MTG Aetherdrift new Mechanics explained: Speed, Exhaust, Saddle, more

Magic: The Gathering’s new Aetherdrift set adds a bunch of new mechanics to help players immerse themselves in its interplanar death race. Here’s what we know about Speed, Exhaust, Saddling, and other new tricks in the set.

Gather a pit crew and check your transmission because Magic: The Gathering has a new set right around the corner. Aetherdrift is a fast-paced thrill ride that takes players on a chaotic race across three Planes.

This is the first major MTG release in a packed 2025 schedule and you can expect a tonne of new cards to collect and deckbuild with. Of course, if you’re going to keep up with the competition, you’ll want to wrap your head around the new tricks that cards from the set can employ.

Wizards of the Coast has revealed a host of new mechanics coming in MTG Aetherdrift. Below, you can find a breakdown of each new mechanic and some tips on how to make the most of them.

Start Your Engines & Speed in MTG Aetherdrift

Wizards of the Coast/Dexerto

Aetherdrift is, first and foremost, a race. As such, the team at Wizards of the Coast wanted to add a new mechanic that really gets players into the mindset of the creatures participating in the chaotic Ghirapur Grand Prix.

To that end, this set will introduce the Start Your Engines and accompanying Speed mechanics. Both of these work in tandem to deliver a raft of interesting effects and game-changing abilities.

Multiple cards in Aetherdrift will ‘Start Your Engines’ and once that keyword is in effect, you’ll be able to gain Speed. To generate Speed, all you need to do is cause your opponent to lose life through either attacking or a direct damage effect.

Players can only increase their Speed once per turn and the Max Speed is four. Devs expressly noted that there will be no methods to gain more than one level of Speed per turn.

Certain cards will have an added bonus if they’re in play while you’re at Max Speed such as Vnwxt, Verbose Host which turns single draws into a draw two if your Speed is at four. Other cards care about what your current Speed is offering on-play abilities like “Deal X damage to an opponent where X is the number of Speed you have”.

Managing your own speed is important to securing a win in an MTG Aetherdrift game but that’s not all there is to worry about. According to the set’s development team, there will also be methods to handle your opponent’s Speed by slowing them down. Be careful though, they’ll likely be trying to do the same to you.

Exhaust in MTG Aetherdrift

Continuing with the racing theme of Aetherdrift, Exhaust cantrips are powerful single-use abilities that are meant to evoke the feeling of shifting gears to blow past your opponent. Creatures, Artifacts, and Enchantments can have more than one Exhaust ability but each can only be used by that card once.

Loot, the Pathfinder is an excellent example of the new mechanic with three incredibly useful Exhaust options. Each requires you to burn a single mana and tap Loot but in exchange, you can gain the effect of Black Lotus to add three Mana of any color, or you could use him as a stand-in for Ancestral Recall and draw three cards.

Wizards of the Coast/Dexerto

Exhaust has the potential to be properly busted thanks to certain Color combos’ penchant for card recursion. A card being Flickered (returned to your hand and then replayed) or being played from the Graveyard counts as an entirely new instance. Devs have confirmed that this resets their Exhaust abilities and can get you around the ‘once-per-game’ caveat.

For instance, if Loot, the Pathfinder was your Commander and was banished back to the Command zone after using all of his Exhaust abilities, upon being replayed, you’d have access to all of them once more. We’ll let you figure out other interesting lines of play for yourself.

Saddling in MTG Aetherdrift

Saddling is by no means a new Mechanic in MTG having been introduced in 2024’s Outlaws of Thunder Junction set. However, in Aetherdrift it will be much more prevalent and the devs have expanded upon it somewhat.

While vehicles will play an important role in Aetherdrift, some contestants in the Ghirapur Grand Prix will race via more organic means. The set will also feature a significant amount of Mount Creatures.

Where Mounts differ from Vehicles is that they do not need to be Crewed to attack. The Saddle mechanic functions similarly to the Crew mechanic, although, rather than enabling a Mount creature to attack, it instead enhances their attacks with a tacked-on ability.

Lagorin, Soul of Alacria for example has a Saddle cost of one meaning a creature with a power of one or greater must be used to Saddle it. Once Saddled, when Lagorin attacks, it can add a +1/+1 to two of your own creatures including itself.

There are also a number of cards in the Aetherdrift set that allow you to Saddle Mounts for free. This will help you free up more attackers and keep your board as wide as possible.

Wizards of the Coast/Dexerto

Those are the new and revamped mechanics you can expect to come across as you play your way through MTG Aetherdrift. Each one has the potential to be a focal point for new deck archetypes and it’ll be interesting to see how they shake up the meta.

For more on MTG, find out what else is coming in 2025, or check out this theory on a potential Avatar: The Last Airbender set and see if we can make you a believer.