May 1995
The sixth expansion, Ice Age was the first “stand alone” expansion. Garfield’s original plan had been for each release to be playable by itself rather than just as additions to the initial set, called “Magic: Ice Age,” was already in playtesting when Magic went on sale. The unexpectedly high demand for cards changed these plans, and the Ice Age set was postponed several times. As the rules evolved and the Magic designers grew mate experienced, the set changed a lot from the first playtest versions.
Like the Dark and Fallen Empires, Ice Age drew its flavor from a specific setting. After the Brothers’ War, the climate gradually cooled and glaciers began to creep down form the north. Ice Age was set several hundred years after the war, at the height of this frozen era. The villain was the necromancer Lim-Dul.
The Ice Age set was sold on both decks and booster packs. It was the largest expansion yet—the same size as Fourth Edition. Because it was designed to be playable by itself, it included new versions of basic lands. Many “core cards” from the basic set were repeated; these were the cards the designers felt were essential to the nature of each color. Noncreature spells, such as white’s Circle of Protection and blue’s Counterspell, were reprinted with only the art changed. Creatures were reprinted with different names; for example, Balduvian bears is the same as Grizzly Bears. These choices were both for flavor and to work with the 4-card limit rule in decks.
The Ice Age set added two new rules to Magic. One, cumulative upkeep, reappeared in several later sets; the other, snow-covered lands, was only used in Ice Age and Alliances (another expansion). Ice Age also introduced spells nicknamed “cantrips” (meaning little tricks). These spells replaced themselves by allowing their caster to draw an extra card. The cantrips originally gave drawing a card at beginning of next turn’s upkeep, but later it was changed to beginning of next turn. Eventually it happened after the spell was cast. Ice Age’s biggest impact, though, was in some of its spells. One in particular, Necropotence, led to the creation of a class of decks known as Nercrodecks, which dominated tournaments for months.
