicitly indicates it's slow speed - and that's because that's the default speed of any spell, unless stated otherwise.

Action Speed

Logically following our framework, you can cast Action Speed cards like Cleave at any point you could slow speed. Moreover, you get one additional window that you will frequently see in the reminder text on the card:

'Play on your turn or in showdowns'

Therefore, in addition to doing it as slow speed, you actually can now play them in showdowns. You still cannot do it when the chain is not empty, though! 

One more practical tip is that those don't have to be combat showdowns specifically! If you enter an unoccupied battlefield, technically a showdown opens and, hence, your window to play Actions.

What's the practical advantage of Action over slow speed since you cannot respond with it to anything anyways, you may ask. Let's use the aforeshown Cleave as an example. You could do it before showdown and attack it immediately with the +3 Assault bonus. However, imagine a simple case when your creature is already bigger than the opponent's. Say, it's Noxus Hopeful versus Travelling Merchant.

In this case, there is no reason for you to make your attacker bigger, since it already outmuscles the opponent. However, the opponent can grow their creature in combat!

Thanks to Action speed Cleave though, we can let the pump spell resolve and then still, in showdown and empty chain, play Cleave, make our Noxus Hopeful 7 Might, and conquer!

Action speed also allows you to trigger your unit abilities in combat directly.

Reaction Speed

The reminder text comes yet again as a little helper:

'Play at any time, even before spells and abilities resolve'

Now we get a proper powerhouse. At Reaction speed, predictably, we can finally react to the opponent's spells, abilities, and effects. Reactions are how you build a chain of spells, because you react to what's happening, and the opponent might use another Reaction card in response. There is no limit to how big a chain can get and how many Reactions are put on the chain in response to one another.

Let's go back to the previous scenario. 

• Opponent comes in with Noxus Helpful into your Merchant. 
• You pump the Merchant with some spell. 
• Opponent plays Action Speed Cleave
• You react to the Cleave with Star-Crossed, returning their Noxus to hand and one unit of yours (like Merchant itself)
• Star-Crossed resolves, Cleave has nothing to grow, chain empties.

Reaction cards allow for much more dynamic gameplay, as you always have to be wary of what the opponent might do.

You could react to the opponent pumping their Merchant with Gust to return it to hand! This would be a huge blowout, as the pump spell wouldn't work *and* they'd get their Merchant returned.

However, both players can be cunning with their tricks. 

An En Garde can re-pump in response to the Gust! And if the creature becomes 4 Might with En Garde, then Gust cannot legally return it to hand!

Such Reaction fights are what Riftbound is all about!

Focus and Priority

There is one more topic to explore for you to fully grasp the speeds of this game: Focus and Priority.

Imagine a poker chip with the word Focus on it. We will be passing this imaginary chip between players. The person with the Focus chip is allowed to play Action speed spells.

You attack with Noxus Helpful a battlefield with Travelling Merchant. As the attacker, you get the Focus chip. Since you have the chip, you can either play an (Re)action spell or pass the chip to the opponent. If the opponent takes the chip and passes it back to you again, because they don't want to do anything, we resolve combat. In other words, in order for you to resolve combat, both players have to pass Focus to each other. If you do play a spell, opponent can naturally react to it, and so can you. After we resolve the chain, the Focus chip goes to the opponent since you started that chain with your Focus. It's a very symmetrical ping-pong game of passing Focus between each other.

Priority is something separate from Focus. It's like mini-Focus within the chain. You're the holder of Focus unless we resolve everything, but when we fight on the chain, Priority is passed back and forth between players.

Full Practical Case

Now, let's add up all the information into the case we've been buliding up, now using all the nomenclature.

1. Player A enters the battlefield with Noxus Helpful. They have the Focus chip. They say 'pass Focus', since their creature is already bigger.
2. Player B gets the Focus chip. They play En Garde on Travelling Merchant to make their creature 4 Might.
3. Player A gets Priority to respond to En Garde and they opt to play Gust in response, and pass Priority back.
4. Player B gets Priority and re-responds with another En Garde. Passes priority to player A.
5. Player A has nothing with which they wish to respond. They pass priority back.
6. Priority has been passed twice, we resolve the topmost // most recent spell on the stack.
7. Merchant becomes 4 Might with the most recent En Garde, Gust cannot return it, second En Garde resolves and Merchant becomes 6 Might.
8. Since everything has resolved, the Focus chip now is passed to player A.
9. Player A plays Cleave.
10. Player B doesn't respond, Cleave resolves.
11. Player B has the Focus now, but passes.
12. Player A also passes.
13. We resolve damage.
14. Player A's Noxus Hopeful is 4+3 Might versus Merchant that is 2+2+2. Therefore, it's 7 to 6. Hopeful wins combat and conquers.

Now, let me show you how it would practically look like in a real-life scenario in the form of a dialogue.

• Attack with Hopeful, pass
• En Garde
• Response Gust
• Another En Garde?
• Ok, En Garde resolves, Gust goes to the trash, the other En Garde also resolves. However, as my Action I'll play Cleave.
• Ok, so 7 to 6?
• Yeah
• My Merchant dies and you conquer

Much cleaner, isn't it? It's still worth knowing what's going on beneath the surface, as sometimes the technicalities might matter, although that's likely to be the case at bigger tournaments.

Conclusion

There are a lot of peculiarities to this speed system, but I do hope that it has now become considerably more understandable for you!