Magic The Gathering Final Fantasy Leak Tells Us Plenty About The Set

While Tarkir: Dragonstorm may just be releasing now (along with the Tarkir: Dragonstorm commander decks), shipping errors from Wizards of the Coast are pulling eyes to June’s release: Magic: The Gathering - Final Fantasy.

First reports came in that some prerelease kits were sent to Brazil by mistake instead of Tarkir: Dragonstorm ones, but those have managed to remain underwraps. Over the weekend a second leak emerged: the Magic: The Gathering – Final Fantasy Starter Kit was leaked in Spanish and it can tell us a number of things about the upcoming Universes Beyond set.

A New Land Subtype

In the beginner friendly starter decks, we see new dual lands for both Sephiroth and Cloud, producing mana in their colors. These lands follow what we often see in these types of products: they come into play tapped and produce one mana of either type. What’s special is that there is a new land subtype here: City.

Neither of the lands do anything with the type, but in the past this has been used with types like Gates(in Battle For Baldur’s Gate and Foundations), Deserts (most recently in Outlaws of Thunder Junction), and several other times. These lands are not among those unique to the starter sets based on their collector numbers (those over 500 like the rares), so they can be expected to be seen in the main set, along with some payoffs for having them.

Choose A Job: A New Living Weapon Variant

For the second time we’re seeing a variant on the mechanic Living Weapon, as Choose a Job follows the ground it and For Mirrodin! previously explored, for the first time without any mirrans or phyrexians around. Honoring the job system that has a long legacy in Final Fantasy, each of these equipment represent one job that might be chosen and taught to one of your troops, or in this case a nameless and colorless 1/1 Hero brought with it.

That Hero token is equipped with the equipment which also gives it a creature type, a buff, and maybe an ability. We see what is Warrior’s Blade for example costing 3R, and giving equipped creature +3/+2 and turning it into a Warrior. Meanwhile Samurai Katana is only 2R giving +2/+2, trample, haste and the Samurai creature type. It’s not only red as the White Mage’s Rod shows a non-sword type weapon at 1W, giving equipped creature +1/+1, cleric, and whenever the creature attacks, you gain 1 life.

The equip costs on these are pretty expensive, 5 for Warrior’s Blade, and Samurai Katana, and 3 for White Mage’s Rod. That fits what we’ve seen in the past, as what you are paying for on the front generally is the creature, and then the equip is the cost to move around, rather than a split with most equipment you see. Warrior’s Blade gives you a 4/3 Hero Warrior, Samurai Katana a 3/3 Trample, Haste, Hero Samurai, and White Mage’s Rod a 2/2 Hero Cleric who gains life.

Not all equipment in the set will be Choose A Job either if that concerns you. Ultima Weapon fills the role of a very big equipment without any of that, and is a rare unique to the starter decks. It costs 7, and also equips for 7 but gives +7/+7 to the creature barring it, who when it attacks can destroy target creature an opponent controls.

Dragoons Represent

Dragoons have a long history in Final Fantasy, being a common job in it, and the jumping lancer is an iconic part of the series. With Dragoon’s Lance (another Choose A Job equipment) we see that they are reasonably being typed as Knights, as that equipment gives +1/+0, and makes them a Knight. The biggest part here is how they are capturing the Dragoon flavor though.

For this, they are using a Jump type effect. During your turn, the creature has flying, meaning it can attack from above, but it can’t defend there. It’s a great flavor fit, and one imagines that we’ll see multiple cards with it in the set.

More 9999 Representation

Jumbo Cactuar got everyone’s attention with it’s ability to get +9999/+0 on attack when it was revealed in the early Magic: The Gathering – Final Fantasy showing, but it isn’t the only card that’s going to represent it.

With what I believe is ‘Overkill’ (translations are divided on this as it’s not just strict translation, but considering also Final Fantasy translations), we see a removal spell that channels this energy. A 2B costed Instant, it gets target creature -0/-9999 until end of turn, killing almost any creature you can find in Magic: The Gathering that has been the beneficiary of an infinite, or near-infinite combo. Like the rest of the non-rares, it is also from the main set, so you can expect to see it running around as an uncommon in Play Boosters too.

There’s even more to be found throughout the leaked images, including the fact that we’re seeing a fair number of Japanese artists on these, the starter kits will have beautiful full art lands, and there’s rich representation of games across the series.

What interests you most from the leaked Magic: The Gathering - Final Fantasy cards? Any characters you are particularly hoping to see? Let us know in the comments below!