Power Nine

The term Power Nine refers to a set of nine specific cards in the game of Magic: The Gathering. These cards were only printed early in the game's history and consist of Black Lotus,^[1] Ancestral Recall, Time Walk, Mox Sapphire, Mox Jet, Mox Ruby, Mox Emerald, Mox Pearl, and Timetwister.^[2]

The Power Nine are considered to be among the most powerful cards in the game. All nine cards were of the rarest level of rarity and printed only in the Alpha, Beta, and Unlimited sets, meaning they were only printed from late 1993 to early 1994.^[3] Currently, all of the Power Nine cards are restricted in the Vintage tournament format^[4] and banned in Legacy, the only formats where they would be legal otherwise.^[5]

Black Lotus

The Alpha version of the Black Lotus card (here, signed by the artist) is usually considered to be the most valuable non-promotional Magic card ever printed, excluding cards with rare printing errors, such as "albino" cards.^[6]

The Black Lotus is the most valuable Magic card ever to be released in a regular set, excluding cards with rare printing errors, such as "albino" cards. Its Alpha and Beta versions in particular are considered to be extremely valuable, due to the more limited print runs and black borders of those sets.^[7] The card has the ability to be sacrificed for three mana of any one color. With its own mana cost of 0, this represents an enormous temporary jump in mana development. Former Pro player and Magic writer Zvi Mowshowitz has declared Black Lotus as the best artifact of all time, claiming every deck in the history of the game is better with a Black Lotus in it.^[8] The illustration on Black Lotus was painted by Christopher Rush, who was at the time a Wizards of the Coast employee. The Black Lotus illustration is a depiction of a black lotus flower over a foliage backdrop.

Moxen

The five Mox cards — Mox Sapphire, Mox Jet, Mox Ruby, Mox Emerald, and Mox Pearl (colloquially "Moxen") — are Artifacts. Similar to the five Basic Lands, they cost nothing to play and can add one mana of a specific color to their owner's mana pool. Unlike lands, however, more than one can be played per turn, in addition to the land for that turn. Like Black Lotus, this acceleration of a game's natural mana development can lead to extremely powerful plays much earlier than normal.^[8] All five Mox cards were illustrated by Dan Frazier. In each artwork, a different piece of jewelry is depicted.

Ancestral Recall

Ancestral Recall allows the player to draw three cards at an extremely low mana cost.^[9] It originated as part of a set of five cards known as "Boons", one of each color, which gave three of something (e.g. mana, life, damage) for the cost of one mana. Ancestral Recall is the only rare Boon and the only one not to have been reprinted since the Unlimited set.^[10]

Time Walk

For two mana, Time Walk allows a player to take an extra turn. In a game that involves a constant build-up of resources over time, a full turn's additional development turned out to be far more powerful than Magic's early designers had imagined. Several cards that grant additional turns have seen print since Time Walk, but always at a greater cost.

In Time Walk's early development version, it originally had the text "Target player loses next turn." Richard Garfield tells an anecdote about a playtester telling him that he had a card in his deck that would guarantee he would win the game on the next turn. Garfield could not figure out which card this could be, until the playtester showed him a Time Walk, and pointed out the alternate meaning of the word "loses". The wording was changed prior to the release of the game.^[11]

Timetwister

Whereas the other Power 9 cards are simple in concept, Timetwister is more complex. It forces each player to shuffle their hand, graveyard, and library together and then draw a new hand of seven cards. Because it affects all players, it may not be apparent at first why Timetwister is a powerful card. Its power lies mostly in situations where the player casting it has fewer cards in his or her hand than the opponent, and has established a powerful board position - Timetwister does not affect cards already on the table. The player casting Timetwister can essentially catch up on cards in hand, and potentially get back powerful cards in the graveyard, without giving up a dominant board position. Unlike the other cards in the Power Nine, Timetwister therefore requires a deck to be more carefully built in order to exploit its power.

Parodies

The Blacker Lotus was a satirical card in the parody Unglued set which produced four mana, although it required the user to physically tear the card up after use. Jack-in-the-Mox from the same set works like a regular Mox but produces either a random color of mana, or destroys itself, depending on a die roll. Mox Lotus, from the later Unhinged parody set, provides infinite mana and immunity to mana-burn (now redundant due to rules changes), but costs fifteen mana to play.

Alternate Art

Because their raw power keeps them from being reprinted, the Power 9 are among the very few widely-recognised cards never to have received updated artwork from their original printing. As a way to rectify this, since 2003, the winner of the annual Vintage Championship has received a unique, oversized Power Nine card featuring brand-new art. These prize cards are considerably larger than actual cards, and therefore cannot be used in play. The five Mox cards feature artwork that represent the settings of the Magic expansions released in their corresponding years. Their artist, Volkan Baga, has also illustrated two other Mox cards - Mox Opal and the reissued Mox Diamond - in the same style. The following cards have been given to the winners:

• 2003: Black Lotus to Carl Winter (Artwork by Christopher Rush)^[12][13]
• 2004: Timetwister^[12] to Mark Biller (Artwork by Mark Tedin)
• 2005: Ancestral Recall to Roland Chang (Artwork by Mark Poole)^[14]
• 2006: Mox Pearl^[15] to Travis Spero (Artwork by Volkan Baga)^[16]
• 2007: Mox Jet to Stephen Menendian (Artwork by Volkan Baga)^[17]
• 2008: Mox Ruby to Paul Mastriano (Artwork by Volkan Baga)^[18]
• 2009: Mox Emerald to Itou Hiromichi (Artwork by Volkan Baga)^[19]
• 2010: Mox Sapphire to Owen Turtenwald (Artwork by Volkan Baga)
• 2011: Time Walk to Mark Hornung (Artwork by Chris Rahn)^[20]

References

1. ^ History of the World by InQuest Gamer & Leigh Newmark, wizarduniverse.com, December 15, 2006
2. ^ "The Power Nine". Magicthegathering.com. 2004. http://www.wizards.com/Magic/Magazine/Article.aspx?x=mtgcom/arcana/432. Retrieved 2008-09-15. 
3. ^ "Ask Wizards: August 7, 2008". Magicthegathering.com. August 7, 2008. http://www.wizards.com/Magic/Magazine/Article.aspx?x=mtg/daily/askwizards/0808. Retrieved 2008-09-15. 
4. ^ "Vintage Format Deck Construction". Magicthegathering.com. March 2008. http://www.wizards.com/Magic/Magazine/Article.aspx?x=judge/resources/sfrvintage. Retrieved 2008-09-15. 
5. ^ "Legacy Format Deck Construction". Magicthegathering.com. September 1, 2008. http://www.wizards.com/Magic/Magazine/Article.aspx?x=judge/resources/sfrlegacy. Retrieved 2008-09-15. 
6. ^ "Most Expensive Magic: The Gathering Card". Most Expensive Journal. 2008-03-17. http://most-expensive.net/magic-gathering-card. Retrieved 2009-12-06. 
7. ^ "Magic: The Gathering – Part Five: Top Ten Cards". Collectors' Quest. 16 August 2008. http://www.collectorsquest.com/blog/2008/08/16/magic-the-gathering-part-five-top-ten-cards/. Retrieved 2009-07-07. 
8. ^ ^{a b} Mowshowitz, Zvi (28 February 2005). "The Top 50 Artifacts of All Time". Wizards of the Coast. http://www.wizards.com/Magic/Magazine/Article.aspx?x=mtgcom/feature/253. Retrieved 2009-08-04. 
9. ^ "The Top 50 Card Drawing Cards". Magicthegathering.com. March 21, 2003. http://www.wizards.com/Magic/Magazine/Article.aspx?x=mtgcom/feature/140. Retrieved 2008-09-15. 
10. ^ Ben Bleiweiss (July 10, 2002). "Sets of Five, Part I". http://www.wizards.com/magic/magazine/Article.aspx?x=mtgcom/daily/bb28. Retrieved November 8, 2010. 
11. ^ "Card of the Day August 2003: Time Walk". Magicthegathering.com. August 12, 2003. http://www.wizards.com/Magic/Magazine/Article.aspx?x=mtgcom/cotd/0803. Retrieved 2008-09-15. 
12. ^ ^{a b} "A Player's Guide to Type I". magicthegathering.com. August 9, 2004. http://www.wizards.com/Magic/Magazine/Article.aspx?x=mtgcom/feature/224. Retrieved 2008-09-18. 
13. ^ "FNM Foils and Judge Foil Promos". starcitygames.com. April 21, 2005. http://www.starcitygames.com/php/news/article/9472.html. Retrieved 2008-09-18. 
14. ^ "2005 Vintage Championship". magicthegathering.com. August 29, 2005. http://www.wizards.com/Magic/Magazine/Events.aspx?x=mtgevent/vintage05/welcome. Retrieved 2008-09-18. 
15. ^ "2006 Vintage Championship Fact Sheet". magicthegathering.com. 2006. http://www.wizards.com/Magic/Magazine/Events.aspx?x=mtgevent/vintage06/facts. Retrieved 2008-09-18. 
16. ^ "2006 Vintage Year in Review, Part 2". starcitygames.com. December 28, 2006. http://www.starcitygames.com/php/news/article/13428.html. Retrieved 2008-09-18. 
17. ^ "The 2007 Vintage Year in Review". magicthegathering.com. December 10, 2007. http://www.wizards.com/Magic/Magazine/Article.aspx?x=mtgcom/feature/435. Retrieved 2008-09-18. 
18. ^ Price, Nate (August 2008). "Feature: Vintage Championship Top 8 Coverage". magicthegathering.com. http://www.wizards.com/Magic/Magazine/Events.aspx?x=mtgevent/usnat08/vintage2. Retrieved 2008-09-18. 
19. ^ "Gen Con: The Days Are Too Short". magicthegathering.com. 24 August 2009. http://www.wizards.com/Magic/Magazine/Article.aspx?x=mtg/daily/feature/53. Retrieved 2009-08-26. 
20. ^ "2011 U.S. National Championship - Day 1 Blog". Wizards of the Coast. http://www.wizards.com/magic/magazine/article.aspx?x=mtg/daily/eventcoverage/usnat11/day1. 

External links

• "The Power Nine" — Images of all Power Nine cards
• The Gatherer Card Database — This database has detailed information on all other cards mentioned in this article