Magic’s Aetherdrift set turns into the skid with multiple storylines

In the fall of 2024, Wizards of the Coast made the controversial announcement that it would change its annual mix of new releases for Magic: The Gathering. Going forward it plans to bring an equal number of Universes Beyond sets and traditional Magic story-based sets to market. But if fans were worried that the change would slow down the creative juggernaut, or hobble its ability to create new and exciting worlds of its own, a new set called Aetherdrift is here to ease your mind. The set, which releases widely on Feb. 14, takes the game’s lore in multiple different directions.

According to a presentation by worldbuliding lead Miquel Lopez, shared with the press last week, Aetherdrift tells the story of a “multi-day, multi-planar combat stage race” known as the Ghirapur Grand Prix. Invented on the plane of Avishkar (previously known as Kaladesh), it’s a way for its leadership to extend influence and power throughout the multiple worlds suddenly linked by the Omenpaths, planar gateways that played a key role in the war against the Phyrexians. But the participating racing teams have plans — and distinct personalities — all of their own.

The Guidelight Voyagers are a bit of an accidental participant in this race. They’ll rely heavily on artifact creatures to reach the finish line first.

The Speed Demons live up to their name. Led by a character named Winter, first introduced in Duskmourne: House of Horror, the whole lot are in service to that plane’s big bad, the moth demon Valgavoth. Expect a solid, 1980s-inspired band of leather-clad misfits.

Not to be out-hardcored, the Endriders hail from an apocalyptic plane rife with Mad Max-style speedfreaks hellbent on bringing water back to their parched home plane.

Goblin Rocketeers are, for all intents and purposes, the smartest idiots in the room. The equivalent of goblin test pilots, they worship something called BOOSTGOD to help them go fast.

The Alacrian Quickbeasts, on the other hand, look to be more at home in an unaired episode of Power Rangers. Each of the plane’s many districts is home to an exotic creature that, when bound to its rider, becomes a formidable racing foe. Expect these cards to make use of the saddle mechanic, returning for the first time since its introduction in Outlaws of Thunder Junction.

Meanwhile, the Champions of Amonkhet are a group of charioteers from the storied plane, which is now trying to rebuild after the war that left in place a fragile peace between the living and the undead.

The insectile Speedbrood is the most devout of the bunch. The clutch of humanoid insects aren’t here to make friends. Instead, they’ve metamorphosized their best and brightest into living vehicles who desire nothing more than to assume the final form of speed itself.

The hometown favorite are the Aether Rangers, whose high-octane hovercraft are nimble little glass cannons.

A favorite of the Magic art team, meanwhile, are the aptly named Chordatan Keelhaulers, a “rough and tumble crew of interplaner shark persons, pirates and their hangers on, fish folk, and other benthic creatures” according to Lopez. But will there be merfolk? Holding out hope for a friend.

Finally, coming in last in the presentation but perhaps first in your own at-home races, is the Cloudspire Racing Team. By far the most professional of the bunch, they’re also last year’s returning champions and claim the iconic planeswalker Chandra among as their co-captain.

You can find a gallery of all the cards shared by Wizards of the Coast today in the gallery below.