There are many resources that do a much better job of breaking down the new mechanics of a set, card grades, and such like. This will not be any of those things. Instead, I like to focus on a high-level summary of what direct this set will be going. Are there build-arounds? Is ramp a thing? What are the splashing tools? What does the removal suite look like? How should your assumptions from baseline Magic shift for the first few drafts?

Removal

So at first I thought 16 was a mind-blowing amount of removal, but Guilds of Ravnica had 18 at common & uncommon, so I guess the overall amount of removal will be about on par. The usual suspects are all here: the Azorius pacifism, cheap red direct damage and expensive sorcery-speed remova, etc. etc. The big thing that jumps out is the lack of removal in Simic. Their split-card creates a 3/3, which is non-trivial. The green fight card doesn’t give any boost to power/toughness (where the Gruul common one does), aaaand, that’s it? This worries me, unless Simic has great tempo (and there is a lot of bounce). Also, almost everything is at instant speed. Even the Pacifism effect has flash! So beware the open mana!

Bounce

Well I guess this is the answer for blue/green then. You’re… bouncing things? Weird because neither Simic nor Azorius  looks particular tempo-based. Maybe it helps control the battlefield until the big fatties can stabilize but color me a little skeptical. Still, along with all of the instant speed removal, be very wary playing into open mana. 

Tricks

Some really interesting tricks here. Two decent-looking one-mana tricks in white and red. The green one-mana does three things (win combat, surprise untap, play with +1/+1 counters) decently but I’m not sure if it does any one thing well enough. I love the cantrip plays (black deathtouch and the scry on the quasi-Sure Strike). I think that makes them pretty playable. 

Milling?!

Blue has some tools at common to mill! The counterspell is a bit meh, but the 1/3 blockers & millers is a good mix of defense & win-con. The 0/4 wall is not good (get that on the wheel), but I think the Shield will sneak up on people. First, milling three is significantly better than it looks. That’s Minister of Inquiries level, and that overperformed in Kaladesh as a win-con. Second, adding the three toughness makes it block nicely, so it checks both boxes. 

Gates

This is interesting, one pretty powerful uncommon in each color (except black because black is the worst) as a ‘payoff’ for playing gates and one colorless. The power level looks to vary quite a bit, but these all look to be worth playing and certainly prioritizing Gates to make work. The sweeper might start in the sideboard (depending on what your opponent is up to) but I think the rest are strong as they stand. The real question is whether or not there will be a ‘gate deck’. There might be 4C green (see below) based off the power of the splash and hoovering up gold cards, but these don’t look to be the payoff just themselves. Plus they are at uncommon. 

Ramp/Splash

I think the Saruli Caretaker is a huge, fascinating question mark. As an 0/3, it can block a bit which is very nice. Reminiscent of Druid of the Cowl. However, needing to tap an additional creature to produce mana is a serious, serious drawback. But the mana can be of any color! So it fixes! I suspect this will be more of a splash-enabler than a piece of ramp per-se. 

I’m also going to start high on Growth Spiral. I think it’s going to be a useful piece of ramp more often than not (and Simic is mana hungry with all the Adapt). You also get to draw first so you can cast it without land in hand and hope. And it’s an Instant, so you don’t have to main phase it. Looks strange but I like it. I don’t think you’ll draft it highly, but if you’re in Simic I think you’ll happily play as many as you get your hands on. 

Untappers

I predict I will get blown out by these at least half a dozen times. 

Interesting Build-Arounds

High Alert looks interesting. There’s a lot of high-toughness creatures in Azorius (not a lot of defenders, so ignore that line of text) and a four-mana untap is value, even if it’s not great. Their generic common is a 2/5 that can’t be blocked, so whoa. The Ill-Gotten Inheritance has potential as a long, grindy way to win. It functionally shrinks their life total to 14 (not nothing) and if you have a bunch of spirits cluttering up the board, fluttering over for the occasional ping, I could see it doing some work. Also it turns on Spectacle for free.

Finally there’s Dovin’s Acuity, which is going to suffer by being compared against Disinformation Campaign. To be clear, DC this is not. However there are a lot of instants in Azorius and turning them into cantrips could be pretty big game. Turning your 4-mana draw two into draw three, gain four life (albeit at 7 mana) is perilously close to Sphinx’s Revelation territory. There’s a lot of room to be a good Magic card and still be worse than Disinformation Campaign.

Tokens!

For those fascinated with tokens (which is probably just the author, but whatever) here are the tokens that you’ll see at common. 

Treasure, Thopter, Spirit, Goblin, Human, Frog

(fun fact, there was a 3/3 Frog/Lizard token from Gatecrash) 

Rares: 4/4 Beast, 4/4 Sphinx, 2/2 Ooze, 2/2 Zombie, 0/2 Illusion

4/4 Beasts can be dug up from Zendikar and Sphinx tokens from Journey into Nyx

Summary

I would play your first few rounds of RNA with extreme respect and caution for the instants. Combat tricks are cheap, lots of bounce, and lots of instant-speed removal. This makes it a little easier for control decks (since they like to react with open mana and places to put them, like Adapt). Splashing looks to be decently supported as does 4C green.