The Brother's War - A Summary of mechanics and archetypes

Once again I find myself in the position of watching everyone else have fun at Prerelease for the new set and this time I cannot put into words how disappointed I am to be unable to partake. Believe me when I say 'This is a good set!'. To help you wrap your head around it and help with deck building for prerelease I have compiled the Mechanics and Archetypes into a single blog post you may scroll through to help.

Mechanics

Returning mechanics from Unearth, to the underutilised Meld mechanic, are all back. The Brother's war leans heavily into the lore of the book that it shares a name with, Powerstones, artifacts and the ramp for artifact dominance. Without further adieu let us look at the new Mechanics in The Brother's War.

Prototype

The Prototype mechanic is new to MTG, providing players with an alternative way to get giant mechs and war machines onto the battlefield. Within the brother's war set, there are multiple Artifact creatures that have big stats and a pricey mana cost to play them. Prototype brings these creatures into play at a lower mana cost with reduced stats. This mechanic really captures the urgency of machine production told in the original story.

Powerstones

Truly the driving force behind the original brother's war storyline, I would've been disappointed to not see them introduced into the set. Powerstone tokens are created by card effects similar to Blood Tokens from the recent Innistrad Double Feature.

Players can tap a Powerstone token to add one colourless mana to the mana pool. That mana can’t be used to cast spells that aren’t Artifacts, but it can get used toward a creature’s activated ability. 

Unearth

Getting Unearth cards into a player’s graveyard is a theme within The Brothers’ War set, and unlike previous versions of the mechanic, there are non-creature cards within BRO that have Unearth. Unearth is activated at Sorcery speed, not Instant. Only Artifacts have the Unearth mechanic.

Ward

Ward is a returning MTG mechanic that protects individual cards from becoming the target of a spell or ability that an opponent controls. To break a Ward, a player typically pays an additional mana cost.

Stun Counters

The almighty sticky tap. If a permanent (note not specifically a creature) has a stun counter and would become untapped, remove one stun counter from it instead, leaving it tapped. This mechanic was introduced in Dominaria United and plays exactly the same as far as I can tell.

Meld

The mechanic I am personally most excited about... I have never seen meld used quite as much as I'd like to (due to all the conditions required for it).

To activate the Meld mechanic, players must meet the specifications mentioned on a pair of Magic cards. The two cards then flip over and become one giant creature.

Transformers (yup...)

You know I was going to talk about them but I don't like Universes Beyond and this won't be information you need to know for the prerelease so please let's skip this and bury it (do not Unearth).

Archetypes

Much like Dominaria United The two colour archetypes are here to stick around just ensure that you remember some of your colourless artifact cards will have coloured mana-activated abilities.

Azorius (Blue/White): Soldier tribal

The White and Blue archetype has a strong soldier tribal theme, that prefers to go wide.

Dimir (Blue/Black): Draw two or more cards

Blue and Black have a new look in BRO Limited Draft. The archetype still has a control feel while encouraging multiple cards drawn per turn.

Rakdos (Black/Red): Sacrifice Tempo

Black and Red still want to sacrifice things, with a focus on sacrificing Artifacts like Powerstones.

Gruul (Red/Green): Stompy

The Red and Green archetype has several Artifacts with the Prototype mechanic that can beat down opponents through Trample and powerful stats.

Selesnya (Green/White): Artifacts and counters

The Green and White archetype contains Artifact hate, combat tricks, and +1/+1 counter themes through Artifact synergy.

Orzhov (Black/White): Recursion

The WB archetype provides access to removal in both colours, along with strong low-cost mana creatures that can return to the battlefield.

Izzet (Blue/Red): Spells and Artifacts matter

Spells still matter in the UR archetype, along with Artifacts due to the creation of Powerstones.

Golgari (Green/Black): Graveyard matters

The Black and Green archetype encourages cards in the graveyard, with the means to reanimate them.

Boros (Red/White): Aggro go-wide

The two signpost cards for RW are Fallaji Vanguard at Uncommon and Queen Kayla bin-Kroog at Rare.

Simic (Blue/Green): Powerstone ramp

The Green and Blue archetype will ramp into big Artifacts, instead of creatures within the BRO Limited format.

That's it, you're all set to play in your prerelease! EPIC Ipswich is running its sealed prerelease Friday the 11th of November at 6PM and is running its jumpstart prerelease on the 12th of November at 12PM.

Your Friend and Ally,

Lachy