By Blake Rasmussen

Blake is the content manager for DailyMTG.com, making him the one you should email if you have thoughts on the website, good or less good (or not good). He's a longtime coverage reporter and hasn't turned down a game of Magic in any format ever.

Amonkhet previews start next week, but there's so much news with this set, we just can't wait to get some of it out. That's why this week we're going to start showing you a few things. The first Amonkhet edition of Magic Story is on Wednesday, as is the full reveal of the Amonkhet Masterpiece Series. We'll also be unveiling the trailer for Amonkhet coming up.

Today we've got some promos to talk about, a new event specially tailored for bringing friends who might be curious about Magic to, and details for the Amonkhet Welcome Decks.

But first, punch cards!

Punch card

We know Magic takes a lot of counters and tokens to get right, so in addition to a bevy of tokens for this set (and they're really cool), we've also got these handy punch cards that give you useful counters and useful reminders that something has -1/-1 counters on it, or its exerted, or it's embalmed, or . . .

. . . wait, ex-whated? Em-whered?

Read on. But first, look at this punch card. It's so punchy!

Amonkhet Promos

This section is going to reveal a lot about what's going on in Amonkhet. Like, a lot a lot.

First up, the Buy-a-Box promo, which you can get if you buy a box at a local game store (supply limited, check with your store first). And, yes, this means cycling is back!

Oh, and those brick-looking counters on the punch card? They're actual brick counters. They help you build things, like:

Finally, participate in a Game Day event, and you could get this fantastic Trueheart Duelist. Make the Top 8, and you'll get this intriguing Glorybringer.

And if you—RECORD SCRATCH—wait, those have some keyword abilities on them that you might recognize from the punch card too. Maybe we should explain some of these first. So here's a sneak peek at the Mechanics article (by Matt Tabak) that will be posted in a week.

Embalm is an activated ability you can activate if the creature card with embalm is in your graveyard. Notably you're not casting the card from the graveyard, so things that counter spells won't work against the embalm ability. The original creature spell can be countered, of course, but that just puts the card in the graveyard. I think you see where this is headed.

To activate an embalm ability, simply pay the embalm cost and exile the card. You do this any time you could cast a sorcery, meaning during your main phase when nothing else is happening. When the ability resolves, you create a token copy of the card, but as you'd expect, going through the process of mummification causes some changes. It's got that whole undead thing going on, so it's a Zombie in addition to whatever creature types it used to have. You'll find lots of ways to take advantage of its new Zombiehood, I'm sure. And now that it's all service, all the time and doesn't care about whatever it was it cared about while alive, it's white instead of whatever color it used to be. One more minor change is that it doesn't have the mana cost the card has.

And, yes, every card that has embalm will have its own token. Like this Trueheart Duelist token.

As for exert, here's an excerpt from the Mechanics article on that topic:

Exert allows creatures to give a little more effort to produce unusually good results.

You make the decision whether to exert a creature as you declare it as an attacker. If you choose to have it exert, an ability will trigger and grant you some bonus. As a trade-off, the creature won't untap during your next turn. It's tired. Needs a nap. Attack more later.

You don't have to exert the creature as it attacks. If you don't, no ability will trigger, and it will untap normal during your next turn. Note that as you declare attackers is the only time you can have it exert. You can't wait until later in the turn and then exert it. When your next untap step rolls around, if the creature you exerted is untapped, nothing happens and the exertion cost you nothing. Maybe you found a different way to untap it, or maybe you gave it vigilance. You are clever!

Now back to your regularly scheduled smorgasbord of images.

Game Day Playmat

Oh yeah, if you happen to win Game Day, you'll get one of these!

Remember Game Day? We talked about it just up above all those rulesy things. That was a good time.

Magic Open House: Amonkhet

We're trying something new coming up that's aimed at helping you bring friends in to a store to help them get started learning about the world of Magic.

Set to occur the Saturday before Amonkhet Prerelease, this new event encourages casual fun for new players and easy, League-style Standard play with a participation promo reward.

On Saturday, April 15, stores all over the world will invite players of all levels to come together and learn about—or teach and play—Magic with learn-to-play sessions, Welcome Decks for new players, and a casual Standard tournament to end the day.

Players who bring a friend to learn the game will receive a promo card, and the new players, of course, will receive a Welcome Deck.

What's in the Welcome Deck? Well, that's the final thing we're going to reveal today.

Welcome Decks

Like previous Welcome Deck incarnations before them, the Amonkhet Welcome Decks come in five versions, one for each color. Each deck is 30 cards and focuses on simple gameplay (and all cards are Standard-legal for as long as Amonkhet is).

First, let's start with the Amonkhet cards you'll be seeing in these decks.

Additionally, the following are going to be in the Welcome Deck and the Planeswalker Decks.

And the full decklists for those Welcome Decks are as follows:

Amonkhet Welcome Deck—White

Decklist Stats Sample Hand

Creature (11)

1 Victory's Herald 1 Stormfront Pegasus 2 Graceful Cat 1 Serra Angel 1 Dawnfeather Eagle 1 Bastion Enforcer 2 Standing Troops 2 Glory Seeker

Instant (6)

1 Mighty Leap 2 Inspired Charge 1 Divine Verdict 2 Impeccable Timing

Land (13)

13 Plains

30 Cards

Deal Another Hand

Amonkhet Welcome Deck—Blue

Decklist Stats Sample Hand

Creature (10)

1 Sphinx of Magosi 1 Air Elemental 2 Coral Merfolk 1 Stealer of Secrets 1 Wind Drake 2 Ancient Crab 1 Angler Drake 1 Nimble Innovator

Sorcery (2)

2 Drag Under

Instant (1)

1 Inspiration

Enchantment (4)

2 Sleep Paralysis 2 Tricks of the Trade

Land (13)

13 Island

30 Cards

Deal Another Hand

Amonkhet Welcome Deck—Black

Decklist Stats Sample Hand

Creature (10)

1 Nightmare 2 Bloodhunter Bat 1 Sengir Vampire 1 Alley Strangler 1 Cursed Minotaur 1 Dune Beetle 1 Gravedigger 2 Tattered Mummy

Sorcery (3)

2 Certain Death 1 Raise Dead

Instant (2)

2 Essence Extraction

Enchantment (2)

2 Untamed Hunger

Land (13)

13 Swamp

30 Cards

Deal Another Hand

Amonkhet Welcome Deck—Red

Decklist Stats Sample Hand

Creature (10)

1 Shivan Dragon 2 Falkenrath Reaver 1 Thundering Giant 2 Frontline Rebel 1 Brazen Scourge 2 Terror of the Fairgrounds 1 Hyena Pack

Sorcery (2)

1 Wrangle 1 Renegade Tactics

Instant (5)

1 Hungry Flames 2 Shock 1 Fling 1 Flame Lash

Land (13)

13 Mountain

30 Cards

Deal Another Hand

Amonkhet Welcome Deck—Green

Decklist Stats Sample Hand