Alchemy: The Brothers’ War Spoilers and Set Information

Piece It Together | Illustration by Peter Polach

Love it or hate it, Alchemy’s still holding strong, with the latest batch of digital-only cards supplementing The Brothers’ War. Like most Alchemy expansions these cards look to expand on the core themes and mechanics of the mains set in the digital-only realm. You can expect all the usual Alchemy mechanics as well as unique takes on BRO mechanics like prototype, unearth, and Powerstone tokens.

So what exactly does Alchemy: The Brothers’ War have in store for us? Let’s dive in and find out!

Alchemy: The Brothers’ War Basic Information

Urza, Powerstone Prodigy | Illustration by Donato Giancola

Set Details

Set Symbol
Set Code	A23/YBRO
Hashtag	#MTGAlchemy
Number of Cards	30
Rarities	5 Mythic, 15 Rare, 15 Uncommon
Mechanics	Perpetually, Historic, Boons, Unearth, Powerstone Tokens, Starting Intensity, Prototype, Conjure, Spellbook, Seek

Important Dates

About the Set: The Story

Alchemy: The Brothers’ War is a digital add-on to the main BRO set meant to complement the established story. But there are some references to previous Magic lore.

Crucias, Titan of Waves is the former name of a character known as Bo Levar. Despite never having a dedicated card, Crucias appeared in the art and flavor text of cards like Gainsay and Planeswalker's Mischief.

Jarsyl, Dark Age Scion is the son of Harbin, Vanguard Aviator and grandson of Queen Kayla bin-Kroog. He’s been referenced briefly before in the flavor text of Gate to Phyrexia, which accounts for the character’s disappearance in the lore.

Set Mechanics

Perpetually

Perpetually is a digital-only mechanic that causes a permanent change to a card and tracks that change across different zones. Melt Through gives a perpetual ability to the target, which stays with that creature if it dies, returns to hand, etc.

Historic

Norn's Disassembly uses the historic mechanic, which is a descriptive word that refers to artifacts, sagas, and legendary permanents.

Boons

Patchplate Resolute is the only new Alchemy card with a boon ability. Boons are a way to represent a delayed ability. They exist in the game until something causes them to trigger, and they disappear after their effect takes place.

Starting Intensity

Starting intensity increases with effectiveness the more it’s used. Some intensity cards only affect themselves, as seen with Great Desert Hellion, while others affect the intensity of other cards with the same name, as seen with Piece It Together.

Starting intensity increases are a perpetual change, so the increases stay with those cards for the remainder of the game.

Conjure

The conjure mechanic creates a new card that wasn’t in your starting deck. Unlike creating a token, a conjured card is a permanent game piece and can go to the graveyard, hand, or library like any other card.

Spellbook

Spellbooks are a predetermined set of cards that players “draft” from when a card references its spellbook. Most spellbooks contain 15 cards in total, three of which are chosen at random when you draft a card from that spellbook. The player selects one to put in their hand from among those three. Kayla's Kindling and Raddic, Tal Zealot have new spellbooks.

Seek

Seek is a digital-only mechanic that allows Arena to search your library for a random card with preset conditions. Unlike searching, seeking a card doesn’t give you a choice of what to find, nor does it shuffle or change the remaining contents of your library.

Unearth

All of the main-set BRO mechanics appear in A23. Unearth is a sorcery-speed activated ability that returns a permanent from your graveyard to the battlefield, gives it haste, and exiles it at the next end step or if it would leave the battlefield for any other reason.

Powerstone Tokens

Powerstone tokens are colorless artifact tokens that tap for one colorless mana. The mana they produce can’t be used to cast a nonartifact spell, but it can be used on activated abilities, commander tax in Brawl, etc. Hurkyl's Prodigy and Yotian Courier are new additions that create Powerstones.

Prototype

Prototype is an alternate way to cast some of your powerful artifact creatures. When you cast a prototype creature you choose whether to pay its more expensive colorless cost or its cheaper prototype cost.

Prototyping a creature changes its color, mana cost, power, and toughness, but all other abilities remain the same. Warzone Duplicator and Forgefire Automaton are the two new prototype cards in this Alchemy release.

Alchemy: The Brothers’ War Gallery

White

• By Elspeth's Command
• Norn's Disassembly
• Patchplate Resolute
• Tawnos Endures

Blue

• Hurkyl's Prodigy
• Piece It Together
• Warzone Duplicator

Black

• Forgefire Automaton
• Gixian Recycler
• Lonely End
• Penregon Besieged

Red

• Fallaji Antiquarian
• Kayla's Kindling
• Melt Through
• Tomakul Phoenix

Green

• Argothian Uprooting
• Foundry Groundbreaker
• Legion of Clay
• Sylvan Smite

Multicolored

• Argivian Welcome
• Assemble the Team
• Crucias, Titan of the Waves
• Great Desert Hellion
• Jarsyl, Dark Age Scion
• Perilous Iteration
• Raddic, Tal Zealot
• Richlau, Headmaster
• Rusko, Clockmaker
• Yotian Courier

Colorless

• Urza's Construction Drone

Notable Cards

Piece It Together

I’ll give a little credit to Piece It Together as a 1-mana spell that could potentially take an extra turn. You need to cast three of these before the fourth one pays off, but each copy cantrips for just one mana, so the opportunity cost is pretty low.

Maybe a shell with Dreadhorde Arcanists and Arcane Proxys can get the job done. It might end up being more meme than dream though.

Assemble the Team

Assemble the Team isn’t Demonic Tutor, but it’s also not that far off. I’d say it’s about two-thirds off from being the Tutor.

Still, this will feel like an unadulterated tutor most of the time in decks with a flat power-level and consistent card quality. It won’t work well in decks running silver bullet cards or one-off combo pieces.

Urza’s Construction Drone

Special shoutout to Urza's Construction Drone as a way to assemble Tron lands on Arena. It conjures a copy of Urza's Mine, Urza's Tower, and Urza's Power Plant into your library and then seeks one whenever it attacks or dies.

This draws you a land whenever it attacks at the very least, and it can be fun to blink or reanimate.

Available Products

Alchemist Bundle

The Alchemist Bundle is a one-time purchase in the Arena Store, giving you 20 Alchemy: The Brothers’ War boosters for either 3,000 gems or 15,000 gold.

Alchemy Style Bundles

There are two “Alchemy Style” bundles available in the Arena Store as well, but these do not come with actual cards. They’re purely cosmetic upgrades to the cards you already own.

The Armed and Dangerous bundle comes with 10 card styles for 4,300 gems or 21,500 gold. The Legendary Heroes bundle comes with 10 different styles for 4,800 gems or 24,000 gold.

Good Luck, and Have Fun

Norn's Disassembly (Alchemy-exclusive cards) | Illustration by Camille Alquier

That’s all I’ve got on Alchemy: The Brother’s War. If you’re an Alchemy player or you plan on engaging with the current Arena Cube, expect to see some of these new additions. As with all Alchemy releases it can largely be ignored if you don’t participate in these formats.

Remember to check the new Arena inbox for some free Alchemy packs, and let me know how you plan on using these new cards. Make sure you also have Arena Tutor with you when you try out this new set.

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