Keyword practice, part 1: Vision, Flow, Show Off and Empower

Four keywords change how or when you get an effect, and each one is a shorthand for something longer. Learning what the shorthand expands to is the whole skill, because every question about these keywords is a question about the expansion.

Vision is short for "When this is played, Predict" (rule 817.1.b). It is a triggered ability on permanents, so gear can have it as well as units, and the trigger is the permanent entering the board (rule 817.1.a and rule 817.1.c). To Predict is to look at the top card of your Main Deck and choose whether to recycle it (rule 437.1). A card can have several instances of Vision, whether printed or granted, and each triggers separately. You choose whether to recycle for each one, and if you decline and nothing else happens in between, each instance sees the same card (rule 817.2, rule 817.2.a and rule 817.2.b).

Flow is the one that people misplay. It is short for "You may play this from your trash for its flow cost. Then banish it" (rule 829.1.b). The flow cost is an alternate cost that replaces the spell's base cost, so you pay it instead of, never on top of, the printed cost (rule 829.1.c.1). Flow changes where you may play the spell from and nothing else, so the spell still needs its usual timing (rule 829.1.b.2). The banishing is a delayed replacement effect. If a spell played this way would leave the chain after becoming a finalized chain item, and its own execution did not tell it to leave, it is banished instead (rule 829.1.b.1). That includes being countered.

Show Off (new in the October 2026 rules) is a choice you make while you play the card. As you play it, you may reveal the named object from your hand, pick it from among your friendly objects on the board, or build a set from both (rule 832.1.c and rule 832.1.c.3). The controller of the chain item decides during finalization, not on resolution (rule 832.1.c.2). Later text such as "if you showed off" is linked to that decision, and information about the object is read when it is shown off, so changes afterwards are not considered (rule 832.1.c.1 and rule 832.1.d.1). If the shown-off object leaves while you finalize, the card can still be finalized (rule 832.1.c.4). A facedown card cannot be shown off for what is on its front, such as having Hidden, because its front-side information cannot be referenced while it is facedown (rule 811.5.a and rule 129.4).

Empower is an activated ability that reads like "[Cost]: Empower this. Play only if not Empowered" (rule 827.1.c.1). Empowered is a binary state, so an object that is already Empowered cannot be Empowered again, unless something grants permission to be Empowered several times (rule 442.1.a, rule 442.1.b and rule 442.1.c.1). The Empowered keyword is a dependent keyword. Text after it is inactive until the object is Empowered, and a trigger such as "When I become Empowered" fires when the object becomes Empowered (rule 828.1.b.1, rule 828.1.c and rule 828.1.d). Disempowering removes the status, so a later Empower is a new event (rule 443.1).

Here is a worked example. You control Gemcraft Seer, which gives your other units Vision, and you play Jeweled Colossus, which has Vision of its own. The Colossus now has two instances of Vision, so you Predict twice. If you decline to recycle the first card, the second sees that same card.