MagicCon Vegas featured a Preview Panel that gave players a look at the future ofMagic: The Gathering. The panel, hosted by Riley Knight, featured Principal Game Designer Jadine Klomparens, Executive Producer Mike Turian, Senior Art Director Sarah Wassell, and Senior Story Lead Roy Graham. I was lucky enough to sit down with Klomparens and Turian, as well as Play Design Team Lead Andrew Brown, to discussMagic’s upcoming sets.
Magic’s next set isEdge of Eternities, soour discussion largely focused on some additional details about the setthat weren’t mentioned in the preview panel. We also talked briefly about next year’sLorwyn EclipsedandSecrets of Strixhavensets, though details on these are still largely hush-hush. Still, the designers were able to tell me more than enough to get me excited for the next few in-universeMagicsets.
Creating The Edge Of Eternities
Magic’s Next Set Takes Place In A New Setting
AsEdge of Eternitiesdominated the Preview Panel,I wanted to know more about howMagic’s new setting was developed. Mike Turian said: “One of the great things that we get to do is we get to go and match what people’s expectations are, right? And so the world, and media when you were growing up looking at the stars, and going and taking all of that in, and then saying, Okay, now, how do we apply that to magic? How can we, how can we deliver on that, and over-deliver on that, and how do we translate that into game mechanics?”
Referencing the Preview Panel, Turian continued: “You heard Sarah [Wassell] talking about how we were inspired by this artist or this style of art. I think you’ll see cards that are like, ‘Oh wow, this is kind of space nostalgia.’ Like the Triumphant cards that we were showing off, we’ve all seen an astronaut standing in front of the moon, typically with a flag or something.” Turian also said that, “the team actually creates these giant boards filled with tropes and inspiration” when designing a set like this.
In summary, Turian said ofEdge of Eternities: “it’s a world about a magical, super void. So what does that mean? And what does the conflict in the world look like? And you layer on all these things that we know we want in the world against expectations, then you have a lot of awesome artists go and execute on that.”
Jadine Klomparens then gave her insight on the gameplay aspectsof the set: “Mechanically, it’s a little different, just since we’re clearly translating it into Magic mechanics. So it’s not going to be something people have seen before, as we are expressing it in our own game, but we get to pick kind of the most important pieces and say this is what we are representing.”
DiscussingMagic’s hot new card type, Klomparens said: “Spacecraft were very important to show off, and we got to figure out how that works in Magic.” She also explained how otherMagicmechanics tied into the setting. “For exploration of space and landing on new planets, landfall’s back, that’s kind of a big thing we’re representing too. And as more mechanics get revealed, I think it’s pretty clear what elements of the genre we’re representing.”
Andrew Brown added thatMagic’s relationship with a variety of artists also helps with art direction: “One of the things that, like Magic is uniquely able to draw from, is that, like, we have a lot of different artists with a lot of different styles, and there are a lot of space properties, and each of them can kind of go off and do all of their own thing, but we still have the unifying vision of the art directors. So it all very much seems supremely unique, but with one vision behind it, which I think is super cool.”
To get some more nitty-gritty details about the set’s design, I asked how color identity was decided on for Spacecraft from a thematic standpoint. Brown explained: “So it’s mostly thematic. Like Roy [Graham] talked about [in the Preview Panel], there are five main factionalized planets in Edge of Eternities, and a lot of the color identity is influenced by which planet they’re from. So, for example, a lot of the Kavu spaceships are going to be red and a lot of the Mono spaceships are going to be black.”
As he had mentioned the Kavu, I asked Brown where the idea came from for their unique design in this set. He told me: “Pretty early on, the creative team knew that they wanted to bring back the Kavu. I think it also just stemmed from the goal of what does Magic look like in space? Well, easy start for us is to put some of our more iconic things in and just kind of go from there. There are angels, there are Kavu up here. They’re like, distinctly Magic things in space.”
Looking Forward To Lorwyn And Strixhaven
Next Year Will Return Players To Two Well-Loved MTG Locations
Edge of Eternitieswasn’t the only set previewed at MagicCon.Lorwyn Eclipsedwill revisit a plane many players have waited to return to for 18 years. I asked what it was like to design such a hyped-up set, and Mike Turian explained: “For me, it’s fairly surreal, right? Because I was the game design lead for Morningtide. I was on the game design team for Lorwyn, so it’s just great to see that people are like, ‘Yeah, I love those cards. And I had a great time with Lorwyn,’ and they are excited to see Shadowmoor style of cards return.”
“A lot of the game design and creative conversation is around what our players expect,” Turian explained. “We know people are excited about this, and we’re excited, and we want to honor that. We want to ensure that the things that they’re excited about, we find ways to bring [them] back. That’s also a challenge because we have feedback from the internet or set assessments from 15-plus years, and it’s like, what is still true, and what has changed? And we end up doing a lot of creative testing and player interviews to try and draw that out. Meanwhile, of course, we still have to make a great set.”
Jadine Klomparens had a slightly different perspective, saying: “I’m a lot newer than Mike. Actually, my first set as a Magic player was Eventide. I only played like two drafts, so I tell people it was Zendikar, because that’s the one I actually know. But I did play with Eventide cards before anything else.”
Klomparens went on to say: “The cool part of working on something that is so popular and kind of so long ago as Lorwyn is we get to take what people really love and apply how much better we are at making Magic cards now than we were when we made Lorwyn, and just get to apply all the new knowledge.”
She then paused, looking at Turian’s reaction to her statement, saying, “He’s like, I’m sitting right here.” After some good-natured laughter around the table,Turian discussed how things had changed since he worked on theLorwynblock. “It’s true though, Magic’s changed. Like Commander, when I was doing Morningtide, we didn’t think about it.” He even went on to agree with Klomparens' statement, saying, “They do a better job than I did.“
Andrew Brown brought up an important note about how to balance expectation with designing a fresh set: “I actually love the challenge of figuring out how to balance nostalgia with also making it new and exciting at the same time. Because you don’t want to just [say] here’s the sequel with the same actors. You actually want to make your own awesome thing yourself, while also leveraging nostalgia, but not leaning into it too hard.”
On the topic ofMagicplanes fans were excited to return to, I brought upthe upcomingStrixhavenset, and asked if it was easier to return to planes now thatMagic’s block system has ended. Brown explained the process: “We have this internal bar of where people’s feelings are on certain old planes and if we want to revisit them. And [Strixhaven] kind of shot up to list super fast. So because we’re not tied to the block model anymore, it was very easy for us to just be like, ‘Okay, yeah, it’s time for this one again.'”
After speaking to these dedicated designers about the future ofMagic: The Gathering, I can’t wait to see what the next few years have in store. While I’ve come around toUniverses Beyondsets more, especially with the release ofFinal Fantasy, I’m happy to see thatMagic’s original IP is still getting the love and attention it deserves. As Andrew Brown said, Wizards of the Coast is looking to create their “own awesome thing,” and previews forEdge of Eternitieswould suggest they’ve succeeded.
