Hey Mark! I've been playing Magic long enough to remember tournament packs (originally known as starter decks) and theme decks, and remembering being disappointed when they were cut in favor of Intro Packs (which then were changed further, but that's for another question). Anyway, i don't remember the reasoning behind that change those years ago. Was it a similar situation to what we are seeing now with Set/Draft being cut and the introduction of Play Boosters?

What did tournament packs in was they were significantly more expensive to make (compared to how many cards were in it) and much less popular than boosters. We also had data that said it wasn’t helping with onboarding which was a lot of their initial purpose.

Why do you keep overcosting planeswalker pack cards? Intro pack Ral actually seems like a decent card but at 6 mana that makes him unplayable, and I really feel that "because new players" isn't a good reason

We don’t want to put tournament viable new cards in the planeswalker packs because we don’t want to make tournament players feel as if they have to buy them.

Like many players I know my main formats are limited and standard. I get most of my standard cards from playing limited and buying boosters. Sure, it would be nice to collect every single card you guys print, in all formats and all artwork, but as long as i can still play standard i don't mind that i will probably never own more than a couple of masterpiece cards. No Problem. Except... apparently now standard also includes cards only printed in intro packs. What the heck??

The new cards in the planeswalker packs are design to be exciting to beginners but not tournament level.

Im getting a friend into magic, so i helped order him an intro pack (WR from SOI). In it was a pack with both Relentless Dead and Thing in the Ice. Thanks for putting that in there for him! (he loves the deck, btw)

You’re welcome.

It's really nice of you guys to turn intro packs into planeswalker decks. But is there a possibility that either one of the 2 walkers(you were making 2 decks at a time instead of 5, right?) are from older sets that just fits better a certain theme? Will there be a possibility to see old walkers reprinted outside Modern masters and such special sets?

The Planeswalkers in the planeswalker packs will be from the current set’s story. Our goal is to get new players invested in the current story and characters.

Any plan for new product for new player? When new truly intro pack like Magic Origins release?

I’m going to have an article on the topic next month.

Non-full-art Wastes will be in the intro packs (like the other non-full-art basics)

FYI

How much control do you have over supplementary products such as event decks and intro packs?

Very little.

Now we've seen the intro pack lists, I'm struggling even more to understand the watermarking decisions. How was Kin-Tree Invocation *not* Abzan, for example, or Master the Way Jeskai? I so want to be ok with it all, but things like that stir my Vorthos blood :(

Remember that if a card was in multiple intro decks, it couldn’t have a watermark regardless of the creative.

I'm usually very optimistic and not a naysayer, but you guys really blew it with the watermark problem in Khans. The intro packs are not more important than respecting the flavor of the cards, and a lot of cards are lacking the mark they should have/have a mark they shouldn't have. Master the Way, the rare enemy-color pair cycle that only Rakshasha Deathdealer has the mark, Altar of the Brood are some of the more serious examples. You should have made different intro decks and marked right.

Different people prioritize different things. Return to Ravnica had spells (although not creatures) that were clearly one guild without the watermark and players didn’t seem to mind so we made our choice somewhat based on that. Khans of Tarkir will definitely get us to talk more about how and where we use watermarks.