Hello and happiest of days to you all! Today, I want to take a moment to talk about one of my favorite expansion sets ever, Invasion, and whether or not it saved Magic by bringing folks back to the game after the one-two punch of the broken Urza's Block and weak Mercadian Masques block. I feel like so many people adored this set and might agree with me, so let's dig in and see how Invasion brought many Magic players back from the brink!

To know the full impact of Invasion, we must reflect on the era it released in.

The first official block in the early era of Magic was Mirage Block, which advanced the game in many ways, from creatures with Enters abilities like the Uktabi Orangutan or Man-o'-War, 1-cost instant Tutors that paid for their cheapness by putting the tutored card on top of your library (a nice and not broken spin), then things like Buried Alive and more in the first set built around the graveyard (Weatherlight ), and it introduced the long-form story of the Weatherlight Saga that many fans eventually got tired of as it spanned every set for years. Believe me, I hear you! But Invasion was the finale of the Weatherlight Saga, and it end up pretty good in the end! Mirage block also gave us slow fetch lands (Flood Plain, etc.), some broken cards like Flash, a beloved Guildmage cycle, and tons more. Ophidian? River Boa? Hammer of Bogardan? Nasty! Overall, Mirage, Visions, and Weatherlight were a great introduction to the block structure.

Then after Mirage block established many norms of that era's set design, like having good stuff at all commons and more, the next block was released, Tempest, Stronghold, and Exodus. It was the first major trip to another plane outside of Dominaria (Arabian Nights and Homelands notwithstanding). it had tons of great and beloved cards, from Living Death to Slivers to Wall of Blossoms to Shard Phoenix to buyback staples like Capsize or the broken Forbid. Propaganda, Grave Pact, Scroll Rack, Cursed Scroll, Jackal Pup, and Mogg Fanatic? Volrath's Stronghold? All bangers! The only major issue with these sets is that after their previous experience with making good cards in Mirage block, they pushed into some less balanced design space with tons of dominant combos like Oath of Druids, Survival of the Fittest, and Recurring Nightmare. Those broke the format entirely. In this era, I ran Sligh or my own fresh brew around Living Death and the Sneak Attack from Urza's Saga to drop big dorks with nasty effects for cheap and then bring them back from the graveyard (the origin of"Abe's Deck of Happiness and Joy" that became my multiplayer deck thousands of cards big). Tempest block saw the beginnings of Magic's designers playing with fire, and they would get burned soon.

The dark days arrived in the very next block: Urza's Saga, Urza's Legacy, and Urza's Destiny. Wizards didn't learn their lesson from Cursed Scroll, a powerful colorless finisher when you only had one card in hand that could go into any deck. They printed tons of powerful colorless artifacts in Urza's Block that broke the game, like Grim Monolith and Thran Dynamo. They had three broken lands to make tons of mana in Gaea's Cradle, Tolarian Academy and Serra's Sanctum. Then you had the broken takes on powerful early era cards that were attempts to make them fairer with higher mana values: the six-mana (but actually free) Time Spiral, Windfall as Wheel of Fortune, Stroke of Genius as Braingeyser and Yawgmoth's Bargain for Necropotence. It was all bonkers good. Sneak Attack, Avalanche Riders, Crop Rotation, and Tinker were all here. Memory Jar was so broken it was nearly insta-banned upon arrival. This led to an era called Combo Winter where tons of players just gave up and quit the game. Even the draft environment was broken with a sweeper enchantment, Pestilence, at common in Black. I ran Wildfire at the time, but things were dark indeed.

Seeing all that power, banned cards, and people leaving the game, Wizards of the Coast overcorrected with the next block: Mercadian Masques, Nemesis, and Prophecy. This block was powered down and slowed down massively and introduced cards like new takes on Stasis, Tangle Wire, Rhystic cards (Commander mainstay Rhystic Study among them), and Rishadan Port. The draft format was slow and the best pick was a common four-drop Blue Wall (Stinging Barrier since it could actually win games by itself). Now, the good news is we had only a few nasty cards here. This block gave us Rebels like Lin-Sivvi, Defiant Hero and Ramosian Sergeant. It created a Sligh variant around Veteran Brawlers. But it wasn't enough, and many more people left the game thanks to this underpowered and slow tempo era. Shout out to Kor Haven, though!

How are you expected to play a game of Magic if you lose on the first 2-3 turns to a Gaea's Cradle and Priest of Titania fueled X Spell, or you keep getting your stuff tapped with Tangle Wire, Rishadan Port, and then have to tap out to pay for Rhystic Study triggers before doing your own thing? Now you see how bad things had gotten since the introduction of the Block Structure, and why some much needed fresh air was overdue.

Enter Invasion Block! Invasion, Planeshift, and Apocalypse.

Did the state of Magic have you down? No worries; we got you! Invasion Block was the first block focused on multicolor cards, as the denizens of Dominaria banded together against the big, bad Phyrexian Invasion of their home plane! Invasion gave us uncommon dual lands that entered tapped, kicker and domain! We got the iconic five three-color legendary Dragons like Rith, the Awakener that saw play in Constructed. Fires of Yavimaya brought one of Standard's most powerful, fair brews since it won entirely in the combat zone. We got great removal options like Flametongue Kavu and Vindicate. Invasion gave us nice, but not broken, card draw, in Fact or Fiction and Allied Strategies. Casual players loved Armadillo Cloak. Aura Shards and Pernicious Dead were great removal on enchantments. We even got one of the first non-poison alternate win-cons in Coalition Victory! Collective Restraint! Thornscape Battlemage and company? Rout and Twilight's Call were sweepers that could be cast at instant speed for an additional two mana? Molimo, Maro-Sorcerer? I don't personally like Obliterate, but it has its fans. Opt and Ordered Migration and Kangee, Aerie Keeper (the original Bird Commander)? Planar Portal. Recoil! Teferi's Moat. Urza's Rage. Apocalypse gave us the original enemy-colored Pain Lands, showing how even enemies could come together to fight as one. Captain's Maneuver? Cromat! The three-mana Dragon Charm cycle? Spiritmonger and Death Grasp. Draco and Dragon Arch! Eladamri's Call! We got our first split cards like Fire // Ice. These sets were packed with powerful, iconic cards that didn't absolutely break the game in half or slow it to a crawl like the previous two blocks had. And there's even more!

Fleetfoot Panther was the foundation for my Standard Equinaut brew around Equilibrium to self-bounce at instant speed while triggering Aura Shards and opposing dorks too. Hull Breach? The iconic Legacy Weapon or Lightning Angel? Lay of the Land and Lord of the Undead as a great Zombie Lord? Meddling Mage was powerful. I adore Mystic Snake! The cycle of Familiars? Orim's Chant? Phyrexian Arena. Quirion Dryad was played in Standard Miracle Gro. Shivan Wurm. Skyship Weatherlight... I could go on and on. Invasion Block brought us tons of great and cheap gold pinpoint removal and counterspells like Terminate, Absorb, Undermine, and Suffocating Blast. Terminal Moraine gave aus a colorless fetch land for basics. Unnatural Selection is great in any kindred brew or to turn off opposing kindred shenanigans. In addition to Lord of the Undead, we had other great kindred support for things like Goblin. We even had Dralnu's Crusade to combine Zombies and Goblins. I love Voice of All and Yavimaya's Embrace and Wild Research broke the Five Color format, my favorite casual format where I was on the ruling advisory panel for a long time.

And I haven't even mentioned the Limited format! Invasion Limited was great and balanced. Everyone loved that the power level had been restored to a happy medium between Masques and Urza's Block. It recaptured the feeling of early Magic and tons of players today fondly remember the cards they played at this time, from Phyrexian Arena to Pernicious Deed that helped powered The Rock deck, Rout in Five Color or multiplayer, and Flametongue Kavu and Fact or Fiction that helped define this era of Standard. Invasion resparked peoples' love for the game after being burned by Urza's Block Combo Winter and the slow grind of Mercadian Masques, and tons of players came back to the game. So, in my estimation, it really does feel like Invasion helped save Magic, because who knows what would have happened if that block wasn't a homerun!

What are your favorite cards from Invasion block? Let me know your thoughts! Do you also feel like this set helped saved Magic? Thanks for reading!