Shards of Alara

Shards of Alara

 

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Intro packs

 

Shards of Alara
[[File:{{#setmainimage:ALA logo.png}}|250px]]
Set Information
Set symbol
Symbol description	5 shards of a plane
Design	Bill Rose (design lead), Devin Low (development lead), Aaron Forsythe, Mark Globus, Mark Gottlieb, Graeme Hopkins, Alexis Janson, Erik Lauer, Michael Mikaelian, Kenneth Nagle, Matt Place, Mark Rosewater, Brian Tinsman, Mike Turian, Noah Weil
Development	same as Design Team
Art direction	Jeremy Jarvis
Release date	October 3, 2008
Plane	Alara
Themes and mechanics	Three-color play, colored artifacts, large creatures
Keywords/​ability words	Cycling, Devour, Exalted, Unearth
Set size	249 + 1
Expansion code	ALA
Development codename	Rock
Alara block
Shards of Alara Conflux Alara Reborn
Magic: The Gathering Chronology
Masters Edition II Shards of Alara Duel Decks: Jace vs. Chandra

Shards of Alara is the forty-seventh Magic expansion and was released October 2008 as the first set in the Alara block. The prerelease events for this set were held on September 27–28, 2008. Release events were held on October 3, 2008, the same day the set went on sale.

Set details

Shards of Alara was the first set to follow a new packaging policy, which amongst other things introduced a new rarity level called mythic rare, as well as the replacement of one of the commons in a booster pack with a basic land (the first time this was done outside of a core set). After evaluating the set sizes, Wizards of the Coast decided that card sets would be smaller than they had traditionally been. Initial sets of a block were now 249 cards (101 commons, 60 uncommons, 53 rares, 15 mythic rares, 20 basic lands) instead of the approximately 300 cards of previous expansions. Shards of Alara heralded the return of planeswalker cards, and introduced the first multicolored planeswalkers.

Shards of Alara design was anything but typical. Design lead Bill Rose assembled no fewer than fifteen people on five teams, one for each of the five three-color shards. Each of the five shards has its gameplay themes and its stable of artists. The expansion symbol of the set is a representation of the five shards.

In light of the flavor of the shards, Shards of Alara launch parties (October 3–6, 2008) were Wizards Play Network events that featured a new format: the Theme Tournament. Designed to highlight the fun and flavorful aspects of the set, the Theme Tournaments had the same structure as the prerelease tournaments (Sealed Deck format in which each player receives one tournament pack and three boosters), with a few additional rules. As players build their decks, they had to choose one of the five shards (Bant, Esper, Grixis, Jund, or Naya). The mana cost of each card in a player's deck could contain only mana symbols that matched the chosen shard's three colors (mana symbols in a card's text box were ignored). Colorless cards could be played in any deck. In addition, a deck could not generate mana outside its shard's colors. Any card that would generate a mana of a color that doesn't match the chosen shard generates colorless mana instead.

Collector numbers

Shards of Alara contains many colored artifacts. These cards were sorted alphabetically into their color when determining collector numbers. For example, the colored artifact Executioner's Capsule (which requires to cast) is placed alphabetically between the black cards Dregscape Zombie and Fleshbag Marauder. Colored artifacts that require multiple colors are alphabetized among the multicolored cards. As usual, the artifacts that have a generic mana cost are alphabetized together and appear numerically between the multicolored cards and the nonbasic lands.

Fourteen years after the release of the set, The List for Streets of New Capenna added a new collector number (#250) to the set with a special non-foil Rafiq of the Many featuring new art and the Streets of New Capenna Golden Age treatment. This card notably lacks the usual List planeswalker symbol in the lower left corner.

Flavor and storyline

“

Five worlds share one fate.

”

Alara was a single plane once, a massive world rich with mana. However, those same resources led to its downfall, for an unknown planeswalker tore the plane asunder millennia ago, harvesting of its mana. This disaster broke Alara along color lines into incomplete planes called shards, as light is diffracted by a prism. The shards recovered their mana in time, but only in part. Each shard is vastly different, as the combinations of triple-colored mana have shaped natural and cultural forces on each world in distinctive ways.

Story Comics

Flight of the White Cat is a webcomic about Ajani's origins on Alara. It was published in three parts in October 2008.

Title	Author	Release Date	Setting (plane)	Featuring
Flight of the White Cat, Part 1	Brady Dommermuth	2008-10-08	Naya	Ajani, Jazal Goldmane, Tenoch, Qala
Flight of the White Cat, Part 2	Brady Dommermuth	2008-10-15	Naya, Jund	Ajani, Jazal Goldmane, Zaliki
Flight of the White Cat, Part 3	Brady Dommermuth	2008-10-22	Jund	Ajani, Karrthus, Sarkhan

Savor the Flavor

Title	Author	Release Date	Setting (plane)	Featuring
Encounter at the Necropolis	Doug Beyer	October 22, 2008	Grixis	Eliza, Malfegor, Sedris

Planes Explorer

Planes Explorer is a Flash object that allows one to explore the flavor of the five shards of Alara.

• 

  Bant: A shard of rolling hills, forests and glittering beaches. The landscape is dotted with beautiful high-rising castles.

• 

  Esper: The sophisticated beauty of this shard is etched into every artifact, city, and even the faces of some of the inhabitants.

• 

  Grixis: The inhabitants of this hellish shard are either buying power at a high price or spiraling out of sanity and into despair.

• 

  Jund: Goblins, lizardmen, and humans scour this shard for food and power, but all here are ruled by fearsome dragons.

• 

  Naya: The lush growth and rich natural beauty of this shard sometimes mask the savage dangers of the jungle.

• 

Marketing

Shards of Alara was sold in 75-card tournament decks, 16-card boosters, five intro packs, and a fat pack. It was the last set to feature tournament decks; in these, any number of the usual rares could have been replaced with mythic rares. The intro packs replaced the traditional preconstructed theme decks and the 2-Player Starter Set. The fat pack's content was changed replacing the novel with a brief introduction of the expansion's respective novel or Planeswalker's Guide. The Pro Tour Player Cards were discontinued. The Alara block was accompanied by only one novel: Alara Unbroken, written by Doug Beyer and the Planeswalker's Guide to Alara, written by Doug Beyer and Jenna Helland.

The promotional card given to participants at both the prerelease and release events was Ajani Vengeant, one of the mythic rare planeswalkers, with alternate artwork.

Starting with the Shards of Alara set, each booster pack contained the following: one basic land, ten commons, three uncommons, one rare or mythic rare, and 1 non-game marketing card. If the pack happened to contain a foil premium card, it would do so in place of one of the commons, regardless of that premium card's rarity. (Every game card in the set can appear as a regular card or as a premium card). The boosters featured artwork from Steward of Valeron (with white background), Sphinx Sovereign (with blue background), Sedris, the Traitor King (with black background), Hellkite Overlord (with red background) and Godsire (with green background). An all-foil booster pack containing cards from Shards of Alara and the other two sets of the block was released on January 8, 2010.

The sixteenth card in the boosters is either a “flavor/shard card”, instead of the usual “rules card”, or a creature token. One face has one of five shard flavor cards or is one of ten different creature tokens. The other face has one of six advertisements for organized play programs, Conflux, Duel Decks: Jace vs. Chandra, fat packs, magicthegathering.com, Magic Online, A Planeswalker's Guide to Alara, and Ultra Pro products for Magic.

Tips & Tricks

The tips & tricks cards are:

• Bant — Keyword: Exalted
• Esper — Theme: Colored Artifacts
• Grixis — Keyword: Unearth
• Jund — Keyword: Devour
• Naya — Theme: Power 5 or Greater

Tokens

The Shards of Alara tokens are:

1. 1/1 Soldier creature produced by Elspeth, Knight-Errant and Knight-Captain of Eos.
2. 0/1 Homunculus artifact creature produced by Puppet Conjurer.
3. 1/1 Thopter artifact creature with flying produced by Sharding Sphinx.
4. 1/1 Skeleton creature with “: Regenerate this creature.” produced by Skeletonize.
5. 2/2 Zombie creature produced by Archdemon of Unx.
6. 4/4 Dragon creature with flying produced by Broodmate Dragon and Sarkhan Vol.
7. 1/1 Goblin creature produced by Dragon Fodder.
8. */* Ooze creature produced by Ooze Garden.
9. 1/1 Saproling creature produced by Jund Battlemage, Mycoloth, Necrogenesis, and Sprouting Thrinax.
10. 8/8 Beast creature produced by Godsire.

Mechanics

Though the set as a whole has multicolored cards as an overarching theme, due to the setting being split into five “shards” with no contact with each other, each shard was given its distinct mechanical theme.

• Bant (primary , secondary ): The shard of Bant was given the exalted ability, which reads, “Whenever a creature you control attacks alone, that creature gets +1/+1 until end of turn.”
• Esper (primary , secondary ): The shard of Esper was given an emphasis on artifacts, including the first widespread use of artifacts with colored casting costs (Sarcomite Myr and Reaper King were earlier forays into this design space).
• Grixis (primary , secondary ): The shard of Grixis was given the unearth ability, which reads, “[Cost]: Return this card from your graveyard to the battlefield. It gains haste. Exile it at the beginning of the next end step or if it would leave the battlefield. Unearth only as a sorcery.”
• Jund (primary , secondary ): The shard of Jund was given the devour N ability, which reads, “As this enters the battlefield, you may sacrifice any number of creatures. This creature enters the battlefield with N times that many +1/+1 counters on it.”
• Naya (primary , secondary ): The shard of Naya was emphasized creatures with power of 5 or greater, “5-power matters”.

Shards of Alara also featured the return of cycling for the third time (or fourth, including Future Sight) since the Urza block.

Cycles

Shards of Alara has 19 cycles:

Cycle name
Common one-drops	Akrasan Squire	Cathartic Adept	Deathgreeter	Goblin Mountaineer	Wild Nacatl
	Each of these common 1/1 creatures costs one mana.
Battlemages	Bant Battlemage	Esper Battlemage	Grixis Battlemage	Jund Battlemage	Naya Battlemage
	Each of these uncommon 2/2 human creatures costs M and has two activated abilities corresponding to each of its allied colors.
Heralds	Angel's Herald	Sphinx's Herald	Demon's Herald	Dragon's Herald	Behemoth's Herald
	Each of these uncommon 1/1 creatures has a cost of M and has an activated ability with the cost “M, , Sacrifice a creature of this creature's color plus one of each of its allied colors” that allows you to search your library for its corresponding noble creature (see below) and put it onto the battlefield.
Allied-ability creatures	Knight of the Skyward Eye () Sighted-Caste Sorcerer ()	Cloudheath Drake () Vectis Silencers ()	Shore Snapper () Undead Leotau ()	Viashino Skeleton () Thorn-Thrash Viashino ()	Cavern Thoctar () Godtoucher ()
	Two cycles at common, with creatures having an activated ability with an allied-color cost. One goes clockwise around the color wheel, while the other goes counter-clockwise.
Cycle name
Allied-colored two-drops	Deft Duelist	Tidehollow Strix	Goblin Deathraiders	Rip-Clan Crasher	Steward of Valeron
	Each of these common creatures requires one mana each of two allied colors to cast.
Common allied-colored spells	Hindering Light	Agony Warp	Blightning	Branching Bolt	Sigil Blessing
	Each of these common allied-colored spells has two effects.
Uncommon allied-colored spells	Kiss of the Amesha	Thoughtcutter Agent	Blood Cultist	Sangrite Surge	Qasali Ambusher
	Each of these uncommon spells has a mana cost that includes two allied-colored mana.
Cycle name
Uncommon enemy-colored spells	Tidehollow Sculler	Swerve	Necrogenesis	Bull Cerodon	Jhessian Infiltrator
	Each of these uncommon spells has a mana cost that includes two enemy-colored mana.
Cycle name
Common tricolored creatures	Waveskimmer Aven	Windwright Mage	Kederekt Creeper	Carrion Thrash	Rakeclaw Gargantuan
	Each of these common creatures has a mana cost that includes MNO.
Uncommon tricolored creatures	Rhox War Monk	Tower Gargoyle	Fire-Field Ogre	Sprouting Thrinax	Woolly Thoctar
	Each of these uncommon creatures has a mana cost that includes MNO.
Mythic legends	Rafiq of the Many	Sharuum the Hegemon	Sedris, the Traitor King	Kresh the Bloodbraided	Mayael the Anima
	Each of these mythic rare legendary creatures has a mana cost that includes MNO.
Noble creatures	Empyrial Archangel	Sphinx Sovereign	Prince of Thralls	Hellkite Overlord	Godsire
	Each of these mythic rare creatures has a mana cost of MNNO.
Panoramas	Bant Panorama	Esper Panorama	Grixis Panorama	Jund Panorama	Naya Panorama
	Each of these common triple lands can be tapped for or sacrificed to search your library for a basic land of one of three types.
Shardlands (or Trilands)	Seaside Citadel	Arcane Sanctum	Crumbling Necropolis	Savage Lands	Jungle Shrine
	Each of these uncommon triple lands comes into play tapped and can be tapped for one of three colors of mana. These are strictly better than the old taplands.
Obelisks	Obelisk of Bant	Obelisk of Esper	Obelisk of Grixis	Obelisk of Jund	Obelisk of Naya
	Each of these common artifacts can be tapped to add one of three mana.
Resounding spells	Resounding Silence	Resounding Wave	Resounding Scream	Resounding Thunder	Resounding Roar
	Each of these common instant or sorcery spells has a base effect and can be cycled for MNO, where MNO are the card's shard colors, for twice the base effect.
Charms	Bant Charm	Esper Charm	Grixis Charm	Jund Charm	Naya Charm
	Each of these uncommon instants costs MNO and has three modes.
Ultimatums	Clarion Ultimatum	Brilliant Ultimatum	Cruel Ultimatum	Violent Ultimatum	Titanic Ultimatum
	Each of these rare sorceries costs MMNNNOO and has a powerful effect.
Rare tricolored spells	Stoic Angel	Punish Ignorance	Sedraxis Specter	Broodmate Dragon	Realm Razer
	Each of these rare spells has a mana cost that includes MNO.

Mini-cycles

Shards of Alara has 5 cycles of three cards, each missing the two colors not associated with its shard:

Cycle name
Esper capsules	Dispeller's Capsule	Courier's Capsule	Executioner's Capsule
	Each of these common artifacts can be sacrificed for an effect common to its color.
Cycle name
Jund scavengers	Scavenger Drake	Rockslide Elemental	Algae Gharial
	Each of these uncommon 1/1 creatures has “Whenever another creature dies, you may put a +1/+1 counter on this creature”
Cycle name
Naya cycling creatures	Yoked Plowbeast	Ridge Rannet	Jungle Weaver
	Each of these common creatures costs MM, has cycling and a power of 5 or more.
Naya druids	Sunseed Nurturer	Exuberant Firestoker	Drumhunter
	Each of these uncommon human druid creatures has a triggered ability that activates at the end of your turn as long as you control a creature with power 5 or greater and “: Add ”
Naya “soul spells”	Soul's Grace	Soul's Fire	Soul's Might
	Each of these common instants or sorceries has an effect based on the power of the creature it targets. In addition, each of these cards has flavor text starting with “An avatar he sculpts of...”

Mega cycle

Cycle name	Bant	Esper	Grixis	Jund	Naya
Planeswalkers	Elspeth, Knight-Errant (Shards of Alara)	Tezzeret the Seeker (Shards of Alara)	Nicol Bolas, Planeswalker (Conflux)	Sarkhan Vol (Shards of Alara)	Ajani Vengeant (Shards of Alara)
	Each shard has a corresponding Planeswalker.

Pairs

Shards of Alara has one mirrored pair.

Mirrored Pairs		Description
Marble Chalice ()	Onyx Goblet ()	Common artifacts that cost M, and have a tap ability. The former causes you to gain one life, whilst the latter causes a player to lose one life.

Reprinted cards

The following cards have been reprinted from previous sets and included in Shards of Alara:

• Cancel — first printed in Time Spiral, was last seen in 10th Edition.
• Goblin Mountaineer — first printed in Portal Second Age, was last seen in 9th Edition.
• Hellkite Overlord — was previewed in From the Vault: Dragons.
• Infest — was last seen in Onslaught.
• Naturalize — first printed in Onslaught, was last seen in 10th Edition.
• Oblivion Ring — was last seen in Lorwyn.

Functional reprints

This is the first expansion set to have functional reprints since Lorwyn. Shards of Alara has three functional reprints:

• Cylian Elf is a functional reprint of Grizzly Bears from 10th Edition, Forest Bear from Portal Three Kingdoms, Balduvian Bears from Ice Age, Bear Cub from Portal Second Age, and Barbary Apes from Legends, save for creature types.
• Jhessian Lookout is a functional reprint of Coral Eel from 9th Edition, Coral Merfolk from 7th Edition, and Wu Infantry from Portal Three Kingdoms, save for creature types.

Colorshifted

• Incurable Ogre is a colorshifted functional reprint of Dross Crocodile from 10th Edition.
• Banewasp Affliction is practically a colorshifted functional reprint of Creature Bond.
• Angelsong is a colorshifted functional reprint of Lull.

Misprints

• Mighty Emergence lists collector number #137, should be #138.
• Manaplasm lists collector number #138, should be #137.

Notable cards

• Ad Nauseam — main engine powering the Legacy ANT deck.
• Blightning — one of the key Jund cards in Standard, also splashed in Red decks.
• Cruel Ultimatum — important card in Grixis and 5-color Control decks in Standard.
• Ethersworn Canonist — popular hate card against various decks, especially combo decks which rely on casting multiple spells in one turn.
• Hellkite Overlord — Was first released in From the Vault: Dragons, a special set predating Shards of Alara.
• Knight of the White Orchid — A popular Tithe variant, especially in combination with the Borderposts cycle from Alara Reborn.
• Ranger of Eos — Antoine Ruel's prize card for winning the 2006 Magic Invitational.
• Wild Nacatl — key creature in aggro decks such as Naya or Zoo. Wild Nacatl was later banned in Modern in December 2011. It was then unbanned in Modern in February 2014.
• Master of Etherium powered up artifact decks in Modern and still sees some play in Legacy
• Fleshbag Marauder is the first of an eponymous archetype of creature that makes each player sacrifice a creature when it enters the battlefield and sees play in Pauper aggro decks
• Fatestitcher's ability to untap any permanent lead to it seeing play in Modern Jeskai Ascendency combo decks as well as some versions of Dredge decks in multiple formats
• Relic of Progenitus is one of the best graveyard hate artifacts of all time, seeing play in sideboards of every format it is legal in but especially Modern and pauper
• Ajani Vengeant has seen sporadic play competitively and is notable for having a one sided Armageddon as a loyalty ability
• Lich's Mirror has a unique effect that prevents its controller from losing the game in exchange for effectively resetting the game for them

Intro packs

Previous to Shards of Alara, there were theme decks. Intro packs premiered in Shards of Alara. All of the intro packs are 3 colors based on their shard.

Intro pack contents included:

• a 41-card preconstructed deck, which included 1 premium foil rare and one non-premium rare
• a booster pack of the current set
• a set-specific insert explaining the new mechanics in the set and info on the preconstructed decks included in the intro packs
• a learn-to-play insert for new players that includes game rules, deck building tips, and storyline information

The preconstructed intro packs are:

Intro pack name	Colors Included					Foil rare
Bant Exalted	W	U			G	Battlegrace Angel
Esper Artifice	W	U	B			Master of Etherium
Grixis Undead		U	B	R		Vein Drinker
Primordial Jund			B	R	G	Flameblast Dragon
Naya Behemoths	W			R	G	Spearbreaker Behemoth

Shard cards

Answering to an Ask Wizards, on October 16, 2008, Brady Dommermuth gave a list of all the Shards of Alara cards belonging to each of the five shards. Here is the list.

Bant	Esper	Grixis	Jund	Naya
Akrasan Squire Angel's Herald Angelic Benediction Angelsong Bant Battlemage Bant Charm Bant Panorama Battlegrace Angel Call to Heel Cancel Clarion Ultimatum Court Archers Dawnray Archer Deft Duelist Elspeth, Knight-Errant Empyrial Archangel Excommunicate Forest Guardians of Akrasa Hindering Light Invincible Hymn Island Jhessian Infiltrator Jhessian Lookout Kiss of the Amesha Knight of the Skyward Eye Knight of the White Orchid Knight-Captain of Eos Obelisk of Bant Outrider of Jhess Plains Plains Rafiq of the Many Ranger of Eos Resounding Silence Rhox Charger Rhox War Monk Rockcaster Platoon Seaside Citadel Sighted-Caste Sorcerer Sigil Blessing Sigil of Distinction Sigiled Paladin Steward of Valeron Stoic Angel Topan Ascetic Tortoise Formation Waveskimmer Aven Welkin Guide	Arcane Sanctum Brilliant Ultimatum Cloudheath Drake Coma Veil Courier's Capsule Dispeller's Capsule Esper Battlemage Esper Charm Esper Panorama Etherium Astrolabe Etherium Sculptor Ethersworn Canonist Executioner's Capsule Filigree Sages Gather Specimens Glaze Fiend Immortal Coil Island Island Marble Chalice Master of Etherium Memory Erosion Metallurgeon Mindlock Orb Obelisk of Esper Oblivion Ring Onyx Goblet Plains Protomatter Powder Punish Ignorance Puppet Conjurer Resounding Wave Salvage Titan Sanctum Gargoyle Scourglass Sharding Sphinx Sharuum the Hegemon Skill Borrower Spell Snip Sphinx Sovereign Sphinx's Herald Steelclad Serpent Swamp Tezzeret the Seeker Thoughtcutter Agent Tidehollow Sculler Tidehollow Strix Tower Gargoyle Vectis Silencers Windwright Mage	Ad Nauseam Agony Warp Archdemon of Unx Banewasp Affliction Blightning Blood Cultist Bone Splinters Cathartic Adept Corpse Connoisseur Covenant of Minds Cruel Ultimatum Crumbling Necropolis Cunning Lethemancer Death Baron Demon's Herald Dreg Reaver Dregscape Zombie Fatestitcher Fire-Field Ogre Fleshbag Marauder Grixis Battlemage Grixis Charm Grixis Panorama Hell's Thunder Incurable Ogre Infest Island Kathari Screecher Kederekt Creeper Kederekt Leviathan Lich's Mirror Lightning Talons Minion Reflector Mountain Obelisk of Grixis Prince of Thralls Quietus Spike Resounding Scream Scourge Devil Sedraxis Specter Sedris, the Traitor King Shadowfeed Shore Snapper Skeletal Kathari Skeletonize Swamp Swamp Swerve Undead Leotau Vein Drinker Viashino Skeleton Viscera Dragger Vithian Stinger	Algae Gharial Blister Beetle Bloodpyre Elemental Branching Bolt Broodmate Dragon Caldera Hellion Carrion Thrash Crucible of Fire Deathgreeter Dragon Fodder Dragon's Herald Flameblast Dragon Forest Goblin Assault Goblin Deathraiders Goblin Mountaineer Hellkite Overlord Hissing Iguanar Jund Battlemage Jund Charm Jund Panorama Kresh the Bloodbraided Magma Spray Manaplasm Mountain Mountain Mycoloth Necrogenesis Obelisk of Jund Ooze Garden Predator Dragon Resounding Thunder Rip-Clan Crasher Rockslide Elemental Sangrite Surge Sarkhan Vol Savage Hunger Savage Lands Scavenger Drake Skullmulcher Sprouting Thrinax Swamp Tar Fiend Thorn-Thrash Viashino Thunder-Thrash Elder Vicious Shadows Violent Ultimatum Volcanic Submersion	Ajani Vengeant Behemoth's Herald Bloodthorn Taunter Bull Cerodon Cavern Thoctar Cradle of Vitality Cylian Elf Druid of the Anima Drumhunter Elvish Visionary Exuberant Firestoker Feral Hydra Forest Forest Gift of the Gargantuan Godsire Godtoucher Gustrider Exuberant Jungle Shrine Jungle Weaver Keeper of Progenitus Lush Growth Mayael the Anima Mighty Emergence Mosstodon Mountain Naturalize Naya Battlemage Naya Charm Naya Panorama Obelisk of Naya Plains Qasali Ambusher Rakeclaw Gargantuan Realm Razer Relic of Progenitus Resounding Roar Ridge Rannet Sacellum Godspeaker Soul's Fire Soul's Grace Soul's Might Spearbreaker Behemoth Sunseed Nurturer Titanic Ultimatum Where Ancients Tread Wild Nacatl Woolly Thoctar Yoked Plowbeast

External links

• Shards of Alara product information page — Wizards of the Coast