Hello and happy days to each of you! I am someone who adores all things MTG flavor, from the art to card names to design concepts. Some sets drip with great flavor and some manage to show off excellent mechanical identity. Some real powerhouses do both! Recently, I covered my favorite Flavor sets, but all of those were from the Modern Era of Magic. But... why? Many of the early era sets were more influential but we think of Innistrad and Zendikar when we think of flavor homeruns. They're both great, but why? Recency Bias? I was sleeping on some smashing flavor successes and I realized I forgot two amazing early sets that were the pinnacle of flavor-first perfection. So Recency Bias might have something to do with it!

Well, no longer! Let's take a look at some of the flavor-packed powerhouse sets of early Magic!

#7. Urza's Saga

Sure, the Urza's Saga set and block may have been too powerful with Combo Winter and folks leaving the game, but you cannot deny that this was a great telling of Urza's story. It knocked things out of the park with flavor, in addition to having powerful cards like Serra's Realm and Tolarian Academy.

#6. Stronghold

I adore Tempest Block a lot as it took us away from Dominaria and to the plane of Rath for the first time. Stronghold built on the themes of Tempest with more Spikes, like Spike Feeder, and then built on mono-colored Slivers with multicolor options and the classic Sliver Queen! Then we have the great and pushed Walls like Wall of Blossoms, and Grave Pact and Volrath's Stronghold that have great power and flavor too.

#5. Visions

This great smaller 2nd set is one of my favorites for mechanics, giving us now evergreen ETB abilities on creatures like Man-o'-War. It's also packed with flavorful designs like River Boa!

#4. Mirage

This was the beginning of Magic's very first block, and it had a heavy African theme with gorgeous lands, great commons, and tons more. Great artists like D. Alexander Gregory abound in this set. I don't like the phasing or flanking abilities too much, which is why it's not higher on my list.

#3. Invasion

This was the set when everyone came back after leaving from the powerful Urza's Block and then super weak Masques block that followed it. This was the first multicolored set and it nailed things on the story front and was packed with exciting new cards. From the Domain mechanic to Fires of Yavimaya to Rith, the Awakener and such, this was a great set!

#2. Portal: Three Kingdoms

This third and final Portal set is built around "The Three Kingdoms" Chinese novel which I've read and loved. The book and set don't have any flying creatures, so they added horsemanship instead as a flavor hit since people often fight on horseback as generals. It's an excellent encapsulation of the classic novel and everything here makes sense!

#1. Arabian Nights

This classic and powerful first expansion set gave us all of the amazing flavor of "One Thousand and One Nights," from stuff like Library of Alexandria to Genies and more! It gave us all of the classic stuff like Erhnam Djinn, Desert Twister, Desert, Flying Carpet, and Merchant Ship - all flavor hits!

And there we have it! What are your favorite flavor sets?