The previous Magic: The Gathering storyline ended with a bunch of dragons taking over one of the planes. The new plotline, Origins, tells the background stories of key Planeswalkers. These reality-hopping wizards are the central characters of Magic franchises. Origins promises to tell the tales of five of them, one for each colour of magic. This also means that the Intro Packs for this wave focus on the theme of each character.
Hunting Pack is a green/black deck inspired by the elven sorceress Nissa Revane. What this means is it’s full of elves and big crunchy monsters. The black cards (mostly elves) are there to control the deck and your opponent, either by buffing your creatures or fishing them out of the grave. The green cards are predictably nice and stompy. Of special note are the Managorger Hydra and Dwynen, Gilt-Leaf Daen, who buffs all your elves nicely.
Brave the Battle is a white/green deck theme designed to suit the needs of Gideon Jura, a whip-wielding pseudo-paladin who likes sending men to their doom. As such, the deck is all about humans wielding swords; we get a single giant wyrm, presumably for all the soldiers to use as target practice. It’s a defend, grow and destroy-style deck and it’s really unsubtle. Expect your opponent to be on you from the first round if you use this deck regularly. Cards of note include the Hixus, Prison Warden, who serves as way of slowing down your opponent and the Citadel Castellan, who can rapidly grow your forces with disposable troops.
Either set is of interest to experienced players, as they are plenty of cards that can be used in regular play. Both come with two packs of booster tucked in the back. The boosters are now back to the plastic/foil format, rather than the nifty little cardboard sleeves we saw in Modern Masters, which should please those of you who fretted about their unopened cards getting wet. Hunting Pack and Brave the Battle are great sets for those new to the game or experienced players looking for useful cards.
MAGIC: THE GATHERING INTRO PACKS – BRAVE THE BATTLE & HUNTING PACK / DESIGNER: VARIOUS / PUBLISHER: WIZARDS OF THE COAST / RELEASE DATE: OUT NOW
