Fifth Dawn Spoilers and Set Information

David Royale 26 days ago Collecting, MTG Cards, MTG Products, Set Overview

Eternal Witness | Illustration by Terese Nielsen

The last MTG set from the Mirrodin block, Fifth Dawn, was released in 2004. While it didn’t bring tons of powerful cards like its predecessor sets, Mirrodin and Darksteel, it has some hidden gems worth exploring. Some of them are key in decks across popular formats, like Steelshaper's Gift in the Modern metagame.

Let’s go through each of this set’s mechanics, notable cards, and more!

Fifth Dawn Basic Information

Trinket Mage | Illustration by Mark A. Nelson

Set Details

Set Symbol
Set Code	5DN
Number of Cards	165
Rarities	55 commons, 55 uncommons, 55 rares
Mechanics	Scry, Sunburst

Important Dates

Prerelease week	22-May-04
Paper release date	4-Jun-04
Launch Party	4-Jun-04

About the Set: The Story

In a tumultuous journey across Mirrodin, Glissa, alongside her companions Slobad and Bruenna, faces a series of trials and betrayals in their fight against the tyrant Memnarch. Amidst the chaos caused by the birth of a green sun, mutations plague the land, and alliances fracture as the Viridian elves accuse Glissa of their brethren's disappearance. Her own sister, Lyese, holds her responsible for their parents’ deaths, adding a personal layer of conflict. As they attempt to rally allies against Memnarch, they encounter the decapitated head of Geth, a former ally turned informant, revealing Yert's vampiric transformation and Memnarch's insidious plans.

The narrative intensifies as Glissa, Bruenna, and Lyese embark on a perilous journey to Taj-nar, facing relentless attacks and revelations of betrayal within their ranks. Despite moments of triumph, like Glissa's acquisition of the Miracore, their victories are short-lived as Memnarch's forces relentlessly pursue them. Meanwhile, Slobad, once a trusted ally, is ensnared in Memnarch's grasp, his body mutilated and his mind harnessed to mechanize Mirrodin itself. The final confrontation unfolds as Glissa, empowered by the Miracore, faces off against Memnarch within Mirrodin's core, culminating in a cataclysmic explosion that eradicates all life on the plane. Amidst the devastation, hope lingers as Karn, the world's creator, offers Slobad and Glissa a choice between returning to their home planes or awaiting his guidance, signaling a new beginning beyond Mirrodin's shattered realm.

Fifth Dawn Mechanics

Scry

With scry, players can peek at the top X cards of their library and then rearrange them as they wish, either putting them back in any order or moving them to the bottom. For instance, a card with scry 2 allows players to decide the fate of two cards: keep one on top, shift one to the bottom, reorder both on top or send both to the bottom. The ability was then popularized in sets like Magic 2011 and Theros and became an evergreen keyword in Magic Origins.

Sunburst

Sunburst is a keyword ability that increases in value depending on the different colored sources you use to cast a spell. For example, if a spell requires 2 mana to be cast, like Pentad Prism, the artifact gets two charge counters if you use two different colors to cast it. What you can do later with these charge counters is then explained on the card.

Affinity

First introduced in Mirrodin, affinity is a keyword ability that reduces the generic mana cost of a spell or permanent for each permanent you control of a specific type. For instance, Into Thin Air costs less for each artifact you control.

Entwine

Like affinity, entwine is another keyword that was released in Mirrodin. It allows players to pay an additional cost when casting a spell to use multiple effects within a card, like Rude Awakening.

Imprint

Summoner's Egg is the only card with imprint in Fifth Dawn (also from Mirrodin). When a permanent with imprint enters the battlefield, its controller can exile a card from their hand, imprinting it onto the permanent. The imprinted card can then trigger various effects depending on the card with imprint states.

Modular

Introduced in Darksteel, modular makes its return in Fifth Dawn in the form of Arcbound Wanderer. This ability allows +1/+1 counters on a creature to be moved to another artifact creature when it dies.

Fifth Dawn Card Gallery

White

Blue

Black

Red

Green

Colorless

Notable Cards

Beacons

These instant or sorcery spells provide an effect representative of the color they belong to, and each has the ability to shuffle the card into its owner’s library as part of its resolution.

Bringers

One for each color, bringers are 9-mana 5/5 creatures with trample that have a triggered ability at the beginning of their controller's upkeep. While 9 mana may seem a lot, each can be cast by paying its alternative cost of instead.

Equipment

These colored-aligned 2-mana artifacts have a special ability of their own and an alternative equip cost that can be used at instant speed by paying 2 of the same mana.

Helm of Kaldra

The Kaldra equipment cycle is now complete with the introduction of Helm of Kaldra. Along with Sword of Kaldra from Mirrodin and Shield of Kaldra from Darksteel, they can “combine” to make a 4/4 creature token known as Kaldra, with each of these pieces of equipment attached to it.

Reprints

Circle of Protection: Artifacts: First released in Antiquities, Circle of Protection: Artifacts makes a return in Fifth Dawn after being printed later in 5th Edition.
Magma Giant: Portal Second Age was the last time we saw our magmatic fella, who later made a return in Commander 2015 and 2018’s Commander Anthology Volume II.
Relic Barrier: Ten years later, this artifact makes a not so triumphant return.

Top Cards

Beacon of Tomorrows: While it’s one of the most expensive “player takes an extra turn” effects, Beacon of Tomorrows can also become one of the most powerful ones in Commander games, especially when paired with tutors or the likes of Narset, Enlightened Master when run as your commander.
Condescend: Mostly used in mono-blue Tron decks in Modern, this is a popular counterspell that lets you look at the top of your library, thanks to its scry ability, ideal for a deck that has access to tons of mana.
Cranial Plating: This equipment is so strong it was banned in Pauper prior to the format consolidation of Paper and Online meta. Having access to an equipment that can be attached at instant speed on an unblocked creature was too much for the format's pace at the time.
Crucible of Worlds: While it wasn’t initially used much, it rose in popularity very quickly in Legacy and Vintage decks, where it can be used for land recursion alongside Wasteland or Strip Mine. It's critical to play lands from your graveyard in other formats, especially those that have access to fetch lands.
Engineered Explosives: This is mostly used as a sideboard card in many formats to pseudo-board-wipe tables.
Eternal Witness: One of my favorite cards in Magic history and one of the best creatures in EDH. For only 3 mana, you get a decent body on the field that can return any card from your graveyard to your hand.
Krark-Clan Ironworks: This artifact is infamous for being a central piece of combo decks in earlier Modern metagames, which ultimately led to its ban on January 21, 2019.
Magma Jet: For a while, Magma Jet was one of the most popular burn spells in the game, mostly because it could manipulate the top of the library and thin your deck of unneeded lands, especially in burn strategies. Nowadays, it's not seen much due to power creep reasons.
Rude Awakening: One of the best cards for strategies centered around lands, as it can be used as a finisher with many of them in play.
Serum Visions: This was one of the very first cheap cantrips before the introduction of Preordain.
Steelshaper's Gift: This is a solid and cheap tutor for equipment that rose in popularity in Modern thanks to Colossus Hammer.
Vedalken Orrery: The artifact version of Leyline of Anticipation is very popular in Commander tables that want to play all their spells at instant speed.

Available Products

Fifth Dawn offers four 60-card theme decks aimed at beginner players.

Fifth Dawn Preconstructed Decks

Nuts and Bolts: An Azorius theme deck that thrives on using small artifacts more effectively, which were introduced in the set. Headed by Trinket Mage, the deck exploits the synergy among cheap artifacts like Chromatic Sphere or Aether Spellbomb alongside Auriok Salvagers and Salvaging Station to apply pressure and gain card advantage by reusing them multiple times. With powerful additions like Skullclamp and Bonesplitter, combined with creatures like Qumulox and Synod Centurion, the deck forms a strong fighting force. Auriok Steelshaper from Mirrodin boosts offensive capabilities by lowering equipment costs and boosting the stats of knights and soldiers, making even small creatures a significant threat. Auriok Windwalker and Salvaging Station are the two rares from the deck.
Special Forces: This Dimir deck features creatures specialized for attack and defense, like Dross Crocodile and Steel Wall, respectively. Utilizing equipment like Slagwurm Armor and Whispersilk Cloak, the deck enhances its attackers' strength and ensures their survivability against blockers. Defensive stalwarts like Arachnoid can be further bolstered with equipment, making them nearly impregnable. The deck also employs cute synergies with cards like Vulshok Gauntlets on Yotian Soldier and Loxodon Warhammer on Pewter Golem for added damage and resilience. Acquire and Plunge into Darkness are the rares from the deck.
Stampede: In Gruul fashion, the plan is to defeat your opponents before they set up. It also uses cards like Rain of Rust, Goblin Replica and Viridian Lorebearers to punish the artifact heavy metagame. The two rares of the deck are Cosmic Larva and Rite of Passage.
Sunburst: Is the last theme deck and one the only one from the set that’s five colors. While its main color is green, it relies on the sunburst mechanic on creatures like Lunar Avenger, Skyreach Manta, and Suncrusher to win games. The latter along with Joiner Adept are the two rares of the deck.

Fifth Dawn Booster Pack

Inside every Fifth Dawn booster pack, you'll discover a total of 15 cards, consisting of 1 rare card, 3 uncommon cards, and 11 common cards. Additionally, there's the chance of finding premium foil cards inserted randomly within the pack.

Fifth Dawn Fat Pack

The bundle comprises a player's guide featuring images of every card within the set, six booster packs, each containing 15 cards, two premium cards, an exclusive life counter, and The Fifth Dawn novel.

Fifth Dawn Booster Box

Every Fifth Dawn booster box is securely factory-sealed and contains 36 packs, each containing 15 cards.

Wrap Up

Krark-Clan Engineers | Illustration by Pete Venters

The last set of the Mirrodin block brought some fun cards to brew with, and some powerful ones, too.

My favorite from the set has to be Eternal Witness, as it enables some key synergies in many formats, with my preferred one being Cube.

Which was yours? Do you miss playing with an artifact-heavy theme set? Let us know in the comments or in the Draftsim Discord!

It's been a pleasure bringing you this information. If you would like to know more about Magic history, remember to follow us on social media so you never miss a thing.

Until next time, take care and enjoy your Magic to your heart's content!

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David Royale

David is a YouTube Gaming content creator and the 2011 Central American MTG Champion. He's been playing Magic since 2010 and -- in real life -- is a database analyst.

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