MTG Lord of the Rings teaser drops with Second Breakfast, a legendary horse, and more

Sticking to tradition, game designer Mark “Maro” Rosewater dropped over two dozen The Lord of the Rings: Tales of Middle-earth hints through his Magic: the Gathering “Maro’s teaser list” on May 23 leading up to the official start of spoiler season for the Universes Beyond set. 

Wizards of the Coast is spicing up MTG summer play with a special Universes Beyond release. Instead of launching just Commander Precon decks, like Warhammer 40,000 and the upcoming Doctor Who Universes Beyond decks, WotC designed an entire Modern-legal set through The Lord of the Rings: Tales of Middle-earth (LTR). 

Starting on May 30, LTR spoilers will start dropping. Some cards have already been shown through the WotC “first look” and additional scene cards for Bilbo’s birthday. Despite all of the previews shown already, Maro’s MTG Lord of the Rings teaser list confirms there are still a bunch of hot LTR spoilers slated to drop in the coming weeks.

All Maro teasers for MTG Lord of the Rings spoilers

Similar to Maro teaser lists for Standard sets, the LTR list contains “things to expect,” “rules text showing up on cards,” “legendary creature types,” and “card names from the set.” As Lord of the Rings spoilers drop, we’ll update the Maro teaser list with the actual card. 

Things to expect in LTR set  

• Five different card types get the legendary supertype
• A decently sized “legendary matters” theme
• New non-mana ward costs  
• A mechanic returns but now references a different creature type
• A card that makes a Smaug creature token  
• Two three-color and one four-color legendary creature to go along with the five-color one already previewed
• A lot of one-of “creature type matters” cards
• A mechanic returns that I had to fight tooth and nail to get into the set it premiered in
• A new creature type gets its own Equip cost
• Some counters in the set: Burden, Deathtouch, First Strike, Hope, Indestructible, Influence, Lifelink, Lore, Stun, Verse, Vigilance, and +1/+1.

Rules text on LTR cards

• “Whenever you attack with Merry and another legendary creature,”
• “Then create a Food token for each creature you control.”
• “Remove an indestructible counter from Arwen:”
• “Copy any number of target instant and/or sorcery spells.”
• “Whenever you draw a card during an opponent’s turn, create a 1/1 blue Tentacle creature token.”
• “Whenever a creature an opponent control dies, put a +1/+1 counter on Legolas.”
• “Target opponent gains control of target Horse you control.”
• “When this ability resolves for the third time this turn, Gimli fights up to one target creature you don’t control.”
• “You may pay zero rather than pay the equip cost of the first equip ability you activate during each of your turns.”  
• Whenever you put one or more counters on Aragorn, put one of each of those kinds of counters on up to one other target creature.”

MTG Legendary creature type lines in LTR 

• Legendary Creature—Avatar Demon
• Legendary Creature—Bird Noble
• Legendary Creature—Halfling Knight
• Legendary Creature—Halfling Soldier
• Legendary Creature—Horse
• Legendary Creature—Kraken
• Legendary Creature—Nymph
• Legendary Creature—Spirit Noble
• Legendary Creature—Spider Demon
• Legendary Creature—Wraith Noble

MTG card names in LTR set

• Birthday Escape  
• Breaking of the Fellowship
• Fear, Fire, Foes!
• Grond, the Gatebreaker  
• Horses of the Bruinen
• Lembas
• One Ring to Rule Them All
• Oliphaunt
• Second Breakfast
• There and Back Again

Official LTR spoilers begin on May 30, followed by Prerelease events starting on June 16. The digital launch of the MTG Lord of the Rings Modern-legal set will take place on June 20 and a global release is scheduled for June 23.