Secrets of Strixhaven Makes Its Best Bonus Sheet Cards Much Harder to Open

Last updated on April 9, 2026

Preordain | Illustration by Aitor Sebastián

Secrets of Strixhaven (SOS) has previewed a number of exciting Mystical Archive (SOA) reprints with stellar art to hype up the set, but players were shocked to see the odds of opening sick cards like these have plummeted.

Wizards of the Coast published their “Collecting Secrets of Strixhaven” article on March 31, which includes all information about alternative arts, Booster Fun treatments, bonus sheets, and so on; this includes what cards appear in Play or Collector Boosters and the odds of opening them. While every SOS Play Booster contains a Mystical Archive card, the odds of it being rare or mythic rare are drastically lower than they were in Strixhaven: School of Mages (STX), as illustrated by this Reddit post by u/HomelessFrogy:

Source: reddit.com

Secrets of Strixhaven Versus Other Bonus Sheets

Counterspell | Illustration by Mark Poole

The reddit post shows the odds difference between SOS and STX, but it’s worth considering how SOS stacks up to previous bonus sheets; this is the first bonus sheet since Edge of Eternities (EOE) dropped the Stellar Sights.

EOE’s Stellar Sights were not guaranteed to be in every pack, but could appear in the wildcard slot, with a rare appearing 10% and mythic rares appearing 2.5% of the time—numbers that are comparable to rares and mythics for SOS, though there won’t be uncommons. They could also appear in the foil slot, with rares appearing 1% and mythics less than that. Since Stellar Sights weren’t in every booster, it’s arguable these are an anomaly.

A more similar comparison would be March of the Machine, whose Multiverse Legends bonus sheet also appeared in every single pack. The “Collecting” article didn’t provide hard numbers, but said about a third of non-foil Multiverse Legends cards would be rare or mythic rare. A rough 33% of a non-uncommon is much better than 12.5% chance of a non-uncommon in SOS.

This is similar to other sets with with bonus sheets; Outlaws of Thunder Junction and The Brothers’ War had similar breakdowns to MOM. This means SOS represents a pretty major collation change in bonus sheet distribution, a trend we might see in future bonus sheets.

Community Reaction

Traumatic Critique | Illustration by Aaron Miller

On Reddit and X, the community has voiced their disliked of the change. u/HeyApples pointed out that the average box with contain “26 uncommons, 3 rares, 1 mythic,” a thoroughly unimpressive number of bonus sheet cards; a reply to that comment discusses how they “had to immediately warn a friend” not a preorder a box “because of memories of how cool boxes of the original Strixhaven were.”

u/ImperialVersian1 pointed out that the diminished pull rates are unlikely to decrease the value of older cards reprinted in the set, an idea echoed by X user UltimateAce in a reply to SaffronOlive’s tweet about the situation. This might be the biggest impact the low pull rate has on the average player; while reprints generally drop a card’s price to increased supply, that might not happen this time around as Wizards pushes these towards a rarity more similar to a chase card than a proper reprint. u/filithyrotten even suggested the special treatment might increase the price.

Pretty much the only positive views of this change have come from Limited players, who have pointed out that lower pull rates of rares and mythic rares should reduce variance in Draft and Sealed. u/W3av3r0 points out that “having fewer rares in Limited is a good thing. It’s just bad for value,” and kyle chmielewski on X said they were “100% on board” with the change since it won’t introduce a bunch of “swingy bombs.”

Wrap Up

Cyclonic Rift | Illustration by Chris Rahn

As a predominately Limited player, I disagree. The Mystical Archive is all instants and sorceries, and those are rarely bombs. There are exceptions (Cyclonic Rift, Breach the Multiverse) but Limited bombs tend to be creatures and planeswalkers with massively outsized effects on the game, like Sab-Sunen, Luza Emobdied or Elspeth, Storm Slayer. And even if making these cards less common creates a slightly more balanced Limited format, is that worth turning the perfect opportunity to make staple cards more accessible to the average player into another batch of chase cards to sell boosters while gutting what made the original Strixhaven such a beloved set in the first place?