Magic: The Gathering Adding Exclusive Cards And Mechanics To Arena

Unprecedented changes to Magic: The Gathering are coming soon.

For those not aware, Arena, a digital iteration of the popular card game released back in 2018 for desktop, has always largely maintained parity with the core tabletop version in terms of cards and mechanics. Whatever the latter received with trimonthly expansions, so too, did the former. An exception to this, however, has recently been present in the form of Historic. An alternative to paper’s Modern, this mode allows players of Arena to use any card they’ve ever unlocked, regardless of its standard legality. Wizards of the Coast has expanded upon this over the last year or so with the introduction of Historic Anthologies, exclusive bundles often containing cards immediately banned from Standard.

Now, the company has decided to go one step further by introducing not only new cards not available anywhere else, but bespoke mechanics designed specifically to take advantage of Magic on PC. According to IGN’s exclusive reveal, this initiative will start rolling out alongside Jumpstart: Historic Horizons, a gigantic 782-card set consisting of creatures and sorceries from planes past and present, 31 of which will be brand-new.

In terms of mechanics, three are going to be trialed in total: Seek, Perpetually and Conjure. The latter of these, for example, is a keyword which, when activated, allows users to create an all-new card not found in their hand, deck or graveyard. While this effect works for any card, it’s also the only means of generating cards not obtainable via other means (i.e. packs), including Tropical Island, Stormfront Pegasus and Ponder.

As for when you can expect to get your hands on all the above, a release date is still forthcoming, though while we wait for more information, be sure to let us know in the usual place below, what you make of this substantial change to Magic: The Gathering Arena!