do we know how many planes death race will take place on?

Three. Two are worlds that have been the main setting of a premier set and one which hasn’t (although has been referenced).

With how many new planes we've gotten, with some of them up in the air if we'll ever see them again, despite how popular they may be, has the team begun to lean into the idea of more multi-plane sets? It's the main reason I'm looking forward to Tennis/Death Race and I think there are a lot of interesting avenues that could be taken in both story and gameplay potential for multiplane sets, but what's the mood around the office for those kinds of sets?

Let’s see how Tennis goes.

Hi Mark! May I please request Worzel and Thomil: Magic's first planeswalkers from all the way back in Magic's first story in the Magic: The Gathering Pocket Player's Guide in Modern Horizons 4 (if there is one)?

We’ve talked about them getting cards.

Hey Mark first I want to thank you for what you and your team do. Is it possible that we could get other D&D planes as sets. Faerun has a lot of history but there are other planes that could be awesome Inspiration for MTG?

It is possible.

Re: “we’ve promised to not straight reprint old sets.”When you say this, do you mean that you won’t print a set with the exact same set list as an existing set? Or do you just mean that you won’t print cards that are indistinguishable from existing versions? That is to say, if you made a hypothetical “return to ravnica redux” where everything was the exact same with no changes, except all the cards had a little planeswalker stamp in the corner like the list or mystery booster, would that be fair game?

It means we won’t reprint a set with the exact same cards, frame/text upgraded or not.

Has there ever been any thought to combining the Ox and Minotaur creature types? Such as simplifying both to simply "Cow?" I'm a huge fan of bovines in all forms and it would be nice if all of the Ox in magic worked alongside their more anthropomorphic cousins the Minotaur. As it is now we're lucky to really get cards of *either* type printed. There's resonance to the name Minotaur, no doubt, but it also has its share of baggage. It has Greek connotations and that's probably a big reason Minotaurs are almost strictly in Theros (although some favorites, such as Neheb, are from other planes). I was happy that Outlaws had more Ox cards, but it also highlights my dissatisfaction: Holy Cow is an *ox* not a cow, despite the name. It feels like a retread of the Hound or Naga debacle all over again. Hound was simplified to Dog and all Snakes, from rattlesnakes to Naga, are simply the type Snake now. This allows snakes and dogs of all walks benefit from a shared unity. Cats had it right, we didn't need Leonin as a separate type.I just feel like there's unnecessary separation being created by dividing Ox and Minotaur and it has the same resonance failings as all dogs being labeled "hounds" had. If it's important for a particular creature to *be* a minotaur then they can just *have* minotaur in their name, like ~30% of minotaurs already do. There's also the simple fact that Minotaur is a longer average creature type, limiting design space for other types to be included. It's hard to justify why a Minotaur is on a random plane, but much less so if it's simply a "Cow Warrior" for example. As for why I think "Cow" should just be the combined type name, I simply think it fits. Cow is a resonant name. Almost everyone, East to west, knows *of* cows if only because their milk is such a widely used commodity. We don't call it "Ox's milk" after all. More than that, it's fun! Cow is *funny* in the same way *squirrel* is funny. It's amusing to see "Squirrels you control" in this game full of fighting. In that vein, "Cows you control" is an amusing line that can help break up the seriousness of a setting. I know this is making a mountain out of a molehill, but magic is a game of different perspectives coming together and creating something new. Cows are my favorite animal and it's simply dissatisfying, to me, that my Holy Cow can't benefit from a Kragma Warcaller. That Angrath, colloquially named "Cow Dad" in the community, would have the creature type "Minotaur." The only downside I can see is that "Cow" *does* specifically refer to females of a bovine species. But that is a distinction few, if any, seriously take into consideration. If one sees a field of cows, they're not saying "I see lots of cows and 3 bulls!" They're going to say "I see cows!"So to bring the thesis back, has there been any discussion internally to simplifying the Minotaur and Ox creature types under a single banner, such as "Cow?" I would also happily settle for "Cattle" as the new type. I just feel the current Ox vs Minotaur divide has to go, for both flavor and mechanical reasons, and the sooner the better.

I have been on Team Cow (as I was on Team Dog) for many years. I even made Cows in Un-sets. I still believe Minotaur should be its own creature type though.

Since the decision seems to be that you won't be returning to blocks, have you guys considered other ways of including additional sets for beloved planes? I think some interesting ways to do it could be by having modern horizons/commander legends sets focused on a single plane.

The mixing and matching of old mechanics would make it tricky to do a Modern Horizons set on one world.

I have a sales question. LOTR, I believe, is the best selling set of all time, right? And if I recall, the best selling commander set of all time is Fallout, behind that being Warhammer. Goes to imply the Marvel sets will likely be the next highest selling sets of all time, if not just behind LOTR. My question is, doesn't this show WOTC should mostly just pivot to UB as the new 'standard' with old planes as the less visited product?

While will continue to do Universes Beyond as there is an obvious audience, but the Magic in-universe sets (which we call “MIP sets”) also serve an important function. There are a lot of fans who love Magic’s IP, and having sets that we have don’t have to interface with outside partners has a lot of advantages.

Why do "until the end of the game" effects are not reworded as emblems? The only card that got the treatment is Elspeth, Knight-Errant

We mostly use emblems for planeswalkers.

Hey Mark, just wanted to say that I'm a big fan of graveyard mechanics and seeing Threshold return in Bloomburrow as well as Delirium in Duskmourn has made me really happy. I would like to ask how do you balance using returning mechanics vs creating new ones when designing sets in completely new planes.

If an old mechanic will accomplish what we need, we try to use the old mechanic, but there are a lot of factors that can make us want to use something new instead.