Magic: The Gathering‘s new Secrets of Strixhaven set is fast-approaching, and aside from a quintet of Commander decks, one of the more exciting additions is the “Prepare” mechanic. Two-part cards are nothing new to Magic, but one of the big draws here is that these act as pseudo-reprints of some of the most iconic spells from the game’s history.
While it’s unthinkable to see powerhouses like Ancestral Recall appear in modern-day competitive formats, the Magic designers found a cool way to give players the experience of slinging these often-banned spells. Here’s how it works, and why some are a cut above the rest.
How Prepare works
Prepare is a mechanic attached to some creature cards in the new set, and once the card reaches the relevant criteria, you’ll be able to use the attached instant or sorcery spell by paying its cost.
Some cards enter prepared. Others may become prepared by fulfilling conditions, for example, through the number of permanents an opponent controls, life lost, or anything else. Whatever your color choice, you’ll have a chance to cast some powerful spells in Secrets of Strixhaven.
The Best Prepare Spells
White
White players gain access to one of the best removals in Magic history, Swords to Plowshares, now available in standard! This lets you instantly remove a threat (or one of your own cards) at the cost (or benefit) of life gain. It’s tied to Emeritus of Truce, a 3/3 Cat Cleric (the best kind of cleric) that creates 1/1 tokens as it enters and is prepared if your foes have more creatures than you. This limitation puts a serious damper on Swords to Plowshares, whose power comes from its minimal mana cost.
Also in white, and found in the Silverquill Influence precon, you’ll get Replenish, which can bring all enchantments back from the graveyard to set up a big late-game finish if you can keep Eiganjo Dynastorian around. To prepare this 2/3 with vigilance, you need to attack with two or more creatures.
Blue
The strength of blue’s Prepare spells is that they’re just always useful. Brainstorm is one of the best draw spells in the game, especially if you have access to ways to shuffle your library, like fetch lands. The cost is a bit steep as you’ll need to keep your Harmonized Trio around and tap two untapped creatures, but I can see it being particularly useful in Izzet spellslinger decks where you need regular small spells.
The absolute all-star on this list is Emeritus of Ideation, which lets you repeatedly dish out a three-card draw with Ancestral Recall, while the card itself is a respectable 5/5 with flying and ward 2. Attack with it, exile cards from your graveyard, and then it’s prepared. This card will likely see play across formats, so hold tight to your copies if you open some during pre-release weekend.
Finally, for blue, more card draw! Dirgur Focusmage synergizes well with its Braingeyser part, as it lowers the cost of your instant and sorcery spells, and casting spells with mana value five or more will allow you to cast Braingeyser for additional draw.
Black
As someone building an Edgar Markov deck (I know, how original), Stensian Sanguinist looks ideal. It’s a 2/2 Vampire that gives another creature deathtouch, and becomes prepared. That allows you to cast Exsanguinate and pilfer some of your opponents’ life totals.
Emeritus of Woe is also well worth a look. It’s a 5/4 Vampire Warlock that enters prepared, and gives you access to Demonic Tutor, allowing you to find a specific card in your deck. This is one of the most powerful effects in Magic history, as it lets you search for combo pieces or answer literally any threat. Sure, it will cost you at least six mana with this card, making it less impressive, but the chance of repeated activations is at least interesting.
Finally, Grave Researcher includes Reanimate if you can prepare it by getting three or more creatures in your graveyard. That’s relatively easy to do in decks that want to bring back big scary monsters from their grave, and means you could potentially hit Reanimate on consecutive turns.
Red
As with Black, we’re focusing on one card here, and it’s the 3/3 jackal wizard, Naktamun Lorespinner. If a player has one card or fewer in hand, it becomes prepared, and then lets you cast Wheel of Fortune to discard everyone’s hand and draw seven cards. As someone constantly top-decking with my Vivi deck, this could be a godsend. “Draw seven” effects can become truly busted if paired with cards like Narset, Parter of Veils.
Green
Yavimaya Bloomsage is our favorite green card on this list. This 2/2 dryad druid not only puts a +1/+1 counter onto a card in your end step, but it also becomes prepared once that creature hits seven power. Having that be an end step trigger is a bit annoying, but you can then cast Magic‘s OG combo piece, Channel, to turn any amount of life into colorless mana, just in case you have some spare Eldrazi Titan in your hand.
Multicolor
We’ve settled on two here, but Defacing Duskmage having access to Vandal’s Edit to gain card draw and dish out two damage to each player strikes me as an ideal pairing with the Y’Shtola precon from Final Fantasy. It’s also a 2/2 with Deathtouch to boot. This particular spell isn’t a glorious return but a new addition, and while an Orzhov version of Divination could not seem too exciting, it pairs really well with the creature side.
Finally, Lorehold Archivist is a 3/2 with first strike that becomes prepared once you’ve got three or more artifact and/or creature cards in your graveyard. Your reward for that is Restore Relic, which creates a copy of one of those cards by exiling it, potentially bringing back a big-hitter or a handy engine piece.
