I had the chance to participate in the Secrets of Strixhaven Early Access Event, and got to see the cards from the new set in action. Excitement for the set as high, as In-Universe sets are great and Arcavios is a popular plane to revisit. It doesn't hurt that the cards have looked great during preview season.

These are the cards from Secrets of Strixhaven that left an impression on me after the Early Access event.

Standout Cards

Lorehold, the Historian

I've seen a ton of talk about building a Miracle deck around Lorehold, the Historian, and I got to see it in action in one of my earliest matches. While my opponent was able to pull of the dream, hitting Jeskai Revelation with Miracle, not enough has been said about just how huge and fast this thing is.

The miracle was neat, and the card filtering was a great bonus, but this just smacking you as a 5/5 Flying Creature with Haste might be good enough on its own. Lorehold was a house, and I think I'm going to give the Boros Dragons deck another go when the set releases.

I saw all of the Elder Dragons in play at one point or another, and they all seem to be interesting build arounds. Prismari, the Inspiration might see play (because Izzet has the best card pool in the format), and I could see Quandrix, the Proof or Witherbloom, the Balancer breaking out too (because Badgermole Cub enables both of them). It's a fun Creature cycle.

Resonating Lute

It seemed like everyone and their mother was trying to build a Resonating Lute deck. I saw Izzet versions, Jeskai versions, and Temur versions all jamming this and big mana spells. The most surprising thing to me was... they all kinda worked.

Doubling your mana (with no restrictions like, "of this Land type" or "only mana from basic Lands") is an extremely powerful ability. There are so many cards that scale so well in Standard at the moment, that this card can do some nutty things. This was probably the biggest standout from the Event, and I wouldn't be surprised to see a Lute deck pop up in Standard tournaments going forward.

Traumatic Critique

Traumatic Critique was the most popular card to pair with Resonating Lute, as a way to dig for Lute in the early game and Fireball out an opponent in the late game. It was popping up all over the place, though.

It enabled Spellementals in the early game, taking out Llanowar Elves while smoothing their draw and dumping multiple spells into the graveyard to power out Eddymurk Crab. It shined in Jeskai control. It enabled Graveyard strategies. The default on this, with X = 0, is good enough to see play, and it scales throughout the game very well. Great card.

Blazing Firesinger & Rapturous Moment

Blazing Firesinger and Rapturous Moment surprised me. However, as someone who registered Dragonstorm for a tournament many moons ago, I should have remembered that Seething Song enables absolute degeneracy.

Both of these cards let to some disgusting turns, and both paired with Pyromancer's Goggles to end games in a hurry. I don't know if there's anything here good enough to be Tier One (Standard is just so ridiculously fast right now) but these were both fun and powerful, and they made me want to build a deck for FNM.

Improvisation Capstone

Improvisation Capstone surprised me with how strong it ended up being once I actually cast it. Of all the Paradigm spells, I think this one has the best shot at making it into Standard, as the top end of a ramp deck. This one doesn't penalize you for using the low mana value spells, as it wasn't uncommon for me to play this and end up casting a two-mana spell and a four+ mana spell off the top (as it keeps going until it breaks a total mana value of four). This is definitely a card to watch.

Withering Curse

Withering Curse wasn't exciting, but it did exactly what you would want it to do. It's a very reliable sweeper. I saw so many people pair this with Ancient Cornucopia, and they worked very well together. Golgari control may be viable now that it has enough sweepers to control the Aggro decks. A solid, solid card.

Skycoach Conductor

Skycoach Conductor was a surprising MVP. Sure, it did a great Restoration Angel impression, saving Creatures from removal spells, or resetting a Creature with Prepare. Where it really shined was paired with Standard All-Star Quantum Riddler. Some decks were already playing Splash Portal as a way to maximize Riddler's Warp ability, and this is so much better.

Mind into Matter

Mind into Matter was the card I really wanted to try coming into the Early Access Event, and it did not disappoint. The biggest issue I had with this card was resisting the urge to hold onto it to cast with more mana available. My best plays with this were when X = 3 or X= 4. It felt like this was Braingeyser with a Black Lotus stapled to it in those cases, and it never failed to improve my board position. Loved this card.

Professor Dellian Fel

Professor Dellian Fel may be the best Planeswalker in Standard the moment he's released, and he might help Golgari decks climb back to relevance. He is so hard to take down once he hits the board. His +2 takes him to seven loyalty immediately and Black's ability to control the early game with Creature removal almost guarantees he'll have enough loyalty to survive.

His abilities line up nicely, since Planeswalkers that can protect themselves and draw cards are almost always playable. The -6 can slowly end a game over multiple turns as he takes control. This may spawn entirely new architypes, and I hope he can shake up Standard as much as he impacted the Early Access Event.

Conclusion

While I didn't get to see everything played on the Early Access Event, I will be combing through the stream coverage over the next few days to get a better picture of how the set performed through the streamers' Youtube/Twitch videos. This was just a taste of the set and I can't wait to play with it when it releases on Magic Arena!

You can find more of my Magic musings on Twitter/X @travishall456 and on Bluesky.