Ikoria: Land of the Behemoths - Magic: The Gathering expansion analysis

With the evolution of the famous card game Magic: The Gathering weblog W, the new expansions can be deepened from another point of view before their official debut. In the days leading up to the debut of the next set, the company takes care to officially reveal all the contents that this will contain once the launch is finalized, guaranteeing players some interesting information on how the meta could settle in a few weeks. The new free-to-play title Magic: The Gathering Arena it also allows you to try the aforementioned cards in one Closed Beta, which we were able to taste in preview. So here's what's ready to offer the new expansion Ikoria: Land of the Behemoths, consisting of 274 cards, in the paper game and in the digital version!

Humans and beasts, between struggles and mutations 

The theme of Ikoria: Land of the Behemoths sees some ferocious mythological beasts of all kinds to interface with the most classic human, which certainly do not share the same effects but open up scenarios for a range of skills that are anything but indifferent. Particular attention has been paid to a character design that brings into play gigantic and sensational monsters, in some cases already known as the unpredictable Godzilla. “Non-human” creatures can use a particular effect between them, to merge and create a single card with interesting additions. By playing certain of these from the hand it is possible to pay them for their cost of Mutation and then place them up or down a non-human creature already on the ground.

No skill will be needed Quickness, since the new creature will still be able to attack, but positioning involves a net change in effect. If positioned below, the monster played by the hand will only provide its effect to the one already on the field, if positioned above, however, it will become the main one and also bring its statistics into play, canceling those of the creature with which the Mutation is made. The effect is usable an indefinite number of times, and some specific monsters grant bonuses based on the number of times they have been Mutated.

In this ecosystem, humans are obviously less consistent, but some minions of this type are useful for having bonuses with the beasts, which in actual fact dominated the playing field in our test. The whole presented a rather low power level, at least in the modalities Sealed e Draft. Although less present, we were also able to interface with some rather particular creatures, which bring to the field an effect similar to that seen in the mode Order. These are specific minions, which require you to compose a “tailor-made” deck for them due to the effect Partner, in any case giving up card types or making sure that all spells inserted meet common requirements.

The reward of all this becomes the ability to throw out of the game, once per game, one of the monsters whose requirements are met, obviously paying its mana cost. These are rather powerful creatures, which even if played normally are effective, even if we are still talking about Legendary cards. Referring to the Commander mode with the mechanics in this Standard expansion, Wizards of the Coast wants to highlight its focus on this slightly neglected format, with cards designed to improve the stability of the same and that will not see mainly play all. inside the most classic matches.

Big returns and changes

In addition to the new additions, Ikoria: Terra dei Behemoth also offers reinterpretations of some mechanics already seen, and an interesting novelty for the game ecosystem related to Magic: The Gathering Arena. First of all, let's talk about Ultimatum, high-cost tricolor cards that don't require colorless mana to play, but have devastating effects given the high resources required. Compared to their first proposition, we can say that the five additions within this expansion show themselves as decidedly more balanced and from the not incredibly high power level, which does not allow anyone who uses them to immediately win the game but only provides a marked advantage, useful for recovering or as a win more on certain occasions.

Mechanics Cycle also, present since the dawn of Magic: The Gathering, is revived in style and it seems more effective than ever, given the amount of cards that can make it more efficient and useful in many situations. The base is always the same, discard the cycle card and pay a mana cost to draw a new one, but the new cards in Ikoria: Land of the Behemoths allow you to activate additional effects in these situations useful for obtaining greater value from the cards.

The latest big news of Ikoria: Land of the Behemoths is about details markers, which are outside the concept of reduced and increased statistics - which we have been used to for years now - but concern all the abilities of the creatures in play. A long list of keywords can now be provided to creatures through certain cards, specifically: Sudden Attack, Overwhelm, Bond Vitale, Touch Lethal, To threaten, Hexproof, Flying, To reach e Caution. In the way in which these are granted to the minions, they can also be moved from one monster to another, which allows the creation of interesting combos with the cards already present and with those just introduced by the expansion. A simple idea, but one that increases the wide range of tokens already seen in this card game, proposing to the actual the possibility of devising archetypes with skills to be handed down, since obviously the tokens remain until the death of a creature and they do not vanish at the end of the turn