Magic: The Gathering is set to explore a new, darker educational institution in its upcoming set, Reality Fracture. This set moves away from the dragon-led colleges of Strixhaven to Hexhaven, a massive mage tower populated by unsettling students and governed by five elder sphinxes, each representing a different school of magic. The set, launching fully on October 2, with prerelease events beginning September 25, is also set to conclude a three-year narrative arc that began with Wilds of Eldraine. The core conflict revolves around Jace Beleren, who, disillusioned with the multiverse's persistent threats, plans to overwrite reality with his own idealized version, the Echoverse.
Empowering Jace Takes Center Stage
A central mechanic introduced in Reality Fracture is "Empower Jace." This mechanic allows players to create and add loyalty counters to a blue Jace Planeswalker token. If a player already controls such a token, new counters are added to the existing one, rather than creating a new token. These Jace tokens can then be used to surveil or draw cards, with specific cards offering additional abilities. For instance, Way of the Cryomancer grants Planeswalkers the ability to copy the controller's next instant or sorcery, while Way of the Pyromancer allows them to generate red mana. Avatar of Burgeoning Echoes further integrates this mechanic with a landfall ability that Empowers Jace and enables Planeswalkers to transform lands into creatures. This approach ensures Jace's presence in many Limited games, as Empower Jace cards are expected to appear frequently in booster packs.
The set's primary antagonist, The Theorist, Jace Beleren, is a four-mana Planeswalker card with abilities that create Illusion tokens, return permanents to hand, and draw cards. Notably, the Empower Jace mechanic is restricted to creating tokens, preventing it from directly boosting other Jace Planeswalker cards, a safeguard implemented after playtesting revealed potential balance issues. However, some cards within the set can create token copies of Jace Planeswalkers, and external effects like Lithoform Engine could also interact with the mechanic.
Echoverse Variants and Powerful New Cards
Reality Fracture will also feature "Echoverse" variants of established Magic characters. Each play booster pack will contain one card from the primary reality and one from Jace's Echoverse. Among these are new versions of Karn and Ghalta. Karn, Gilded Guardian, a five-color artifact creature, draws a card for each color among its controller's artifacts. Its Echoverse counterpart, Karn, Argent Defender, is a cheaper creature that prevents enter-the-battlefield abilities from triggering. Similarly, Ghalta the Unstoppable is a large green creature focused on power, while Ghalta the Immovable is a white creature that reduces its cost based on toughness and allows creatures to attack as though they had no defender.
The set also includes several powerful individual cards. Hexhaven Invigorator, a four-mana green creature, allows its controller to search their library for lands equal to the damage dealt to it, potentially generating significant mana acceleration. Return to the Light Realms is a white sorcery that returns all nonland permanents from a player's graveyard to the battlefield. Loyal Tutor, a one-mana white instant, searches the library for any Planeswalker card, making it a potentially valuable addition to many decks.
The "Prepared" mechanic, first seen in Secrets of Strixhaven, returns with new iterations. These cards have an additional spell that can be cast upon meeting specific conditions. Bloodline Recollector, featuring a black reinterpretation of the classic spell Ancestral Recall, is highlighted as a particularly tantalizing Prepared card, with a serialized headliner treatment limited to 500 copies.
The Five Founder Sphinxes of Hexhaven
Replacing Strixhaven's Elder Dragons, five elder sphinxes now lead Hexhaven's allied-color schools. Aerid Konstrari (Gruul) focuses on artifacts and creating Heartwood tokens. Denzilore Fatehold (Azorius) enhances all creatures with +1/+1 counters whenever its controller scries or surveils. Ingris Stingerquill (Rakdos) deals direct damage to opponents when creatures attack and can generate haste for other creatures. Kwia Vigorbloom (Selesnya) is a powerful lifelinking, warding creature that generates Lotus artifact tokens when its controller gains life, referencing the iconic Black Lotus. Uldaros Theorix (Dimir) allows for the casting of multiple spells from the graveyard based on their combined mana value when it enters the battlefield.
These five sphinxes are depicted across 15 borderless basic lands within the set, illustrating the imposing Hexhaven tower itself.