Magic: The Gathering players have a refined concept of “cute” — one that includes parasitic, shapeshifting creatures that can ravage entire ecosystems. Old and new aficionados of the popular trading card game know that I’m talking about slivers, the creature type introduced in Tempest, 1997’s MTG expansion set. Slivers have always been a popular creature type and a staple of tribal decks, thanks to their trademark mechanic that allows each sliver to share its abilities with the rest of the brood. Now, after a long absence, slivers are back in MTG’s newest set, Edge of Eternities. Sort of.
Players hoping to spice up their Slivers Commander or tribal decks will be disappointed to learn that there is only one sliver card in the set, and… it’s not a creature. Thrumming Hivepool is a rare artifact card that looks really powerful for any Sliver deck, but is technically not an actual sliver. More importantly, the critters do not appear in the awesome story that Wizards cooked up for Edge of Eternities. Not officially, at least. There are still plenty of hints that slivers are present in this intriguing new setting, and they will probably make an explosive (and slithering) return to the stage in an upcoming set.
Image: Rob Rey/Wizards of the Coast
Slivers draw inspiration from the sci-fi trope of a swarm of alien creatures linked by a hive mind, similar to the Tyranids in the Warhammer 40k universe. In Magic: The Gathering lore, this species’ origins are still shrouded in mystery. They appeared on an unnamed plane where they were used as beasts of burden due to their ability to adapt and evolve for specific functions. However, evolution can’t be stopped or tamed, so the hidden queen of slivers, the Gravemother, orchestrated the rise of her species and their takeover of the world. Some time later, the Evincar of Rath, Volrath, visited another plane overrun by slivers and took some specimens, along with a Sliver Queen, away to serve him and his Phyrexian masters’ plans to invade Dominaria.
When the Phyrexian invasion failed, most slivers, along with their Queen, died. The few that survived and remained dormant were eventually found 100 years later by the wizards of the Riptide Project. In another take on a classic sci-fi twist, the wizards lost control of the slivers, who are still at large in the world of Dominaria, waiting to be used by another villain, or perhaps biding their time until a new Sliver Queen rises (but don’t expect to actually see that card, as it’s in the dreaded “reserved list” of MTG cards that will never be reprinted again to preserve their market value.)
Excluding Commander Masters and Time Spiral Remastered, the latest appearance of slivers in an MTG set dates back to 2019’s Modern Horizons. With Edge of Eternities being presented as a space opera set in a remote expanse of space, players correctly guessed that the very xenomorph-esque slivers may make an appearance. The Edge of Eternities story, written by Seth Dickinson, confirmed that, in the Sothera system, slivers are fictional creatures that appear in movies, imitate sounds to attract unwary victims, and lay embryos inside them. A nice reference to a classic MTG creature and a callback to the Alien franchise, but with no actual presence in the set. Or at least, that’s what it looked like.
As shown in the Thrumming Hivepool card, slivers do exist outside of fiction in the Sothera system. According to the lore text at the bottom of the card, the creatures are trapped on a “rock” (possibly an asteroid.) Someone left behind an encrypted log recording the existence of slivers, either an unlucky explorer or, perhaps, a scientist involved in experimenting with the creatures, which would be a nice callback to the Riptide Project. Something that could be a sliver also appears in the side story Grasp in the Dark by RJ Taylor, but it’s speculation at best, as the creature’s description is too vague.
So, slivers exist in the Sothera system, but where are they, exactly? The biggest hint may have been dropped in the art for the card Wurmwall Sweeper. In the bottom-left corner of the illustration, a familiar shape lurks in the darkness of a barren landscape, waiting for a spaceship to land. The Wurmwall is a dangerous and remote expanse of space where the next chapter of the Sothera story will likely take place, teasing the full appearance of slivers in an upcoming set. Colossal space wurms and a new batch of slivers? Sign me up.
