First of all, LOVE Bloomburrow! Especially the otters, frogs, and rabbits. Re: Gift a tapped fishGift is like Haunt in that the instant/sorcery version and permanent version do different things. The spell gifts the fish before other effects. The permanent gifts when it enters. I see this having similar challenges with Haunt. Also the rules text doesn’t specify a 1/1 blue fish. Reminder text isn’t technically part of the rules. Can I gift my opponent other kinds of fish? I see the “gift a tapped fish” as being potentially “rules-challenging”.

Rules text has meaning beyond what’s on the card. Reminder text is telling you relevant information. That is real information that has rules weight. Reminder text just isn’t written in technical Magic templating.

I know they are relatively low on the storm scale, but I really like both Haunt and Cipher. They both feel like you are doing something with your cards that they don't normally do, which I think is really cool. Do you think there's room for them returning somewhere, or similar mechanics being printed?

I think haunt has more potential than cipher as cipher has so much less practical design space.

I think Descend X, “if you descended this turn”, and “Fathomless decent”, have a vocabulary issue like Haunt did. They all mean different things. Descend 4 is a condition (similar to delirium/threshold). “If you descended this turn” is an action (similar to “if you milled a permanent or a permanent died” which is “Revolt”). Fathomless descent is neither a condition nor an action; it functions closer to Undergrowth/Chroma as a counting mechanic. As a tiny amount of feedback, using vocabulary in 3 different contexts makes it more difficult to grok (and remember).

Would using three different words for things so mechanically connected not cause more confusion?

What's difficult to understand about Haunt?I've seen a couple of comments on this, and I'm not sure why

There are three main reasons: 1) The mechanic works different on permanents and non-permanents. 2) Its initial ability being something that happens when the card gets played, where the second ability happening when the card dies is non-intuitive.3) It doesn’t do a good job of matching the flavor.

Which do you think is easier to understand haunt or cypher

Cypher.

Yesterday you mentioned that Haunt had a lot of issues beyond memory. Could you elaborate? I’m curious as to what other issues you see with the ability.

It has a bunch of issues. The biggest is it isn’t “sticky” meaning it isn’t done in such a way that players can easily remember what it does. This isn’t helped by the fact that creatures and spells with haunt work differently.

Saw someone talking about Haunt, made me think of Skulk. I loved the mechanic, and the name was perfect. Wish it could’ve worked its way to some usage here and there.

When I created Skulk, I did do thinking I’d designed the new blue/black evergreen creature mechanic. It proved to have a narrower design space than I thought and was harder to use than I expected. Note it’s not off limits as returning, just not up to the bar of being evergreen.

If you could go back in time and get a do-over on one mechanic, to fix it knowing what you know now, which would you pick?

I think the mechanic with the highest potential to the worst original execution is haunt.

Hello Mark, I'd like to add to the pile of requests a cycle of cards that combine two abilities of a given ravnicas guild. Eg: graft + adapt, afterlife + haunt, bloodlust + riot...Most likely on a supplemental set, given the ensuing complexity.Thank you !

I designed these for original Modern Horizons, but they got cut.

Why is haunt considered a mistake? Was it hard to keep track?

It has a quality I call “unsticky” where the vast majority of players can’t remember what it does. The fact that it works differently on creatures than it does on spells doesn’t help. Also, it scored very poorly in market research.