Today Jan. 28, 2013 Wizards of the Coast announced that all ten shocklands and guildgates will be reprinted in the third and final expansion set of the "Return to Ravnica" block "Dragon's Maze." This news comes before their upcoming expert "Magic: The Gathering" expansion set "Gatecrash" (which contains five of the shocklands and guildgates in it) has even been officially released.
The ten shocklands won't be replacing any rares in the set. They'll appear in a "new" rarity slot, but "show up at rates about like their original rarity." How exactly does that work? There won't be any basic lands in the set. Instead, you'll find one of the guildgates. Using the ratio of shocklands to other rares in "Return to Ravina" and "Gatecrash" as an example, you can expect to open a shockland once every 11 or so booster packs of "Dragon's Maze."
3:16 EST Update: The shocklands will be appearing half as frequently as previously stated.
"You are about half as likely to open a shockland in "Dragon's Maze" as in "Return to Ravnica" and "Gatecrash."
This new change means that the shocklands will appear roughly one out of 22 packs, or three for every two booster boxes.
All ten guildgates will be showing up (with the "Dragon's Maze" expansion symbol), as will all ten shocklands from "Return to Ravnica" and "Gatecrash" (with their "Return to Ravnica" or "Gatecrash" symbols).
The inclusion of guildgates in booster packs will make multicolored decks in limited easier to pull off. The addition of shocklands will help add an extra supply to help drive down prices of the lands, which see heavy play across multiple formats. The shocklands won't be the only rare appearing in the basic land slot though.
"There's also a mythic rare land from "Dragon's Maze" that will show up there sometimes!"
An educated guess would be that a new land called (wait for it) Dragon's Maze will appear in "Dragon's Maze." As mythic rares occur one out of every eight booster packs, if that same ratio is then applied to the appearance of shocklands in "Dragons' Maze" booster packs you'll need to open 96 booster packs of "Dragon's Maze" to find a Dragon's Maze in the land slot. It'll still appear as normal in the mythic rare slot of booster packs. Unless Wizards of the Coast decides to make it an alternate art foil ultra rare card.
You may also like:
Stay up to date on the latest "Magic: The Gathering" info:
Subscribe for email alerts of new articles, follow me on Twitter @David_Leavitt, like my page on Facebook, and add me to your circle on Google+.
For more information about "Magic: The Gathering" visit MagicTheGathering.com and follow "Magic" on Facebook and Twitter.
