Earlier this year, Wizards of the Coast (WotC) released a special Secret Lair drop dedicated to the memory of the godfather of Commander (EDH), Sheldon Menery, who passed away last September after a long battle with cancer. Now, almost four months later, those who ordered the drop are beginning to receive them and the bonus card has been revealed.
Shared to the magicTCG subreddit by user Dreams000, this bonus card is the first reprinting of Keen Duelist since its debut in Commander 2021 and also its first time in foil.
Despite not being a tremendously popular or expensive card, everything from the artwork to the flavor text is a fitting tribute to Sheldon Menery. The artwork depicts Sheldon dressed in silver and black and wielding ink, a nod to his work designing Strixhaven’s Silverquill preconstructed Commander deck, while the flavor text “Win before you start playing the game” references the ideals Sheldon lived by and encouraged everyone to bring to the table for each game of Commander.
Sheldon’s Spellbook was printed to demand in both foil and nonfoil, and benefited the American Cancer Society (Sheldon’s charity of choice), who received half of all proceeds from the drop.
