Wizards of the Coast is officially kicking off spoiler season for its next Magic: The Gathering set Edge of Eternities. The space-themed collection packs in new ideas, like Station and Warp, as well as a host of new cards to draft and play.
Alongside all the new cosmic possibilities, there are also quite a few special art treatments and lands to accompany all the Landfall potential in this set. Here’s everything shown off in today’s debut stream.
Reaching the Edge of Eternity
Set on the fringes of the multiverse, the Edge of Eternities set follows numerous storylines: Sami, Wildcat Captain and their crew of misfits; monks worshipping a black hole; and five planets, revolving around the five colors of mana in Magic.
During the preview, the Edge of Eternities team says it got to play with cosmic potential. Planets don’t have to be round, they can be corkscrew-shaped, or broken into shattered pieces. There are returning characters like Tezzeret and returning archetypes like Kavu, Slivers, and Eldrazi. Even the Tarmogoyf gets a Cosmogoyf version. It’s Magic, with a cosmic spin.
Spacecraft and Planets
Announced before today’s stream was Station, one of the new mechanics for Edge of Eternities that revolves around two new subtypes, Spacecraft and Planets. A card can be fed power, and then gain power or effects when it’s been Stationed enough. The Seriema, for example, gives other tapped legendary creatures indestructible when it has enough Station power.
The Infinite Guidline Station, a five-color Legendary Artifact Spacecraft, turns into a 7/15 creature with Flying and gains “Whenever Infinite Guidline Station attacks, draw a card for each multicolored permanent you control” at 12+ Station power.
Spacecraft play a significant role in the new set, even acting as the “face” Commanders for the pre-constructed Commander Decks for Edge of Eternities. This coincides with a ruling change in Commander, allowing Vehicles to act as Commanders.
Landers
Lands play a notable role in this set, and part of that’s tied into the new Lander token. Different cards can create Lander tokens, which are artifacts that can be sacrificed to search for a basic land card and put it into play, tapped.
Not only does this seem like a pretty good option for Landfall decks, but it’ll help put the gorgeous new Land treatments from Edge of Eternities into play faster. More on those further down.
Warp and Void
Warp lets you play it from your hand for warp cost, exile beginning of next end step, then cast it from exile on a later turn. The idea is to get a card into play and have an immediate effect, then exit and come back later. You could get a higher power creature out faster or use an “enters” ability at a crucial time or bank some of that power into a Station.
These stilll play into color identity, though. Timeline Culler, for example, is a two Black mana card with Haste that can be cast from the graveyard for its Warp cost, which is one Black and pay two life. Green, meanwhile, gets the two Green and three colorless mana Eusocial Engineering, an Enchant with a Landfall trigger that generates 2/2 Robots. You could Warp it in early for a quick build-up, then make it stick later.
Void, meanwhile, is a Kicker-esque mechanic that adds extra effect if something happened the turn its card was played. Voidforged Titan, for example, lets you draw a card and lose 1 life if a nonland permanent left the field or a spell was warped on the turn it is played.
Borderless Space
Wizards of the Coast showed off quite a wide variety of cards today, but alongside the base set of new cards, there were numerous special lands and art treatments.
Some of these add new looks to classic lands, like Plains or Mountains, with some special vertical borderless layouts. Several big lands, like Breeding Pool and Sacred Foundry, are also getting new reprints with some nice art.
On top of that, there are Stellar Sights, poster-like treatments, triumphant framings, Japanese showcase art cards, and my personal favorite, the pulp sci-fi special guest cards. The Sliver Overlord variant looks absolutely fantastic.
The Expanse
Alongside the new mechanics and special treatments, there were also a wide variety of cards shown off today that could be an exciting addition, whether cracked open in a Limited draft or slotting into a Commander build. Everything from new artifact synergies using the Warp to massively powerful voids tearing open the battlefield seems to be on the table for this set.
There are also old lands returning through the Stellar Sights treatment, like the Mutavault or Eldrazi Temple. While these are not legal in Standard, as indicated by an “EOS” in the corner instead of “EOE,” they do add some visual flavor for those seeking some non-Standard additions in the bonus sheet.
On the promo side, the Buy-A-Box promo card is a special version of Singularity Rupture. For the Bundle, there’s an alternate art version of Emissary Escort. And for promo packs, the Magic team showed off a special version of Starfield Shepherd.
Magic: The Gathering’s Edge of Eternities set goes live officially on August 1, with pre-release held the week before from July 25 through 31. More previews will be rolling out in the coming days, which will all be listed on Magic’s preview hub here.
Eric is a freelance writer for IGN.
