Chris Angel Murphy

The Problem

Whether you’re a Magic the Gathering player or collector, you’ll probably know that it can be sometimes difficult to identify which set a MTG card comes from, here’s a useful guide to help you identify what set your MTG cards come from.

Identification

Identification of any particular Magic the Gathering card can be broadly grouped in to three separate sections:

a) Cards with Set Markers

This group is applicable for the majority of Magic the Gathering cards in circulation today, it includes all Expansion Sets, and Core Sets from 6th Edition onwards.

To identify these cards, look in the bar between the card art and text box. On the right hand side of this bar, you will see a set icon. The image of that icon defines which set it comes from. There is a handy reference on my website detailed in the resource box below which details all the MTG set icons and how you can recognise them.

It should be noted that the colour of that icon represents its rarity, usually, the plain black icon represents common, silver is uncommon, gold is rare and purple is mythic rare. This does not change what set the card comes from, simply its rarity within that set.

b) Cards without Set Markers

Not all cards have a set marker on them. This is only applicable for cards from the following MTG sets:

Limited Edition Alpha
Limited Edition Beta
Unlimited
Revised Edition
Fourth Edition
Fifth Edition

4th and 5th Edition cards are easy to identify. These two sets have a date in the bottom left corner of the card. 4th Edition will have a date of 1995, 5th Edition has the date of 1997.

The next way to differentiate the remaining sets is the colour of the border. Alpha and Beta Edition cards have a black border, Unlimited and Revised have a white border.

To differentiate between Alpha and Beta sets, Alpha cards have very rounded edges compared to all other kinds of MTG cards. Just pick up a card from another later set and overlay them on top of each other. If it is very different from the newer card then you have Alpha, other than that you have Beta.

Differentiating between Unlimited and Revised is a little more difficult. Unlimited cards usually have a blurry look to them due to the way the cards were printed. Revised cards also tend to look much more “washed out” and pale due to the printing process used.

c) Promotional Textless Cards and Reward Cards

There are also two other notable types of card which fall outside of those two categories: textless cards and DCI reward cards.

Promotional textless cards are cards given as rewards by Wizards of the Coast to tournament players. These cards have a larger art block which takes up nearly all of the card space apart from an outer border. Hence these cards have no set marker, and belong to no set. In play terms for deck construction, this card can be taken to be a copy from any set that already has a copy of this card in its card list.

Reward cards such as DCI promotional cards (e.g. Arena cards) and FNM foils have a DCI icon as its set marker. As with the textless cards, this means they belong to no particular set.

Summary

Hopefully this guide should help you to identify which set your Magic the Gathering cards come from. This can be especially helpful in the process of selling your Magic the Gathering cards – this information is critical in making sure you get the true value of your cards.