MTG Innistrad: Midnight Hunt cycle revealed via Fearless and Tainted Adversary

A cycle teaser from head Magic: The Gathering designer Mark Rosewater for the upcoming Innistrad: Midnight Hunt set was revealed today via Fearless Adversary and Tainted Adversary.

Solving the Rosewater teasers is an exciting tradition within the Magic community, especially when the reveal is a cycle of two-drop Mythic Rare creatures with a mana sink enter-the-battlefield cost. Similar to the MTG mechanic Kicker but unique to Innistrad: Midnight Hunt (MID), players can pay an additional mana cost upon the creature entering the battlefield for “+1/+1 counters on the creature and another in-color effect,” according to Rosewater.

Fearless Adversary and Tainted Adversary, two Mythic Rare MID creatures with a new ETB mechanic, were revealed by WeChat and Wizards of the Coast today. 

Tainted Adversary

• CMC 1B
• Type: Creature—Zombie
• Rarity: Mythic Rare
• Stats: 2/3 
• Keyword: Deathtouch
• Ability: “When Tainted Adversary enters the battlefield, you may pay 2B any number of times. When you may this cost one or more times, put that many +1/+1 counters on Tainted Adversary, then create twice that many 2/2 black Zombie creature tokens with decayed.”

Fearless Adversary

• CMC: 1W
• Type: Creature—Human Scout
• Rarity: Mythic Rare
• Stats: 3/1
• Keyword: Lifelink
• Ability: “When Fearless Adversary enters the battlefield, you may pay 1W any number of times. When you pay that cost once or more, put that many courage counters on Fearless Adversary. Creatures you control get +1/+1 for each courage counter on Fearless Adversary.” (This is an estimated translation and may contain errors).

The flavor of both Fearless Adversary and Tainted Adversary is spot on for MID, using keywords typically tied to those Magic colors while portraying the day and night battle taking place on the plane. Even the new mechanic Decayed was worked in nicely with Tainted Adversary. 

Fearless and Tainted Adversary have solid stats but don’t come with the ETB mana sink getting paid due to their stats and keyword abilities. They can slot into a two-drop slot or increase in value during the late stages of a game. Unlike Kicker, though, the Adversary cycle cards aren’t limited in their value since players can pay the ETB cost as many times as they want. 

Testing of this new Mythic Rare cycle of MTG cards can start with the digital release of MID on Sept. 16 and via tabletop with a global launch on Sept. 24.