Master's Edition 4 was scheduled to be released this month, but release schedules have resulted in the online-only expansion being delayed until the second week of January 2011. As a result of this delay, the MTGO Legacy precons will also be delayed until then.

Even though it won't be out until January, it still comes out before Mirrodin Beseiged, and there are things to discuss about the set.

A recent announcement about the set indicated that the Urza's lands will be in each pack. (like a basic land) Each of the four arts will be represented, as currently only one of each is available online. Obviously this decision seems strange for limited play, as it would take little effort to assemble the 'tron in a draft deck.

The set may have been designed with this in mind, and maybe it even makes the limited format play out more like eternal formats, with easy, fast mana available to all.

The second, more interesting, detail about the set is its size. I have written about set size before, and Master's Edition has no standardized set size, but ME4 is different in an interesting way from the previous sets.

[caption id="attachment_12774" align="aligncenter" width="320" caption="Master Edition Rarity Distribution"][/caption]

Even though most people seem to think that there are a dwindling amount of cards left to put in Master's Edition sets, ME4 has MORE rares (105, which is 20 more than the MED set with the most rares!) than any previous Master's Edition set. It is also the largest in size overall.

Is this going to be more of a 'cards we need to put back in circulation' set than a 'cards we need to put on MODO because they aren't there' set? That is a decent question. Some friends think they could (or should) just include Masques block into the pool of cards that can be considered for MED sets. While it seems like a decent enough idea, and I'm sure Masques wouldn't exactly fly off the online shelves, I feel like not reprinting that entire block would anger some players.

The more recent sets have more 'pet cards' than older sets, which had many unplayable, forgettable cards in them. While Masques block (sup Prophecy) was full of less than desirable cards, it would feel unfair to shortchange the final old block released online.

Magic Online has plenty of cards that have strange or high values due to the sets they were in being underdrafted at the time. MED sets can exist to help course correct the market, especially once Masques block is fully on the client. (in 2012?)

Are there 105 rares that should be on MODO and aren't? (Not including Destiny/Masques block) I don't really think so. I feel like this could be the first 'core' MED set. 105 rares is quite a bit. We haven't had a set with that many rares since 10th edition, which had 121. A high rarity count allows for cards to be put back into circulation, but not oversaturate. It also allows for them to throw several high value recirculated cards into the set, rather than just a few.

Will MED4 and the Legacy precons help shake up the eternal scene on MODO? I guess we will see.