Put on your thinking caps and get ready to unravel a mystery: MTG Murders at Karlov Manor is the first premier Magic set of 2024. This Magic: The Gathering release returns to one of the game’s most popular planes, the cityscape world of Ravnica. But unlike our other visits, this time Wizards has gone full genre, with a set based on intrigue, detectives, and murder mystery tropes.
In Murders at Karlov Manor, MTG Ravnica’s famous guilds take a back seat for once, in favor of deerstalker hats and magnifying glasses. Here’s all the core info for this MTG set, from the Murders at Karlov Manor release date and where it lies in the 2024 MTG release schedule, to all the artwork, card spoilers, and other news.
MTG Murders at Karlov Manor release date
The Murders at Karlov Manor release date was Feburary 9, 2024. Long before that, we got to see plenty of previews, with a week or so of card spoilers that fully revealed the set to us. These kicked off with the set’s debut on January 16.
Based on the now-established pattern of MTG set releases, the first time players got their hands on Murders at Karlov Manor cards was the prerelease events held at local game stores between February 2 – 8. Then the set dropped in digital form on MTG Arena, before its official global tabletop release.
MTG Murders at Karlov Manor card spoilers
All the spoilers for Murders at Karlov Manor cards are here, with detectives, cards that investigate and create clue tokens, and some exciting legendary creatures. Guildmasters, like Aurelia and Judith the Scourge Diva, as well as lead super sleuth Alquist Proft all make an appearance.
Examining some of the other cards from the set, there’s zombie detectives and scooby doo references, plus some very unusual creature types.
Here are a few more of the most exciting MTG Karlov Manor cards from the spoiler season which may yet have a lasting impact on MtG:
Leyline of the Guildpact is a five-color leyline. Like the other Leyline cards this enchantment can come into play for free if it’s in your opening hand. It sorts all your fixing for you, but more terrifyingly, the card provides four free green devotion for Pioneer decks.
Massacre Girl, Known Killer brings back wither, a mechanic Wizards of the Coast has been afraid to use, in case it makes +1/+1 counters confusing. Mark Rosewater says this is an example of a cameo mechanic, so we should probably keep an eye out for more cards like this in future sets.
Anzrag, the Quake-Mole offers an absurd statline for its four mana mana cast. We search the card for the downside and… all upside! Thank goodness this thing doesn’t have trample; it’s terrifying nonetheless.
Prisoner’s Dilemma is a really interesting Commander card that literally forces your opponents to tackle the Prisoner’s Dilemma game. If you snitch on your opponent and they choose to keep silent, they receive an enormous 12 damage, and you get away scot free. Mind games!
Doppelgang is an interesting Simic mass-clone effect, that seems designed to make players sigh and break out the calculators when someone targets a Doubling Season with it.
Duskana, The Rage Mother is a bear that cares about bears. But not the MTG creature type bear, the in-game jargon term ‘bear’ used to describe 2/2 creatures that cost two mana. Luckily you can pile buffs on your creatures, since Duskana is only concerned about base power and toughness.
MTG Murders at Karlov Manor mechanics
The Murders at Karlov Manor mechanics start with Investigate, and the Clue tokens that come with it – not really surprising that this is in a set about detectives. Speaking of which, the Detective creature type is really prominent. 
The other really big mechanic in Murders at Karlov Manor is Disguise and the related Cloak. Disguise works just like Morph. Creatures with Disguise can be played face down as a small creature for three mana. Then, any time, you can turn that creature face up for its disguise cost. Notably, this doesn’t use the MTG stack, it happens immediately, as a special action.
Disguise is an upgrade on Morph: disguised creatures are 2/2s with MTG Ward 2, unlike the vanilla 2/2s generated by Morph. Many Disguise creatures have some sort of trigger once they’re turned face up.
Similarly, Cloak is a new version of Manifest. It lets you play cards facedown even if they don’t have the Disguise ability. You can then turn these cards up for their mana value. This part only works if they’re creatures, however: you can’t turn up an instant or enchantment.
Suspect is another new mechanic for the set. When a creature is suspected, it gains the keyword menace, but loses the ability to block. Aggressive decks might want to use this ability to make their own creatures harder to block, or apply it to opponents’ cards, to make them helpless before a relentless assault.
Finally, we have Collect Evidence. This mechanic interacts with the graveyard. To Collect Evidence X, you need to exile cards from your graveyard equal to mana value X – typically to get a cheaper, or powered-up, version of a spell.
MTG Murders at Karlov Manor story
Ravnica, with such wholesome guilds as the killer clowns, vampire bankers, zombie farmers, and sneaky assassins is pretty murdery already. So for a Ravnica murder to be a big deal, the victims have to be so influential that everyone’s sitting up and taking notice.
In this case Teysa Karlov, leader of the Orzhov guild, is the first on the chopping block. Solving her murder is the set’s protagonist, the blue trench coat-doffing detective with elaborate facial hair, Alquist Proft. The eye/city symbol on his badge links him to a new faction: the Ravnican Agency of Magicological Investigations.
Kaya helps Proft out, as the set’s one and only MTG planeswalker. Her fate is intrinsically linked to the Orzhov guild, though given that she previously killed everyone important in the black-white guild, you’d expect her to be the primary suspect.
Despite Etrata, the Silencer from the underhanded Dimir, and Massacre Girl from the reckless Rakdos, lurking in the shadows, they’re not the culprits… which isn’t to say that they don’t cause some problems on the way,
It’s no mystery where you should turn for more Magic: The Gathering content. Check out our MTG Arena decks guide, our list of the best MTG commanders, or – if you think you might’ve missed one – our page of all the many MTG Arena codes.