As a format, Standard has been struggling a lot recently. Almost abandoned on paper, many MTG players have moved to more affordable, and diverse, formats, such as Commander. Thankfully, Wizards of the Coast is doing their best to fix the format with a variety of changes.
Implementing a wave of bans and a new rotation schedule, Standard has been looking a lot more interesting. Despite this, however, the metagame has still been plagued by powerhouse decks that stomp the competition. Mercifully, this current Dimir dominance shouldn’t last too long as Wilds of Eldraine is now on the horizon.
Set to release on the 8th of September, the spoiler season for this set is very nearly upon us. Before we could enjoy it as Wizards intended, however, leaks emerged to spoil the MTG set’s contents ahead of schedule. As we covered already, these leaks have spoiled the set’s new mechanics, as well as plenty of interesting MTG cards.
Unfortunately for Wizards, the first major round of leaks wasn’t the end of it. Over the weekend, we saw another batch of never before seen cards, many of which look concerningly powerful and versatile! As if that wasn’t bad enough, the leaks may not even be over just yet!
A quick note before we dive into things, we will be talking about leaks today, so keep in mind they may not be genuine. As we’ll get to later, however, these leaks have basically been confirmed by Wizards. Subsequently, it may only be a matter of time before they appear in the official spoiler season.
Beseech the Mirror
Beseech the Mirror is the new spoiler that everyone is talking about right now and looking at the card, it’s easy to see why. At its worst, Beseech the Mirror is an expensive tutor that looks awful in comparison to Demonic Tutor. While this isn’t great, even in Standard, players obviously won’t be deliberately playing Beseech the Mirror in its worst state. Instead, they’ll want to Bargain.
Should you sacrifice an Artifact, Enchantment, or Token to Bargain when playing Beseech the Mirror, the card becomes absolutely insane. After all, doing this allows you to cast the card you tutored for free. So long as its mana value is 4 or less, that is. If you have something to sacrifice, this means Beseech the Mirror is any four-mana spell in your deck.
To put it bluntly, even with the sacrifice requirement, Beseech the Mirror is incredibly strong in multiple formats. In Commander, for instance, Beseech the Mirror can find and play The One Ring for added consistency. Meanwhile, in Standard, this card is four more chances to find Sheoldred, the Apocalypse.
As if that wasn’t enough, the card is absolutely busted in any format that has Storm combo as a serious option. This includes Legacy, Vintage, and maybe even Modern.
Considering Sheoldred, the Apocalypse is core to Standard’s dominant Dimir tempo deck, the thought of added consistency is definitely worrying. Technically, it may not be an issue, however, since Wilds of Eldraine could entirely shake up the meta. Until we see enough cards to make this happen, however, many MTG players are understandably concerned.
“Oh cool, beseech the mirror can sacrifice your first [[The One Ring]] to tutor out the next one”
u/abadops
“All standard decks have 4 more chances to draw Sheoldred. Esper legends will love grabbing whichever legend they didn’t draw.”
u/LordSlickRick
“Weird, I see ‘Beseech the Mirror’ and all I can read is “sac a food/treasure, cast Sheoldred from your library”
u/kinbeat
Even More Awesome Adventures
Alongside Beseech the Mirror undoubtedly stealing the show, the latest leaks revealed even more Adventure cards. As usual, this mechanic effectively offers two-in-one value for each card. In Throne of Eldraine, this makes these cards incredibly versatile, albeit not always useful. Not every card was Bonecrusher Giant for instance.
For better or worse, the Adventures we’ve seen so far in Wilds of Eldraine have all appeared to be seriously strong. Not only do these cards offer two cards in one, but both cards appear to be well costed and playable. As evidence of this, we can look at one of the newly leaked cards that you can see above; Questing Druid.
Offering an early and growing threat, Questing Druid is already a fairly powerful, if somewhat slow, threat on their own. To make this card even better, however, they come coupled with Seek the Beast. Similarly to, Wrenn’s Resolve, this will help keep you stocked with gas, without taking up a card slot.
As if Adventures weren’t already looking good enough, the other rare Adventure, Decadent Dragon, is also similarly powerful. Offering two good cards within one neat package, this card is good no matter which way you play it. If you want to deny or steal threats, Expensive Taste has you covered. Otherwise, Decadent Dragon is just a powerful Treature token-generating dragon.
Admittedly, while strong, Decadent Dragon probably isn’t destined for high-level Standard play. Instead, this card’s theft and treasure antics should be more suited to the more casual confines of Commander. Despite this more limited use, however, it’s safe to say that the new adventure cards are seriously strong and versatile. So much so, in fact, that just like Beseech the Mirror, they have many players concerned.
“There is absolutely no way these Adventures aren’t going to significantly impact Standard. Each of them is effectively an extra card, and all of them have seemed rather potent so far.”
u/HolographicHeart
“They were OP last standard, and they are gonna be OP this standard. Hopefully, there aren’t any support cards (Edgewall Innkeeper/Lucky Clover) to really set them over the edge.”
u/FurutreComplaint
Leaks Confirmed by Wizards?
Unfortunately for Wizards of the Coast and leak-hating MTG players, it seems the leaks won’t stop here. Not only are there more MTG cards within the latest batch of leaks but there may be even more to ruin spoiler season. This has reportedly been confirmed by Wizards in a recent email to WPN stores, shared by Reddit user MachVizzle.
Within the email, Wizards reportedly states that “Due to a logistical issue, Wids of Eidraine promotional materials may arrive early at Wizards Play Network stores in North America.” Since these materials include promo packs and cards, there’s a likelihood that almost every rare card from the set could be spoiled. To try and prevent this, Wizards asks WPN stores to “not open it, and do not share its contents on social media.”
Currently, since packages may be en route to stores, it’s unclear how effective the email will be. To make sure the spoiler season goes as smoothly as possible, we can only hope that nothing more gets leaked. Whether or not this will actually happen, however, remains to be seen. For now, we’re just going to have to wait and see what the future brings.
Thankfully, even if we don’t see any more leaks, MTG players won’t be left waiting for long for official spoilers. At 10 am Pacific tomorrow, Wizards will officially kick off spoiler season with the Wilds of Eldraine Debut Stream. Following this, players can look out for a week and a half of steady reveals, which we’ll be covering intently. So, if you want to keep up to date with all the latest spoilers once they get revealed, watch this space!
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