Mirage Collation

Mirage is a large set with 110 commons, 110 uncommons, 110 rares, and four variations of each standard basic land. This is smaller than previous large sets (due to a change of the print sheet size), but this size goes on to be normal for a large set. The set was printed in the USA and Belgium.

Mirage was sold in 15 card booster packs. Booster boxes have 36 packs.

US Pack Anatomy

The US printing uses sequential collation with 10 × 11 sheets. Packs are back-facing and contain 11 commons, 1 rare, and 3 uncommons (in that order). Basic lands do not appear in booster packs.

Starter decks have 3 rares, 9 uncommons, 26 commons, and 22 basic lands. There are at least two orderings I've observed. In both cases, cards I've seen are back-facing (but in general this tends to be inconsistent). In one case, lands are first, then rares, uncommons, and commons. In the other case, commons and lands are reversed. The rulebook is always at the end (facing outwards). Decks have an outer seal, but no inner seal.

There are four common runs. Two, A and B, have 30 cards (each twice) and two, C and D, have 25 cards (again, each twice). Each pack contains 6 commons from A and B followed by 5 from B and C. The A and B commons can be in A-B order or B-A order. Either way, the split will be either 3-3 or 4-2. (Empirically, a very rough estimate of the 4-2 rate is 1/3.) The C and D commons can also be in either order independently of the ordering of A and B. (It is possible that these ordering are correlated in the same box, but I haven't seen a booster box opening.) Their split will be 3-2 or 2-3.

Starter decks are a bit messier. They can be split either 15 from A and B and 11 from C and D, or 13 and 13. Mathematically, the 15-11 split should happen 13/22 of the time. If there are 15 A and B, they will be split 7-8 or 8-7. If there are 13 A and B cards, the split will be 6-7 or 7-6. Likewise, 11 C and D will be split 5-6 or 6-5 and 13 C and D will be split 6-7 or 7-6. Like booster packs, A and B can appear in either order, and so can C and D. In the cases I've observed these orders are correlated (always A and D first or B and C first), but it's possible this is just due to small sample size. (Within the same box, at least, they are probably correlated.) In land-first starters, C and D come first. In land-last starters, A and B come first.

Note that there is apparent symmetry between A and B and between C and D, so the labels here are arbitrary.

There is a picture of the rare sheet. [1]

Common Runs

Run A contains 30 cards each twice. Cards are in a repeating color pattern of white, black, green, red, blue. It is probably printed on the same sheet as either C or D. The choice of first card is mostly arbitrary.

Run B also contains 30 cards each twice. Cards are in a repeating color pattern of white, black, green, red, blue. It is probably printed on the same sheet as either C or D. The choice of first card is mostly arbitrary.

Run C contains 25 cards each twice. Cards are in a repeating color pattern of white, black, green, red, blue. It is probably printed on the same sheet as either A or B. The choice of first card is mostly arbitrary.

Run D contains 25 cards each twice. Cards are in a repeating color pattern of white, black, green, red, blue. It is probably printed on the same sheet as either A or B. The choice of first card is mostly arbitrary.

Rare Sheet

The rare sheet contains each rare once.

Belgian Pack Anatomy

The Belgian printing uses striped collation with 10 × 11 sheets. Packs are back-facing and contain 3 uncommons, 1 rare, and 11 commons (in that order). Basic lands do not appear in booster packs.

Starter decks have inconsistent ordering. They contain 3 rares, 9 uncommons, 26 commons, and 22 basic lands in addition to a rulebook. Ordering can be inconsistent. Observed decks are front-facing. There are two main ordering types. Some packs have lands and uncommons, then rares and commons. In other packs, the uncommons and rares are switched. In both cases the rulebook is between the rares and uncommons. Decks both an outer seal and an inner seal.

There are pictures of the common and uncommon sheets. [2]

Common Sheet

There is a single sheet that prints each common once.

Uncommon Sheet

There is a single sheet that prints each uncommon card once.

[1] There is a picture of the US rare sheet on the Gamepedia wiki.

[2] User mmgun has posted pictures of the Belgian common and uncommon sheets on the Magic Librarities Forum.