Weatherlight

Weatherlight

Expansion symbol
Product code	WTH
Number of cards	167
Release date	June 1997
Design team	Dan Cervelli (lead) Mike Elliott Joel Mick
Development team	{{{developers}}}

Weatherlight was the eleventh Magic: The Gathering expansion set, third in the Mirage Block. It was released in June 1997. Its expansion symbol is an open book (the Thran Tome).

Storyline

Weatherlight began the longest story arc in Magic's history, which would last continuously until the release of Apocalypse four years later (the aftermath of the story was explored for two years afterward). The story introduces us to the crew of the flying ship Weatherlight, which traverses the planes of the multiverse in search of the scattered group of ancient artifacts known collectively as the Legacy. The captain of the ship, Sisay, is abducted to the shadowy world of Rath, and her old friend and crewmate, a general named Gerrard, is pressed into taking command of the ship to rescue her.

Mechanics

• Weatherlight was based largely around the use of the graveyard. The set boasted more ways to retrieve cards from the graveyard than ever before, and other spells used the graveyard as a resource by removing cards in it from the game.
• Weatherlight was the last set to use cumulative upkeep, which had been introduced in Ice Age, but the set provided a new twist: Cards which had an effect which got larger as their cumulative upkeep costs increased.
• Weatherlight had many so-called "cantrips", another idea that was created for Ice Age, which was spells that let you draw a card in addition to their normal effect. Weatherlight's innovation was to draw the card as soon as the spell resolved, rather than next turn, a change which is still used on cantrips to this day.
• Though the third set in the Mirage block, Weatherlight does not prominently feature the keyword mechanics introduced in Mirage, phasing and flanking, which appear on only three cards and two, respectively.

Notable Cards

• Null Rod: A cheap artifact which renders many other artifacts in play useless, the Rod is often used defensively in Vintage tournaments to shut down powerful artifacts like Black Lotus, the Moxes, and Mindslaver.
• Gemstone Mine: A land that can produce any color of mana, but only three times. The Mine, combined with other five-color-producing mana sources, made multicolor decks very popular in 1997 and 1998.
• Gaea's Blessing: A green cantrip that was often used by control decks to recycle their used spells. The additional ability of Gaea's Blessing to shuffle the entire graveyard back to the library made it ideal as a defense against Millstone, and later for use with Oath of Druids when Exodus came out.
• Empyrial Armor: A common white enchantment that boosted a creature's power and toughness for each card in its player's hand, the Armor dominated Limited play and helped keep "White Weenie" a popular deck until it rotated out of Type II.
• Firestorm: Firestorm allows a red player to deal damage to many targets at once for only one red mana, at the cost of cards in hand.

External links

• Weatherlight product page from Wizards.com