Gisa and Geralf

Sibling Conflict in Storytelling

Why every major brothers and sisters of Magic have to be in a severe conflict? Magic needs conflict, that's sure, but is there something in American storytelling I'm not understanding?

Who else other than Rowan and Will? Gisa and Geralf bicker, but it’s not severe; they have a shared love of the undead.

United States Gisa and Geralf

Trivia on Ghave and Birthday

I would like to invoke the power of birthday trivia! I am turning 30 this year and would like to know if you remember any trivia about Ghave, Guru of Spores from the first official commander precons!

Or alternatively, of my favorite pair of Magic characters, Gisa and Geralf.

Thanks, and have a great summer!
Give the story team high fives from me.

When we originally designed Innistrad, we were tickled by the idea that blue and black created different kinds of Zombies. Blue built them out of parts, ala Frankenstein, where black was more about necromancy. To capture this distinction, we made two characters, brother and sister, that represent each type of Zombie making, and made their core conflict about which is better.Happy 30th Birthday!

Birthday Black Blue Commander Ghave, Guru of Spores Gisa and Geralf High Fives Innistrad Necromancy Story / Lore Zombie

Gisa and Geralf Pronunciation

With regards to the pronunciation of Gisa and Geralf, I don't know how "official" other translations of Magic cards are for this purpose, but Japanese is a language with unambiguous phonetics and it uses hard Gs for both of them. (ギサ and ゲラルフ )

FYI

Gisa and Geralf Japan

4-Color Commanders Idea

The MOM Legendary team-up cards seem like they would've been the perfect way to get more 4-color Commanders into the world. You've often mentioned how designing a 4 color card is difficult without ending up making it just "not the missing color", so teaming up two characters with different color alignments seems an easy fix to that. ex. Winota and Kinnan for a non-B Commander, or Rafiq and Sharuum for non-R, or Gisa and Geralf & Halana and Alena for non-W.

The reason we make less four-color Commanders is not we can’t come up with how to do it.

Colors Commander Four Color Gisa and Geralf

Blue Black Team-Up

At any point was it considered that a reprint of Gisa and Geralf would be the blue black team up card before you settled on the one in the final set?

They’ve already teamed up on a card. The idea behind March of the Machine’s teamups are they are unlikely pairs to ever interact with one another.

Black Blue Card Printing Gisa and Geralf Reprints

Popularity of Gisa and Geralf

How popular are gisa and geralf?

Fairly.

Gisa and Geralf

Dual Planeswalker Cards

Since there’s a rule that says a planeswalker card can have multiple planeswalker types, and because the planeswalker uniqueness rule is gone, and also a precedent exists for 2 (or more) individuals represented on a legendary card (like Gisa and Geralf); might we see a planeswalker card with a pair of planeswalkers (like Jace and Vraska) in the future?

It’s a possibility.

Gisa and Geralf Planeswalkers Rules

Spirit Legend Future Promise

I'm a little bit sad we didn't get Funny-Hat Geist (of St. Traft) in SoI block. Werewolves got Ulrich (and Arlinn Kord, kind of), vampires got Olivia, zombies got Gisa and Geralf, and humans got Sigarda. Why did we miss out on a spirit legend?

We had to save something for a third trip to Innistrad. : )

Gisa and Geralf Human Humor Innistrad Spirit Vampire Zombie

Legendary Creature Desires

Mark, in my opinion, which probably doesn't matter much, you are still missing the point about why people ask for a legendary creature for a specific tribe. It is *NOT* in any way for a lord effect. Look at the first Olivia, look at Iskanah, even look at Gisa and Geralf from SOI Block and Depala. *THOSE* are the type of things people want a legendary creature of a specific tribe for, not +1/+1 effects. Put it to a poll if you don't feel that way

Here’s one of our biggest challenges. Lots of players want very specific things, but not all want the same thing. For example, some players very specifically want a legendary creature that’s a lord. It’s a very common request here on Blogatog. Others like yourself want a flavorful design that has more general usefulness to be a commander.Yet others don’t even play Commander and have a completely different set of parameters for what they want in a legendary card. My hope is to make each of you happy some of the time with some of the legendary creatures.More feedback is great though so when aiming for your segment of the audience, we can deliver what you want.

Commander Creatures Flavor Gisa and Geralf Legendary Creatures

Request for More Stories

While I'm perfectly fine with Iskanah not showing up, I'm less cool with Gisa and Geralf not getting an EMA story. We've been following them since Innistrad and them actually coming together (in their grudging way) is a big moment whose absence disappointed this dedicated Vorthos. Since the main story has become about Walkers, has Wizards considered making a second story column to cover Plane-centric tales? (You could even bring back the name "Uncharted Realms to differentiate from Jace stories)

If you said to me that you wanted more new cards, I’d respond that new cards require resources and that while I know players would love additional new cards, I don’t want to produce cards at anything but the highest level of quality. With the resources I have available, there’s a cap on what I can produce at the quality that I deem acceptable. The story team would say the exact same thing about stories.

Gisa and Geralf Innistrad Story / Lore Vorthos

Ludevic Card Inquiry

Is there much call for a card for Ludevic? Gisa and Geralf are cool, but as they already have cards I was disappointed not to see Ludevic, especially as he was already known, unlike the first visit to INN.

I’ve gotten a number of questions on his absence.

Gisa and Geralf

Appreciating Gisa and Geralf

I want to thank all the people responsible for the Gisa and Geralf card, I really love zombies, and I really love that card. From design, to art and flavour it is amazing.

I’ll pass along your kind words.

Art Flavor Gisa and Geralf Zombie

Character Cards Timing

"There’s a cool character in flavor text or “Uncharted Realms”, usually someone created long after the card file is locked." Is this what happened with Gisa and Geralf and why they didn't appear in Innistrad?

Yes, that is exactly what happened. Flavor text is one of the last components created.

Flavor Gisa and Geralf Innistrad

Flavor Text Characters

Given what happened with Gisa and Geralf, do you now pay more attention to characters that might appear in the flavor text?

You’re not getting the timeline. Design (and a good chunk of development) is done before the work on flavor text starts. If characters don’t shine until flavor text, it’s usually too late to get them into the set.

Flavor Gisa and Geralf

Gisa and Geralf Creation

When design/creative was making innistrad block, did you intentionally choose not to represent Gisa and Geralf directly in cards, knowing they would show up in later products?

Gisa and Geralf weren’t really a thing when we were designing Innistrad. They didn’t become a thing until flavor text got finalized which happened long after design and most of development was done.

Flavor Gisa and Geralf Innistrad

Pronouncing Names

Okay, seriously, how do you pronounce Gisa and Geralf's names? Are they both hard G's, both soft G's, or is one hard and the other soft? And if the last is the case, which one is which?

Gisa’s a hard G and Geralf is a soft one.

Gisa and Geralf

Future Legendaries

Can we see passed-over legendaries (such as Gisa and Geralf) in supplemental products? Thanks!

Maybe. : )

Gisa and Geralf Legendary Creatures

Time Spiral Block Possibilities

On a scale of 1-10, 1 being definite and 10 being never, Chances we see another time spiral-esque block? I'd love to see characters like Gisa and Geralf (The necromancer siblings from Innistrad) finally see card-form.

It really depends on what you are defining as a Time Spiral block. Will we have blocks with a strong nostalgic element? I believe so. Will we have a bonus sheet again? While not a certainty, I think there’s a good chance. Will we have a time-themed block where we pluck characters out of time? Less likely but not impossible. I do believe we are more willing to do supplemental products that do some of what you are asking capturing characters we didn’t do the first time around.

Bonus Sheets Gisa and Geralf Innistrad Out of Time Time Spiral

Gisa and Geralf Exclusion

Did you ever consider putting Gisa the Mad and her stitcher brother Geralf as cards/legendaries in the Innistrad block? If so why didn't they make it?

Gisa and Geralf were designed as flavorful characters for flavor text by creative team member Jenna Helland. She enjoyed the characters so she wrote a short story with them. By the time we realized that they were popular with the players, the cards for the set had long been locked down.

Flavor Gisa and Geralf Innistrad Legendary Creatures Story / Lore

Missing Innistrad Characters

Why were the Innistrad characters Gisa and Geralf left out of AVR? They were pivotal to the story. If there were no plans to make cards for them, then they should not have been included in the block at all...

I’ve been getting a lot of mail about Gisa and Geralf. There’s not always room for every character mentioned in flavor text to make it as a legendary creature. I get that there’s a lot of love for Gisa and Geralf and maybe if we had foreseen that we could have made them a card.

Creatures Flavor Gisa and Geralf Innistrad Story / Lore