Spoiler season has begun for Lost Caverns of Ixalan in between many other announcements from Wizards of the Coast. The early spoilers show a colorful landscape with rich lore and exciting new mechanics, and the return to the lush lands of Ixalan puts a special focus on precisely that—lands.
Creature Lands in Lost Caverns of Ixalan
The previous two Ixalan sets were a big hit among players with their rich lore, powerful cards, and fun mechanics, like Enrage. For the third Ixalan set, Wizards of the Coast has decided to bring the vivid landscape to life, quite literally. Lost Caverns of Ixalan finishes the “Restless” creature land cycle that started in Wilds of Eldraine, with Rakdos, Selesnya, Gruul, and Azorius color pairings.
Restless Prairie
- Mana Cost: –
- Type: Land
- Rarity: Rare
- Ability: Restless Prairie enters the battlefield tapped. TAP: Add G or W. 2GW: Restless Prairie becomes a 3/3 green and white Llama creature until end of turn. It’s still a land. Whenever Restless Prairie attacks, other creatures you control get +1 / +1 until until end of turn
Restless Prairie does everything a Selesnya player wants to accomplish. Firstly, it becomes a decent-sized 3/3 Llama. Yes, you read that right, Llamas are as of now a creature type in Magic: The Gathering. Secondly, and most importantly, when the Llama attacks, it gives a small anthem effect to all other attacking creatures. This effect is perfect in Selesnya strategies, which are best known for creating armies of tokens.
Restless Ridgeline
- Mana Cost: –
- Type: Land
- Rarity: Rare
- Ability: Restless Ridgeline enters the battlefield tapped. TAP: Add R or G. 2RG: Restless Ridgeline becomes a 3/4 red and green Dinosaur creature until end of turn. It’s still a land. Whenever Restless Ridgeline attacks, another target attacking creature gets +2/+0 until end of turn. Untap that creature.
For four mana, Restless Ridgeline creates two threats by making a 3/4 dinosaur and pumping another attacking creature by +2/+0. Gruul strategies tend to be aggressive early on but can struggle to keep the pressure up if the opponent survives the first waves of attacks. Restless Ridgeline offers a solution to the problem by continuing to put the pressure on even in the mid-game.
Restless Vents
- Mana Cost: –
- Type: Land
- Rarity: Rare
- Ability: Restless Vents enters the battlefield tapped. TAP: Add B or R. 1BR: Until end of turn, Restless Vents becomes a 2/3 black and red Insect creature with menace. It’s still a land. Whenever Restless Vents attacks, you may discard a card. If you do, draw a card.
Restless Vents offers two things that resonate with its black and red color identity. Firstly, for only three mana, it turns into a 2/3 insect with evasion, which is perfect for aggressive strategies typical of Rakdos. Secondly, players may choose to discard a card and draw a fresh new one from their deck. This “discard then draw a card” ability has become a signature piece for many red strategies that plan to recast spells from their graveyards.
Relentless Anchorage
- Mana Cost: –
- Type: Land
- Rarity: Rare
- Ability: Restless Anchorage enters the battlefield tapped. TAP: Add W or U. 1WU: Until end of turn, Restless Anchorage becomes a 2/3 white and blue Bird creature with flying. It’s still a land. Whenever Restless Anchorage attacks, create a Map token.
Restless Anchorage brings back familiar themes typical of its blue and white colors, like flyers and card draw. For only three mana, it turns into a 2/3 with evasion and additionally creates a Map token. Map tokens are new to MTG. For the cost of only one mana and by sacrificing the Map token, players can choose one creature they control to “explore.”
The explore mechanic is from the original Ixalan set and lets the player look at the top card of their library. If it’s a land card, they draw it. If it’s not a land, they can choose to bury it in their graveyard or leave the card and put a +1/+1 counter on the creature.
Restless Reef
- Mana Cost: –
- Type: Land
- Rarity: Rare
- Ability: TAP: Add U or B. 2UB: Until end of turn, Restless Reef becomes a 4/4 blue and black Shark creature with deathtouch. It’s still a land. Whenever Restless Reef attacks, target player mills four cards.
Restless Reef turns into an exceptionally beefy creature, atypical for its color pairing. The blue and black Reef becomes a 4/4 shark with deathtouch, meaning it will kill any creature it deals damage to. But it gets only better from there, whenever Restless Reef attacks, a player must mill four cards. This ability is perfect for decks trying to mill themselves.
Hidden Caves in Lost Caverns of Ixalan
As the set’s name suggests, there are plenty of cards with a focus on underground exploration. Let’s explore the deep vastness of Ixalan’s caves and their hidden secrets.
The cycle of the five caves all have the same ability to tap for mana, except, of course, they each provide mana of a different color. These hidden caves are a new card type in Magic: The Gathering and have an entirely new mechanic printed on them, namely Discover. Deep down in the underbelly of Ixalan, secrets that were kept safe for millennia are now being revealed. The Discover mechanic goes hand in hand with the set’s lore by digging deep into the player’s library to unearth long-lost treasures.
Reminiscent of the Cascade mechanic, Discover exiles cards from the top of the player’s library until they exile a nonland card with a mana value equal or less to the number on the Discover ability. Players can then play the card without paying its mana cost or choose to put it into their hand. The rest of the cards are shuffled in random order into the bottom of the library.
As players familiar with the Cascade ability know, casting spells for free is very strong. It does add a “luck” factor to the game, but the potential upside of both Discover and Cascade is simply too enticing to ignore.
Forgotten Monument
- Mana Cost: –
- Type: Land – Cave
- Rarity: Uncommon
- Ability: Other Caves you control have “TAP, Pay 1 life: Add one mana of any color.”
Forgotten Monument is a niche card that rewards players who collect more than one Cave in their decks. While it doesn’t tap for colorful mana itself, it does nonetheless greatly help stabilize the mana base by allowing other Caves to tap for one mana of any color. This is a great land for players running more than two or three colors in their decks. However, they should be wary not to drain themselves too many life points.
Spoiler season for Lost Caverns of Ixalan has only just begun, and we’ve already seen powerful new cards with exciting mechanics. Lost Caverns of Ixalan is set to release on Nov. 17 of this year, with more spoilers expected to come out as we near the launch date.
