Upcoming Magic: The Gathering set The Brothers’ War is a pretty momentous occasion – a set that takes the tale of the war between Urza and Mishra, a huge part of MTG history, and retells it in a new form. Wizards has approached this challenge in an unusual way, splitting the set into three ‘arcs’ to show different points in the story.
In Thursday’s worldbuilding video, the set’s designers explain that they didn’t want to merely retread old ground and recreate the original Antiquities set from 1994 in modern clothing. Instead, worldbuilding lead Emily Teng explains they were trying to “find the spaces where no one’s looked before”.
Miguel Lopez adds that 51 cards depict moments from the famous The Brothers’ War novel by Jeff Grubb, 250 other cards show what else is going on in the world.
The worldbuilding leads explain that The Brothers’ War is split into three arcs, showing different points in the conflict – essentially before, during, and after.
The first arc shows the leadup to The Brothers’ War. There’s numerous cards (no spoilers were shown, but we saw plenty of art) representing Urza and Mishra as kids, showing the discovery of the power stone that sows the seeds of jealousy between them, and leading up to their initial conflict.
The next arc is the biggie, showing the conflict at its apex, with huge robots crashing together. In the building worlds video, we saw dozens of art pieces showing the giant mechs and war machines that each side was fielding.
The final arc shows the aftermath of The Brothers’ War – the immense, apocalyptic damage that’s been done to Dominaria, Mishra turned Phyrexian, and a landscape laid to waste.
Check out our The Brothers’ War guide, to find out more about this set, which releases November 18, 2022.