August 2026 State of the Game

A Note From the Editor

Hello Riftbounders and welcome to the second Riftbound State of the Game. After our first State of the Game this year, I immediately began work for this one. We intend to publish these twice a year, usually around February and August. The Spring edition will generally focus on the year ahead, whereas the Fall edition is when we begin turning toward the next year.

One of the things I’ve been focused on this year with Riftbound is building routines, predictable content schedules, and more ways you get to hear from us. Good communication is an active skill and not something that is passive, so I’m trying to build the processes which keep the connections between us and the community alive and open. It’s still a work in progress, but I see the State of the Game moments as two key pieces of that schedule going forward for the game. 

Alongside this article, we also have a “Looking Ahead for 2026 and 2027” product rundown, which looks at products and future Riftbound sets from this year and gives a high-level overview at the booster sets planned through 2027. 

Tomorrow we’re discussing our plans for Organized Play in 2027 and also giving details about the European Regional Championship. And then finally on Wednesday we’ll have the Roadmap article update and also an update for Creators going into 2027.

Before I sign off, I want to thank the community. Riftbound’s first year has been a lot of fun to work on and we’re so excited to continue building this game with you all. A big part of doing that is the conversations we have with you all, whether online, or in person at events. Many of today’s questions were pulled from the community’s submissions when we asked for them on social media.

The Riftbound community is something special, whether it’s the amazing previews our community produces, the regional communities such as we have seen in Poland, the community creations such as #Liftbound, our judge community’s growth, or the welcoming nature we hear about over and over as players venture out to events and find themselves welcomed with open arms. Thank you.

Cheers,
Trick Jarrett, Riftbound Editor-in-Chief

Now, without further ado. For today’s State of the Game we have:

• Chengran Chai, Executive Producer
• Dave Guskin, Game Director
• Nik Davidson, Design Director

Let’s start out hearing from Dave and Chengran on the state of Riftbound and its first year:

Q: What is going well for Riftbound?

Dave:

It’s safe to say that Riftbound has succeeded after its launch globally last year - we have a thriving competitive scene, players are hyped about new sets, and they’re engaged in discussions of sweet new decks for new Legends. The meta for Unleashed was one of our best yet, and there’s a lot of excitement for truly collectible stuff like the Ultimate Baron, the upcoming T1 bundle, plated Legends, and more.

Chengran:

In addition to the areas that Dave covered I’d say that Riftbound’s community has been one of the highlights for me. We’ve seen a tremendous outpouring of support from the newly formed Riftbound community. They're doing all sorts of amazing things, from making creative content for every reveal season to supporting each other by giving cards to new players, whether it's at their local game store or at the Regionals.

Q: What are the biggest learnings for Riftbound since launch?

Dave:

It’s never great to have to ban cards, and we saw with Spiritforged and the evolution of the meta there that Miracle decks and Draven were both powerful in a pretty distorting way. I don’t regret making powerful things - we want you all to have cool stuff to experiment with! But as we learn the nuances of making Riftbound (which is something we are doing right alongside you all, our extremely intelligent players) we’ve learned there’s still room to grow in how we approach designing the six domains and gauging the true power of certain game mechanics. Additionally, we are learning how and when to use powerful mechanics and cards across our sets.

The other big area of learning for our team has been in the precision of our rules and card text. Riftbound is attracting a diverse group of players with different backgrounds. This is really awesome and exciting, but it also has made clear that there is still work to be done to make the game accessible to the newest Riftbounders. 

We’ve realized some of the challenges our game rules approach has created and have already taken some strides (well, already taken in the future… time for TCG design is weird) to continue improving clarity and learnability of the game. More on that below!

[Editor’s note: In fairness to Dave, he wanted to use what other languages call the “future perfect tense” which English doesn’t really support cleanly.]

Chengran:

Details matter a lot! TCGs are complex projects with many teams and partners working on them. We need to execute a lot of things perfectly to deliver a game that meets both our expectations and those of our players. As we’ve made clear, we are approaching Riftbound with a growth mindset focused on learning and improving going forward. You’ll find a number of things discussed in this article, as well as in other State of the Game articles, referring to changes and improvements we’re making for the future, as well as improvements we’ve already made but which haven’t come out yet. Whether we’re talking about the game’s design, the rules, our events, or our art - we are constantly pushing to improve on each successive iteration. We are constantly refining and improving our processes, whether internal or external, to ensure that we can meet our own high expectations and those that Riftbounders have for us.

Now onto questions from you all.

Q: When will Riftbound introduce [insert favorite champion]?

Dave:

One day!

That’s the answer I always give to questions like this. The universe of League of Legends - and the cool extensions we get to do with it in Riftbound - is vast, so there’s a lot to explore, and one of the things we are always looking out for is how and when to incorporate all of the remaining Champions from League into upcoming sets  where it makes sense to.

What does that mean? We evaluate whether a champion is good for a set on a few axes:

• Does it fit with the theme? Some champions might be less popular, but are a great fit for a particular set’s theme and existing lineup.
• Does it let us tell cool stories or explore cool relationships?
• Do the mechanics of that champion align with the mechanical identity of the set?

The best fits are ones that check all of these boxes, but we’re also always looking for oddballs that help fill a puzzle-piece shaped hole in a set’s themes or mechanics.

Q: Will Riftbound continue being so reactive to player feedback as it grows?

Dave:

YES. Full stop. 

We are building this game WITH you. And, sometimes, that feels strange. After all, aren’t we making a game for you to play? Well, yes, but we believe the strongest version of Riftbound is the one where we listen carefully to our players and integrate their feedback and experiences.  In return, we will always try to clearly communicate as we improve our process and learn lessons we apply to the game in the future. Building this game together with the community is vitally important to us.

We care a lot about Riftbound - we all play it, we’re all long-time TCG fans and veterans, and we want the game to be the best it can be. I share this to make clear that we share the same mission as all of you and together we think we will continue to iterate and improve toward what looks to be a really bright future for Riftbound.

Q: Riftbound has been out for a year, how has the team changed? What does the Riftbound team look like now?

Chengran:

In short, bigger than a year ago! Since we’ve launched the game, we’ve added many more critical roles to the team, including our Creative Director Brice, Art Director Allen, and Publishing Director Rachel, to just name a few. Some of the things they do are very visible and you’ve already seen them with the recent product reveals. We can’t wait to share the other cool things we’ve been able to do with the expanded team for our future sets.

While the team has gotten bigger, one thing that hasn't changed is our vision for the game - we want to build lifelong communities for our players through the unforgettable moments the gameplay creates, and immortalize the memories of the League of Legends universe. Every member of the Riftbound team contributes to that goal and we’re excited for all the things we have in store for you!

Q: What is Riftbound doing to make the game rules more accessible?

Dave:

My first draft of an answer to this question began diving into the details of what we’re updating in our templating for Set 6 until Trick, our Editor-in-Chief, told me that that was covered in depth in today’s Products and Sets into 2027 article. Definitely go see those changes coming in Legacy if you haven’t yet.

At a philosophical level, when we created Riftbound, one design decision we made was to limit the amount of special language a new player would need to know to read and understand a card. Every set, by their nature, increases the complexity of our game. The new complexities add new keywords as well as introduce or expose areas of the rules which need attention to smooth out or refine.

You all have seen the work we’ve been doing for the rules. It has been a lot, but that’s because we want to make these changes as fast as possible and see fewer of them happening in the future.

In addition to the work improving the rules of the game, our Publishing team is working to continue to improve our rules documents, their availability, and the process they go out to our community. We shifted the rules introduction dates for Vendetta based on feedback from the community who wanted more time between the rules being announced and them being in effect.

All of these things combine to make our game more accessible for new players.

Q: We’ve now had bans for two consecutive sets, will this continue?

Dave:

Our philosophy isn’t changing. We will continue to ban cards which we see as active problems for Riftbound.

We’ve said it before: Riftbound is young. Every game goes through a learning curve as players and designers learn how the game works and what the actual impacts of design decisions are. It’s important for us to design Riftbound and find where the limits are for the power levels and where the problem areas are in the game’s design. Let’s talk about why.

First, it’s important that players have the chance to explore and find cool things to build decks around, and when those things prove to be both powerful and fun, while not being too warping, that’s awesome. To find those things though, we have to push the boundaries. If we don't do this, the game would become stale and unfun. This means players don’t find excitement in exploration and playing and they lose interest. Obviously, that’s bad.

With that, when we design powerful tools there’s always the chance we miss too high on the power level of a card, or overlook a combination of cards. The cost of that is that we ban cards that are too warping to the play experience or the health of the metagame. 

Our promise to you is we’ll always consider ban decisions carefully, doing our own playtesting to identify when there’s a problem. When that happens we’ll be direct in our communication about what we think those problems are, how we think bans will solve it, and provide sufficient time for you as players to adapt to the new meta.

I also want to talk briefly about “infinites” or combos that straight up win the game. Our team’s general philosophy on those has been that we think it’s fun and valuable to have players excited to try combinations like these, so long as they are lower power levels or have interesting counterplay. As you can see from the ban of Stealthy Pursuer with Vendetta, sometimes we think the combo is over the line. But as we’ve said, not every infinite combo is actually problematic. 

In cases where infinite combos aren’t quite powerful enough to ban, we’ll continue to monitor them and let you know if one or more of these end up over the line in the future.

All this to say: Yes, we expect to continue to ban cards. We will try to make it as few as possible. We’ll also consider whether to unban any previously unbanned cards, but we aren’t making any promises.

Q: With Riftbound reusing art from other games, such as Legends of Runeterra, why do you rename cards when using those arts?

Nik:

We have competing desires with art originally made for Legends of Runeterra - we want to honor the work that was done and stay true to it where possible, and we also want to recontextualize that art and make it fresh and interesting for Riftbound players. 

So we sometimes try to have it both ways - we'll sometimes keep a name of a favorite character, like Trevor Snoozebottom or Commander Ledros, but more often we'll try to name a card in such a way that it helps communicate the card’s function for Riftbound, as that’s almost always different than it was for LoR.

Q: How do you think about the balance and design challenges to support 2v2?

Dave:

We have not spent enough time designing for and balancing Riftbound for 2v2 play, to be frank. I would describe what we’ve done so far for 2v2 as “throw a bone toward 2v2” (for example, when we use “friendly” rather than “you control” on some cards). 2v2 is a good example of the partnering that exists between the game team and our community, as the popularity of 2v2 at events has shown us the need to think about it more. Which is to say, the format needs more love and attention from us.

We haven’t talked about it in a while, but in many ways this is similar to the way we’ll support our future and still to-be-named non-rotating format (when Standard and rotation becomes a thing in 2028+): we’ll begin to spend design cycles and playtesting time on 2v2. It probably will never get to the same level we want to provide for 1v1 constructed as our premier competitive format. But we do want 2v2 to end up being in that tier of fun, fair, and balanced, that we hope for the non-rotating format to be, come 2028.

Though, as a final note, I should say that the Champion decks in Set 6 are set up to work very well when played 2v2 out of the box.

Q: How do you think about collectors and players when it comes to Riftbound?

Chengran:

Riftbound is a game first and foremost. And that means we want it to be accessible to players and not something players can’t afford. But we also want to create special collector products for both Riftbound and League. So, that is, we want to serve both groups directly.

Perhaps the easiest way to discuss this is to break our products down into three types: booster sets, ancillary products, and collector's items. 

We’re committed to keeping Booster sets accessible at least as long as they are legal in Standard. This means reprinting them to meet demand and ensure availability.

Ancillary products are ones we design to appeal to smaller audiences within the Riftbound community, or to serve specific needs, such that they are available in stores and can be reprinted should we see the need for it within the community. In response to the high demand we launched reprints for Proving Grounds and also took steps earlier this year to put copies of Flash into the community to try to solve issues caused by that product's limited availability.

For our collector-focused products, like the Worlds Bundle 2025 or the T1 2025 Worlds Champion Signature Edition, these are the sort of thing that is limited edition and that we will not reprint. They are meant to be collector’s items that players cherish.

One final thing I want to be clear about is that we’re going to keep new Riftbound cards in booster packs and not put them in ancillary or collector products. As I said at the start, Riftbound is a game and we want people to be able to play it.

Nik:

Riftbound brings together all kinds of people - players of all levels, League fans, esports fans, Arcane fans, fans of other Riot games. We want to make Riftbound a game and a community where there’s always something for you. Obviously the heart of the game is the game itself. The large majority of our focus is always on new cards, new sets, and creating awesome social and competitive experiences. But we also want ways to commemorate those experiences, celebrate our favorite characters and, frankly, create awesome stuff that people (myself first in line) want to collect.

Some of what we do is experimental, some of what we do is going to be fairly niche. Our goal is to make sure that whoever you are in the Riftbound community, there’s something that’s exciting for you, not that every player feels pressure to pick up every single product we put out there.

Q: With the recent announcement for Korean, what language is Riftbound going to add next?

Chengran:

We’re excited to be bringing Riftbound to a market where there’s strong League affinity and fandom with the Korean launch in September. Plus we're launching the Traditional Chinese edition of Origins on Friday for those regions!

However, that being said, each new language we introduce also brings new logistical and other complexities. We’re going to pause adding any more new languages in the short term while we get the latest languages off the ground for Riftbound.

As always, we will closely monitor player demand globally and identify new opportunities as they arise.

Q: The T1 set has Riftbound’s first serialized cards, should we expect to see serialization in future booster sets?

Nik:

We have no plans to put serialization on cards in booster packs.

T1’s competitive performance over the years is nothing short of legendary, and we wanted to commemorate their 2025 championship with an equally legendary collector’s product. As we designed it, we decided that serializing these cards would be appropriate for an exciting box set. 

We won’t say never. It’s a possibility for the future, but believe me when I say that it’s not something that we will do lightly and without doing our due diligence.

Q: What are you thinking about for the future of Riftbound?

Dave:

I am so, so excited to build the architecture of a game (and a lifestyle, honestly) worthy of the incredible community we have. Some of those things involve more exciting ways to participate and achieve at your local store or with your friend group, and some of those things involve bringing more ways to play in a variety of new ways - in-person at large events, at the release of new products, and yes, digitally. (No, we do not have any announcements, but we are thinking about it.)

I think for me, the shape of the future of Riftbound has these three core pillars:

• Easiest game to bring your friends into, but still super deep and rewarding for long-timers
• Rewarding for fans of the League universe, especially for your main
• Best-in-class synthesis of theme, mechanics, and the boundary between the physical and the digital world

Q: Will we see past set mechanics get support in future sets (XP, Empower, etc.), or will sets be more self-contained and focus on supporting the new mechanics?

Dave:

Both. We won’t hesitate to bring back mechanics if they are the right key to solve a specific problem or need for a future. But we also want to balance that with what’s right for the new set - sometimes that’s an update or cool tweak to an old mechanic, without bringing that mechanic back wholesale.

Some mechanics require a lot of footprint to support in a set (XP being a good example) while others can be on just one or two cards and still function (e.g. Empower). Different sets will have different needs in terms of these two footprint-shapes, and that often determines whether we’ll try an old mechanic in a new set. And then, based on trying it, we can tell whether it’ll be interesting, feel different, and ultimately serve that set’s needs.

For our final question, we put it to the full Riftbound team and here are some of their replies from our internal Slack.

Q: What are your favorite memories from Riftbound’s first year?

This first year for Riftbound has been incredible. Thank you again to our amazing community. We’re so excited to grow this game, watch this community continue to expand and surprise us, and we can’t wait to show you all what we have coming.