The Lord of the Rings: Tales of Middle-earth preview season kicked off today with a debut video and Weekly MTG stream that showed off key characters, mechanics, Commander Deck face cards, scenes, boxtoppers, and more.
Previews
Check out the preview cards, along with their showcase variants, for characters like Samwise Gamgee, Aragorn, the Uniter, Gandalf the White, Sauron, the Dark Lord, and many other fan favorites.
Commander Deck Face Cards
Here are the face cards for the Commander Decks.
Eowyn, Shieldmaiden headlines the Riders of Rohan deck.
Frodo, Adventurous Hobbit and Sam, Loyal Attendant helm the Food and Fellowship deck.
Galadriel, Elven-Queen leads the Elven Council deck.
Sauron, Lord of the Rings headlines The Hosts of Mordor deck.
Mechanics
Two returning mechanics include Food tokens and amass.
Amass returns with a twist as amass Orcs, switching things up from the Zombie Army from War of the Spark.
The Ring tempts you is a new mechanic that functions similar to dungeons and initiative. When The Ring tempts you, you may choose a creature you control to be the Ring-bearer, and move up the scale.
Scenes
See all the cards that make up a few of the scenes already previewed in the set, including Bilbo’s Birthday Party, Mount Doom, and Battle of the Pelennor Fields.
Weekly MTG previewed the nine cards in the only three-by-three scene in the set, Isengard Destroyed.
Boxtoppers
The boxtoppers for The Lord of the Rings: Tales of Middle-earth are called Realms and Relics. Each display of Draft Boosters, Set Boosters, and Collector Boosters will come with one in traditional foil. Weekly MTG and the debut video showed off 12 of the 30 boxtoppers. Players can also open non-foil versions or surge foil versions of the Realms and Relics cards.
Key Dates
- The Lord of the Rings: Tales of Middle-earth Debut and Previews Begin: May 30
- Card Previews: May 30–June 9
- Commander Previews and Decklists: June 8
- Complete Card Image Galleries: June 9
- Pre-Prerelease with LoadingReadyRun: June 10
- In-Store Prerelease Events: June 16–22
- CommandFest Events: June 16–July 23
- MTG Arena Digital Release: June 20
- Command Zone Podcast’s Game Knights Gameplay: June 21
- Global Tabletop Release: June 23
- Launch Party Events: June 23–25
- Bundle: Gift Edition Release: July 7
- The Lord of the Rings: Tales of Middle-earth In-Store Celebration Events: July 7–9
- Commander Parties: July 21–23
- MagicCon: Barcelona featuring The Lord of the Rings: Tales of Middle-earth: July 28–30
- Store Championships: August 5–13
- Holiday Release: November 3
More details on The Lord of the Rings: Tales of Middle-earth can be found in the official collecting and mechanics articles from Wizards of the Coast.