The green flag is in the air now that Aetherdrift preview season is in turbo mode. The debut video revealed the mechanics and some key cards while the Weekly MTG stream that followed offered a deluge of previews to get everyone’s engine roaring for the next Standard-legal release for Magic: The Gathering.
Let’s kick things off with the headliner of the set — The Aetherspark!

Another, more typical, planeswalker from the set is Chandra, Spark Hunter.

And what would a preview season be without checking out all the lands? Aetherdrift will complete the cycle of Verges that was started in Duskmourn: House of Horror.



A cycle of Roads, one for each color, are handy for when you have a vehicle or mount in need of a driver or rider.

The common “gain” lands are back to help the limited format and showcase parts of the track for the Ghirapur Grand Prix.

The full-art Driver’s Seat basic lands are the latest version of full-art basics, giving players a POV of the competitors in the death race.


Some additional non basic lands include colorless Raceways for each plane the Ghirapur Grand Prix takes place on.



And Night Market is the set’s version of a tapped land that can help fix your mana at common. It also happens to have cycling.

Teams
Now let’s check out the drivers and vehicles for all 10 teams in the Ghirapur Grand Prix.































Mechanics
In addition to returning mechanics like vehicles, mounts and saddles, and cycling, there are a couple new racing related abilities coming in the set.
Start your engines!

Start your engines! is a new keyword ability. The first time in a game you control a permanent with start your engines!, your speed becomes 1. This happens immediately, so no one can respond and try to remove the permanent before you pick up speed. Once your speed is 1 or greater, you can trigger an ability to increase your speed. That ability is “Whenever one or more opponents lose life during your turn, if your speed is less than 4, increase your speed by 1. This ability triggers only once each turn.” This ability isn’t tied to any permanent. For the rest of the game, it can be triggered as long as your speed is less than 4, no matter what permanents you control.

Once your speed is 4, you’ve achieved “max speed,” and your speed can’t go any higher. Some cards have abilities that care if you have max speed. That means that as long as you have max speed, meaning your speed is 4, the permanent has the stated ability. However, you don’t always need max speed to benefit from cards that care about speed. Plenty of cards will reference your current speed and reward you based on that number as well. If you haven’t started your engines and don’t have speed yet, that number is 0.
Exhaust

Exhaust abilities are activated abilities that can give you a bonus, but only once. Exhaust abilities can have many effects. They usually have an easy way to remember that they’ve been activated, though, whether that’s putting a counter on the permanent with the ability or creating a token. If a permanent with an exhaust ability that’s already been activated leaves the battlefield and then returns, it’s a new object with a new instance of its exhaust ability. That exhaust ability can be activated.

Commander Decks
We also got our first looks at the face cards for the two Commander Decks in Aetherdrift. The Eternal Might deck is an Esper deck all about Zombies and getting value from finding ways to add to your army.


The Living Energy deck is a Temur deck all about the energy mechanic, which is back for a third time in MTG history.


Box Toppers
Aetherdrift welcomes the return of Box Toppers, which will be included in Play Booster and Collector Booster displays. Each Box Topper pack contains two cards with the First-Place Foil Booster Fun variant — one a basic land and the other a card that features the new foiling treatment.

Special Guests
The subset of Special Guests also returns, but the only one we got to see today was Chrome Mox.

Additional Previews
A handful of extra previews came in, including a new take on Hazoret, two of the new multi-color Gearhulks, and some other cards that reference popular cards from Magic’s past.













Aetherdrift is scheduled to release on February 14. You can preorder your singles and sealed product and view our official preview gallery here.