Magic: The Gathering (known to most as just "Magic" or "MTG") is a collectible card game from Wizards of the Coast that can be played physically as a tabletop game, or digitally online.
If you've played any collectible card game before (like Hearthstone, Yu-Gi-Oh, or Gwent), then you know the drill - use your wits and strategy to build a deck, and then battle against others for the win against their deck.
Magic tends to release in "sets" that tell a story, with the current set, Dominaria United, marking the beginning of an immersive year-long story.
The story continues with The Brothers' War, which centers on a brutal clash of mechanical armies
The new set brings with it two new commander decks and a whole host of new cards, two of which we got our hands on early.
Card 1: Simian Simulacrum
Simian Simulacrum is an artifact creature, and although it costs 3 mana of any kind, it's most at home in a green deck.
When it enters the field, you get to put two +1/+1 counters on a target creature (just one) you control. You can also unearth it for 4 mana (2 green).
Unearth is a great mechanic that allows you to bring cards from the graveyard to the battlefield while simultaneously giving them haste (meaning they can act immediately without worrying about summoning sickness)
Unearthed creatures are exiled at the end of the turn, meaning they don't go back to the graveyard.
For a card that has an effect that triggers when it enters the battlefield, unearth is great, albeit in this case potentially a little expensive.
In practice, this means you get a 2/1 creature for 3 mana, and then get to give another creature +2/+2. If Simian Simulacrum is sent to the graveyard, you can do it again for 4 mana.
The creature is exiled at the end of that turn, but the counters remain, giving decent value and potentially +4/+4 on a single turn if you have the resources and a way to send Simian Simulacrum to the graveyard after you play it.
It also potentially makes it a good way to clear two weak creatures off the board while keeping tempo - Simian Simulacrum only has one toughness meaning it will probably die in the trade, but the counters that stay on the board are fairly threatening.
The threat of Simian Simulacrum being unearthed is powerful too - if your opponent knows its there and they know you have the mana to unearth it, they have to watch out for the potential of you bringing a +2/+2 boost to any of your other cards.
Overall, Simian Simulacrum looks like a versatile and fun card that fits the theme of most Green decks pretty well, since a lot of green decks (monotype and green/white specifically) carry cards that add +1/+1 tokens, or trigger another effect when the token is added.
This card will also throw a curveball to a lot of diehard MtG fans, who might have assumed that the card carries some similarity with Solemn Simulacrum.
Card 2: Thopter Architect
Thopter Architech is a white card costing 4 mana, that gives a target creature flying until the end of your turn whenever an artifact enters the battlefield under your control.
The card carries 2/3 stats, which is reasonably average for a 4 mana card with an effect like this, however the card has huge potential to outpace its stat block.
For starters, there's a clear synergy between Thopter Architect and Simian Simulacrum, which is great considering the historic popularity of green/white combo decks.
Picture the scene - your turn starts and you have some medium-strength creature on the battlefield. You play Thopter Architect, and then Simian Simulacrum - now your medium creature gets +2/+2 and flying until the end of the turn.
You trade off Simian Simulacrum and deal some damage with your temporarily flying creature, and then next turn you unearth Simian Simulacrum - now your medium strength creature has +4/+4 and gets flying again.
The potential synergies here are too many to count, but there are a lot of great artifacts in Magic the Gathering that will sync up nicely with Thopter Architect, and I'm excited to see where it's used.
Mecha-monkeys with blades for arms, and smug-looking Architects with cool quotes... what's not to love?
Magic the Gathering: The Brothers' War releases worldwide on 18 November, and can be pre-ordered now from retailers listed on the Wizards of the Coast website.
