Tempest

Tempest

 

Theme decks

 

Official Guide

 

Tempest
[[File:{{#setmainimage:TMP logo.png}}|250px]]
Set Information
Set symbol
Symbol description	Cloud with Lightning Bolt
Design	Mark Rosewater Richard Garfield Mike Elliott Charlie Catino
Development	Henry Stern (lead) Mike Elliott William Jockusch Bill Rose Mark Rosewater
Art direction	Matt Wilson
Release date	October 14, 1997
Plane	Rath
Themes and mechanics	Flowstone, Licids, Slivers, Spikes
Keywords/​ability words	Buyback, Shadow
Set size	350 cards (110 commons, 110 uncommons, 110 rares, 20 basic lands)
Expansion code	TMP
Development codename	Bogavhati
Tempest block
Tempest Stronghold Exodus
Magic: The Gathering Chronology
Weatherlight Tempest Stronghold

For other uses, see Tempest (disambiguation).

Tempest is the twelfth Magic expansion and was released in October 1997 as a standalone set, and as the first part of the Tempest block. The set continues the Weatherlight Saga on the stormy plane of Rath.

Set details

The 350-card black-bordered set is comprised of 110 commons, 110 uncommons, 110 rares, and 20 basic lands. Tempest's expansion symbol is a cloud with a lightning bolt, to symbolize Rath’s turbulent sky and Tempest’s tumultuous plot. This set was the first after Antiquities that featured Richard Garfield in an active role as designer.

Marketing

Booster featuring Greven il-Vec

Tempest was the last set that was marketed as a standalone set, and the first that was advertised as an expert-level set in the new rating system for sets. Tempest cards were sold not only in traditional 60-card starter decks and 15-card boosters but also in a new form: pre-constructed theme decks. Using only Tempest cards, the design team built four theme decks, marketed as a ready-to-play introduction to the set. The accompanying booklet explained the play strategy for each deck and suggested ways to strengthen them by swapping in cards from other sets. Another difference from the previous large expansions came in the rulebook. Anyone buying Tempest cards could safely be assumed to have either a Fifth Edition rulebook or a friend who could teach them the game. So instead of reprinting all the rules in the Tempest booklet, WotC only printed a brief overview and a few pages describing the features that were new in the set. The rest of the booklet, some fifty pages, profiled the main characters and summarized the Tempest story. Each Tempest booster contained 15 cards: 11 commons, 3 uncommons, and 1 rare. The packs featured artwork from Auratog, Volrath's Curse, and Commander Greven il-Vec. Tempest was the first set to feature a special prerelease card: Dirtcowl Wurm. The card is non-foil, with the word "Prerelease" and the Magic "M" stamped in gold leaf on the type line.

The Official Guide to Tempest is a complete companion card set, written by Beth Moursund. This guide gives tips for playing in a Tempest-only environment and how to best use Tempest cards with Fifth Edition. There are full-color reproductions of all of the Tempest cards, along with information on the rarity of the cards and current errata.

Storyline

The set takes place on the stormy plane of Rath, where Gerrard and the heroes of the Skyship Weatherlight set out to find Volrath's stronghold.

Mechanics and themes

The block mechanics Buyback and Shadow were introduced in this set. White, blue, and black have creatures with shadow (white Soltari, blue Thalakos, black Dauthi), while green and red have multiple methods of blocking creatures with shadow. The abilities associated with Slivers, Licids, Spikes, and flowstone were also introduced in this set. There are cycles of Slivers and Licids and one green Spike that served as a preview of sorts for the rest of the Spikes yet to appear in the block. Flowstone creatures are red.

Creature types

The following creature types are introduced in this expansion: Crab, Licid, Shapeshifter, Sliver, Spike.

The following creature types are used in this expansion but also appear in previous sets: Angel, Ape, Atog, Beast, Bird, Cat, Cleric, Dragon, Drake, Druid, Dryad, Elemental, Elephant, Elf, Faerie, Giant, Goblin, Hound, Illusion, Imp, Insect, Knight, Lizard, Merfolk, Minion, Ooze, Pegasus, Rat, Rhino, Salamander, Serpent, Skeleton, Soldier, Spider, Spirit, Treefolk, Thrull, Turtle, Vampire, Wall, Wizard, Wurm.

Cycles

Tempest has eleven cycles:

Cycle name
Circles of protection	Circle of Protection: White	Circle of Protection: Blue	Circle of Protection: Black	Circle of Protection: Red	Circle of Protection: Green
	Each of these common white enchantments has a mana cost of and the ability to prevent the all damage from a source of a given color for . This cycle was reprinted from the Core Set. All Circles had similar art by Harold McNeill.
Hoser double cycle	Light of Day Warmth	Chill Insight	Perish Dread of Night	Havoc Boil	Choke Reap
	Each color has two uncommon cards that prey on its enemy colors.
Licids	Quickening Licid	Stinging Licid	Leeching Licid	Enraging Licid	Nurturing Licid
	Each of these common 1/1 Licid creatures has a mana cost of M and the ability to turn itself into an aura enchantment attaching itself to a creature or back to its normal state.
Medallions	Pearl Medallion	Sapphire Medallion	Jet Medallion	Ruby Medallion	Emerald Medallion
	Each of these rare artifacts has a mana cost of and reduces the cost of spells of a given color by . Some of them have residual images from a dirty press.
Common slivers	Talon Sliver	Winged Sliver	Clot Sliver	Heart Sliver	Muscle Sliver
	Each of these common 1/1 Sliver creatures costs M and has an ability that it grants to all Slivers, including itself.
Uncommon slivers	Armor Sliver	Mnemonic Sliver	Mindwhip Sliver	Barbed Sliver	Horned Sliver
	Each of these uncommon 2/2 Sliver creatures costs M and grants an ability which activates for to all Slivers, including itself.
Cycle name
Gold allied-color spells	Sky Spirit	Lobotomy	Spontaneous Combustion	Segmented Wurm	Ranger en-Vec
	Each of these uncommon spells, one for each allied two-color combination, has a mana cost that includes both of its colors.
Nap lands	Thalakos Lowlands	Rootwater Depths	Cinder Marsh	Mogg Hollows	Vec Townships
	Each of these uncommon dual lands can be tapped for or one mana of two allied colors; if tapped for the latter, it doesn't untap during your next untap step.
Cycle name
Gold enemy-colored spells	Selenia, Dark Angel	Dracoplasm	Vhati il-Dal	Soltari Guerrillas	Wood Sage
	Each of these rare spells, one for each enemy two-color combination, has a mana cost that includes both of its colors.
Enemy-color tap-pain lands	Salt Flats	Caldera Lake	Pine Barrens	Scabland	Skyshroud Forest
	Each of these rare lands come into play tapped and can be tapped for or one mana of two enemy colors; if tapped for the latter, it deals 1 damage to you.

Mega cycle

Cycle name
Retrievers	Treasure Hunter (Exodus)	Scrivener (Exodus)	Gravedigger (Tempest)	Anarchist (Exodus)	Cartographer (Exodus)
	Each of these 2/2 creatures returns a card of a certain type from your graveyard to your hand when it comes into play. There were four from Exodus and one from Tempest. Four out of the five were reprinted in Odyssey.

Mega-mega cycle

Cycle name
Atogs	Auratog (Tempest)	Chronatog (Visions)	Necratog (Weatherlight)	Atog (Antiquities)	Foratog (Mirage)
	Auratog is the final card of this mega-mega cycle of creatures that started in Antiquities with the eponymous Atog.

Pairs

Tempest has two mirrored pairs.

Matched Pair
Warmth (Tempest) ()	Havoc (Tempest) ()	Each of these uncommon enchantments costs M and rewards you or punishes an opponent, respectively, when another player casts a spell of the other's color.
Scalding Tongs (Tempest) ()	Thumbscrews (Tempest) ()	Each of these rare artifacts costs and deals damage to an opponent if you have a low or high number of cards in hand, respectively.

Theme decks

Tempest was the first set to be released with pre-constructed theme decks. The decks are:

Theme deck name	Colors Included
Deep Freeze	W	U
The Slivers		U	B
The Swarm	W				G
The Flames of Rath	W			R

Notable cards

• Capsize was a notoriously miserable experience as a control finisher, as at every end step they could remove anything, and at a certain point their opponent's board began diminishing.
• Cold Storage confused players as written with the ability ": Put target creature you control on Cold Storage". With errata, it now reads ": Exile target creature you control." Duplicity has a similar effect.
• Ertai's Meddling later inspired Delay and consequently Suspend.
• Goblin Bombardment remains extremely powerful as a sacrifice outlet, being free to activate and is not as vulnerable as an enchantment.
• Humility was a seemingly simple enchantment with complicated layer implications due to timestamps (what was played before it / after it), especially when paired with Opalescence.
• Oracle en-Vec functionally forces your opponent to commit to attacks a turn in advance.
• Stalking Stones was the second printed creature to land and remains unusual in that it does so permanently. Newer designs would have it be sacrificed to put a token into play.
• Tradewind Rider was a staple in block constructed and extended bounce decks.
• Wasteland - Though strictly worse than Strip Mine, it is a staple in eternal formats where it is not restricted or banned.
• Escaped Shapeshifter is the first of many cards to "borrow" keyword abilities from other cards, listing out all of the keywords that it can have one by one.

Banned and restricted cards

• Earthcraft pairs with Squirrel Nest from Odyssey for a quick way to make an arbitrarily large number of creatures. It was banned in Standard in 1999, and in Legacy in 2003.
• Cursed Scroll is a powerful artifact when down to one card in hand. This card is worth even more in the Japanese language version as its activation cost was misprinted as instead of . It was banned for the Tempest Block format.
• Lotus Petal was a small version of Black Lotus, but it proved to be still too powerful and was eventually banned from the Legacy and Extended Formats, and restricted in the Vintage format.
• Grindstone combos with Painter's Servant from Shadowmoor to mill entire decks. While it was banned in Commander in 2008 shortly after, it was unbanned and Painter's Servant was banned instead in December 2009.

Reprinted cards

The following cards have been reprinted in Tempest from previous sets.

• Armored Pegasus — was last seen in Portal.
• Charging Rhino — was last seen in Portal.
• Circle of Protection: Black — was last seen in 5th Edition.
• Circle of Protection: Blue — was last seen in 5th Edition.
• Circle of Protection: Green — was last seen in 5th Edition.
• Circle of Protection: Red — was last seen in 5th Edition.
• Circle of Protection: White — was last seen in 5th Edition.
• Coercion — was last seen in Visions.
• Counterspell — was last seen in 5th Edition.
• Dark Banishing — was last seen in Mirage.
• Dark Ritual — was last seen in 5th Edition.
• Disenchant — was last seen in 5th Edition.
• Dream Cache — was last seen in Mirage.
• Enfeeblement — was last seen in Mirage.
• Gaseous Form — was last seen in 5th Edition.
• Giant Strength — was last seen in 5th Edition.
• Gravedigger — was last seen in Portal.
• Horned Turtle — was last seen in Portal.
• Natural Spring — was last seen in Portal.
• Needle Storm — was last seen in Portal.
• Pacifism — was last seen in Mirage.
• Power Sink — was last seen in 5th Edition.
• Rain of Tears — was last seen in Portal.
• Rampant Growth — was last seen in Mirage.
• Shatter — was last seen in 5th Edition.
• Spell Blast — was last seen in 5th Edition.
• Stone Rain — was last seen in Portal.
• Time Ebb — was last seen in Portal.
• Tranquility — was last seen in 5th Edition.
• Wind Drake — was last seen in Portal.
• Winter's Grasp — was last seen in Portal.

Functional reprints

Tempest has five functional reprints:

• Clergy En-vec is a functional reprint of Samite Healer from 5th Edition.
• Pit Imp is a functional reprint of Vampire Bats from 5th Edition, save for creature type.
• Rootwater Hunter is a functional reprint of Prodigal Sorcerer from 5th Edition and Zuran Spellcaster from Ice Age, save for creature type.
• Skyshroud Troll is a functional reprint of Gorilla Chieftain from Alliances, save for creature type.
• Staunch Defenders is a functional reprint of Spiritual Guardian from Portal, save for creature type.

Colorshifted

Tempest has one colorshifted card:

• Sudden Impact is a colorshifted version of Storm Seeker from Legends (green to red).

Trivia

• Aluren is an Old English word meaning ‘paradise’.
• Apes of Rath is a pun on The Grapes of Wrath.
• Bayou Dragonfly was inspired by a video game that was to be released in conjunction with Magic, but was never published.
• Eladamri, Lord of Leaves was named as a tribute to Michael G. Ryan's mother Irma, and his stepfather Dale.
• Emmessi Tome follows the R&D tradition of naming tomes using one of the R&D member's initials. In this case, Michael Scott Elliott (MSE).
• Intuition was originally intended to fetch three cards with different names but the playtest card was written as just "three cards" and R&D enjoyed the way it played.
  • Mark Rosewater later designed Gifts Ungiven to fetch cards with different names to have a card that functioned the way Intuition was originally supposed to.
• Lyna, the Soltari Emissary, was named after Mark Rosewater's mother Lynn.
• Mogg Squad is a play on the The Mod Squad, the '60s show about three undercover cops posing as hipppies. The flavor text reflects this spoof.
• Orim, Samite Healer was originally designed as a very minor character. Stumped for a name Michael G. Ryan took Mark Rosewater's nickname (Maro), and reversed it. The ‘a’ was later changed to an ‘i’ to make the name easier to pronounce.
• Squee's Toy is pronounced as squeeze toy.
• The flavor text of Time Warp is a reference to a song from the Rocky Horror Picture Show.
• Vhati il-Dal's name is derived from ‘Bogavhati’, the codename of the set.

Gallery

• 

  Booster box

• 

  Booster featuring Auratog

• 

  1997 Ultra Pro Tempest card box

• 

  Advertisement

External links

• Mark Rosewater (March 14, 2023). "Lesson Learned, Part 1". magicthegathering.com. Wizards of the Coast.