Goodmorrow all Deep Dive Denizens and welcome to this week's installment of the Deep Dive Blog! While this week's edition did take a little longer to come out, I will admit it was almost for no reason at all. So apologies to anyone who was waiting patiently! First thing is first, we’re covering the recent spoilers on the new Commander Precons that will release alongside the set itself. The two that were shown, and the only two that there will be, are World Shaper which will be a Rund Sacrifice Lands deck (black, red, and green) and Counter Intelligence which will be a Jeskai (blue, red, and white.) Artifact Boost deck. While it is unfortunate that we will only be getting two precons, I must admit that my personal fondness for anything in relation to cool robots, I.e. the Counter Intelligence pre-con, counteracts that disappointment for me personally. However, that is just your writer giving you their opinion. With Eternities set to release in August, we definitely have more to look forward to spoiler wise until then.
Moving on to more recent news and the reason behind the delay on this iteration of the Deep Dive Blog, the new Spiderman Set recently dropped some of the big names and new cards set to release alongside the set. Such as Golgari Venom, Azorius Spiderman, Dimir Doc Ock, and Rakdos Green Goblin. Alongside this, they also spoiled a red artifact, that being the Green Goblin's Pumpkin Bombs, which have a unique feature as they are passed around from person to person in a game. While I won’t go into its exact mechanics here, you can click on the link that I previously left to go straight to the card! Finally, we’ve got the Dimir Grasping Tentacles, being in reference to Doc Ocks’ tentacles.
Now that I have finished listing the cards, we can go into other aspects of the spoilers. We were revealed the alternate arts, them all coming together akin to the Lord of the Rings Witch King box-scene that they did with various alternate arts in that set. While it is rather cool in concept, unlike the Lord of the Rings set, they didn’t match the artstyle of Magic unfortunately. While most people may not have an issue with this, I myself find it rather awkward. Seeing those cards played next to other magic cards might throw someone more fixated on the art like myself off a bit.
Finally, the last thing I will cover is the unfortunate reality of the pricing. The biggest offense when it comes to Universes Beyond is the greed that is followed. While it does have a track record of being more expensive, the prices listed for the Spiderman set are listed currently as 209$ for one Booster Box, 70$ for a Bundle, and 38$ for a single Collector Booster pack! Now I’d rather not dabble in controversy, however I can’t help but comment on these outrageous prices being, well, outrageous. While it can be understood that these sets make Wizards of the Coast a lot of money considering they are collaborations with massive IPs, increasing the price dramatically while already knowing that even if these were priced at normal costs they’d rake in tons of $$$, is a very greedy business practice.
However, I digress. While things did get a little opinionated nearing the end, to whomever stayed with me I thank you for reading! This is your beloved Deep Dive writer, signing off.