It’s been nearly five years since we made our debut in June 2015: as a company, everything about trading card games, from publishing to ongoing service, was a totally new experience for us. We only made it this far thanks to all of our customers, our retailers and our distributors coming together.

It gives us so much pride to know how much entertainment we brought to you all with Cipher. We will continue to support Cipher for one year further, but it would mean the world to us if you all continued to enjoy Cipher to the very end.

From all of us here at the Fire Emblem Cipher team, thank you so, so much for all of the patronage you’ve given us to date.

April 2, 2020
Intelligent Systems
Fire Emblem Cipher Project Team

(English translation originally provided by bookofholsety)

This past spring, Intelligent Systems shared a major update regarding the Japanese trading card game Fire Emblem Cipher: product development is to finish with the Series 22 booster expansion slated for October, and will mark the end of Cipher.

In a follow-up broadcast, Cipher producer Ryota Kawade explained that the card game’s discontinuation is due to various reasons which he could only share a few of. The reasons given were namely that times have changed, and mediums connecting Fire Emblem fans such as Fire Emblem Heroes and Fire Emblem Expo will be focused on.

Mr. Kawade also provided a schedule of remaining Cipher events to be held, but for the purposes of this article, we will get back to this after going over the main topic. Now, without further ado…

With less than two months until launch, the epic conclusion to Cipher draws near! Are you prepared? Here is everything we know about the final set, including confirmed characters, when to expect new reveals, and where to import products.

Fire Emblem Cipher: Series 22 (The Finale)

Booster Pack – The Heroes’ Paean

Release date:
October 1st, 2020

List prices:
10-card packs — ¥350 each
16-pack boxes — ¥5,600 each [sold at AmiAmi or Nin-Nin Game]

Featured titles:
Shadow Dragon & the Blade of Light | Gaiden | Mystery of the Emblem | Genealogy of the Holy War | Thracia 776 | The Binding Blade | The Champion’s Blade | The Blazing Blade | The Sacred Stones | Path of Radiance | Radiant Dawn | Shadow Dragon | New Mystery of the Emblem | Awakening | Fates: Birthright | Fates: Conquest | Fates: Revelation | Tokyo Mirage Sessions #FE | Heroes | Echoes: Shadows of Valentia | Warriors | Three Houses

Pre-Release Artwork

All of the above cards were confirmed by Mr. Kawade to be of Super Rare (SR) rarity. Together, these thirteen cards create a united vision!

Additional notes:

Update: August 12th, 11:31 AM PT — Revisions have been made to the additional notes below.

• The artists for the SRs known thus far have been confirmed as each of the following:
  • Marth — Daisuke Izuka
  • Alm — Hidari
  • Sigurd — Rika Suzuki
  • Leif — Masaki Hirooka
  • Roy — Eiji Kaneda
  • Eliwood — Saori Toyota
  • Eirika — Sachiko Wada
  • Ike — Senri Kita
  • Micaiah — Mayo
  • Chrom — Kotaro Yamada
  • Corrin (Male) — Yusuke Kozaki
  • Alfonse — Nijihayashi
  • Byleth (Male) — Kurahana Chinatsu
• The Marth artwork with Caeda is of Super Rare Plus (SR+) rarity, and was announced to be drawn by Maki Hakoda.
• The Leo artwork is based on the Crown of Nibelung manga, and was revealed to be drawn by its artist, Tama Yugyouji.
• The Edelgard, Dimitri, and Claude artwork was personally confirmed to be drawn by Rika Suzuki on Twitter.
• The Frederick artwork was emphasized by Mr. Kawade to be for a cost 1 card. For the sake of gameplay, this may lead to Frederick seeing more than one new card.
• The Valbar artwork was said to be him in the Spartan overclass, thus being one step further to completing Cipher’s lineup of the Echoes overclasses (each class was slowly being represented by a character from the game, with Oliphantier now remaining).
• The Silque artwork is for a card inspired by her appearance in Gaiden, as opposed to Echoes (akin to Celica in Series 17).
• Nintendo Dream magazine’s September 2020 issue has a Cipher feature confirming a few more artists, including Ayaka Kato for Deirdre, Yoneko for Narcian, and Homazo for Danved. We reached out to Twitter user coma_96bouzu to help verify extra details (such as the artists for Miranda and Ninian), but we were unable to learn more by the time of this writing.
• According to issue 55 of the Cipher Frontier column, one of the contributing artists for this set will be Yugo Okuma.
• Marth and male Byleth are known to have cost 1 cards in this set, by virtue of their sneak peek box topper promos from the previous booster box. We might have seen the artwork for Marth’s already, but Byleth’s is completely unknown.
• Based on the trend of recent Tokyo Mirage Sessions cards, Mamori and Draug are likely to see more cards (with the latter appearing as either a General or Berserker).
• Since Series 16, an assortment of SRs of The Binding Blade characters have been releasing which can be assembled to recreate Elibe’s Eight Legends. There is one card yet to release in this collection, and it may finally come out this set. Character speculations include the likes of Guinivere due to the associated weapon being the light tome Aureola.
• Since Series 12, a card of Lehran was suggested to exist according to Zelgius, but no such card has ever been printed to have that name. If there is any plan to do so, this set would be their last chance.

Fire Emblem Cipher: Matte Card Sleeves Collection – Volume 24 by Movic

Release date:
October 1st, 2020

List prices:
65-sleeve packs — ¥836 each

Launching alongside Series 22 will be officially licensed 65-packs of card sleeves featuring select Cipher designs. Pick any of these up to protect your precious cards in a favorite look.

Join Cipher producer Ryota Kawade and Kubocchan from Intelligent Systems as they cover the latest topics about the TCG in the Summer 2020 episode of their live show! Here is where you can learn what’s new with card information, artwork previews, and any other related events.

Tune in and you can also catch appearances by guest host Yuuki Kuwahara (voice of Niamh from Cipher, Effie and Ophelia from Fates, and Hilda from Three Houses), and special guests Tomokazu Sugita (voice of Chrom from Awakening) and Yuu Kobayashi (voice of Lucina from Awakening)!

It all happens on Saturday, August 22nd at 4:00 AM PT, and you can watch it online via YouTube and NicoNico. In the event you can’t watch it, you’re welcome to check back with us later for an article summarizing the highlights.

Until August 17th, fan mail may be sent by post or web to show support for the show or its cast, as well as answer this episode’s prompt: “What’s your favorite Cipher card art?”

Those whose responses are shared on air will be given this special Cipher sticker sheet! Full details can be found on the official site.

Mr. Kawade holding up a (now oudated) timeline graphic of the remaining Cipher events scheduled, as seen in last April’s broadcast.

Earlier, we touched on what else is left to look forward to with Cipher, and now we’ll share an updated overview of that. Note that plans have since adjusted since they were originally announced, and are still subject to change.

• National Qualifiers (second half) — November (originally planned to start last April)
• National Championships Finals — December (originally planned for last June)
• Everyone’s Cipher Meeting — December 19th
• Across Japan! Exchange Tour — Postponed (originally planned for June-October)
• The 3rd Hero-King Grand Prix — Canceled (originally planned for February, then August)
• End of support for shop/user-sponsored events — March 2021
• End of Cipher customer support — March 2022

In other recent news, Intelligent Systems announced that they will be re-running supply of the hot-selling 18th booster: Oratorio of Embarkation, which features Three Houses, Awakening, and The Sacred Stones. For a quick tour of this booster’s contents, check out our previous article.

This reprint is planned for September, so avid collectors can look forward to revisiting this popular set or jumping in for the first time next month. As of now, we can recommend Nin-Nin Game for importing this booster box.

That about wraps up everything we can share about what’s new with Cipher!

Keep an eye out as well for the official Cipher Twitter account, @FEcipher, in the coming weeks to see brand new cards from the upcoming expansion shared directly to your feed each weekday. In case you miss anything, you can rely on our future recap articles rounding up all the details soon to come.

Feel free to visit our forums to talk about Cipher if you have any questions or are looking to share your love for the card game!

Fire Emblem Cipher’s next and very last booster expansion set, The Heroes’ Paean, will be available from Japan starting October 1st!