New Noxus cards in Legends of Runeterra emphasize effect damage

Riot Games revealed five new Legends of Runeterra cards in today’s Noxus card announcements. With the reveal of the next Noxus champion, Swain, Riot continues to push Noxus’ identity of hitting the enemy Nexus hard and fast.

While the region didn’t gain any new keywords, these cards return to the more fundamental basics with Fearsome and Overwhelm.

Imperial Demolitionist is a two-cost, two power, three health unit with a skill that allows her to deal one damage to an allied unit to deal two to the enemy Nexus. Besides the obvious synergy with Swain, Imperial Demolitionist also has some combo potential with the Crimson Gang in Noxus and the Scar synergy cards in Freljord.

Citybreaker is a four-cost, zero power, five health unit with an ability that occurs at the start of each round that inflicts one damage to the enemy Nexus. While the lack of combat stats is concerning, this card has potential with the recently-revealed Sejuani by having a guaranteed round where you have credit toward leveling her up.

In a similar fashion, The Leviathan is an eight-cost, five power, eight health unity with Overwhelm, a Play effect that draws Swain, and a Round Start ability that deals one damage to the enemy Nexus three times. While the three concussive hits look weird at first glance, it has deadly potential with Swain when he reaches his leveled form. The Leviathan procs Swain’s stun effect three separate times, thus granting your units safe passage to the enemy Nexus. Since The Leviathan also guarantees you a drawn Swain, expect to see this combo as a curve-topper for Noxus-based decks.

Ravenous Flock is a one-cost fast spell that deals four damage to a unit if it’s damaged or stunned. While four damage is a lot, the condition for activating it is a little steep against lower-cost enemy units. But this card can quickly enable Swain to reach his leveled form since it’s a quarter of what’s necessary to achieve 12 non-combat damage.

Noxain Fervor is another three-cost fast spell that deals three damage to an allied unit to deal three damage to anything. While the cost may look drastic at first, this card can be comparable to the Shadow Isles’ Black Spear with an altered condition to activate it. The cost also serves as a strong reward since dealing damage to your own unit counts as non-combat damage toward leveling up Swain. This means that this one card can serve as half of Swain’s level-up condition on its own.

These new cards will be in LoR when the game officially releases for PC and mobile on April 30.