In this Fall’s Wilds of Eldraine, Magic: The Gathering is returning to the plane of Eldraine, a world of monumental quests and a tenuous relationship between the various realms and the magical beings of the forests surrounding them.
Don’t miss our coverage of today’s Wilds of Eldraine previews, Commander decks of Wilds of Eldraine, plus Universes Within versions of The Walking Dead cards and six cards from the Enchanting Tales bonus sheet will be banned in Historic.
The last time players visited Eldraine, Magic introduced several new mechanics that became incredibly popular among players, two of which return in Wilds of Eldraine. The first is Adventures, unique split cards that gave players a choice between casting the instant or sorcery (the Adventure) or the creature portion of the card (which could also be played after casting the Adventure). The second are Food tokens—special artifact tokens representing tasty dinners, snacks, and other meals that players could sacrifice to gain three life.
Three new mechanics are making their debut in Wilds of Eldraine: Roles, Bargain, and Celebration. These mechanics promise unique gameplay scenarios, letting you set the stage for how you want your game to go—and if you don’t like the direction of the show, sacrifice those creatures for extra effects.
Roles
Roles is an incredibly flavorful mechanic that puts players in the role of director, turning the battlefield into a stage and letting them direct the flow of battle with enchantment tokens. There are seven Roles players can distribute: Cursed, Monster, Royal, Sorcerer, Virtuous, Wicked, Young Hero. Each Role comes with unique abilities and will modify your creature in different ways.
- Cursed: Enchanted creature is 1/1
- Monster: Enchanted creature gets +1/+1 and has trample.
- Royal: Enchanted creature gets +1/+1 and has ward 1.
- Sorcerer: Enchanted creature gets +1/+1 and has “Whenever this creature attacks, scry 1.”
- Virtuous: Enchanted creature gets +1/+1 for each enchantment you control.
- Wicked: Enchanted creature gets +1/+1. When this Aura is put into the graveyard, each opponent loses one life.
- Young Hero: Enchanted creature has “Whenever this creature attacks, if its toughness is 3 or less, put a +1/+1 counter on it.”
Six of the seven Roles.
Creatures can only have one role on them at a time, which makes sense given how you rarely will find the same actor playing multiple roles.
Roles can be created from spells or from a creature’s abilities and can generally be attached to any creature. Each card will designate what role it is creating, so you don’t get to pick and choose what Role you’ll get but each card will tell you what type of role it is distributing.
Bargain
Bargain is functionally similar to the Exploit mechanic from Dragons of Tarkir but with a few twists to help it fit in the world of Eldraine. To bargain a spell, you can sacrifice an artifact, enchantment, or a token when casting it. When you do, you get to resolve the bargain portion of the spell.
Let’s take a look at the new mythic rare sorcery, Beseech the Mirror. This spell lets you search your library for a card, exile it face down, and then put it into your hand. However, if you pay the bargain cost, you get to cast that spell for free if that card’s mana value is four or less. By paying the bargain cost, you get a situational two-for-one for any situation.
Since Wilds of Eldraine is filled with enchantment tokens from Roles and artifact tokens from Foods, Bargain has plenty of potential to give players an edge in their matches.
Celebration
Celebration is a quirky new mechanic that cares about dropping multiple permanents onto the battlefield in a turn. If you have two or more nonland permanents enter the battlefield this turn, you get to resolve the Celebration trigger. For cards like Ash, Party Crasher, triggering her celebration ability will put a +1/+1 counter on her when she attacks.
So long as those permanents are nonlands celebration doesn’t care if they’re tokens, creatures, or any other permanent types. Players should expect Celebration to do particularly well in token-based decks, where you can generally create multiple tokens in a turn.
Adventure
Adventures make a return to Magic in Wilds of Eldraine—but with a twist. The first major change coming to Adventures is that Wilds of Eldraine will have multicolored Adventure cards, with spells requiring different mana color commitments for the creature and the adventure. One of the main characters from the Wilds of Eldraine story is Kellan, the Fae-Blooded whose adventure is Birthright Boon.
Birthright Boon is a White adventure that lets you tutor for an enchantment or an aura card, reveal it, and put it in your hand. It then exiles itself upon resolution. You can then cast Kellan, the Fae-Blooded from exile for just three mana, giving you a 2/2 with double strike and giving other creatures you control +1/+0 for each aura and equipment attached to Kellan. (You can of course skip the adventure, if you wish, and simply cast Kellan from your hand.)
Decadent Dragon (and its adventure, Expensive Taste) is another card that is almost guaranteed to be a powerhouse in Constructed formats, is. The Adventure, Expensive Taste, exiles the top two cards of your opponent’s library face down, letting you play those cards so long as they’re exiled. While you still have to pay specific color costs for those cards, Decadent Dragon helps you generate any color of mana by being a 4/4 Dragon with flying and trample that also creates a Treasure token when it attacks.
Food Tokens
The highly synergistic Food tokens are coming back in Wilds of Eldraine, with no better example than Gretta, Sweettooth Scourge. This Green and Black creature is an uncommon legendary creature for just three mana, providing you with both a 3/3 creature and a Food token when it enters the battlefield.
Gretta also comes with two Food-related activated abilities. The first lets you pay one Green mana and sacrifice a Food token to put a +1/+1 counter on any creature, though you can only do it at sorcery speed. Her second ability lets you pay one generic and one Black mana to sacrifice a Food token to draw a card and lose one life. With a reliable way to produce Food tokens, you’ll have a draw engine and a way to heal back up after you’ve taken a good amount of damage.
Synergies and Cycles
There are more returning cycles in Wilds of Eldraine, including the return of Sagas, as well as heroic and villainous legendary creature cycles that have become synonymous with the plane of Eldraine.
Sagas
Only one Saga has been revealed so far, but it’s a fun take on the classic nursery rhyme Three Blind Mice. The first chapter creates a 1/1 Mouse creature token, while the next two chapters create copies of any of your tokens. The final chapter gives your creatures +1/+1 and vigilance for the turn, giving you a powerful anthem effect on all your creatures.
Legendary Creature Cycles
With all sorts of knights, villains, heroes, and monsters on Eldraine, it should come as no surprise that tons of legendary creatures are front and center in the set. There are at least two multicolored cycles in the Wilds of Eldraine, one at uncommon and one at mythic rare. These cards make use of the various themes in the set like enchantments, adventures, and more.
I’m a particular fan of Johann, Apprentice Sorcerer for its nod to “The Sorcerer’s Apprentice” from Disney’s Fantasia.
Don’t miss our coverage of today’s Wilds of Eldraine previews and Commander decks of Wilds of Eldraine.