The Brothers' War Set Review

Magic: The Gathering’s 30th anniversary celebrations are now in full swing, which means it’s the perfect time to take a look back at one of the biggest events in its history: the Brothers’ War. The conflict gave us one of its most powerful mages with Urza, and also really hammered home just how big a threat the Phyrexians could be – pertinent considering everything that just went down in Dominaria United!

It's a battle we’ve heard a lot about over the years, but The Brothers’ War is finally giving us a detailed look at the lives of Urza and Mishra. Combine that with some incredible artifact reprints, and a surprise appearance from Optimus Prime, and there’s a heck of a lot going on in the final Standard-legal set of the year, The Brothers’ War.

Mechanically, The Brothers’ War is keeping things relatively constrained. There’s only one brand-new mechanic here, but prototype is a doozy. It lets you cast hulking artifact creatures for a much cheaper cost, with the drawback being they’re a bit smaller than they otherwise would be. For instance, Autonomous Assembler is a 4/5 if you cast it normally for five generic, whereas for just one white and one generic, you can have it come in as a 2/2 instead. It helps that a lot of them have fantastic abilities that you get access to regardless of how much you paid to cast it!

We’re also getting three returning mechanics – Powerstone tokens, introduced in Dominaria United as a preview of what was to come here, work as mana sources for your artifacts and abilities, but not your nonartifact spells. Unearth lets you bring your creatures back from the graveyard, but only for a single turn. And, finally, there’s Meld.

If you remember the Shadows Over Innistrad days, you remember how impressive meld can be. If you have two cards that meld together, you can flip them over to reveal one double-sized card on the back – such as Urza, Lord Protector melding with The Mightstone and the Weakstone to become the mega-planeswalker Urza, Planeswalker. These are some of the most powerful cards in the set, and their imposing presence on the battlefield is a sight to behold.

Last year’s Strixhaven: School of Mages introduced the Mystical Archive, a series of reprints of powerful instants and sorceries that quickly became the highlight of the set. As The Brothers’ War is all about two powerful artificers going to war, it only makes sense for the set to introduce its own reprint series featuring the game’s most iconic artifacts. To make it extra special, they’ve all been given the classic retro frame, to hammer home just how important to the game’s history the story of the Brothers’ War is.

You’ve got game-defining artifacts in every booster, like Altar of Dementia, Aetherflux Reservoir, Helm of the Hose, Gilded Lotus, Millstone, Mox Amber, Platinum Angel, Swiftfoot Boots, and Wurmcoil Engine. They’re all also available in a schematic showcase frame, which reimagines the artifacts as plans scrawled in an artificer’s ledger – giving us a deeper look into some of the cards we’ve been playing with for years.

For collectors, Collector’s boosters also have a chance to include ‘serialised reprints’ in a unique double rainbow foiling. Each artifact reprint has 500 of these serialised cards out in the wild, and includes its own serial code to identify it. If you’ve ever fancied owning a literal one-of-a-kind card, opening a few Collectors’ boosters to find one of these could be the way to go!

Speaking of retro framed reprints, no set would be complete without Commander preconstructed decks. The Brothers’ War features two, with Urza’s Iron Alliance and Mishra’s Burnished Banner giving two very different approaches to artifact decks. Except, there’s something new with these decks never seen before: they’re 100 percent retro framed. Every single card in the decks is in the old frame, even the brand-new debut cards and those never seen in retro frames before. If you love the old border, grabbing these decks would be an excellent idea.

Finally, there’s one more surprise for The Brothers’ War. This is a set all about big mechs tearing up Dominaria, which makes it a fitting place for Universes Beyond’s next crossover with Transformers. This is a subset of 15 brand-new double-sided cards that feature some of the most famous Autobots and Decepticons in their vehicle and robot modes. Using the new “convert” mechanic, these can flip between their faces mid-game, just like a transforming card in Magic! Collector’s boosters also have a chance to pull the showcase Shattered Glass art style, which peers into an alternate reality where the Decepticons are actually the heroes fighting against the tyrannical autobots and their leader, Optimus Prime.

You can find Transformers cards in roughly 10 percent of all Set boosters, and the Shattered Glass treatment in 12 percent of Collector’s boosters. Booster bundles also have one guaranteed card, with regular bundles getting non-foil and gift getting foil.

The Brothers’ War is available in Draft, Set, and Collector’s boosters (and booster boxes), bundles, gift bundles, and two Commander decks. This is one packed set, so make sure you don’t miss it by preordering your singles and packs through Magic Madhouse today!