Arriving everywhere April 24th, Secrets of Strixhaven returns players to the plane of Arcavios. In the Magic story, we've been following along with five students who recently returned from an adventure in Lorwyn, only for them to get into further trouble back at Strixhaven. As we know, the next in-universe set is called Reality Fracture, so we kind of know the direction the story is headed, as one of our planeswalkers for this set is Ral Zarek, the well-known black-aligned mage. 😄
Secrets of Strixhaven Episode 1 - Penmanship Practice
Wait, are these the good guys or the bad guys?
Even with the knowledge of the next set, there are a lot of interesting things happening at Strixhaven, and it is also nice to see the school again. Like many places, Strixhaven is moving past the invasion of the Phyrexians, and new students are arriving to receive the full college experience:
Hey, this is just real life...
With that, we get to see how the colleges are continuing into the future with new cards and new mechanics:
Silverquill
Repartee is all about targeting creatures and triggers when you cast an instant or sorcery that targets a creature:
Prismari
Opus is all about going big with an initial effect and a bonus effect if five or more mana was spent to cast the instant or sorcery:
Witherbloom
Infusion is about the balance of life and death, and triggers if you've gained life this turn:
Lorehold
Lorehold is the only school to not receive a new mechanic and instead receives a classic, Flashback. In line with their delving into the past, Flashback allows you to cast an instant or sorcery from your graveyard for its flashback cost:
Quandrix
Increment makes you do math by adding a +1/+1 counter to a creature whenever you cast a spell that has a higher mana value than the creature's power or toughness:
Prepared
While those are the new mechanics for each of the schools, there are also new mechanics found throughout the set. What if your creatures could cast spells for you? With Prepared, they can, when a creature is prepared, it can expend that status to cast the spell on its card:
Paradigm
Appearing on a cycle of sorceries with the lesson subtype is the new keyword Paradigm:
The Mystical Archive Returns
Secrets of Strixhaven also brings back the Mystical Archive with a total of 65 cards. This is a bonus sheet with a dedicated slot in each Play Booster Pack. There are even special Japanese Mystical Archive card versions, though they can only be found in Collector Boosters.
Alternate Arts
The Borderless Field Notes make a return, along with other Borderless frames and Special Guest cards:
Sneaking in some returning lands that may be more Standard relevant.
Serialized Headliner
Last but not least for the main set, the Serialized Headliner for Secrets of Strixhaven is the Emeritus of Ideation with a double-rainbow foil full art frame with special Mark Poole artwork found in Collector Boosters:
Commander Decks
As you might expect, each school of Strixhaven is getting a new Commander Deck helmed by some familiar faces:
This is just some of the highlights of the upcoming set, with so much to learn. Check out your local pre-release starting April 17th and the full set releasing April 24th.
