Image courtesy of Scryfall.com
Tracking Mystic Decree Across Expansions: Print Frequency Revealed
Blue has always enjoyed playing guardian to the pace of a game, and Mystic Decree leans into that identity with flair 🧙🔥. This World Enchantment, priced at 2 colorless and two blue mana ({2}{U}{U}), is a pure curve-twister: it doesn’t target, it doesn’t even require you to tap a mana source, and its effect blankets the battlefield. When it lands, every creature loses flying and islandwalk. That means the skies and the watery real estate beneath the surface suddenly become less chaotic, for better or worse depending on which side of the table you’re sitting on 🎯.
From a historical lens, Mystic Decree is a peculiar resident of the Masters Edition IV set, released under the ME4 banner. The card is a blue, color-identity creature-control staple in this particular print run, but the rarity is listed as uncommon, which nudges collectors to seek copies with care. The card’s reprint status (reprint: True) signals a specific moment in MTG’s print history: Wizards of the Coast revisited established blue-world enchantments for Masters Edition IV, giving players a chance to find or complete this storied effect in a slightly reimagined packaging. In the world of print frequency, that means we’re looking at a single, documented ME4 reprint in the modern era—at least according to current official data—that makes Mystic Decree a neat, not-overflowing part of the Reserved List conversation and a collector’s curiosity 🧭.
The card’s reserved status (reserved: True) adds another layer to the frequency discussion. The Reserved List is a line Wizard of the Coast drew to preserve the nostalgia and integrity of older printings by limiting reprints of those cards. As such, Mystic Decree’s ME4 appearance sits at an intersection of nostalgia and scarcity. That dynamic often elevates its value to collectors who chase distinctive blue control pieces that come with a story beyond the battlefield. The ME4 print—art by Liz Danforth, frame drawn from the late-1990s aesthetic with a 1997 frame lineage—delivers both historical flavor and tactile rarity in foil and nonfoil options 🪙.
What the card does at the table: mechanics, synergy, and tempo
In practical terms, Mystic Decree is a broad-spectrum debuff that punishes high-evasion armies and island-based behemoths equally. If you’re piloting a blue control shell, the card is a double-edged sword — it curtails your own creatures’ evasion too, so you’ll want to time its impact with counterspell support and board wipes that preserve your control spell pipeline. The violet-blue symmetry of the effect makes it a head-turner in multiplayer formats where flying and islandwalk are central to how threats win the race. It naturally pairs with mass-control packages that reset the battlefield or lock in your inevitability, letting you ride a tighter, safer late game 🧙♂️🧊.
In Commander, where games often resolve in the blink of a counter-tap, Mystic Decree can swing a board state in a single moment. It shines when you’re facing a pair of opponents who rely on evasive fliers or islandwalk-enabled lists—think heavy pirate or merfolk archetypes on the other side of the table. The card encourages you to think beyond raw power and toward timing, tempo, and the delicate dance of “when to cast” vs. “when to hold.” The result is a strategic, sometimes cheeky, but always engaging mental puzzle—very much in the spirit of a blue mage’s best late-night nostalgia party 🎲.
Lore, flavor, and the art that carries it
The flavor text on Mystic Decree touches the classic Sengir line of power and curse: “Curse Reveka, and curse her coddled conjurers. Their sorcerers' school shall yet be ours.” This line, attributed to Irini Sengir, threads a gothic whisper through a mechanically clean effect. The art, by Liz Danforth, captures a sense of arcane pressure building—an enchantment that reaches out, rearranging who can skim the skies and skim the foam of the sea. It’s a reminder that in MTG, even a universal effect can carry a narrative weight, influencing both the board state and the mood at the table 🎨⚔️.
“Curse Reveka, and curse her coddled conjurers. Their sorcerers' school shall yet be ours.” —Irini Sengir
Print history, value, and why frequency matters to collectors
For those tracking print frequency, Mystic Decree offers a crisp case study. The card’s ME4 printing confirms a targeted reprint in Masters Edition IV, with the card remaining on the Reserved List, a factor that typically preserves some scarcity in both foiled and non-foiled forms 🧭. The ME4 print showcases the 1997-era frame style and the classic black border, a visual cue that many collectors associate with “historic” reprints of the blue control toolkit. The rarity (uncommon) and the fact that there is a foil option further diversify how readers approach pricing and collection goals. If you’re building a blue-themed collection that prizes iconic, symmetrical-enchantment utility, Mystic Decree becomes a poster-child for how print history can shape value and narrative alike 💎.
Beyond the shelves, you’ll notice the card’s ME4 entry sits alongside a broader theme: Wizards periodically revisits powerful, non-targeted, global effects for blue-dominated control decks. The frequency of such reprints remains sparse enough that each appearance carries a weight of nostalgia and strategic consideration. That balance—between accessibility and scarcity—defines how players talk about Mystic Decree when comparing it to other world enchantments in blue’s toolbox.
Practical takeaways for players and collectors
- When building a blue-control or tempo-heavy deck, count on Mystic Decree to slow down large, evasive threats across the board. It’s a great candidate for combo-friendly slots where you plan to stabilize and win shortly after the decree lands 🧙♀️.
- In Commander, consider how your deck’s own creatures might be affected by a global loss of evasion. Pair decrees with effects that grant you safer wins, or include ways to recoup in case your own creatures lose pertinent evasion assets.
- Collectors chasing Reserved List prints will likely find value in ME4 copies due to their scarcity and historical significance. Foil versions add a splash of shine to a blue or multi-color collection 🪙.
- For dedicated trackers, the print history data indicates limited reprints beyond ME4 in the current dataset. If you’re compiling a complete timeline, this card stands as a precise data point for a blue world-enchantment printing history.
Curious minds who want to dive deeper into Mystic Decree’s lineage or explore contemporary prints can check the card’s official details on Scryfall’s pages, which trace the ME4 printing and are linked through the card’s entry. If you enjoy pairing MTG lore with practical deck-building, you’ll find that the decree’s implications resonate with many of blue’s long-form tactics—control, tempo, and a little bit of lore-flavored mischief 🧙♂️💎.