Magic: The Gathering artwork for the Thought-Knot Seer card

[Update]: Explorer Anthology 2 and Alchemy: The Brother's War expansions have now arrived with staples and jank galore.

Magic: The Gathering's big artifact focused expansion The Brother's War launched only a couple of weeks ago, and already the MTG Arena team is looking to add a bunch of new cards to play around with. However, instead of more Standard cards, the new additions will be launching for the Explorer and Alchemy formats.

First and foremost, Explorer Anthology 2 will be coming this December 13th with a variety of Pioneer staples, fan-favorites and good ol' fashioned jank. The full list of cards has not been revealed just yet, but here's a quick rundown of everything showcased (or accidentally leaked) so far:

 Eidolon of the Great Revel
 Fiery Impulse
 Courser of Kruphix
 Satyr Wayfinder
 Reflector Mage
 Thought-Knot Seer
 Mutavault
 Wastes

As for the price, the Explorer Anthology 2 will, much like its predecessor, set you back 4,000 gems or 25,000 gold. The Anthology will bring with it a full playset (four copies) of each card, so if you're looking to play with even a couple of the rares and mythics, it'll be well worth the asking price.

If you prefer the Alchemy format, or just messing around with the cards in Historic or Historic Brawl, you'll be happy to hear that Alchemy: The Brother's War mini-expansion will also be launching on December 13th! The new Alchemy expansion will bring with it a variety of cards aimed at supporting underdeveloped strategies from previous Standard sets, as well as a couple of new designs to experiment with.

Much like the Explorer Anthology 2, most of the Alchemy cards have not been revealed just yet. That said, here's three previews that were shared during the recent announcement stream to give you a bit of an idea of what to expect:

MTG Arena Alchemy: The Brother's War card artwork and text for Crucias, Titan of the Waves

MTG Arena Alchemy: The Brother's War card artwork and text for Argivian Welcome

MTG Arena Alchemy: The Brother's War card artwork and text for Lonely end

The final thing worth mentioning is that Wizards of the Coast has revealed the relative popularity of all constructed formats (which does not include Brawl, Historic Brawl and Limited). As you'll see in the graph below, Standard is and probably always will be king, though I must admit I'm quite impressed with how high Historic has managed to get considering how difficult it can be to enter for new players. As for Explorer, I can only hope that the format will pick up in popularity as we get closer and closer to parity with Pioneer.

MTG Arena screenshot of a graph showing the popularity of the main ranked modes like Standard, Explorer and Historic

Once Wizards of the Coast spills the beans and announces all of the inclusions for both the Explorer Anthology 2 and Alchemy: The Brother's War, I'll make sure to let you know. Until then, have fun brewing up new decks with all of the stuff announced so far!