Should you open boosters or get single cards?

The cards of Riftbound: the League of Legends trading card game reach players in two main ways. A booster pack gives you random cards from one set. A single card is one particular card that you pick and get on its own, from a game store, an online marketplace or another player. Which way suits you depends on what the cards are for: a deck you already have in mind, a set you want to complete or a Sealed evening with friends.

Most players use both, and the numbers below show why a deck usually gets finished with single cards.

What does a box of booster packs really give you?

A booster display of 24 packs gives you many copies of the common cards and very few of any one rare card. Every pack holds seven Commons, three Uncommons, two cards of Rare or better, one foil card and one rune or token, spread over a whole set. Origins, the first set, has 82 different Commons apart from its runes, 84 Uncommons, 84 Rares and 42 Epics. Riot's article on collectability puts an Epic in about one Origins pack in four, so a display holds about six Epics, and Rares fill most of the other rare slots.

A display therefore covers the Commons of Origins about twice over, while one particular Epic is missing from about six displays in seven. Spiritforged, Unleashed and Vendetta have fewer Epics than Origins, 27 to 38 against 42, and the same slots in their packs. One particular Epic of those sets therefore turns up a little more often, but still only about once in five or six displays at the Origins rate, which Riot has not confirmed for them.

Why are single cards the quicker way to finish a deck?

Single cards are quicker because a deck needs particular cards in particular numbers, and packs only give averages. A deck may hold up to three copies of a card with the same name (Core Rules 103.3.b), and Riot's deckbuilding primer advises three copies of a deck's signature card unless you have a good reason to play fewer.

A Champion Deck, the ready-made deck of one champion, shows what that means. The Origins Champion Deck: Jinx is led by Loose Cannon, the Jinx Legend. It holds one copy of its chosen champion, Jinx, Demolitionist, a Rare, and no copy of her signature spell Super Mega Death Rocket!, an Epic that deals 5 to a unit and that you can return from your trash to your hand by discarding a card when you conquer.

At about one copy in seven displays, three copies of Super Mega Death Rocket! take about 21 displays on average. That is 504 packs, with a combined launch price of about $2,520. As single cards, they are three cards to pick, and one copy sells for $2.64 today. Two more copies of Jinx, Demolitionist take about four displays in the same way, while one copy sells for $0.28 today. Packs fill a deck with Commons and Uncommons quickly, but they are a poor way to find the few cards a deck is built around.

Do booster packs save money on a deck?

Opening packs rarely saves money on a deck. A deck is a list of named cards, and a pack holds 14 cards picked at random from a whole set, so a player who opens packs for one deck pays for many cards that the deck does not use. Today the 56 cards of the Origins Champion Deck: Jinx bought one by one come to $8.33, and a single Origins booster pack sells for $12.70.

The cards you open and do not need can still be traded, kept for the next deck or added to a collection. What a pack holds is lopsided, though: the rarest printings lift the average value of a pack, but most packs hold none of them, so a typical pack is worth less than the average one, as the article on what a booster pack is worth on average works out.

When is opening booster packs the better choice?

Booster packs are the better choice whenever the opening itself is the point.

• Sealed and Draft. In Sealed, each player opens six packs and builds a deck from them. In Draft, each player opens three packs, and the players take one card at a time and pass the rest around the table (Tournament Rules 602.4.a.1 and 602.4.b.1). These decks may only use the cards handed out at the event, apart from basic runes (rules 602.1.a.1 and 602.1.a.2). At a Pre-Rift event, each player gets a kit with a small ready-made deck of 15 cards, five booster packs of the new set and a promo card.
• Starting a collection of a set. An Origins display gives about two copies of each Common and just under one of each Uncommon on average, a quick base for someone who wants the whole set. The last Rares and Epics then come sooner as single cards, as the article on completing a set shows.
• The fun of opening. By Riot's Origins rates, an alternate art card turns up in about one pack in 12 and an overnumbered card in about one pack in 72, as the article on pull rates sets out. Treat that chase as entertainment with a budget you are happy to spend, and get the cards your deck needs another way.

What should you know before you get single cards?

Single cards come from local game stores, from online marketplaces such as TCGplayer in the United States, Cardmarket in Europe and CardTrader on both sides of the Atlantic, and from trades with other players at store events. Four things are worth knowing first.

• The printing. Alternate art, overnumbered and signed printings play exactly like the standard card and count toward the same three copies, so a player who only wants to play the card can take whichever printing sells for less.
• The language. Official cards of any language are allowed in a deck at events (Tournament Rules 420.1), so a copy in a language you can read is as good as any other, and the price of a Chinese or French copy differs from card to card and from one country to the next.
• Real cards only. Home-made stand-ins, called proxies, are not allowed at events of any level (Tournament Rules 419.2), apart from an official proxy that the head judge issues to replace a card that cannot be used.
• Runes. A Rune Deck holds 12 runes (Core Rules 103.4.a), and a booster pack holds one rune at most. A Champion Deck comes with its 12 runes, and a Vault, with a launch price of $34.99, holds 36 basic runes, six of each domain, beside six booster packs.

The cards below show two cards in two printings each: the Epic Jinx, Rebel and her alternate art printing Jinx, Rebel, then the Origins Epic Seal of Rage and its overnumbered printing from Spiritforged, Seal of Rage. In a deck, each pair plays the same. Today the Epic Jinx, Rebel sells for $2.79 and her alternate art printing for $3.53, and the Epic Seal of Rage sells for $22.93 and its overnumbered printing for $66.33.

What is a good way to combine boosters and single cards?

For most players the best plan lets each do what it does well. Start from a ready-made deck, such as a Champion Deck with a launch price of $19.99, so you can play from the first day. Choose the deck you want next, look it up among the shared decks and get the cards it still lacks as singles. Open packs for Sealed, Draft and Pre-Rift events, for a set you collect and for the fun of it.

With an account, add the cards you own to your collection: the page of any deck then says how many cards you still need and about what they cost. To see what the packs of each set tend to hold, you can rip a pack on this site. A booster display holds 336 cards for certain but few of any one rare card, so whether a booster display is worth it depends on whether you want the whole box for a set or for Sealed. A strong deck on a budget starts from a ready-made deck and adds only the few Rares and Epics it plays, as the article on building a strong deck on a budget shows.