The upcoming wave of Universes Beyond sets has created some of the anticipated MTG releases in its entire 30-year history. Whether you’re a fan of Marvel’s Spider-Man or Avatar: The Last Airbender, players are rabid for any scrap of new information for Magic’s next two sets. Today, an old tradition from MTG designer Mark Rosewater will offer lots of never-before-seen info for Magic’s Spider-Man crossover.
Commonly appearing right before the release of a tentpole set, Mark Rosewater has once again taken to Blogatog, posting lots of little tidbits about the upcoming Spider-Man release. Referred to as set teasers, there’s a ton of information here, and among a long list of hints are some particularly interesting notes.
A Famous Meme Recreated
Universes Beyond and Secret Lairs have expanded Magic’s tone massively. Seeing a recreation of an internet meme in Magic: The Gathering was unthinkable even just a few years ago. Now, we have an entire SpongeBob Secret Lair dedicated to some of the most iconic memes on the internet.
Perhaps the most shocking teaser from Rosewater’s Spider-Man hints is that an iconic Spider-Man meme will be referenced in the main set. It seems likely to us that this will be the meme that has Spider-Man pointing at himself, but there are a wide number of different memes that this could be referencing.
Whatever the meme is, it will hopefully appear on a multi-format playable card instead of something that won’t see play outside of Limited.
A New Mirror Gallery for Spiders and a Five-Colored Spider-Man
This card could very well be the meme that Rosewater is talking about, if it’s Spider-Man pointing at himself, at least. To be specific, a card that prevents the Legend Rule from applying to Spiders is going to be printed. This card should be rather popular in Commander, especially considering the potential to build a Spider-Man-themed Commander deck with all the different Spider-Men that have already been spoiled.
Thanks to Rosewater’s Teasers, we also know that a Five-Colored Spider-Man is coming. This is likely going to be a card geared towards putting all of Magic’s Spider-Man cards under one Commander. A Spider-themed payoff, or a Hero-themed one, perhaps that offers a payoff for Transforming Spider-Man related cards, seems like a fitting mechanic to unify these cards under one banner. All of that said, aside from the presence of a Five-Colored Spider in the set, we don’t really know anything for sure.
Life Swap
We have not had many life exchange effects in Magic: The Gathering, and one is appearing in Spider-Man. For reference, only two cards in Magic’s history specifically allow players to exchange their life totals amongst one another, and neither is particularly playable. Axis of Morality and Magus of the Mirror don’t even see much Commander play, mostly due to the cards being incredibly inefficient.
Chances are, the life swap effect in Spider-Man will be a bit more usable. Even then, an effect like this can easily be abused in MTG, which likely means it will be behind a larger mana value. Six has been that mana value so far, which will probably make the card unplayable outside of Commander. Since power creep has sped up Magic significantly since the last life total exchange effect, there’s a reasonable chance that the effect will be on a card that’s a bit cheaper or has some sort of other restriction.
Lots of Character Hints
There are quite a few obvious hints at the appearance of popular characters from Spider-Man. Mysterio is one of two name-dropped characters that we haven’t heard from yet, with a very flavorful effect utilizing Illusions.
Otherwise, a particularly bizarre deep-cut has been confirmed to appear in the set. Spiders-Man, Heroic Horde is a confirmed card name appearing in MTG’s crossover. This refers to a Spider-Man variant from a different universe that is actually a hivemind of Spiders behind a mask.
In addition, a list of revealed Villain creature types strongly suggests the appearance of all kinds of different Spider-Man characters. Here’s a list of new creature types coming in Spider-Man that match some Spider-Man villains a little too well:
• Legendary Creature – Sand Elemental Villain (Sandman)
• Legendary Creature – Human Shapeshifter Villain (Chameleon)
• Legendary Creature – Vampire Scientist Villain (Morbius)
• Legendary Creature – Insect Villain (Shathra or The Swarm)
This isn’t all of the new creature types named on Rosewater teasers, but they are the ones that haven’t turned up in spoilers yet, and have obvious depictions from Spider-Man. These aren’t by any means confirmed, but they seem pretty on the nose.
We Already Know a Few of These Hints
These release teasers from Mark Rosewater aren’t a new thing. Every tentpole MTG set is generally accommodated with a few teasers from Rosewater’s Blogatog right before a spoiler season kicks off. Generally, all of the information in these teasers is new information that we haven’t previously seen. This time around, there is some information that already fits with cards we’ve seen before.
J. Jonah Jameson’s second block of text, for example, appears as a hint in Rosewater’s teasers. We also have some creature types that have already been revealed in early spoilers, like Legendary Creature – Symbiote Spider Hero appearing on Symbiote Spider-Man.
While this is unusual, most of the information presented is something we haven’t seen before, and there’s still a lot more to explore beyond the few things we’ve discussed. If you’re interested in everything that Mark Rosewater teased about the upcoming Spider-Man release, you can take a look at everything here.
Better yet, if you want even more Spider-Man spoilers, you won’t have to wait much longer. Spoiler Season for MTG Spider-Man kicks off on August 29, and, hopefully, we’ll see some of the hints discussed here come to fruition.
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