Riftbound: Intro to Playing Red (Fury)

The Fury Domain is all about aggression and taking over the battlefield. Many of its units are well above the curve, making them fierce enemies to fight head on. And when foes do get in their way, they’ll be blasted by efficient damage-based spells.

When playing this Domain, sometimes you’ll need to commit extra resources in order to enact your game plan. However, this tradeoff comes with a great deal of power, rewarding those who make their move at the right time.

In this beginner guide, we’ll cover a handful of the themes and synergies that define the Domain, along with some examples. Of course, keep in mind that this is only one half of the equation, as you’ll always have two Domains at your disposal when you start building decks!

Conquer

Assault is a prevalent keyword among Fury units, putting an emphasis on attacking and conquering as opposed to defending and Holding. Some cards even have unique effects that trigger whenever you conquer a battlefield.  

Vayne, Hunter is a great example of this. As a 4-Energy/1-Power cost unit with 2-Might, Vayne, Hunter is definitely not built for defending. However, Assault-3 makes her a solid attacker, and the “when I conquer” ability allows you to safely return her to hand.

Kai'Sa, Survivor and Tryndamere, Barbarian also reward you for conquering. In the case of Kai'Sa you get card draw, making it easier to press your advantage. As for Tryndamere, Barbarian, you actually get a chance at scoring extra points! While you do need to have enough Might to meet the excess damage threshold, Fury certainly has ways to close the gap (ex. Assault, damage spells).

Captain Farron is another unit that encourages going on the offensive. Standalone you get a respectable 5-Might for 4E/1P, but what’s even better is the board-wide Assault passive it provides. It’s a great way to bolster your units, making it easier to challenge stronger foes.

Lastly, having access to units with Accelerate/Ready effects makes it easy to jump into the fray as soon as possible. After all, Kai'Sa, Survivor's card draw effect becomes much more reliable when she can make her move immediately.

Discard

While discarding cards is generally less than desirable for most players, there can be certain advantages to doing so. At a baseline, the drawback of discarding often comes with the benefit of speed and power.

Let’s look at Chemtech Enforcer. For only 2-Energy you effectively get a 4-Might attacker, which is double the norm in terms of cost to stats. This can create an immediate advantage, as the opponent won’t likely be able to match you without making sacrifices of their own.

This of course doesn’t come free, as continuing to discard cards will eventually run you out of resources. However, when you build a deck with this in mind, there are effective ways to almost mitigate the downside entirely.

For starters, playing the Chemtech Enforcer as the last card in your hand simply avoids the issue. You can’t discard what you don’t have. And while it’s generally not ideal to have zero cards in hand, It’s a whole different story if you’re playing Loose Cannon.

As for optimizing discard with a full hand, the best case is to discard specific cards that actually reference being discarded. Flame Chompers says “When you discard me, you may pay (Fury) to play me.”, allowing you to still get the value out of the card, and at a discounted cost!

While these types of effects are the clear winners, you can also justify discarding when it triggers other abilities like Raging Soul. Granting a temporary stat increase and/or keyword can sometimes be worth losing a card, especially if it puts you ahead on tempo.

You may also find other cards that don’t mind being discarded for their own reason. In the case of Super Mega Death Rocket! (Jinx exclusive), you can likely get away with tossing it in the Trash, knowing there’ll be opportunities to bring it right back later.

Overall, it’s about making the most of what you’re given. Things won’t always line up accordingly, but knowing the tools that are available will help lead to a smoother experience.

Legion

Continuing with Fury’s trend of aggression, another keyword that helps you press your advantage is Legion. This is a very easy condition to fulfill, especially when you have multiple low cost cards. Play more than one card in a turn, then reap the rewards. What’s not to like?

Noxus Hopeful is a prime example, effectively functioning as a 2-cost 4-Might unit with no drawback. It’s quite the contrast to the aforementioned Chemtech Enforcer, who not only discards, but also only benefits while attacking (only 2-Might without Assault-2).

Of course Chemtech Enforcer's use case is alongside other discard synergies, but even still, this is a good example of Legion’s raw strength. Let’s look at a couple others.

Dangerous Duo's Legion trigger provides a useful on-play Might increase, great for pushing tempo while establishing more on board. Scrapyard Champion offers solid filtering, but can even become an excellent “draw 2” if it’s the last card in hand.

Legion is all-around excellent. While the options are still limited given the small card pool, there’ll surely be future additions that make it even better. Even without new Legion cards, the more 0-cost and 1-cost cards that get printed, the more efficient the strategy becomes!

Here we’ll briefly highlight a few key cards you can expect to see in your games. Keeping these in mind is important for recognizing what your opponent may have, giving you the opportunity to prepare and play around it!

Cleave: 1-Energy for 3-Might is a very good rate, and always represents a sizable swing (while attacking) even with few resources available.

Hextech Ray: 1E/1P for 3 damage is excellent. It’ll almost always trade-up in terms of card advantage, letting you pick off units with little investment.

Void Seeker: Combining “draw 1” with removal makes this a premium choice. Plus, four damage hits a solid breakpoint for handling many important units (including Champions).

Falling Star: Dealing 3 damage to a unit twice for 2-Energy is absurd, even with the high cost of 2-Power. While it can’t be played during showdowns, its hyper efficiency can drastically swing the tempo of the game.

Shakedown: While the defending player does have control over what happens, having to agree to give the opponent more cards never feels good. It’s a rough choice, because 6 damage for 2E/1P is a lot.