Lorcana: Shimmering Skies Guide | Release Date, Products, Cards
Get ready for Lorcana’s fifth set, the massively anticipated Evolving Skies! Scratch that…I meant Lorcana Shimmering Skies!
While it will be hard for this set to be even as epic as the Pokemon expansion that it very nearly shares a name with, so far the products and cards revealed in this set are looking pretty exciting.
In this guide, we’ll be going over everything you should know about Lorcana’s fifth set.
Buckle up!
Shimmering Skies is releasing on August 9, 2024
Ravensburger (the makers of Lorcana) released the full releases schedule for Lorcana earlier this year (you can see all the Lorcana release dates here), so it’s really no surprise that Shimmering Skies will be getting the same two phased release as every other Lorcana set to date. Shimmering Skies early release will be happening at local game stores and select Disney Parks on August 9, 2024. Its full retail release will also be happening two weeks following on August 23, 2024. The full retail release basically just means big box stores like Best Buy, Target and the like will start selling Lorcana products on that date.
The Shimmering Skies theme is basically a big party
It’s a party! Yay!
After four solid sets with four solid thematic theming, the fact that Shimmering Skies’s theme so far is that there’s a big party is somewhat underwhelming. It could be that this will get more exciting or make more sense as we dive deeper into the mystery hinted at in the trailer. But I’m not sure.
Just as a recap, the last couple sets have had very definitive themes to them that have caused a lot of online conversation to crop up around them. For example, in Rise of the Floodborn we dug deeper into the mystery of the Ink Flood that caused glimers to take on dramatic differences in apperances from their Storyborn counterparts.
Meanwhile, in Into the Inklands we discovered locations in-depth. Ursula’s Return was slightly less thematic in that it focused primarily on the fact that Deep Sea Trouble would be seeing daylight – a quest that you can play cooperatively with friends in order to try and defeat the big bad guy.
How exactly you can shape the theme of an entire Lorcana set around a festival I’m not exactly sure. Then again, Pokemon TCG literally just did the same sort of thing with Twilight Masquerade. However, in that situation they were drawing on something from established lore, whereas here the story in Lorcana feels more like an interlude inbetween two different things.
That doesn’t mean the set won’t still be epic. Indeed, the cards we have already seen released in this set suggest it will be a strong addition indeed. However, so far I’d give Shimmering Skies middling marks for its theming.
But don’t take my word for it alone: watch the trailer yourself below and let me know what you think!
Lorcana Shimmering Skies products and preorders
Unlike Ursula’s Return which revealed an exciting new product into the Lorcana product line, everything looks much the same here in Shimmering Skies, with the exception of the long anticipated Lorcana Gateway product. However, that product is aimed more at beginners who are new to Lorcana, so it won’t be quite as exciting for those of us who are already well accustomed to the nuances of the game.
Let’s go through which of the Shimmering Skies products are coming out and which you should think seriously about preordering.
Shimmering Skies Booster Box
Here’s a first look at the Shimmering Skies Booster Box. From the looks of the box, nothing is crazy new here. Indeed, most of these characters revealed on the box have also been revealed via the Lorecast that announced the new set (I’m sure that’s not a coincidence).
Booster Boxes are best for seasoned players who want the best odds of pulling the cards they need to build the decks they want while paying the lowest possible price per pack of any other Lorcana product.
While your actual experience oppening booster boxes will vary, I got very lucky with my booster box from Ursula’s Return, pulling just about everything I needed for my decks from a single box, and also bagging an Enchanted!
Shimmering Skies Illumineer’s Trove
Not gonna lie – this Trove looks gorgeous. It has a much more simplistic design than previous boxes and really focuses on the whole “Shimmering Skies” angle. Meanwhile the Lore Counter appreas to be very similar to the one we saw in the Ursula’s Return Trove while the dice have a shimmering aspect (as revealed in the Lorecast).
I see Ravensburger made the astute decision to return to color-coded organizers as opposed to the organizers that encouraged you to separate your cards by rarity. I never used those but have found the color-coded ones to be quite helpful indeed.
Although booster boxes are your best bet for pulling the most cards, Troves are my all around favorite Lorcana product because they come with plenty of goodies and are quite beautiful. I’ve also been very, very lucky with my pulls from Troves so that helps.
Read our review about the Shimmering Skies Trove.
Shimmering Skies Starter Decks
Starter decks are typically very popular products, especially early on when a set releases. In fact, entire tournaments are held featuring these starter decks where players get to customize them with a few added packs and duke it out in battle.
What’s noteworthy in these decks, however, is the fact that the Ink combinations chosen for these starter decks are well aligned with the actual Lorcana meta decks doing well at competitions.
Does that mean that these starter decks will be stronger or more competitively viable than previous starter decks have been? Probably not. Undoubtedly they will be more of the same.
That being said, my early money is on the Ruby/Amethyst deck given it has the awe-inspiring Elsa – The Fifth Spirit in it.
Shimmering Skies card accessories
While most Lorcana fans and competitors will pick up at least one of the above products without hesitation, each set also includes additional accessories beyond the card-specific products. These are actually pretty cool because they can help enhance your gameplay experience or can be accquired just for collectibility reasons. For example I picked up both of the Rise of the Floodborn playmats because of how cool they looked.
Apart from different artwork than we’ve seen from previous accessories, the main difference is that the card portfolio binders in this set are larger than the previous ones, holding nine cards per page. Meanwhile, Ravensburger also is including sleeves that feature the basic Lorcana backs on them, which is something that players will certainly find intriguing.
Last but not least, the deck boxes Lorcana comes out with are actually quite good, and while I can’t say I recommend using the sleeves (I don’t personally), the deck boxes are certainly worth picking up if you are serious about the card game.
Shimmering Skies Spoilers Revealed
One of the things Ravensburger does really, really well is their spoilers for a Lorcana set. If you were watching the Lorecast where all of this information was revealed, you might have noticed the big cards Ryan Miller used to show off some of the latest stuff, as well as the precise angles they used so people could get as good a look as possible.
None of that is by accident – they know how much the Lorcana community eats up card reveals and they use that fact extremely strategically.
For a more in-depth commentary on which cards from Shimmering Skies are likely to be the best, you can read our best cards in Shimmering Skies list. Below, find a gallery with all of the spoilers revealed initially for Shimmering Skies.
Lorcana and Villainous crossover in upcoming Villainous product
Apart from the excellent stuff revealed above, Ravensburger is also coming out with a crossover product between the popular Disney Villainous games and Lorcana. New versions of Introduction to Evil bearing the Lorcana stamp (pictured below) will also contain a special foil alternate art card of Prince John. To me, it seems that this is likely more of a marketing attempt to sell more Villainous games and also potentially pull the large Lorcana player base into that game as well.
I love Disney Villainous and have loved it long before Lorcana was a thing, so I was pretty excited to see it featured in the Shimmering Skies Lorecast. However, it might be cooler if there was more of a native tie-in between the two products as picking up a Disney Villainous Introduction to Evil won’t likely benefit you much as a Lorcana player. That being said, plenty of people will pick up the game just for that Prince John card.
Is Lorcana: Shimmering Skies worth it?
All said and done, Shimmering Skies looks like it will be a solid set from Ravensburger, and some of the cards already revealed look very fun to use and quite competitively viable. I’m looking forward to picking up most of these products myself once they become available and can’t wait for the next exciting chapter of Lorcana!
