Lorwyn Eclipse set previews include major hints about Magic: The Gathering characters

Strixhaven students take center stage

Throughout this week, Wizards of the Coast has published a series of short stories all about what's going on in the Magic: The Gathering multiverse as a lore primer for the upcoming Lorwyn Eclipsed set due out in January. The first three stories described how four students from Strixhaven were lured to the mythological Lorwyn through an interdimensional Omenpath by a mischievous faerie. That's all well and good, but we want to see new cards. Thankfully, the fourth entry delivered. The fifth, released Dec. 12, however, confirms that these four students aren’t just side characters in wider Magic lore. One of them was revealed as a legendary card, which means the other three almost certainly are as well.

March of the Machine, Wilds of Eldraine, Aftermath, and even Outlaws of Thunder Junction previously did something similar by introducing characters with pieces of fiction that then appeared in the card sets. Lorwyn Eclipsed doubles down on this trend with these narrative episodes that spotlight characters who appear in the set as legendary creatures. All the cards revealed through these stories so far are one-to-one reflections of the exact story beats introduced in these chapters.

The four Strixhaven students stranded on Lorwyn are:

• Abigale, an owlin who communicates through sign language
• Kirol, a studious vampire with a knack for magical botany
• Sanar, an impulsive goblin
• Tam, a pragmatic gorgon from Shandalar

Together they feel like a balanced adventuring party of magical students with a diverse set of skills. After they accidentally awaken Isilu, the elemental god of Lorwyn, the delicate balance between Lorwyn's idyllic day and Shadowmoor's dark night is thrown out of balance, with the boundaries between the two fluctuating wildly. Natives to this plane shift between alternate versions of themselves on either side, but the students don't suffer the same fate.

Episode four, released on Dec. 11, marks the moment when the story of their harrowing adventures in Lorwyn and Shadowmoor begins to double as a card preview cycle for Lorwyn Eclipsed. Kirol is separated from the group and taken to the elven seat of power in Lorwyn called Lys Alana, where they're brought before High Perfect Morcant, the highest ranking elf on the plane. Morcant interrogates Kirol for more information that can help her take advantage of the crisis to establish elven supremacy.

Morcant is the first card revealed in these stories. She triggers a blight counter whenever an elf enters (forcing an opposing player to put -1/-1 on a creature). She also lets you tap three untapped elves to proliferate (which means dishing out additional blight counters to your enemies). Especially since she's a black-green, her toolkit squarely positions her as a villainous legendary creature in the set — and a powerful commander for an elf deck at that.

Her interrogation of Kirol is represented in the black Perfect Intimidation sorcery that makes the opponent exile two cards from their hand and/or removes all counters from a target creature. In the next section of the story that happens elsewhere, Abigale the owlin is helped by some merfolk she encounters, as depicted in the Unexpected Assistance card.

When we see Kirol again in episode five, released on Dec. 12, they're being led to a grove and forced to pick magical dawnglove flowers that grow near the Shadowmoor border, believing they can be used for some kind of mind-opening ritual. Because Morcant and her people reside in Lorwyn, they cannot cross the border, or they'd transition into their shadow selves. Kirol, who specializes in botany, is a convenient pawn here. Episode 5 delivers only one card reveal, and it's Kirol in the moment that they pick the flower.

Kirol, Attentive First-Year copies a triggered ability you control by tapping two untapped creatures you control. It's a red-white with hybrid mana costs (which is bound to be common in a set so focused on duality). By itself, it's not really a game-changer by any means. Between Morcant and Kirol, however, it's starting to seem like "tap creatures to do X" may appear on even more cards in Lorwyn Eclipsed. Does that mean we might get a lot of creature token generators in the set to help with that?

At first, these stories felt like a fun narrative way to drum up enthusiasm for the lore surrounding Lorwyn Eclipsed, but episode four confirmed we're getting the actual story behind the set itself. And since we now have a Kirol card, it's only a matter of time before Abigale, Sanar, and Tam get their own legendary creature cards as well.