Quick Links
- What Is A Preview Season?
- When Does Streets Of New Capenna's Preview Season Begin?
- How Long Is Streets Of New Capenna's Preview Season?
- Where Can I See All The Cards?
- How Are Preview Seasons Arranged?
- What's The Next Preview Season After Streets Of New Capenna?
It's been a blast running around Magic The Gathering's cyberpunk world of Kamigawa, but it's time to head off into the multiverse to visit Elspeth Tirel's home plane: the Streets of New Capenna.
Built by angels but run by five demonic crime families, New Capenna is an art-deco haven of swing, sharp suits, and organised crime and is easily one of the most visually impressive sets we've ever seen for the game. But before we tango with the Obscura, Cabaretti, Riveters, Brokers, and Maestros, we've got an entire preview season full of reveals and spoilers to enjoy. Here is everything you need to know about Magic The Gathering's Streets of New Capenna preview season.
What Is A Preview Season?
Preview seasons (or spoiler seasons) are when the vast majority of a Magic The Gathering set is revealed. These tend to happen a few weeks ahead of the official launch, and are heralded in by a debut stream on the MTG Youtube and Twitch channels.
In these streams, the big information about the set is finally unveiled, such as set mechanics and any surprising story elements (for example, Tamiyo's Phyrexian compleation was revealed at the end of the Kamigawa: Neon Dynasty stream). The stream also gives us our first chunk of cards from the set, making the first day by far the largest day of the entire season.
After the debut stream, control is handed over to the community. Various outlets, influencers, and other content creators reveal cards given to them by Wizards of the Coast to show. It's a neat way to bring the community together and shine a spotlight on smaller creators, as the entire player base will briefly be focused on them as they reveal their cards.
Preview seasons typically end with the Commander preconstructed deck reveals a few days after the main set. While these reveals are usually given to larger content creators, this time Wizards of the Coast is handling itself on its Weekly MTG stream – likely because there are five decks for Streets of New Capenna over the usual two.
When Does Streets Of New Capenna's Preview Season Begin?
Preview seasons start with the debut stream, where set mechanics, big cards, and an overview of New Capenna will be unveiled.
This stream starts on Thursday, April 7 at 9AM P.T. (16:00 UTC) on the MTG Youtube and Twitch channels and will be hosted by frequent MTG presenter Becca Scott and Tabletop Jocks host Joseph Johnson. This is a pre-recorded event that may include some interviews with set designers alongside the usual first wave of card previews.
While it's unlikely to happen, there is also a chance we might hear some more about sets after Streets of New Capenna, like Commander Legends: Battle for Baldur's Gate or Unfinity. Baldur's Gate is launching roughly two months after New Capenna, and Unfinity was meant to already be out had it not been delayed due to supply chain issues, so it wouldn't be too surprising if they make a minor appearance in the show as well.
How Long Is Streets Of New Capenna's Preview Season?
The Streets of New Capenna preview season will last eight days, starting on April 7 and ending on April 14. Unusually for this season, the Commander previews are on the last day of the full set reveal instead of a few days later, making April 14 the overall end of the entire season as well.
This season has plenty of community names revealing cards, such as MTGNerdGirl, Corey Baumeister, Eilidh "AlisasV" Lonie, and Arin Hanson. There are also a number of official Magic channels revealing throughout the event, such as Good Morning Magic, Weekly MTG, and SpellTable.
Where Can I See All The Cards?
As always TheGamer will be doing daily roundups of the preview season, with each card announced that day and how viable they'll be in various formats.
If you don't want to wait for those, there are a few great ways to keep track. The first is through the official Magic site, which updates daily in a raw card gallery. There's also MTGGoldfish, who tweet throughout the entire preview season every card they can find, complete with translations for those not previewed in English.
How Are Preview Seasons Arranged?
Preview seasons take a lot of planning, with previewers being contacted weeks in advance. Wizards tries to vary who does previews between sets, and there is a good mix of names of varying degrees of recognisability involved in each season. All those involved must agree to embargoes for the specific time they're allotted, after which they are sent an email with images of the card.
Other than the time, how a previewer does their reveal is entirely up to them. Some write articles and produce videos, while others will tweet them out. The one thing previewers are not allowed to do is obscure the card image – shoving a watermark over it defeats the object of revealing it, after all.
Contrary to popular belief, previewers are not paid by Wizards of the Coast. This isn't an advertisement or brand deal; it's more akin to a community engagement program – Wizards could just release the full card gallery itself and potentially would get more traffic and hype if it did so. Instead, it allows the community to come together in a week-long celebration of the set.
What's The Next Preview Season After Streets Of New Capenna?
Provided nothing is delayed, the next preview season should be for Commander Legends: Battle for Baldur's Gate, starting with its own debut stream on May 16.
This is one of the shortest gaps between two preview seasons we've ever had in Magic, with just 32 days between the end of New Capenna's and the start of Baldur's Gate's.
Source: Read Full Article