Magic is reprinting a powerful $30 card with terrifying new D&D art

[ad_1] Magic: The Gathering's newest Dungeons & Dragons crossover arrives Monday, Feb. 9, with the "Roll for Initiative" Secret Lair Superdrop delivering varied reprints of spells and characters all set within the Forgotten Realms. The drop was introduced through the Feb. 3 episode of Weekly MTG hosted by Blake Rasmussen, the place he was joined by Secret Lair Senior Director Lindsey Bartell and Senior Product Designer Steve Sunu. Every of those drops might be accessible in non-foil and foil variations, priced at $29.99 or $39.99, respectively.

As a result of it is a sequence of seven D&D-themed drops, most of the playing cards included are reprints from Commander Legends: Battle for Baldur's Gate. Followers of Baldur's Gate 3 could be thrilled to see new variations of Shadowheart and Gale right here bundled with playing cards that instantly help their talents. Throughout the remaining drops, there is a good quantity of worth available, however maybe the perfect focuses on Curse of Strahd's titular villain. Let's take a more in-depth look.

Shadowheart's Devotion

1x Shadowheart, Darkish Justiciar 1x Beseech the Queen 1x Black Market 1x Victimize 1x Historical Bronze Dragon Many of the playing cards right here do not boast a ton of worth, however there's some nice synergy available between Shadowheart, Darkish Justiciar; Black Market; and Victimize for anybody with a black deck that emphasizes sacrificing creatures. Even different multicolored decks that leverage this mechanic, like one that includes Edea, Possessed Sorceress because the Commander, could make nice use of those playing cards. The standout of this drop, nevertheless, is unquestionably the Historical Bronze Dragon, which prices about $16 or extra on TCG Participant. Although it is costly to forged at seven mana for a 7/7, it comes with flying and allows you to roll a d20 after which add X +1/+1 counters on every of as much as two creatures at any time when it offers fight injury to a participant. Roll excessive on that d20, and this means can win you video games. Even for those who roll low, you are still taking a look at a reasonably constant buff to 2 of your creatures.

Gale's Ambition

1x Gale, Waterdeep Prodigy 1x Arcane Denial 1x Archmage's Appeal 1x Brainstorm 1x Private Tutor There is not a lot happening within the Gale's Ambition drop except you've a variety of love for the long-haired wizard from Baldur's Gate 3. Brainstorm and Arcane Denial have already been reprinted so typically they're actually not value a lot. Archmage's Appeal has some versatility, however because it prices three blue mana, that just about limits it to mono-blue decks. Private Tutor might be the perfect card right here due to its sheer worth: for a single blue mana, you possibly can search your library for any sorcery card and put it on the highest of your deck.

Black Lights & Darkish Dungeons

1x Seasoned Dungeoneer 1x Displacer Kitten 1x Tortured Existence 1x Sefris of the Hidden Methods That includes eye-catching pulpy artwork and a strong assortment of playing cards, this could be the good of all of the drops in Roll for Initiative. That stated, Seasoned Dungeoneer and Sefris of the Hidden Methods each require that you just're already invested in Magic's dreaded "enterprise into the dungeon" mechanic. In the meantime, the value for different variations of Displacer Kitten at present hovers round $24, and with good motive. Its core means allows you to blink one in every of your creatures (eradicating it from after which returning it to the battlefield) each single time you play a noncreature spell for further enter the battlefield (ETB) triggers. Investing lots in instants means you are able to do this throughout fight to stop injury. Tortured Existence can be an attention-grabbing selection right here. That enchantment was initially a part of 1998's Stronghold set and might solely be present in The Record (a curated record of older playing cards that not seem in Play Boosters these days), making it slightly arduous to accumulate except you pay the circa $4 to purchase it on some sort of market. The preliminary forged prices one black mana, after which with it on the board, you possibly can pay one other single black mana and discard a creature card to return a creature out of your graveyard to your hand, thus making it a powerful recursion device.

Shadows Over Baldur's Gate

1x Grim Hireling 1x Wild-Magic Sorcerer 1x Xorn 1x Prosper, Tome-Sure These 4 playing cards encourage you to create a deck with Prosper, Tome-Sure because the Commander, leaning right into a twin concentrate on casting spells from exile and producing treasure tokens consequently. Wild-Magic Sorcerer prompts cascade each time you forged a spell from exile, so that you'd get simple free spellcasting there. Xorn allows you to generate an additional treasure token each time you create one, making it helpful as effectively. Grim Hireling is definitely the costliest and helpful card on this bunch with a market value between $16 and $18. It generates two treasure tokens everytime you deal fight injury to an opposing participant, however for one mana, it additionally allows you to sacrifice treasure tokens to cut back a goal creature's energy and toughness by that quantity. It isn't a legendary, so you possibly can't have it's your Commander, however for those who're operating any sort of treasure-focused deck — like Korvold, Fae-Cursed King — then it is a must-include.

Whispers in Candlekeep

1x Counterspell 1x Dragonborn Champion 1x Klauth, Unequalled Historical 1x Miirym, Sentinel Wyrm Klauth, Unequalled Historical mainly invented firebending lengthy earlier than the Avatar: The Final Airbender set formally launched it to Magic. Higher but, you get to maintain the mana it generates till the tip of your flip slightly than lose it on the finish of fight. (Although Ozai, the Phoenix King does this even higher, permitting you to maintain the surplus mana.) Miirym, Sentinel Wyrm is strong, however solely in green-blue-red dragon decks and nowhere else, in order that's a tad limiting. Dragonborn Champion is okay for serving to you draw playing cards, however you want a strategy to reliably deal at the least 5 injury to a participant (in all probability with one other dragon with flying). And you actually do not want yet one more Counterspell, do you?

Strahd's Descent

1x Strefan, Maurer Progenitor as "The Satan Strahd" 1x Bloodletter of Aclazotz as "Solid-Off Consort" 1x Finish the Festivities 1x Voldaren Property as "Fortress Ravenloft" It is a disgrace that Wizards went with Strefan as an alternative of Edgar Markov to lastly give us the long-lasting Strahd von Zarovich in Magic. Frankly, Strefan is not all that attention-grabbing along with his clunky Blood token talents, whie an Edgar reprint would have despatched gamers into an absolute frenzy. Finish the Festivities looks as if an extremely highly effective early-game sorcery in four-player Commander, hitting each opposing participant, creature, and planeswalker for one level of injury — and for just one crimson mana! Fortress Ravenloft is first rate for vampire decks, and a must-include for people who lean into blood tokens (aka, good for Strefan/Strahd). The massive draw of this explicit drop, nevertheless, is Solid-Off Consort. Initially from 2023's The Misplaced Caverns of Ixalan as Bloodletter of Aclazotz, it is a vampire demon that doubles the quantity of life an opponent loses. That explains why it usually goes for round $30 on-line.

Lands of the Forgotten Realms

2x Plains 2x Island 2x Swamp 2x Mountain 2x Forest Drops that focus solely on fundamental lands are a little bit of a rarity, however Wizards appears to be banking on the truth that gamers have a variety of love for the Forgotten Realms. Every land right here represents a distinct location within the Forgotten Realms, specifically Waterdeep on plains, the Moonshae Isles on islands, the Underdark on swamps, Neverwinter on mountains, and the jungles of Chult on forests.