How Star Trek Changes Standard

The Short Version

Magic's Star Trek set is a Standard-legal set. It goes live on MTG Arena on Tuesday, November 10, 2026, and in stores on Friday, November 13. From those dates every card in it is legal in Standard, both on Arena and at Friday Night Magic.

Three things change for a regular Standard player. All ten shock lands are reprinted, so they stay in Standard for as long as Star Trek does. A handful of cards look ready to join decks people already play. And of the new mechanics, Station and facing a dilemma matter in 60 cards, while Federation and assimilate mostly don't. Every card pick on this page is a prediction from card text, made before anyone has played the set.

What Changes in the Mana

The shock lands were already in Standard before Star Trek. Edge of Eternities brought back five of them in August 2025 and Lorwyn Eclipsed brought back the other five in January 2026. What Star Trek changes is how long they stay. A card is legal in Standard while any of its printings is in a Standard-legal set, and Star Trek is newer than both of those sets. So all ten now stay legal for as long as Star Trek is in Standard.

Each one taps for two colors and has both basic land types. As it enters you may pay 2 life; if you don't, it enters tapped. That makes them the best dual lands in the format for most decks, and having all ten in one set means a deck you build now keeps its mana base longer. If you play on Arena, a rare wildcard spent on a shock now buys more time in the format than it did before Star Trek.

Rotation itself does not move. Wizards said in its October 12 banned and restricted update that Nauctis, early in 2027, will trigger the next Standard rotation, and that it will be an extra-large one. Star Trek is the newest set in Standard, so it stays through that rotation. Wizards has not said when Star Trek itself rotates. The Standard deck guide explains how rotation works.

Star Trek adds more lands too. Five rare lands, one per color (Federation Outpost, Ni'Var Science Academy, The Unicomplex, Quark's Bar and Q Continuum), enter tapped unless you control two or more other lands, and give you surveil 1 or a small bonus when they enter untapped. They help most in one-color decks, which have no use for a shock. Ten common Planets, one for each pair of colors, enter tapped and gain you 1 life.

Cards for Decks You Already Play

These four fit decks that Wizards named in its October 12 update as ones people are playing in Standard now. Each does something those decks already want, which is the best sign a new card gets played. They are predictions, so test them before you trade for a playset.

Captain Kathryn Janeway ↗

Mono-Green Landfall. Four mana: play an extra land each turn, and every creature that enters under your control explores. Two land drops a turn means two landfall triggers.

Lieutenant Commander Data ↗

Izzet spells. Three mana, and it gets a +1/+1 counter whenever any player casts a noncreature spell. Pay one mana and remove three counters to draw a card.

Gowron, Eager for Battle ↗

Jund Sacrifice. Four mana, grows whenever another creature dies, and sacrificing a Klingon to it draws a card for 1 life.

Dr. Beverly Crusher ↗

Lifegain. Three mana: abilities of your permanents that trigger on gaining life trigger twice, and she grows every time you gain life.

Captain Kathryn Janeway is the strongest fit on paper. A landfall deck wants as many lands entering as it can get, and Janeway adds a land drop every turn while each creature after her explores, which finds more lands. Lieutenant Commander Data counts noncreature spells from every player, so it grows on your opponent's turn as well as yours in a deck full of instants. Gowron, Eager for Battle and Khan, Vengeful Heart, a four-mana 5/3 that can sacrifice a creature or artifact to draw two, both give a sacrifice deck more to do with its fodder.

Removal Any Deck Can Use

Cheap, clean removal travels between decks more than any other card type. These four are the ones most likely to show up in decks that have nothing else to do with Star Trek.

70,000 Light-Years from Home ↗

Two-mana sorcery that exiles a creature or Spacecraft. Its controller may fetch a basic land to hand, which is a small price for exile.

The Wrath of Khan ↗

Three-mana Saga: 4 damage to an opposing creature and you borrow it if it lives, then a card swap, then each opponent sacrifices a nontoken permanent.

Engineered Explosives ↗

Colorless artifact with one counter per color spent on it. Sacrifice it to destroy each nonland permanent with that mana value. At zero it hits most tokens.

Encounter the Unknown ↗

Three-mana instant. Exile your top two cards and play them through next turn, or deal 2 damage to every creature and player.

Engineered Explosives is the reprint to watch. Its only earlier Standard-legal printing was Fifth Dawn in 2004. It enters with one charge counter for each color of mana spent on it, so a two-color deck can set it to zero, one or two. At zero it destroys most tokens, since a token's mana value is usually zero, and Star Trek makes plenty of Officers, Treasures and Clues. It also hits your own permanents at that mana value, so build around what it leaves standing.

For blue decks, Highly Illogical is worth a look: two mana to counter a spell with mana value 2 or less, or four mana with kicker to counter any spell.

New Decks to Try

Some Star Trek cards need a deck built around them. These are the ones with the clearest plan, and the most fun to try in a Best-of-One queue or at FNM.

Captain Jean-Luc Picard ↗

Three mana: other creatures get +1/+1, and every creature or Spacecraft you cast makes a 1/1 Officer. A white go-wide deck starts here.

Captain Pike, Fullness of Time ↗

Three mana, power and toughness equal to your differently named lands, and you can play lands off the top of your library.

Seven of Nine, Unassimilated ↗

Two-mana 0/4 that draws a card each turn. You discard after unless you control five or more differently named lands.

Elim Garak, Simple Tailor ↗

Three-mana 3/3 menace. Every time you face a dilemma, each opponent loses 2 life and you gain 2.

Officers. Captain Jean-Luc Picard makes a 1/1 Officer for every creature or Spacecraft you cast and pumps your other creatures. Pair him with cheap creatures and a Spacecraft or two, which the tokens can station.

Strange new worlds. These cards count your differently named lands, and every shock land has its own name. A three-color deck with three shocks, three basic land types and a Planet or two can reach five or six names. That turns Captain Pike, Fullness of Time into a big body for three mana and lets Seven of Nine, Unassimilated draw without discarding. The Destruction of Praxis gives every creature -X/-X for that count, and makes two hasty 2/1 Klingons if it is six or more.

Dilemmas. You face a dilemma every time you choose modes for a spell or ability, and the set has dozens of modal cards. Elim Garak, Simple Tailor drains 2 for each one, so a black deck with plenty of modal removal and card draw turns every choice into damage.

The Mechanics in 60 Cards

Not every new mechanic is built for Standard. Some need a 100-card Commander deck, or a board only Limited allows. Here is how each one reads in a 60-card deck.

Station is the one most decks will touch. You tap one of your creatures to put charge counters equal to its power on a Spacecraft, and once it has enough, the Spacecraft becomes an artifact creature. Edge of Eternities already put Spacecraft in Standard, so Star Trek's 17 add to a pool that exists. A cheap one such as Romulan Bird-of-Prey, which has hexproof until it becomes a creature and charges itself when you cast noncreature spells, can go in a spells deck.

Federation counts the creature types among your non-Borg creatures. A focused 60-card deck usually runs a few types, so the payoffs stay small. Assimilate only appears on Borg Cube and Death Is Irrelevant, which cost seven and eight mana. Both are strong in Commander and slow for Standard.

What We Don't Know Yet

Everything on this page comes from reading the cards before release. We don't know yet which cards people will actually keep in their decks after a week of games, how fast a Spacecraft deck is in practice, or whether strange new worlds is strong enough to build around. Wizards also has one more banned and restricted window planned before the 2027 rotation, and it has not given Star Trek's own rotation date. Check the official Standard list before an event rather than trusting any page, this one included.

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