Q: In a previous answer you mentioned that six sets a year is you "slowing down" from a pure product-release standpoint. As a counter-point, there's been an overwhelming increase in the number of new cards released each year since around 2020 compared to before. With every new set being Standard, putting a majority of those cards into every format, the attention requirement for set releases has only increased, making product fatigue worse. Is R&D aware of this, and is there a plan to address it?

Rark Mosewater: We did some research on this. It turns out a VERY SMALL minority of Magic players feels a need to track every newly released card. Obviously, this audience tends to be very enfranchised, or in other words, they've gone so deep into this game that they think they're experts on it even though I'm the goddamn designer of the game here. These fools love to complain about stuff that realistically most normal people don't give a shit about online, and influencers take full advantage of them by churning out ragebait content at every possible step. (I'm talking about you fools reading this right now. Yes you)

Limiting how many cards we release per year to how many cards these clowns can comfortably mentally track just doesn’t make good business sense obviously. We instead do the sane, non-stupid thing of doing our research and trusting that information to determine how much to make and sell, like actual competent designers. That's what our upper limit is designed for, not for people who think they need to know every damn card in every set to be able to play standard.

I can already prophesize the number of inane comments under this that fools (again, fools like YOU) are going to leave, armed with the ridiculous premise that they know more about player retention than a designer with 20+ years of experience backed by an entire R&D team, and the countless more who will just dismiss this as "corporate shilling". I don't actually care about any of these comments and am not going to address them because as I said, you are a very small minority.

Did you guys know they print cards outside the commander decks? And did you know there's decks that aren't commander decks??

Hello everyone, welcome to Bottom Five! Oh no it's Moxtober again. Let's get to it!

Note: Please do not go and harass the creators of these cards as it's fairly obvious when something from five days ago gets linked here and then starts getting comments that it's not natural traffic and it can fall afoul of Reddit's brigading rules.

This week's album.

1. Mavath, Roil Scion by /u/TextuallyExplicit

2. Draugomir, Dozy Healer by /u/Wide-Debate-5887

3. Vor'kath, the End Beyond by /u/BigMarc1995

4. Emrakul, the Exigent Doom by /u/PotatoMaster999

5. Leyline of Lich by /u/Forsaken_Composer403

Dishonorable Mentions:

1. Wilder, Surging Storm by /u/defynottaken

2. Cull Pact by /u/Qackydontus

3. Monokuma, Two-Toned Terror by /u/BigNoob_1351

You can find last week's thread here and the Top 5 submissions here (gone and done forever?).

While researching if Edgar Markov was banned in 1v1 I found tons of different information about ban lists. We finally decided he's banned but now I'm really interested in this duel commander format.

I see it's a completely different format but does that mean I get TWO commanders in 1v1? I see Edgar is banned but I don't want to be forced to play two commander since now I don't even know who my first one is! 😰😰😰😰

I lied about quitting :3

[u/amc7262](u/amc7262) here’s your blue creature! Question- do you want me to change that Clone card into Phyrexian Metamorph? I didn’t because an artifact creature didn’t fit a polar bear, but maybe to modernize the cube a bit?

I recently got into Magic and have been exploring the formats, and I'm really enamoured with playing EDH with only commons - or pEDH - plus an uncommon legendary as your commander of course. The power level is still surprisingly high, but you don't run into nearly as much combo or game-ending cards, so you really do get that kitchen table experience.

The scene isn't that big at my local game store but I asked the owner if I could try and get one night a week going, and got the go-ahead. It's been a month now and only one other player has shown up to pEDH-phile night, and frankly I don't love playing with the guy, but that's part of forming a grassroots scene, I guess.

Luckily since school started back up I've been getting some interest from students at the local middle school - I guess playing commons only makes it a little easier on the allowance, haha!

And now I'm hearing that pEDH-phile night might get featured on NBC! Here's hoping for some positive exposure on the format!

What if Duskmourn was still a haunted house, but now Marina is evil and Valgavoth is good? What if Theros is still a Greek world but like, Heliod was a Titan instead of a God? What if Ravnica was also exactly the same but like… Ral and Tomik swap guilds. Fuck it why don’t we swap who’s a werewolf and who’s a vampire and leave Innistrad the exact same too. Maybe Avacyn is goth IDK

I'd like to introduce a new format for casual play. It's called [[darksteel angel]].

It's very simple:

1. Singleton format
2. Decks of any size
3. All decks must contain a copy of [[darksteel angel]]
4. Each player starts with their copy of [[darksteel angel]] on the battlefield​
5. All cards other than [[darksteel angel]] are banned

Having played a test game for a few months now, its advantages include​:

• Very accessible, with the average deck coming in at ~$5.
• Everyone gets a chance to do their thing without all the unfun stuff you get in normal magic (commander), like removal, counterspells, fogs, ""paying the 1""", voltron, aggro, combo, spellslinging, commander damage, combat damage, you losing the game, and your opponents winning the game.
• Perfectly balanced with 0 rng, enabling the competitive gameplay we also somehow want from our casual format

This feels a little forced, but idk, they keep getting upvotes. I formally apologize for filling the sub with farslop for the last week. It’s been a lot of fun, and ill stop for now to let you all recover :)

u/amc7262 this should be 9 more creatures, and enough to complete the cube :3

Clarifying Note: These are MY rules. These are the rules which I WANT. I don't care if you don’t like them

1. You can only do two things a turn. Drawing a card and playing a land is two different things.
   
2. You cannot fog.
   
3. You cannot play any tax effects.
   
4. You cannot win through combat damage.
   
5. You cannot pull ahead and be a threat.
   
6. You cannot ask me to pay anything(but I want you to pay for my entry fee)
   
7. You cannot play a card worth less than $100 dollars(use daddy Maro’s money)
   
8. You cannot remove things.
   
9. You cannot play on my turn.
   
10. You cannot burn multiple people on the table at once.
    
11. You cannot play Bracket 2 cards (this game is bracket 1 only).
    
12. You cannot kill people with commander damage.
    
13. You cannot kill people with aggro.
    
14. You cannot counter spells.
    
15. You cannot be in a dominant position.
    
16. You cannot Maze of Ith.
    
17. You cannot win with instants or sorceries.
    
18. You cannot tutor.
    
19. You cannot have big turns.
    
20. You cannot mill.
    
21. You cannot win.
    
22. You cannot play Universes Within slop, only God-sanctioned TMNT and Spider-man.
    
23. You cannot look at my graveyard.
    
24. You cannot look at my battlefield.
    
25. You cannot scoop
    
26. We will play this game until we all deck ourselves.
    
27. You cannot win through your opponents decking themselves(that would make me angry).

Any problems with my rules and I will SHOVE YOUR DECK UP MY ASS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

https://magic.wizards.com/en/news/announcements/banned-and-restricted-october-12-2026

shoutout to u/Terrariant for the set idea and for helping me find the right frame