Innistrad, and a day that turns to night
Midnight Hunt is the first half of a two-set Innistrad return, and its werewolves finally got a mechanic that works. Daybound and nightbound replace the old transform-on-a-condition wording with a single game state that everyone shares.
The rule is worth stating exactly, because the old werewolf wording is what it is fixing. It becomes night if the active player cast no spells during their turn; it becomes day again if a player casts two or more spells in a turn. So the state is something the whole table steers, not something one player owns.
Themes
Daybound and nightbound
A shared game state rather than a per-card condition. It becomes night if the active player casts no spells in their turn, and day again if any player casts two or more in a turn. Every daybound permanent flips together.
Disturb
Cast the card from your graveyard for its disturb cost and it enters transformed, usually as a Spirit. One card that is a creature first and a haunting second.
Coven
An ability word checking whether you control three or more creatures with different powers. A deckbuilding constraint that pushes against playing four copies of the same body.
Decayed
On Zombie tokens. A decayed creature cannot block, and it is sacrificed when it attacks. A body you get exactly one attack out of, which is what makes the tokens cheap enough to hand out freely.
Flashback
Cast the spell from your graveyard for its flashback cost, then exile it. An Innistrad staple, back for the plane's third visit.
Where You Can Play It
Midnight Hunt has left Standard, but that is the only format it left. Here's where each code is legal now.
Midnight Hunt left Standard at the August 2024 rotation, the one Bloomburrow triggered, alongside the other three sets of its rotation year. A rotation only ever removes cards from Standard, so everything here is still playable in Pioneer, Modern, Legacy, Vintage and Commander. Commons from any set are Pauper-legal; that isn't listed per set here.
Limited
A full ten-pair format built on Innistrad's tribes. Werewolves, Zombies, Spirits, Humans and Vampires all have support, and the day and night cycle cuts across whichever one you are in.
All ten two-color pairs
Full ten-pair format
Werewolves anchor red-green, Zombies and decayed sit in black, Spirits and disturb in blue-white, and coven pushes the green-white end toward a spread of creature sizes rather than a curve of identical bodies.
Commander
One per half of the set's identity.
Coven Counters
Leinore, Autumn Sovereign
Green-white Humans and +1/+1 counters, built on coven.
Undead Unleashed
Wilhelt, the Rotcleaver
Blue-black Zombies and decayed tokens.
Building one of these into something of your own? The precon buying guide covers how to judge a deck, and the Commander deck template is the shape to build toward.
FAQ
No. It left Standard at the August 2024 rotation, the one Bloomburrow triggered, along with Crimson Vow, Kamigawa: Neon Dynasty and Streets of New Capenna. MID cards are still legal in Pioneer, Modern, Legacy, Vintage and Commander.
They are a single game state the whole table shares rather than a condition on each card. It becomes night if the active player casts no spells during their turn, and it becomes day again if a player casts two or more spells in a turn. Every daybound permanent flips together when it changes.
It lets you cast the card from your graveyard for its disturb cost, and it enters the battlefield transformed, usually as a Spirit. One card that is a creature first and a haunting afterwards.
An ability word that checks whether you control three or more creatures with different powers. It is a deckbuilding constraint as much as a trigger, since it pushes against filling a deck with four copies of the same body.
A decayed creature cannot block, and it is sacrificed at end of combat when it attacks. It appears on Zombie tokens, and being worth exactly one attack is what makes those tokens cheap enough to hand out freely.
Two: Coven Counters, led by Leinore, Autumn Sovereign, and Undead Unleashed, led by Wilhelt, the Rotcleaver.
All card names, art, and mechanics belong to Wizards of the Coast. Innistrad: Midnight Hunt released on Sep 24, 2021; details reflect the set as published. Sources: Wizards of the Coast set pages and release notes, Draftsim, Untapped.gg.
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