This past week capped off the final reveals of The Lost Caverns of Ixalan. The image gallery is finally complete and I'm here to wrap it up with a quick little breakdown of what we got over the past week! Let's not waste any time and dive right in!

Commander Releases Unveiled

Easily some of the bigger news of the week is that we got The Lost Caverns of Ixalan Commander decks and they are a doozie! There's tons of great new cards in the mix, including lots of excellent roleplayers for specific creature type matters decks - which is exactly what you'd expect from an Ixalan set. The decks are also packed with tremendous value and stellar reprints that all look excellent to boot. You can find the decklists in a link at the bottom of this page but first, I'd like to highlight a couple cards!

Seriously, just look at that artwork. I don't even care what the card does, it's adorable and I want to build it. So do many others as well, as the card was the talk of the town for how wonderfully goofy the art is. Even better, the artist Campbell White shared on Twitter that it was originally looking more fierce, which has spawned a new Magic-focused version of the happy/angry meme around the net.

It's the pirate captain's parrot! That's amazing! It's also clearly meant to be a play on the previous partner pirates we saw in Commander Legends and were reprinted as Special Guests with this set. Seeing as pirates on Ixalan are represented as Grixis, but the only partner ones we'd seen so far were in Red and Blue, getting a Black one in the mix is a natural fit. It's a fun card that's bound to make a showing in most pirate decks from here on out!

Speaking of pirates, you know what's really fun? Taking control of your opponents' stuff and making it your own. Don Andres does this in spades, making for a unique approach as a commander in that it encourages you to steal your opponents' creatures away from them to form your own little pirate crew. Many players love playing Control Magic style effects, so you can definitely expect this to appear in several Commander pods in the not so distant future.

The Cards People Are Talking About

It's that much-needed re- oh, wait, no. This is something completely different! Everyone's favorite meme from the original Ixalan block Colossal Dreadmaw gets an upgrade this time around and that alone was enough to get people talking. It's not just a better version of that card, but it's basically an easy auto-include in any Dinosaur type matters deck. Even more fun is that given this card is an uncommon, many have suggested that this implies a long-term vertical cycle, meaning there's a possibility we'll see rare and mythic Dreadmaws sometime in the future.

Premium removal is always going to get strong buzz around it. I still remember when Fatal Push was previewed and everyone lost their minds. This isn't quite that good, but it packs a lot of value in the form of efficient removal that hits not just creatures but planeswalkers as well. It's comparable to Dismember and also allows you the opportunity to discard cards to set up Reanimator-style strategies (or similar) all at instant speed.

Whether or not you're a fan of Universes Beyond, there's just something here for everyone. There's the fun factor of seeing Samuel L. Jackson on a Magic: The Gathering card, the goofiness of the scene being depicted, and the fact that the card itself is actually a pretty half decent counterspell. All of these made for the perfect storm of talking points when it comes to a new card during preview season. Best of all, the name works quite well even outside of Universes Beyond, making it fairly reasonable to reprint in the future.

Listen, it's adorable and cute. It might not be the best card, but it's everything that gets people talking in a fun way beyond playability.

What's New and Pricey?

Most of the in demand cards with this set were front loaded during the first week of previews, however there's a couple cards I was able to find that command a decent price at this time, such as:

Ojer Pakpatiq, Deepest Epoch brings a one-off cameo keyword back into Standard. Rebound first showed up in Rise of the Eldrazi and has occasionally seen returns in the likes of Modern Horizons due to being a popular mechanic. This card comes in stark contrast to Cast Through Time, the last card to give all your spells rebound, which cost seven mana compared to this one's eight. Additionally, even if it's killed, it comes back easily from being a land - especially if you can utilize cards that remove counters from permanents.

Don't be fooled by the stat line here, this creature is basically a 4/4 that also doubles the power of each creature you have in play. For all intents and purposes, it's quite comparable to how Torbran, Thane of Red Fell played in Standard. The fact that it doubles not just damage but also life loss means it makes cards like Exsanguinate deadlier as well, making this card command quite a solid preorder price.

Alternate win conditions are always going to get a lot of love and attention from players and this provides a fun way to do so. How do you maximize the amount of counters on this in the shortest way possible for the quickest route to victory? It provides an interesting puzzle and while it might not be the most viable competitive Constructed card (though people will certainly try) it's the epitome of what a Commander card is, giving it lots of widespread appeal.

Notable Reprints

The reprinting of Resplendent Angel provides a huge boon to players of Selesnya Angels in Pioneer. The deck may not put up the best numbers, but is still a deck many enjoy playing and has driven up the price of one of the list's main centerpiece cards in this card. The reprinting here still commands a decent price but will provide a new means for players who enjoy the archetype to get it in a more affordable manner.

While not a particularly expensive reprint, Abrade has been put into this set as a means of keeping it in Standard long term. While the card was already in Standard thanks to Innistrad: Crimson Vow, Abrade would've been set to rotate next fall. This allows it to stick around past the next rotation and continue being a solid role player in the format.

As mentioned above, this set's Commander decks are absolutely loaded with good value reprints. I don't think many players would've expected to see a copy of Exquisite Blood show up in the Blood Rites precon, but here we are. Similarly, Black Market Connections commands a high price tag following its first precon printing last year and such reprints usually end up left more for Masters-style releases as opposed to additional future precons. Other pricey reprints include Branching Evolution, Akroma's Will, Pitiless Plunderer (which is also showing up in the Special Guests subset), New Blood, Elenda, the Dusk Rose; Xenagos, God of Revels; Bloodghast, Kindred Discovery, Apex Altisaur, Chandra's Ignition, and Descendants' Path. No shortage of goodies to be had here!

Additional Resources

If you'd like more information on this set, check out the following links to various official resources from Wizards of the Coast:

• The Lost Caverns of Ixalan official card image gallery
• The Lost Caverns of Ixalan Commander Decklists
• Collecting The Lost Caverns of Ixalan
• The Lost Caverns of Ixalan Mechanics
• The Lost Caverns of Ixalan Story Episode One (additional stories can be found on the right side of the page)

You can find everything The Lost Caverns of Ixalan right here on CoolStuffInc.com, so be sure to check out our page and preorder your Ixalan needs today! Prerelease is next weekend so make sure you go out to your local game store, play an event or two, and have a great time!

Paige Smith

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