What's Next in Magic: Innistrad Remastered + Aetherdrift First Looks

Hello and welcome back. It’s been a bit quiet over the Thanksgiving holiday but news has started to come in about both Innistrad Remastered and Aetherdrift. Unfortunately there isn’t much information as far as cards are concerned, but there is enough to start getting people excited for these upcoming sets.

INNISTRAD REMASTERED

While not too much is yet known about our reprint set here, we do know a few things like the fact that it is a reprint set. However, it features reprints from outside the sets that take place on Innistrad but can or do have Innistrad flavor, like Mass Hysteria which originally debuted in Mirrodin (in this case, the hysteria caused by werewolf attack).

This isn’t a bad thing to have a reprint set. Some cards, like Meathook Massacre, needed a reprinted to bring that price point down so more players could afford to buy some copies. Perhaps the most specific anticipated reprint for Commander players (outside of Meathook 1 and Avacyn) is Edgar Markov, the legendary Red, White and Black vampire typal legend.

Beyond the reprints, we see the enchantment frame treatment from Theros making its way into the set, so I think it’s safe to say at this point the frame is probably on its way to be on all enchantments. I think this is a good change since some other cards types, like artifacts and specifically vehicles each have their own. With enchantments also getting a distinctive frame, searching for them when building a deck or tutoring them up should be a bit easier now.

AETHERDRIFT

We just got a bunch of info on this set, from the planes it takes place on to the teams of racers involved in the story and even the boxes for the Commander decks that are coming with it!

Still, not much is yet spoiled as far as the cards go. We do have some returning characters that hint at plot friction against the backdrop of the race itself and whatever complexities that brings. We don’t yet know almost any cards outside of cards shown to us a while ago like the Brightglass Gearhulk and Daretti. We do have some fantastic looking basics lands in the gallery, so definitely go check that out. They feature the three planes where the race will take place; Avishkar (formerly Kaladesh, see the articles about the change of planar name), Amonkhet and Muraganda!

(If you’re unfamiliar with Muraganda, it is a very primal place that has little representation on cards, BUT a recent article with more detail was released just Wednesday on the main Magic website! Go check it out!)

There is also another new plane spoiled via the racing teams called Alacria who use living beasts that eat aether to fuel themselves. Must be quite the creatures to keep up with the mechanical marvels of Avishkar! Another briefly mentioned plane is Gastal.

As far as cards, we do have the Commander deck boxes to talk about though, and something to put together. First we finally have another energy deck but Temur, or Red Blue and Green, this time. I’d bet most of the new energy cards in the deck will be Green since we’ve already had some new Red and Blue ones from Modern Horizons and the prior two energy Commander preconstructed decks. The face art is Saheeli as well, so we are getting a sweet new Saheeli card! The tagline for the deck is “Stockpile energy, power up artifact creatures”.

The other deck coming with the set is an Esper or White, Blue and Black deck featuring a mummified character. I’m not sure if the character is the same as the one leading the Amonkhet racing team named Zahur, but time will tell. This deck’s tagline is “Burn though cards, Grow your mummy army”. If you remember, Amonkhet had a cycling theme, so I imagine this deck will at least touch on it. Keep an eye on good singles for it. We’ve already had a cycling deck with Commander 2020 that was White, Red and Blue, so that might be a good place to look. Granted, this is all speculation on my part.

NEWS IN DRIBS AND TORRENTS

While not too much relates to Commander in today’s article. I couldn’t help talking about it. As much as I love Commander, I’m a Vorthos at heart with deep care for the lore of the game. As things stand, I had to roll back the submission of this article to overview new lore delivered recently, but it’s something I enjoy immensely.

I’m looking forward to our revisit of Avishkar and Amonkhet and looking forward to new things out of Muraganda, including the many cool cards we’re going to get!

Until next time, watch out for blue shells.