Lorwyn Eclipsed Review – Grotesque Fantasy
It’s been a while since the last straight-shot, traditional fantasy Magic wave hit players hands, with some grizzling and grumbling about the steady stream of Universes Beyond drops, although you’ll only find positivity here after this writer’s enjoyment of Avatar: The Last Airbender joining the MtG stable. Lorwyn Eclipsed revisits the titular setting of Lorwyn and its twin plane Shadowmooor, a land of eternal day and night juxtaposed against one another with once distinct borders now bleeding together. It’s dark fantasy vibes all the way down, the occasional burst of brightness tempered by artwork that channels Dark Crystal, Labyrinth and Troll where each cute creature is a split second away from bearing some fearsome fangs.
Player2 was fortunate enough to receive a Lorwyn Eclipsed Bundle, the Blight Curse Commander Deck along with some Collector Boosters (check out our Instagram for the contents!) and some more Play Boosters for good measure thanks to Wizards of the Coast. A ubiquitous piece of launch gear, the Lorwyn Eclipsed bundle has some striking art on it that effectively conveys the mixture of whimsy and off-putting vibes present across the entire range, both inviting and unnerving all at once. It also happens to have what is maybe the most striking spindown d20 I’ve seen yet, the sparkling teal die perfect for catching the eye across a table. Previous Bundle purchasers will know what to expect here, so if all you’re after is some Play Boosters and a visually pleasing place to put them, it has you covered. Outside of the Bundle, the product range for Lorwyn Eclipsed features two Commander pre-cons, a Prerelease box, a Draft Night Box and two ‘themed’ decks – Pirate and Angels – for Standard magic play, the latter of which sound like an interesting way to drive more interest in this traditional format.
Moving over to the Commander decks for Lorwyn Eclipsed, there are two options; Dance of the Elements and Blight Curse. We received the Blight Curse Commander Pre-con Deck which is easily the trickiest I’ve played with thus far, a Black/Red/Green Wedge deck that spotlights ‘Auntie Ool, Cursewretch’ and ‘The Reaper, King No More’, Legendary Creature Commanders that come across as very nasty to play. As you can see from the images below, ‘Auntie Ool’ is about pushing -1/-1 counters and turning that function into either card draw for controlled creatures and direct damage for opponent-controlled creatures. A quick perusal through the rest of the deck naturally reveals an abundance of opportunities to get -1/-1 tokens out, or take things even further with cards like “The Scorpion God’ and ‘Dusk Urchin’ among others which combo to push draw even further. For someone still coming to grips with many of the intricacies of Magic, especially in regards to exploiting debuffs and timing, this was the first deck that I felt it necessary to go through the entire set of cards and read the accompanying materials to try and understand how to get the most out of it. That said, Dance of the Elements is a five element deck, so kudos to Wizards of the Coast for not trying to break my brain completely – maybe one day I’ll be there!
In play, Blight Curse felt slow to ramp without drawing a good opening or mulligan hand – the deck can be challenging to get things going early due to card costs, as both Legendary’s need some diverse lands available to make an appearance, alongside many other creatures in the deck that often had me scrambling for a single Swamp. Even with a mulligan, I had a few games start with my opening turns doing little than putting out Land and praying to the heart of the cards I would top-deck something immediately useful. That’s not to say the overall distribution is bad, but I felt less versatility compared to other Commander pre-cons I’ve played with – I would put Blight Curse in the ‘intermediate to advanced’ pre-con category, likely aimed at someone with a fair amount of Magic experience looking to experiment with new methods and strategies of play. Meanwhile, I’m still having fun puttering around with ATLA Jumpstart decks, so while I’ve muddled my way through a bit, I can see Blight Curse becoming far more interesting once I develop as a player.
It’s always great to see a company try and cater to every level of user, and it seems only fair that for a ‘core’ release, Lorwyn Eclipsed gives some attention to longtime MtG players who have perhaps felt a little left out in the cold these past six months. With Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles next on the schedule (with its own Commander deck to boot!) the added complexity and bite of Lorwyn should satiate those avoiding UB releases until Secrets of Strixhaven hits in April.
