Jarvan IV, Martial Paragon: Deploy gear can fire in showdowns
Jarvan IV finally has his Radiance champion unit, and it is called Martial Paragon (RAD 091/167). It costs 4 Energy, has 4 Might, and does something no other card in the set has done so far: it lets your Deploy gear be played outside your own turn. The preview surfaced on r/riftboundtcg on October 1, posted by u/nic_bolas. It is a photo of the English print, and as we write Riot has not published the card on playriftbound.com.
The cardWhat it does, in plain words
There are two lines of text. The first: «Your gear with Deploy have Action. (They can be played on your turn or in showdowns.)». The second: «When I conquer, if there is a friendly gear with Deploy here, channel 1 rune exhausted.». At the bottom sits the flavour line, «We shall rest when we are dead!», and the artist credit, JunHuan.
The first line is the one that matters. Deploy gear are equipment that goes onto a battlefield instead of onto a unit, and until now they could only be played on your own turn: you put one down, passed, and hoped it mattered. With Jarvan IV on the board they turn into answers. You hold them, wait for the attack, and drop them inside the showdown, once you know where the reinforcement needs to go. Not a bump in numbers, a change of timing.
The second line pays off the long game: if Jarvan conquers a battlefield where you already hold a Deploy gear, you channel a rune exhausted. Small, but free, and it repeats.
| Champion unit | The champion's unit card. You play it from hand like any other unit, but only one copy can be on the board. |
| Gear | An equipment card. It stays in play and gives an ongoing effect, instead of doing one thing and going to the discard pile. |
| Deploy | The gear can only be played onto a battlefield, not onto a unit. In exchange, if your opponent manages to hold that battlefield, the gear dies. |
| Action | «Play it on your turn or in showdowns»: in other words, also when the turn is not yours. |
| Showdown | The fight over a battlefield: the window where both players answer each other before anyone counts who wins. The winner «conquers» it. |
| Channel a rune | Take a rune from your rune deck and add it to your resources. «Exhausted» means it arrives tapped sideways, so you use it from the next turn. |
The fitWith the legend it becomes movement
The missing piece is the legend. The Jarvan IV legend already in our grid (RAD 176/167, the Overnumber «Exemplar of Demacia», also unconfirmed by Riot) reads: when you play a gear with Deploy, you may exhaust the legend and pay 1 Energy to move a friendly unit to that battlefield. Together: your opponent attacks a location they thought was empty, you drop the gear inside the showdown, and the legend teleports a defender into it. That is the «flag and drag» the thread's commenters were hoping for.
Those same comments name the catch, fairly: everything depends on how many Deploy gear the set prints. Our grid holds four so far and none is a bomb: Banner of Conquest (002/167), Blossoming Dreamroot (024/167), Concert Poster (116/167) and Dockside Lock-Up. Without a gear worth a turn on its own, Jarvan is a 4/4 with elegant text.
RAD 091/167
Champion unit, Jarvan IV and Demacia subtypes, 4 Energy and 4 Might. Art by JunHuan, English print.
The third piece
With the 176/167 legend and the signature spell already previewed, Jarvan IV now has all three cards uncovered.
Why it matters to us. Radiance lands on October 23, and Italy will play it in English packs, with the first tables at the in-store Pre-Rift events from October 16 to 22. Anyone already planning what to bring has one more reason to watch the gear: if Jarvan IV holds up, it will not be because of the 4/4, but because of how many cards the set hands him to play on the opponent's turn. Preview season ends on October 9, so we will know by then whether the Deploy gear are enough.
The short version
- Jarvan IV, Martial Paragon (RAD 091/167) is a 4 Energy, 4 Might champion unit, posted to r/riftboundtcg on October 1.
- It gives your Deploy gear Action, so they can be played during showdowns — something no card allowed before.
- When it conquers a battlefield where you hold a Deploy gear, it channels 1 rune exhausted.
- The preview comes from the community: Riot has not put the card on the official site yet.
Source: r/riftboundtcg (post by u/nic_bolas). Set dates: playriftbound.com. Images: Riot Games.
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