Opening Riftbound Unleashed packs feels even better than Magic: The Gathering

I’ve opened thousands of Magic: The Gathering booster packs in my lifetime, and the process has its own sort of narrative flow: if it’s one of my first packs from a particular set, I’ll go slowly, reading each card so I can assess its strength. If I already have a lot of cards from that set, I’ll usually skim through to the last few to check out the rarest cards in the pack. Unless I’m participating in a draft event, it always feels as if this exercise exists in a vacuum, kind of like pulling the lever on a slot machine so that the fleeting rush of dopamine can hit. Because rest assured, opening booster packs is a form of gambling.

Opening boosters from Riftbound: Unleashed, the third set in the official League of Legendstrading card game out on May 8, feels totally different — and it made me realize that Riftbound just might deliver the most satisfying pack experience of any TCG. Not only do the cards themselves have considerable heft to them, but preconstructed decks also have that neat little perforation in the plastic that makes them that much easier, and more satisfying, to open. More importantly, every time you rip open a pack, you feel like you’re hunting for something.

Image: Riot Games

That thrill of the hunt has everything to do with the structure of the game itself. From a deckbuilding standpoint, you could argue that Riftbound is a lot like Magic’s Commander format. You have your “Legend” that defines your deck’s color identity and overall strategy. It starts on the board in an area similar to the Command Zone alongside your “Chosen Legend” representing the same character. The rest of your 40-card deck ideally includes three copies of that character’s “Signature Spell,” a powerful unique effect that’s cheaper than comparable spells. The rest of your deck often develops organically with other spells, units, gear, and champion units once you’ve established this foundation.

Regardless of whether you’re a League of Legends fan, Riftbound forces you to emotionally attach yourself to a champion first, then sends you hunting for all the missing pieces. Compare that to Magic, where my head spins opening a pack figuring out which of my dozen or so potential Commander decks a card might work in — or if I should just slot it into a deck for a totally different format. Because Magic has always focused on the mechanical value of a card first, the process feels more emotionally detached, whereas Pokémon, Lorcana, Riftbound, and even that new Cyberpunk TCG all lean heavily into the connections we have with characters. But Riftbound alone makes it the entire point of the game, achieving an idealizing midpoint between emotional attachment to characters and mechanical value.

Not every Riftbound pack is going to have a legend, champion unit, and/or signature spell, either. So actually finding one of those three feels like a huge win. Across 32 packs of Unleashed that I opened, I only found three signature spells in total. Somehow, those included Pyke’s Death from Above, but I only got the Pyke – Dockside Butcher champion unit and no Pyke legend. Then, bafflingly enough, I pulled two copies of Poppy’s Keeper’s Verdict signature spell, along with a champion unit but no legend. Womp womp. While that means I can’t build a deck out of these yet, it leaves me with just enough dissatisfaction that I might wind up buying the cards I need as singles or going for more Unleashed packs. Always leave them wanting more, right?

That said, I did manage to collect a Lillia – Bashful Bloom legend and two different champion unit versions of the character, both of which lean into creating sprite unit tokens and temporary units. I also pulled two copies of LeBlanc – Deceiver, widely regarded as the best legend in the set, along with two copies of the champion unit LeBlanc – Fragmented.

Back in April, I had the pleasure of playing the Vi-themed preconstructed Unleashed deck against set design lead Jon Moormann at PAX East 2026 in Boston. I suspect he let me win, considering his Vex deck had some devious tricks, but I was able to muscle through using Vi – Hotheaded as my champion unit. She has a powerful ability that doubles her might for one turn at a cost of two energy and one red rune. While the effect is temporary, it allows for huge bursts of damage. And the Vi – Piltover Enforcer legend allows you to exhaust her every time you assign three or more excess damage to ready a unit. It’s a straightforward but effective combo. (I also pulled a second copy of Vi – Hotheaded from the booster packs that’s going right in the deck.)

Even though Pyke’s signature spell will go to waste for now, I can still slot the champion unit into the Vi deck since he’s red. Similarly, my copy of Poppy – Paragon can go into any orange deck. Perhaps one I build with probably my single best pull overall: the red-orange Rengar – Pridestalker.

Image: Riot Games

For now, my next course of action will be building out LeBlanc and Lillia decks, being careful as to which of them gets all my best blue cards — since the former is blue-yellow and the latter is green-blue. Then I’ll probably move on to Rengar since I also have some older Rengar cards that can fit nicely into the overall strategy.

Riot has effectively transformed booster packs into character progression systems. A single LeBlanc pull isn’t just a strong card. It’s the start of a deck. A second copy feels meaningful. A matching signature spell feels like a breakthrough. Even the misses create momentum, because every partial package quietly nudges you toward the next purchase, trade, or deckbuilding experiment.