MTG’s new Poker Faces Secret Lair is beautiful but confusing
WotCMTG’s Spring Secret Lair Superdrop includes the Poker Faces Secret Lair, a gorgeous-looking set of Magic cards that may cause problems when used in play.
MTG’s Secret Lair releases offer a freedom of artistic design that extends beyond Magic’s usual boundaries. While MTG’s varied planes and genres allow for art with a wide variety of inspirations, its cards still need to make sense within the lore of the game.
Secret Lairs have no such limitations and are free to draw on sources as varied as cereal box mascots and tarot decks. It was only a matter of time until classic playing cards got their time in the spotlight, and that’s just what Secret Lair: Poker Faces is. The Secret Lair’s full reveal on Twitter/X can be found below:
Styled after classic playing cards, Poker Faces is easily one of the most striking and unique Secret Lairs released by MTG to date. The set features reprints of Jaxis, The Troublemaker, Coffin Queen, Goblin King, Professional Face-Breaker, and Rankle, Master Of Pranks
However, there’s a drawback to this set. In order to be as close to the paying card style as possible, the cards in Secret Lair: Poker Faces have been printed without rules text. Not knowing how the cards work in play can present issues to opponents who aren’t well-versed in these Creatures’ capabilities.
While Secret Lair products should be able to be used alongside regular Magic cards in any deck, releases like Poker Faces are often more geared towards collection and display than ease of use.
Most copies of these cards will likely live in binders and behind glass, but even those that are slotted into decks will likely only cause momentary confusion.
MTG’s Secret Lair Spring Superdrop will go live for orders on May 13. Many recent Secret Lairs have sold out extremely quickly, thanks to Wizards switching from the previous print-to-order model to limited-run. Unfortunately, many players have missed out on these Secret Lair drops, so be sure to check out the Spring Superdrop on May 13 if you want the best chance of locking in your Secret Lair purchase.
