Escape

Xerex's Storytelling Potential

New 23 Jul 2024 Asked by 1953943 6 Comments

The fact that Xerex is beyond comprehension could be an asset for storytelling. That’s the kind of place that’s ideal for an escape story or a story about finding an important objective that’s hidden there. As far as mechanics go, that’s a bit tougher. I could see it overlapping with the flavor of the Eldrazi.


It could work in print where the player can imagine the setting. It has a lot more problems when we have to draw art showing what it looks like.

Celebrating Father's Day

New 17 Jun 2024 Asked by darrinkatzska 3 Comments

Happy Father's Day, Mark! How are you celebrating?


My family saw Inside Out 2, then did a Egyptian-themed escape room (we got out with 1:30 to go), went to an Italian restaurant for dinner, and are having dessert at home.

Omenpaths Between Planes

New 06 Apr 2024 Asked by mjawadb 49 Comments

so do planes keep guard against omenpaths connecting to not-human-friendly places like innistrad and ikoria? and can people just mass migrate from said places? like who the hell wanna stay in innistrad when they can escape to ravnica


Most omenpaths are not stable and do not remain open continually. Also, you have no idea where you’re going when you go through one, so it’s not something to be done lightly. Finally, not all omenpaths are in obvious places.

Keyword Templating Discussion

New 10 Mar 2024 Asked by dude1818 38 Comments

Embalm and escape are no different than unearth or flashback. What flavorful word you drop in for a particular alternate casting cost or activated ability doesn't change the structure of how the ability is written. Commit a crime and collect evidence are uniquely templated and warp the text box around them. They stick out like a sore thumb compared to every other keyword


But they aren’t uniquely templated. Collect evidence, as an example, is templated like any other mechanic that uses the graveyard as a resource.

Aesthetic Mechanics Critique

New 10 Mar 2024 Asked by dude1818 30 Comments

I just listened to your episode about designing MKM. Your comments about capturing the aesthetic of the genre crystallized why I don't like mechanics like commit a crime and collect evidence. I like the aesthetic of how Magic cards are written, and these violate that. Normal keywords and ability words still follow magic-ese, but these throw out the normal magic-ese to try and be cheeky, and it breaks my immersion


Can you give me more detail? Embalm or escape doesn’t break immersion, but collect evidence does? I don’t understand.

Top Mechanics Selection Criteria

New 26 Feb 2024 Asked by blaze-1013 47 Comments

For your top 20 (non-evergreen) mechanics I noticed none were from this decade. What would you say is the best new mechanic from this decade so far?


Note that I would pick the mechanic that started a trend. Foretell is an awesome more recent mechanic, but Morph is the first to use face down as a resource, so I chose that for the talk.Amass, while not technically from this decade, is only five years old. Mechanics I really like from this decade include: alliance, backup, collect evidence, connive, corrupted, decayed, enlist, escape, foretell, incubate, learn/lesson, magecraft, mutate (although it has its complexity issues), party, prototype, reconfigure, role tokens, and shield counters.

Vorthos and Mel Intersection

New 04 Oct 2023 Asked by clatterslikeworry 33 Comments

Question re-ask: could there be an aesthetic profile for people who value the ideal mechanical execution of a particular flavour concept? Cards like Candy Trail (Food Clue!) and Jurassic Park (Dinosaurs have escape!) are really doing it for me from an aesthetic point of view, but I don't identify as a Vorthos or a Mel. Am I actually one of those two types and I'm just understanding them badly?


That intersection means your a Vorthos and a Mel. : )

Eldraine Phyrexian Arc

New 06 Aug 2023 Asked by darktimemachinewitch 45 Comments

You Said that Eldraine was the beginning of the phyrexian arc but the reasons were very subtle. Could you explain how that is the case cause I'm utterly flummoxed


Probably the biggest plot point in that first year was the escape of Elspeth from Theros. She was key to saving the day against the Phyrexians.

Future Planeswalker Distribution

New 05 Aug 2023 Asked by wulframofthedas 32 Comments

Are all these new sets stuck with the 1 planeswalker thing or can I hope that the later ones will escape?


What’s true for Magic today isn’t always necessarily true for Magic tomorrow.

Hybrid Card Correction

New 18 Jul 2023 Asked by ebonstone 33 Comments

"Also, hybrid’s first appearance was in original Ravnica block." Dovescape is from Dissension.


Oops. Dovescape bended more in white than we should have.

Hybrid Design Philosophy

New 18 Jul 2023 Asked by apo08 40 Comments

"Hybrid effects need to exist in the overlap space between two colors (aka they both can do it as a monocolored card), not the space in between two colors."It totally makes sense. But, is it something decided after the first appearance of hybrid? Say, is Dovescape something that white can do on its own? Is it because there is compensation and it's a bend because of the countering?


Shadowmoor pushed a little too hard on the as-fan of hybrid and designed a handful of cards that pushed more into bend space than it should have. Also, hybrid’s first appearance was in original Ravnica block.

Myr Escape Query

New 03 Apr 2023 Asked by androgeus 111 Comments

Did any Myr make it off New Phyrexia?


Maybe. : )

Squee's Graveyard Casting

New 04 Feb 2023 Asked by lexatwist 34 Comments

Why isn't squee, dubious monarch's "cast from the graveyard" ability escape? from what i can see they have identical rules.


Escape isn’t deciduous and it wasn’t a keyword in that set.

Defining a Cycle

New 08 Jan 2023 Asked by shallowerblue 24 Comments

There's a set of five common instants in BRO that each reference a legendary creature in its name: Loran's Escape, Urza's Rebuff, Ashnod's Intervention, Mishra's Onslaught, and Tawnos's Tinkering.

The question is whether this is enough to be considered a cycle. They don't have any mechanical similarities; only three target a creature, only two are modal, etc. Thanks for taking the time to answer!


It’s all boils down to how you want to define “cycle”. If you’re loose enough with you definition, it is.

Baseball aka Theros Trivia

New 23 Jul 2022 Asked by mikecarlucci 59 Comments

Hi Mark! It’s my birthday today and I’m going to the Red Sox game. Can I get some trivia about baseball aka Theros Beyond Death?


When we started exploratory Baseball was going to be a second Throne of Eldraine set. The original plan was the first set was going to focus on the civilized part of Eldraine and it the second set would be focused on the woods. In the story, Rowan and Will were going to venture into the woods to find their father, the king. Mid-exploratory design, the decision was reached to keep Eldraine to just one set. When that happened, I pitched pulling forward our return to Theros which was going to be Cricket. I handed off the design to Ethan Fleischer who was going to lead Cricket (and thus return to Theros), so I had time to figure out what Cricket was going to be. We had already planned for Theros’ return to involve the underworld, as we knew Elspeth’s escape was the story we wanted to tell. One of the major mechanics made in vision design to reflect the underworld was stygian (referencing the river of the dead, Styx) where the battlefield was divided in two by the river and players had to decide which side of the river each creature was. Stygian ended up causing major play design and digital issues and got pulled in set design and replaced with escape. Happy Birthday!

Protection from Everything Query

New 18 Jul 2022 Asked by breawycker 21 Comments

If your opponent has a card with protection from everything, does Escaped Shapeshifter get protection from all colors?


No. It only copies protection specifically from a color(s).

Thanks For Magic's Escape

New 08 Mar 2022 Asked by ticked-off-squirrel 34 Comments

Hi Mark! I’m a college student and this is my midterm week. I’m stressed to the gills and haven’t had time to play mtg very much this semester, but I just wanted to say how much of an escape magic offers and to say thank you for helping to make it great. Magic is a very bright spot in my life, even if everything else gets stressful sometimes. Thanks :)


I’m glad to hear that. Thanks for writing.

Design Space Inquiry

New 10 Feb 2022 Asked by arandomstringofcharacters 27 Comments

It occurs to me that "pick a keyword" Eternal cards like Animus of Predation, Cairn Wanderer, Escaped Shapeshifter, etc. have to list all the relevant keywords, but Acorn cards can lean on you-know-what-I-mean language like "choose a creature keyword." So my question: is that actually fruitful design space?


There’s some design space, not as much as people probably think though.

Comfort from Playing Magic

New 20 Nov 2021 Asked by darrinkatzska 44 Comments

I've had an extremely tough week in my personal life, so I reinstalled Arena for the first time since I took a break a couple of years ago. Playing Magic again was extremely comforting when other things in my life have been so difficult. Thank you to yourself and everyone who makes Magic for providing me with some much needed solace and distraction. Magic has made a meaningful positive impact on my life.


Happy we could be an escape for you.

Thoughts on 'Disturbed' Mechanic

New 21 Sep 2021 Asked by myheartgoesoontz 85 Comments

My thoughts on Disturbed: it's an interesting mechanic in a vacuum, but it's hampered by the fact that this is like the fourth or fifth time we've gotten "Flashback... But for Creatures!" (Unearth, Embalm, Eternalize, kind of Escape) and it shows up alongside actual Flashback, which saps a lot of the excitement because it feels like a rehash. Add that to it eating up DFC space that feels like it could have been spent on resonant tropes and it seems lackluster in my opinion.


Why is people dying and coming back as ghosts not resonant?


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