Hi Mark, while it's still my birthday I would like to kindly ask for some trivia on Morkrut Necropod or Blitz Leech.Thank you!

Blitz Leech was designed for Ikoria that made use of keyword counters. That’s where the counter rider comes from. Happy Birthday!

Hey Mark, as a newer player (Started in New Capenna), and I wanted to express that I don't mind leaving between each set, but what I really crave is the set mechanics lasting longer than one set. Prototype, Unearth, Blitz, Backup, and now seemingly Spree and Crime cards are all mechanics that I crave more of and feel both that I will have to wait years to see them again. What are the chances that we will see mechanics across consecutive standard set releases?

It’s not off the table.

Sometimes a mechanic is for more than limited play. Energy was a whole mechanic that seemed highly pushed for competitive tournament play so much so that several of the strongest energy cards were banned and energy was still a decent choice in standard. I think the more parasitic a set mechanic is the more it is for constructed. Infect was like this too. Mechanics like blitz do not care how many you play in a deck. You do not get rewards for playing only blitz cards in your deck.

The word you mean is “linear” not “parasitic”. Parasitic only plays with cards from the set it is in. Linear means the cards pushes you play cards of a similar theme/mechanic. Linear cards more push you towards play mechanic themes in constructed. “Modular” cards, the opposite of linear, allow you to play them easier as one-ofs.

Was Blitz inspired by the Bad Action Dynamite keyword from Duel Masters?

Not directly.

Regarding complexity and mental load:One of my friends in our playgroup has given nearly identical feedback about complexity and power creep, and a handful of content creators / doomsayers have echoed those same notions.I am the opposite. I love new mechanics. New Capenna was a fever dream of connive (which is a 5 star ability), blitz, casualty and what have you. These terms were overwhelming for the first ten minutes of our first precon matchup, but then we talked them through at the table and everyone got it.Sefris / dungeons is my favorite commander deck, so much so that I’m looking to build an initiative/monarch deck with Vela the Night Clad at the helm.And I’ve been enthusiastically been trying to make my Myra commander deck work too. Again, I explain in clear terms to my spell table group how attractions work, and everyone gets it within a turn or two, and good times are had.I hear the complexity feedback, but also I always wonder what the alternative is. Simple vigilance and haste and reach keyworded creatures every few months from here to eternity?

The nature of a trading card game is we have to keep exploring and trying new things. If complexity is an issue, there are a lot of formats that can cut it down for you. Ones that use (almost) all the cards are just going to continue to rise in complexity.

i love how blitz fixes the repetition of dash, was it dash at any point during design or did it just develop into its own dash 2.0

We originally thought of dash, but tweaked it to bash (the design name for blitz).

Please tell me that Dash's playtest name was "Super haste."

No, it was blitz.

I'm starting to wonder if a lot of the structure added to sets does more harm than good for new players trying to figure out how Magic works. You have no idea how many people I've run into who are trying to bring something competitive to FNM who don't get why their all-Evolve deck or Angel deck or All-The-Izzet-Cards deck flops. Is there something to this, or is it necessary to see one's BR Vampires deck get crushed by Naya Blitz to learn why these strategies are bad?

Just because the linear strategies aren’t top tournament decks doesn’t mean they don’t do a whole lot of good. Remember that tournament players are the minority.