Will Magic ever undergo the process of carcinization and have all creature types become crab?

On Crab World.

Will Homarids eventually get the same treatment as Cephalids getting their creature type updated to Lobster, or are there too few of them to warrant that change? We did just get one in OTJ with Deepmuck Desperado. I always associate Cephalids and Homarids so I wonder why one is getting an update and not the other.

I do think Homarids will eventually get changed. To Crab is my best guess.

Happy birthday Mark! How was your crab this year?

Very good.

I love batching! The recent Outlaw batch was fantastic flavor, and it got me thinking about something I’ve wondered for a while. Would it be possible to have a “sea creatures” or “sea monsters” batch? We see cards on occasion that care about various sea-related types, like Leviathans, Krakens, and Octopi, but there’s never been exactly a fixed or comprehensive list due to space. Would creating a batch for those types that could include a wider range of types such as crabs, fish, merfolk, homarids, (clamfolk?), and more be possible?

Our internal rule is to limit batches to five, and the sweet spot is three.

on homarids:

1. They shouldn't be changed into crabs because they're lobsters.
2. "I don't understand all the doom and gloom about the future of the IP! Anyway we're removing all terms unique to it from the game".

1. I can’t speak to crab vs. lobster. Both would be considered.2. Changing creature types is not removing the words from the game. Card names and flavor text will still use the words.

With Viashino going away in favor of Lizard as a race, was there any consideration to replace the Homarid creature type with Crab?

There is talk about that.

Are there any creature types you'd love to see getting support in the future?
(please be crabs)

There is.

What's the likelihood of A) cephalids being changed to octopus, B) viashino being changed to lizard, or C) homarids & camarids being changed to crab?

It is a topic that has come up on numerous occasions, so there’s a chance.

An interesting, if not particularly useful bit of trivia: debate in recent years suggesting horseshoe crabs might be arachnids, rather than a closely related class of arthropods, would mean that with the introduction of Skrelv and the mite tokens would mean that there might now be at least one mono-coloured arachnid in each of the five colours.

Interesting.

Happy birthday! Can we get some birthday trivia about you on your birthday?

Sure. I turn 56 today, so here’s fifty-six things you may or may not know about me. 1) I never lost a baby tooth. Every one had to be extracted.2) I was once a contestant on Trivial Pursuit: The Game Show with Wink Martindale. I answered the most questions correct, but didn’t win. 3) I once had scarlet fever (the thing the boy gets in the Velveteen Rabbit).4) I’ve been told by doctors I have very weird blood.5) I self taught myself to juggle.6) I was a magician when I was a kid with the stage name The Wiz Kid. I mostly performed for kids parties.7) I was once a freelance greeting card writer. My favorite (that didn’t get printed) showed a jug of maple syrup tipped on its side making a puddle of syrup. In the syrup was a top hat. A hand is pulling a can of green paint with a shamrock out of the hat. You open up the card and it says Sappy Paint Hat Tricks Day. It’s a triple Spoonerism. 8) Sara Gilbert (of “Roseanne” fame) and I once went out for lunch. (It wasn’t a date or anything.) 9) I broke my collarbone doing a prat fall off a stage. 10) I once pet a cheetah. In South Africa. My face from the picture of me doing that was used as my “Making Magic” photo for years.11) I once made a root beer float for Keanu Reeves. It was at a play I was volunteering for. 12) I once get trapped inside Fred Astaire’s Estate. This factoid is oddly on my Wikipedia page.13) Starting during the pandemic, my family began fostering animals. So far, we fostered four dogs, six cats, and two Guinea pigs.14) In college, I wrote and directed two plays, started an improvisation troupe, and a writing workshop. 15) I still have all my wisdom teeth. 16) I have visited every continent except Antarctica for Magic. 17) I once asked Clint Eastwood for directions, not realizing who it was until he started talking. I was lost on the Warner Brothers lot.18) My first job in Hollywood resulted from me taking part in someone else’s interview. I snuck on the lot, and ended walking into a room where they asked “Are you here for the production assistant interview?”, and I said, “Yes.”19) I once had a disease the doctors couldn’t identify. They called it Mark’s Disease. 20) I was born in Mississippi. My dad was in the Air Force at the time. 21) I asked out seven woman to my senior prom who all turned me down. I ended up going with a friend who also couldn’t get a date. 22) I took six years of Spanish. 23) Most of my family’s vacations growing up were ski vacations, so I’m a decent skier. 24) I once delivered a pizza to Richard Gere. It was as a production assistant, not a pizza delivery person. 25) I once broke into an actor’s apartment building to deliver a script. It was so late, they were asleep and didn’t hear the buzzing of the door bell. 26) I once drove six hours (three in each direction) to pick up one five-stick package of Blackjack gum as a runner (production assistant).27) Dennis Miller once thought I was a crazy man. I was sent to get him from the parking lot for a shoot and he thought I was stalking him.28) I have over two hundred tee-shirts. They are organized by color. 29) I was supposed to pitch to “The Simpsons”, but it got cancelled when I got hired in the “Roseanne” staff.30) I pitched multiple times to “Star Trek: The Next Generation”, but never sold a script. The closest I got was a pitch about Data malfunctioning. 31) I once ate crocodile. In Australia.32) I played the Tinman in fifth grade in a production of “The Wizard of the Oz”. I was so hot, my silver make-up had to be reapplied halfway through as I sweated it off.33) My mother turned down being on “Oprah” to come to my college graduation.34) My parents are both retired. My dad was a dentist and my mom a psychologist. I used to joke I had a “paradox”. 35) Every birthday since I was 9, I’ve celebrated my birthday with crab legs. 36) Since I was in grade school, every Valentine’s Day, I hand out candy hearts, and every Halloween, I hand out mellowcreme pumpkins (basically pumpkin shaped candy corns). 37) My tee-shirts every week are themed. Some themes are pretty obvious, but they often get tricky. R&D likes figuring out the theme. 38) I got a BS in Communications (no, really) from Boston University’s College of Communications. 39) I collect superhero Minimates (they look Lego-ish). I have somewhere around two thousand. They are displayed in a number of cabinets built by my dad.40) My podcast was inspired by a talk by Kevin Smith (at San Diego Comic-Con) where he said anyone could make a podcast. 41) I have attended over twenty-five San Diego Comic-Cons.42) I am related to Lorne Green of “Bonanza” fame. 43) My dad’s family came from Germany and my mom’s from Russia. In Germany, my family’s name was Rosenvasser, but it was changed to Rosewater when they came to the U.S.44) There are so few Rosewaters in the United States, that if you meet a Rosewater odds are I’m related to them.45) I have lived in five states (Mississippi, Ohio, Massachusetts, California, and Washington, in that order).46) I have visited over thirty states for Magic. 47) I once met Jim Henson when I worked on a clip show that Kermit was on. The question I asked him was if Ernie and Bert were named after the characters from “It’s a Wonderful Life”. He said not consciously. Jim Henson is one of my idols and I feel so blessed to have met him. He died a few months later.48) I met Stan Lee at Hascon. He is another of my idols that I feel so lucky to have met. 49) On “Roseanne”, I worked with Amy Sherman-Palladino (just Amy Sherman back then) and Chuck Lorre. She made “Gilmore Girls” and “The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel”. He made “Big Bang Theory” and “Two and a Half Men”. Amy was super sweet and we got along well. I don’t think Chuck liked me.50) I am a super picky eater. For example, except for apples, I don’t eat fruit. I hate bananas with a passion. 51) I have been a game player since very young. My dad loves games and introduced them to me early in life.52) I get the writing bug from my mom. 53) I used to collect lint in a giant jar. When I got married, Lora made me get rid of it. It was an impressive amount of lint.54) I have a bad tendency to burn myself a lot. My family loves to make fun of it. 55) I own over fifty flannels. My favorites are from Japan because they are more colorful with their flannels. Normally I wear a large, but in Japanese sizes, I’m an extra large.56) My favorite number is 254. I chose it when I was little.