I was lucky enough to be invited to a Magic: The Gathering Streets of New Capenna Commander event last week (April 13th) which included some play-time with the five new pre-constructed decks!
A big thanks to Wizards of the Coast for the invite and for putting on quite the day of content for us to enjoy! We’ll give you a quick rundown of the event, what took place and our initial impressions of how the Streets of New Capenna Commander decks play.
Read More: MTG 2022 Release Calendar
Belle of the Ball
Upon arriving at London’s stunning Bloomsbury Ballroom, I was greeted by a doorman who appeared to have travelled through time from the 1920s. Once admitted, we descended to our meeting location, the Rose Room.
Here, I was greeted by members of each of the five crime families from the Streets of New Capenna. The Riveteers, Maestros, Obscura, Cabaretti & Brokers all had representatives present and vying for my loyalty.
Also present was Senior Magic Designer Gavin Verhey who treated everyone to a very passionate presentation on how Streets of New Capenna – as a set – came to be and when the idea was first developed. Magic fans are well aware that new sets spend years in R&D before they see the light of day and New Capenna is no different having started out in 2019.
Playing the Game
The focus of this event was Commander which meant that Gavin dove into each of the individually themed decks that will be released on April 29th. I already knew where my loyalty would sit – with the Riveteers – so I made sure this was the deck I got my hands on.
Commander was the game of choice for a reason as there were varying levels of experience when it came to people attending the event. This helps not only to showcase the entry-level nature of the decks but the format too.
During our gameplay session, it became clear that each family-themed deck has had plenty of care and attention given to it. They all play phenomenally well and luckily no one started pumping out treasure tokens to spoil the fun!
Each of the families’ special mechanics came into play at some point and allowed for a proper demonstration of how they worked. It’s clear that Commander is becoming the best place to start playing Magic: The Gathering and the products on offer to get you started are varied and reasonably priced.
This product isn’t intended to be a collector’s item and buying all five is fine but again, not necessarily the point of this product. As a way to access a game that has been around for nearly 30 years without feeling like you’re missing a ton of history/content, the New Capenna Commander decks will be the best way to go.
Once again, thank you to Wizards of the Coast for inviting me to the event, we can’t wait to do it all again for a future set!
