Wizards revealed Magic: The Gathering | Marvel: Darkhold Destiny at New York Comic Con on October 9, 2026, and it comes with four Commander decks led by Hela, Blade, Thor and Doctor Strange. The set releases on April 9, 2027, and preorders are open now.
The decklists aren't out yet. This post collects everything that is: the four decks, the products, the new mechanics and every card shown so far. When the lists drop, every deck goes straight onto our Darkhold Destiny precon page with a power level, a bracket and a Turn Clock.
A Marvel story written for Magic
The first two Marvel sets adapted stories you already knew. This one doesn't. Wizards calls it the first Universes Beyond set built around an original story and setting, written together with Marvel. Hela and Dormammu use a page of the Darkhold to tear open the walls between realities, and the story runs across nearly thirty dimensions with Doctor Strange, Thor, Hela and Dormammu at its centre.
It continues off the cards too. Jackson Lanzing and Collin Kelly are writing a Marvel comic that tells the origin of a brand-new character, out digitally in February 2027 and in print in April.
The four Commander decks
Wizards has shown the four boxes, and each one prints its colours and two theme words under the name. Every deck is 100 cards with 30 cards new to Magic, two Traditional Foil legends (one with borderless art), ten double-sided tokens and a deck box. The commander cards themselves haven't been revealed yet, so the details below come from the boxes and the packaging text.
Lords of Hel (black-red), Hela: tokens and sacrifice
Sacrifice paired with token makers, so there is always a willing victim for the next sacrifice. The main set's Hela, Mistress of Darkness already points this way: whenever a player loses life during your turn, she can make that many tapped 2/2 Zombies, once per turn. In a deck that drains on every sacrifice, that is a lot of Zombies.
Midnight Sons (white-black), Blade: life and Vampires
Vampires and lifegain, with the life you bank spent on effects that change the board. It's the deck the packaging pitches as the last one standing when the sun comes up. Orzhov lifegain has always been a strong precon archetype, because the engine is easy to see and the payoffs scale.
Gods of Asgard (red-green-white), Thor: power matters and godlike gear
A board of creatures with power 4 or greater, rewarded for holding the greatest power at the table, and "godlike gear" on the box suggests Equipment to push them there. Naya decks like this usually ramp hard and then attack, which makes it the most likely of the four to win through combat.
Strange Academy (white-blue-black), Doctor Strange: spellcasters and blink
Spellcasters that blink in and out through portals to repeat their enters-the-battlefield effects. Esper blink is a grindy, card-advantage plan, and usually the slowest of a set's decks to close a game but the hardest to run out of gas.
Every product in the set
- Commander Decks: the four decks above.
- Collector's Edition Commander Decks: the same 100-card decks in Surge Foil.
- Booster Packs: built for Limited, including Pick-Two draft.
- Draft Night: a four-player draft party in a box, with a Collector Booster for the winner.
- Bundle: 9 Booster Packs, a mechanically unique Mythic Rare promo, 5 full-art Strange Places basic lands and a Spindown die.
- Arcanum Bundle: 8 Booster Packs, full-art Bifrost lands, Arcanum promo cards with exclusive art and a Collector Booster.
- Collector Boosters: source material cards, silver foil cards and team-ups in Midnight Raised Foil.
- Scene Boxes: Assault on Asgard and Skirmish at the Sanctum, six borderless Scene cards each that form one picture.
New mechanics so far
Vengeance. A new sorcery subtype on the back of a card that you can cast only from your graveyard, then it's exiled. Hela's back face is Dark Tutor, which finds any card and puts it into your hand or your graveyard. That second option makes it an Entomb as well as a tutor.
Arcane, with pawprint modes. Arcane spells return, and Hela's Arcanum uses the {P} pawprint system from Bloomburrow: choose up to five pawprints' worth of modes, repeating them if you like.
Dimensions. Temple of Khonshu enters untapped if you control a Dimension. Nobody has seen a Dimension card yet, so that is the next thing to watch.
Conditional transforms. Magik, Illyana Rasputin doesn't flip by paying mana. She transforms at your end step if you sacrificed two or more permanents that turn, which fits the Lords of Hel deck neatly.
Every card revealed so far
The Darkhold, {1}{B}{B}, legendary artifact. Tap it to put a sin counter on it, draw a card for each sin counter, then lose 1 life for each card in your hand. Its second ability, {6}{B}{B} and tap, sets every player's life total to the lowest one at the table. It's the set's big Commander card: a draw engine that rewards an empty hand, with a built-in finisher for decks that can survive at low life.
Hela, Mistress of Darkness, {4}{B}{B}, 6/6 God Sorcerer Villain, with Dark Tutor ({1}{B}{B}, Vengeance) on the back. Even ignoring the creature, a three-mana tutor that can also Entomb will see a lot of Commander play.
Magik, Illyana Rasputin, {1}{B}{R}. Exiles your top card each upkeep and lets you play it. Transformed into Darkchild, Demon Uncaged, she exiles until she hits a nonland card, and can pay 4 life for indestructible.
Hela's Arcanum, {3}{B}{B} instant. Pawprint modes: a deathtouch pump, a "return when it dies" save, or three pawprints to destroy every non-Zombie creature with power 3 or less. An instant-speed sweeper that spares Zombies is a strong fit for a Hela deck.
Gargantos, the Endbringer, {2}{B}{G}, a Scene card. Deathtouch, enters with three +1/+1 counters, doubles them every upkeep, and copies its combat damage to each other opponent. Golgari isn't one of the four decks, so this one comes from a Scene Box rather than a precon.
Penance Stare, {W} instant. Destroys an attacking creature with mana value 3 or less.
Rise from the Nether, {6}{R} Arcane sorcery. A 3/1 Mindless One for each noncreature, nonland card in your graveyard.
Temple of Khonshu, the white-black common dual that cares about Dimensions.
Wizards has also shown art of a green Infinity Stone by Volkan Baga, who painted the previous two Stones. The product reveal points to the Time Stone as the set's headliner.
What we'll do when the decklists drop
The Darkhold Destiny precon page is already live. When Wizards publishes the lists, all four decks go on it with:
- a power level and WotC bracket for each deck,
- the Turn Clock: how fast each deck kills the table when nobody stops it,
- every combo Commander Spellbook knows about,
- the full 100-card list, ready to load into the deck builder and upgrade.
If you want to see where a precon you already own lands in the meantime, paste it into the analyzer.
The next Commander release is closer: the Star Trek Commander decks arrive on November 13, 2026.
Sources: Wizards of the Coast announcement, Wizards product page. Card text from Scryfall.