Faction is the term for the 5 individual Influence types, and can also refer to the combined 2- and 3-faction alliances. These terms are typically used for flavor and story-building; however, cards in the same faction may share themes of similar keywords and abilities.
Many Keywords are largely or completely restricted to one or more factions. For example, Unblockable is only found on cards that include 
Shadow influence; Stun is mostly limited to 
Justice and 
Primal, although it appears on a few others.
Over time some abilities that were previously tied to a specific faction have bled into other influences' cards. For example, the Warcry skill originally appeared only on 
Fire/Justice Rakano cards in the base set, but began to show up on Shadow cards in The Dusk Road.
Playing games earns you experience in the factions included in your deck; you can then level up in each faction and earn Progression Rewards.
Basic Factions[]
These factions refer to and share the names of the 5 Influence types:
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| Fire | Time | Justice | Primal | Shadow |
The colour wheel[]
The game Magic the Gathering which heavily ispired Eternal is based on five colours arranged in a color pie where colours next to each other are "allied pairs" and the other five pairs are "enemy"; allied colours represent similar philosophies in the game's lore while enemy colours represent conflicts like order vs chaos or life vs death.
The main five factions in Eternal do not have allies or enemies; they're more aligned to the actual colour wheel from the colour theory with yellow 
and purple factions replacing white and black colours, and the order matching one of a rainbow. The factions next to each other on that order have analogous colour schemes and the factions separated by others have their colours form complementary pairs.
Despite ally-enemy distinction not being an established rule in Eternal, a lot of sets and bundles release Power cards in batches of either analogous (adjacent) or complementary (opposite) pairs and triads.
Two-faction Alliances[]
Two faction alliances have been present since the beginning of the game. The names can be found on various cycles of cards, including Banners, Insignia, and the cycle of influence-granting Strangers.
These alliances also have associated descriptive nouns, found on cards including Crests, Seats, and Champions.
| Name | Factions | Noun |
|---|---|---|
| Praxis | Fire/Time |
Impulse |
| Rakano | Fire/Justice |
Glory |
| Skycrag | Fire/Primal |
Fury |
| Stonescar | Fire/Shadow |
Chaos |
| Combrei | Time/Justice |
Progress |
| Elysian | Time/Primal |
Wisdom |
| Xenan | Time/Shadow |
Mystery |
| Hooru | Justice/Primal |
Order |
| Argenport | Justice/Shadow |
Vengeance |
| Feln | Primal/Shadow |
Cunning |
Three-faction Alliances[]
The names of the first five three-faction alliances were revealed in Defiance. Although the names had previously appeared on the original Merchants, they were confirmed as the three-faction alliance names with their appearance on the Cargo and Contraband cycles of spells.
As with two-faction alliances, these also have associated nouns, found on the Token and Display card cycles.
The remaining three-faction alliances first appeared on a cycle of sites in The Flame of Xulta, and gained further support in Echoes of Eternity. Unlike other alliances, their names seem to be the same as the associated nouns; these appear on the Chants, which function similarly to the cargo/contraband cycle from Defiance.
| Name | Factions | Noun |
|---|---|---|
| Jennev | Fire/Time/Primal |
Instinct |
| Ixtun | Fire/Justice/Primal |
Honor |
| Winchest | Fire/Justice/Shadow |
Ambition |
| Kerendon | Time/Justice/Shadow |
Vision |
| Auralian | Time/Primal/Shadow |
Knowledge |
| Creation | Fire/Time/Justice |
Creation |
| Destruction | Fire/Time/Shadow |
Destruction |
| Menace | Fire/Primal/Shadow |
Menace |
| Tradition | Time/Justice/Primal |
Tradition |
| Purpose | Justice/Primal/Shadow |
Purpose |
Other Factions[]
- Neutral (No Influence)
See Also[]
Some themes and unit types appear in multiple (or all) influences, however they are not terms for nor define those influence combinations.