Wednesday, August 19, 2015

If they are not in Battle for Zendikar, where will the Zendikar fetchlands be reprinted?


To my great surprise, Mark Rosewater announced that the Zendikar fetchlands would not return in Battle for Zendikar this fall.

You can read more about that here: http://mtgolibrary.blogspot.se/2015/08/no-fetchlands-in-battle-for-zendikar.html



So, if they are not in BFZ, when will they be reprinted?

Wizards of the Coast is probably pretty confident that BFZ will sell well. Zendikar is a beloved plane. Two appreciated mechanics are already known to return - Allies and Landfall. The Eldrazi are scary villains and without Annihilator they will not cause as much grief as they did the last time around.

But what about the next block after that? Maybe it is a new world and they are unsure whether it will be popular or not. What if they put the fetchlands in that set to make sure that it sells? Then they are guaranteed two successful blocks in a row.

The other obvious option is the next Modern Masters set. People generally think about that set as Modern Masters 2017, but both Modern Masters sets have been well received. Maybe the fetchlands will arrive in Modern Masters 2016? When Commander turned out to be a successful set Wizards had no problem making it a yearly thing. Why would they act differently with Modern Masters, a product that I believe is more successful than the Commander sets.

I would be very surprised if we don't see the fetchlands before the end of 2017 but I don't think many people disagree with me on that. The cost of the manabases in Modern is still a barrier to entry in the format.

Special thanks to Ted, who presented this theory to me first.

No comments:

Post a Comment