Modern Horizons

Modern Horizons

 

Art Series

 

Card comparisons

 

Modern Horizons
Set Information
Set symbol
Symbol description	Modern Masters symbol coming up from beyond the horizon
Design	Ethan Fleischer (co-lead) Mark Globus (co-lead) Alli Medwin Nat Moes (hackathon only) Mike Majors Mark Rosewater
Development	Adam Prosak (co-lead) Mark Globus (co-lead) Mike Majors Dan Musser Tom Ross Jules Robins Mike Turian Sam Stoddard
Art direction	Cynthia Sheppard
Release date	June 14, 2019
Plane	Various
Themes and mechanics	Modern power level, hybrid mana, pitch spells, Slivers, snow, the untap symbol
Keywords/​ability words	Battle cry, buyback, cascade, changeling, convoke, cycling, dash, delve, devour, dredge, echo, entwine, evoke, evolve, exalted, exploit, fateful hour, flashback, hellbent, hideaway, kicker, level up, manifest modular, monstrosity, ninjutsu, outlast, overload, persist, proliferate, protection, rebound, replicate, retrace, shroud, splice, storm, suspend, threshold, totem armor, undying, unearth, vanishing
Set size	254 cards +1 Buy-a-Box promo
Expansion code	MH1
Development codename	Contemporary
Straight-to-Modern sets
Modern Horizons Modern Horizons 2 N/A
Magic: The Gathering Chronology
War of the Spark Modern Horizons Signature Spellbook: Gideon

Modern Horizons is a Magic booster set which was released on June 14, 2019. Modern Horizons is the Innovation Product for 2019, and is designed to be drafted.

Set details

The full-art snow lands

Modern Horizons contains 254 cards (5 snow-covered basic lands, 101 commons, 80 uncommons, 53 rares, 15 mythic rares), and includes randomly inserted premium versions of all these cards. In addition, there is a Buy-a-Box card numbered #255/254. This set introduced new cards into Modern without them ever being legal in Standard. It contains 209 new cards and (excepting the snow basics) only reprints which previously weren't legal in Modern. For this, it was rigorously playtested by Play Design. The Buy-a-Box card is also a new-to-Modern reprint. The powerful new card options, some with old mechanics, are mixed with flavorful updates for favorite characters. The snow-covered basic lands appear in the land slot of Modern Horizons boosters.

Modern Horizons was originally dubbed as "Timespiral / Planar Chaos 2" in concept due to set complexity. Mark Rosewater has called it a "love letter" to the Time Spiral block. It isn't an entry level set because of its many returning mechanics. There was no story support for the set.

Marketing

Modern Horizons was sold in slightly larger-than-usual 17-card boosters (one card being a double-faced token, and one being an art card), and in a Draft Pack. The boosters feature horizontal artwork from Ayula, Queen Among Bears, Serra the Benevolent and Urza, Lord High Artificer. The set was printed for as long as demand held. It was released on Magic Online on June 13, with a booster price of $6.99 (regular booster packs cost $3.99). It was not featured on MTG Arena.

Prerelease

Prerelease events took place on June 8–9, 2019.

Promotional cards

• Buy-a-Box: Flusterstorm (non-foil, because it was expected to see tournament play and most tournament players prefer non-foil cards.)
• Preview (prerelease participation promo card): Astral Drift

Tokens / Emblem

The sixteenth card in the boosters is a double-faced token creature card or an emblem: One out of every four tokens is foil (but not double-sided).

1. 2/2 Shapeshifter creature with changeling for Irregular Cohort and Birthing Boughs.
2. 4/4 Angel creature with flying and vigilance for Serra the Benevolent.
3. 1/1 Bird creature with flying for Battle Screech.
4. 1/1 Soldier creature for Recruit the Worthy.
5. 1/1 Illusion creature with flying for Moonblade Shinobi.
6. 20/20 legendary Avatar creature with flying and indestructible named Marit Lage for Marit Lage's Slumber.
7. 2/2 Zombie creature for Rank Officer.
8. 1/1 Elemental creature for Seasoned Pyromancer.
9. 3/1 Elemental creature with trample and haste for Force of Rage.
10. 1/1 Goblin creature for Goblin War Party, Pashalik Mons‎, and Sling-Gang Lieutenant.
11. 2/2 Bear creature for Ayula's Influence and Mother Bear.
12. 3/3 Elephant creature for Generous Gift and Trumpeting Herd.
13. 4/4 Rhino creature with trample for Crashing Footfalls.
14. 1/2 Spider creature with reach for Rotwidow Pack and Twin-Silk Spider.
15. 1/1 Squirrel creature for Deep Forest Hermit and Squirrel Nest.
16. 1/1 Spirit creature with flying for Kaya's Guile.
17. 0/0 Construct artifact creature with "This creature gets +1/+1 for each artifact you control" for Urza, Lord High Artificer.
18. 3/3 Golem artifact creature for Splicer's Skill.
19. 1/1 Myr artifact creature for Mirrodin Besieged.
20. Emblem for Serra the Benevolent.
21. Emblem for Wrenn and Six.

Modern Horizons Art Series

Mox Tantalite art card

Back side of the art card

The seventeenth card in the boosters is an art card with horizontal full art from one of the regular cards in the set. The card back is mostly blank, with some collector's info. There are 54 different art cards.

Themes and mechanics

There are no new mechanics in Modern Horizons. Instead, the set features more than forty non-evergreen returning mechanics. R&D decided that the set could use any mechanic already in Modern up to Dragons of Tarkir.

A major mechanic is changeling, used to make a cohesive set (like it was used in Lorwyn previously). Snow is also a major mechanic.

With Splicer's Skill and Everdream, the set introduces a long-awaited variant from "splice onto Arcane" with "splice onto instant or sorcery" (As you cast an instant or sorcery spell, you may reveal this card from your hand and pay its splice cost. If you do, add this card’s effects to that spell.).

Other returning mechanics are: anchor words, battle cry, buyback, cascade, convoke, cycling, dash, delve, devour, dredge, echo, entwine, evoke, evolve, exalted, exploit, fateful hour, flashback, hellbent, hideaway, hybrid mana, kicker, level up, manifest, modular, monstrosity, morbid, ninjutsu, outlast, overload, persist, pitch spells, proliferate, protection, rebound, replicate, retrace, shroud, storm, suspend, threshold, totem armor, undying, unearth, the untap symbol, and vanishing.

Like in Future Sight before, the set features some "Mix-and-Match" cards, combining two different non-evergreen keywords on the same card: Feaster of Fools, Hogaak, Arisen Necropolis and Throes of Chaos.

Modern Horizons features the following limited archetypes:

• : Blink (Soulherder)
• : Ninjas (Ingenious Infiltrator)
• : Goblins (Munitions Expert)
• : "Lands in graveyard" matters (Ruination Rioter)
• : "Creaturefall" (Good-Fortune Unicorn)
• : Changelings (Etchings of the Chosen)
• : "Drawing two cards" matters (Thundering Djinn)
• : Graveyard (Rotwidow Pack)
• : Slivers (Lavabelly Sliver)
• : Snow (Abominable Treefolk)

Card types

• Modern Horizons introduces the Serra and Wrenn planeswalker types.
• Slivers are a major tribe. They are depicted in their pre-M14 form.
• Rare types like Coward, Goat and Trilobite get new support (Pyrophobia, Goatnap, Scuttling Sliver), reinforced by the changeling mechanic. Ninjas see a return as a draft archetype, as well as goblins.

Cycles

Modern Horizons has nine cycles, two of which are double cycles.

Single cycles

Cycle name
Forces	Force of Virtue	Force of Negation	Force of Despair	Force of Rage	Force of Vigor
	Each of these rare spells (four instants and an enchantment with flash) has an alternate casting cost that includes exiling a card of its color if it is not the player's turn.
Slivers	First Sliver's Chosen	Scuttling Sliver	Dregscape Sliver	Hollowhead Sliver	Tempered Sliver
	One monocolored uncommon Sliver of each color.
Legendary creatures	Sisay, Weatherlight Captain	Urza, Lord High Artificer	Yawgmoth, Thran Physician	Pashalik Mons	Ayula, Queen Among Bears
	Each of these monocolored legendary creatures represents a character in Magic lore.
Cycling lands	Secluded Steppe	Lonely Sandbar	Barren Moor	Forgotten Cave	Tranquil Thicket
	Each of these uncommon cycling lands enters the battlefield tapped, taps for one mana of a color, and has cycling for one mana of that color. They were reprinted from Onslaught.
Snow-covered lands	Snow-Covered Plains	Snow-Covered Island	Snow-Covered Swamp	Snow-Covered Mountain	Snow-Covered Forest
	Each of these basic lands has the snow supertype. They were reprinted from Ice Age and Coldsnap.
Cycle name
Horizon lands	Silent Clearing	Fiery Islet	Nurturing Peatland	Sunbaked Canyon	Waterlogged Grove
	Each of these rare pain lands can be sacrificed to draw a card by paying . They form an enemy colored cycle mirroring Horizon Canopy from Future Sight.
Talismans	Talisman of Hierarchy	Talisman of Creativity	Talisman of Resilience	Talisman of Conviction	Talisman of Curiosity
	Each of these uncommon artifacts costs to cast. They form an enemy cycle mirroring the talismans from Mirrodin.

Double cycles

Cycle name
Uncommon signposts	Soulherder	Ingenious Infiltrator	Munitions Expert	Ruination Rioter	Good-Fortune Unicorn	Etchings of the Chosen	Thundering Djinn	Rotwidow Pack	Lavabelly Sliver	Abominable Treefolk
	Ten uncommon spells, each one a signpost for its respective draft archetype.
Rare spells	Unsettled Mariner	Fallen Shinobi	Lightning Skelemental	Reap the Past	Eladamri's Call	Kaya's Guile	Collected Conjuring	Hogaak, Arisen Necropolis	Cloudshredder Sliver	Ice-Fang Coatl
	Ten rare spells, one for each color pair.

Mega-mega cycles

The Mirran swords mega-mega cycle gets its first allied colored additions. Though, the cycle is not complete with Modern Horizons.

• Sword of Truth and Justice
• Sword of Sinew and Steel

The Morphlings mega-mega cycle was completed.

• Endling

Reprints

About 15% of the cards in the set (45 total + 1 Buy-a-Box) are reprints. Except for the 5 basic snow lands these cards are Modern legal for the first time.

Functional reprints

• Phantom Ninja is a functional reprint of Phantom Warrior, save for creature types.

Notable cards

Modern Horizons was a set that completely shifted the meta of eternal formats especially in modern and slightly in legacy. This included the banning of both older and newer cards which led to the collapse of several older decks that were part of the main modern meta.

• Morophon, the Boundless has a five-color color identity, and can be used as a commander for various tribal Commander decks.
• Ayula, Queen Among Bears is a bear lord that is a prototype bear.
• King of the Pride is a cat lord.
• Throes of Chaos is a sorcery with no spell ability.
• Force of Negation is a powerful three mana blue spell which was an attempt to port the popular Force of Will from Legacy into Modern. Initially, it was little used (mostly in Azorious control decks and Infect decks) and through most of 2020 actually saw more play in Commander than modern. However, the card is still a powerful sideboard card in both modern and legacy, acting as extra Force copies in unfair matches and a serviceable Negate variant in fair ones.
• Urza, Lord High Artificer is an incredibly powerful artifact-based payoff card spawned and revived several long-form artifact based decks (unlike Affinity). It originally started with a variation on the Thopter Foundry-Sword of the Meek combo deck which began to put up large wins especially in a meta test with no Hogaak. Despite the Mox Opal ban the deck still could function perfectly well, given Urza's combo with Whir of Invention getting lock pieces. Urza still stands as one of the stronger foundations of Modern decks, and only with the bannings of Uro, Titan of Nature's Wrath and Arcum's Astrolabe has its share been lowered.

Banned and Restricted cards

• Wrenn and Six is the second, much more successful attempt to print a balanced two-mana planeswalker, limiting its abilities to rebuying lands and pinging. While successful in Modern, as it revived Midrange Jund as a deck while not being overwhelming, access to repeatable Wasteland was enough to warrant its ban in Legacy by November 2019.
• Hogaak, Arisen Necropolis, is a unique creature that can only be cast via usage of the delve and convoke mechanics and may also be cast from the graveyard. As it turned out, two creatures and five cards in the graveyard was so trivial in Modern that a second-turn Hogaak was a little over a third to occur per game. This resulted in the event know as Hogaak Summer around the time of Mythic Championship IV whereby the Hogaak Bridgevine decks (using Vengevine, Bloodghast and Bridge from Below) completely dominated the modern meta. Banning Bridge from Below simply forced superior tuning of the deck, and while it was underrepresented in the Top 8 it was known to be a victim of its own success. It ultimately also took a ban shortly after, in August 2019.
• Arcum's Astrolabe is one of the only Snow-casting spells in Magic, designed to support Snow decks in draft by filtering off-color Snow land mana into any color. Ported to Constructed, however, it let four-color manabases run Blood Moon without any hesitation, turning formats into "four color soup" decks, and its Artifact typing enabled various ways to abuse it in any format. It was hence banned in October 2019 (Pauper), July 2020 (Modern) and February 2021 (Legacy).

Callbacks

Card	Inspired by	Notes
Answered Prayers	Angel's Tomb	Both cards are 3-mana permanents which can transform into a 3/3 Angel creature with flying whenever a creature enters the battlefield under their controller's control.
Archmage's Charm	Cryptic Command	The art also resembles Cancel (Amonkhet). Archmage's Charm is one mana and one ability less than Cryptic Command and can also counter target spell.
Aria of Flame	Torch Song	And other growing enchantments using verse counters from Urza's Saga. Aria of Flame has the same cost as Torch Song.
Astral Drift	Astral Slide	Both cards are 2W enchantments that can exile a creature and return it to the battlefield under its owner's control at the beginning of the next end step whenever its controller cycles a card. Astral Drift serves as a self-functioning version that can cycle itself to gain its effect.
Ayula's Influence	Seismic Assault	Colorshifted red to green. Both cards are enchantments that cost three of the same colored mana and have the ability to discard a land to produce an effect with the number 2 on it.
Bazaar Trademage	Bazaar of Baghdad	Its flavor text references Squandered Resources. Bazaar Trademage's enter-the-battlefield ability acts the same like Bazaar of Baghdad's activated ability.
Cabal Therapist	Cabal Therapy	Both cards cost 1 black mana. Cabal Therapist's precombat main phase ability functions similarly to casting Cabal Therapy for its flashback cost.
Changeling Outcast	Tormented Soul	Changling Outcast is Tormented Soul except as a shapeshifter with changeling.
Chillerpillar	Giant Caterpillar	Both creatures are 3/3 insects that cost 3M (where M is a colored mana). Both also have an ability to grant themselves flying.
Cloudshredder Sliver	Skyknight Legionnaire	Cloudshredder Sliver's artwork is similar to Skynight Legionnaire's first artwork. Both creatures have flying and haste.
Collected Conjuring	Collected Company	Both cards cost 5 mana. Collected Conjuring is Collected Company except as a sorcery, multicolored, and does the same free casting effect for sorceries instead.
Collector Ouphe	Brown Ouphe and Null Rod	Collector Ouphe is Brown Ouphe with Null Rod. In other words, a 2/2 Brown Ouphe with the mana value and ability of Null Rod.
Cordial Vampire	Indulgent Aristocrat	Both vampire creatures add a +1/+1 counter whenever a creature dies.
Crashing Footfalls	Hypergenesis, etc.	As Hypergensis is the only "costless suspend" card of the cycle banned, Crashing Footfalls recompletes the cycle.
Deep Forest Hermit	Deranged Hermit	Both creatures are 1/1 elves with the cost of 3GG. Their enter-the-battlefield abilities creature four 1/1 green Squirrel creature tokens and grant squirrel creatures +1/+1. Both also have an ability that makes their stay on the battlefield temporary.
Defile	Mutilate	Defile is a 1 black mana Mutilate that only targets a single creature.
Dregscape Sliver	Dregscape Zombie	Aside from having Dregscape in their names and the same mana costs, Dregscape Sliver also trade the cost of its unearth ability for 2 generic mana over the original 1 black mana cost.
Echo of Eons	Time Spiral and Timetwister	Echo of Eons has the same ability as both Time Spiral and Timetwister. Echo of Eons also has a mana cost the same as Time Spiral and a flashback cost the same as Timetwister. The flashback ability also imitates Time Spiral's self-exiling ability.
Endling	Morphling	Last card of the Morphling mega-mega cycle.
Everdream	Evermind, Think Twice	Everdream has a mana cost the same as Evermind's splice cost and its splice cost is the same as Think Twice's flashback cost. The three cards have the same ability of drawing a card. Everdream's artwork is also similar to Evermind.
Excavating Anurid		References the Anurids of Otaria, and references Turg.
First-Sphere Gargantua	Phyrexian Rager and Phyrexian Gargantua	References the First Sphere of the original Phyrexia. First-Sphere Gargantua has the same mana cost as Phyrexian Gargantua and its unearth cost is the same as Phyrexian Rager. When cast twice, First-Sphere Gargantua imitates Phyrexian Gargantua's enter-the-battlefield ability.
Fists of Flame		First ever mentioning of Jared Carthalion (the Shadow Mage) in the flavor text.
Force of Despair	Force of Will and Cradle to Grave	Force of Despair is Cradle to Grave with Force of Will's similar alternate casting cost.
Force of Negation	Force of Will and Negate	Force of Negation is an exiling Negate with Force of Will's similar alternate casting cost.
Force of Rage	Force of Will and Akoum Stonewaker	Force of Rage is a double Akoum Stonewaker's landfall ability with Force of Will's similar alternate casting cost.
Force of Vigor	Force of Will and Naturalize	Force of Vigor is a doubled Naturalize with Force of Will's similar alternate casting cost.
Force of Virtue	Force of Will and Glorious Anthem	Force of Virtue is a Glorious anthem with flash and Force of Will's similar alternate casting cost.
Frostwalla	Rootwalla	Frostwalla is a snow Rootwalla that has an activated ability costing one snow mana instead.
Generous Gift	Beast Within	Colorshifted green to white.
Geomancer's Gambit	Ghost Quarter
Giver of Runes	Mother of Runes
Glacial Revelation	Kruphix's Insight
Gluttonous Slug	Morkrut Necropod
Goatnap	Goatnapper
Goblin Engineer	Goblin Welder
Goblin Oriflamme	Orcish Oriflamme (Alpha#Misprints)	Also has a quote from the Sarpadian Empires in its flavor text.
Good Fortune Unicorn	Juniper Order Ranger
Graveshifter	Gravedigger
Hall of Heliod's Generosity	Academy Ruins and Volrath's Stronghold	Third in a cycle of legendary lands that for 1M can put a target card of a particular card type from your graveyard on top of your library.
Headless Specter	Hypnotic Specter	References Hymn to Tourach in the flavor text.
Iceberg Cancrix	Hedron Crab
Ice-Fang Coatl	Baleful Strix and Winged Coatl
Impostor of the Sixth Pride	Blade of the Sixth Pride
King of the Pride	Savannah Lions	References the The Love Song of Night and Day in the flavor text.
Knight of Old Benalia	Knight of New Benalia
Lancer Sliver	Talon Sliver
Lesser Masticore	Masticore
Lightning Skelemental	Ball Lightning and Blightning
Llanowar Tribe	Llanowar Elves
Marit Lage's Slumber	Dark Depths
Martyr's Soul	Nantuko Shaman	Colorshifted green to white.
Mind Rake	Mind Rot
Mirrodin Besieged	Monastery Siege, etc.	Call back to the Mirrodin Besieged set where Mirrans and Phyrexians fought over dominance of Mirrodin. One of the few cards to share its name with a set. Depicts Jin-Gitaxias.
Mist-Syndicate Naga	Spawnwrithe
Mother Bear	Grizzly Fate
Mox Tantalite	Lotus Bloom and Mox Opal	And other Moxen
Munitions Expert	Volley Veteran
Nature's Chant	Naturalize and Disenchant	Colorshifted from green and white to hybridcolored
On Thin Ice	Chained to the Rocks
Pashalik Mons	Mons's Goblin Raiders	A vanity card.
Phantom Ninja	Phantom Warrior
Plague Engineer	Engineered Plague
Planebound Accomplice	Sneak Attack
Pondering Mage	Ponder
Pyrophobia		Refers to famed "coward" Norin the Wary in quote, and Boldwyr Intimidator.
Prismatic Vista	Terramorphic Expanse
Ranger-Captain of Eos	Ranger of Eos
Ransack the Lab	Strategic Planning	Colorshifted blue to black.
Ravenous Giant	Juzám Djinn	Colorshifted black to red.
Rotwidow Pack	Spider Spawning and Ishkanah, Grafwidow
Savage Swipe	Savage Punch
Scale Up	Craw Wurm
Scour All Possibilities	Preordain
Scuttling Sliver	Horseshoe Crab
Seasoned Pyromancer	Young Pyromancer
Segovian Angel	Segovian Leviathan	References Segovia, and Worzel and Thomil in the flavor text. The art also resembles Serra Angel (Ninth Edition) and has The Hippodrome in the background. The plane of Gargantikar was created exclusively to set up a joke for this card.
Serra the Benevolent	Serra Aviary, Serra Angel, and Worship
Shenanigans		Art resembles the destruction of a Chromatic Lantern.
Sisay, Weatherlight Captain	Captain Sisay
Sling-Gang Lieutenant	Siege-Gang Commander
Smiting Helix	Lightning Helix
Soul-Strike Technique	Soul Summons
Spell Snuff	Cancel
Spiteful Sliver	Spitemare
Splicer's Skill	Sensor Splicer	References the Splicer mechanic, with art specifically referencing Sensor Splicer and Phyrexian Splicer
Springbloom Druid	Harrow
Stream of Thought	Stream of Consciousness and Train of Thought
String of Disappearances	Chain Lightning	Colorshifted red to blue.
Tempered Sliver	Slith Predator
Thundering Djinn		References Brainstorm and Lightning Bolt in the flavor text.
Thornado	Tornado
Tribute Mage	Trinket Mage, Treasure Mage, and Trophy Mage	Depicts the Sword of the Meek
Trumpeting Herd	Call of the Herd
Twisted Reflection	Twisted Image
Umezawa's Charm	Umezawa's Jitte
Undead Augur	Corpse Augur
Urza, Lord High Artificer	Temporal Aperture and Tolarian Academy	Karn, Scion of Urza (Urza's creation) produces the same artifact tokens.
Venomous Changeling	Giant Scorpion
Vesperlark	Reveillark
Viashino Sandsprinter	Viashino Sandstalker
Wall of One Thousand Cuts	Wall of Swords
Watcher for Tomorrow	The hideaway lands from Lorwyn.
Weather the Storm	Grapeshot and Tendrils of Agony
Webweaver Changeling	Mammoth Spider
Winding Way	Mulch
Winds of Abandon	Path to Exile and Cyclonic Rift
Zhalfirin Decoy	Master Decoy	Features a quote by Sidar Jabari, and is riding a Zebra Unicorn.