"From a big picture, Magic excels at creating variety and does poorly at consistency."I would argue that historically, it's done well at both. Variety and consistency are not opposing concepts; you don't need to sacrifice one for the sake of the other. Ravnica, Theros, Zendikar and Bloomburrow are all very different places, but they're easy to see side by side. You could take a character from each of those planes and put them in a story together, and they would all be very distinctive, but none would feel out of place. Put someone from Duskmourn in that lineup, and they'd stick out like a Ghostbuster in Middle Earth. The complaints aren't from people who, as you seem to be implying, dislike variety. They just think that even in a very varied setting, you can still have cohesiveness, and Duskmourn's aesthetic breaks the cohesiveness that Magic has actually done very well at previously even with its great variety (there are other reasons people may dislike it as well of course, but that's most relevant to this point).

There are people who thought Ravnica *did* break the mold of what Magic was. A city? Core fantasy is not urban. There are people who thought Theros *did* break the mold of what Magic was. Theros borrowed too heavily from an existing mythology. Magic is about creating its own things, not being influenced by non-fantasy real world sources. There are people who thought Zendikar *did* break the mold of what Magic was. It leaned to heavily into adventure tropes and not enough on basic fantasy. There are people who thought Bloomburrow *did* break the mold. It was too cutesy and didn’t have the gravitas of a real Magic set. The idea that the thing you felt went too far is the actual thing that went too far is what everyone believes when we stretch to a place that they aren’t comfortable with. But that place varies from person to person. And more importantly, it changes as the game adapts. Innistrad was once the world that went a step too far, and now it’s the thing Duskmourn is being compared against as the sign that we went too far.Magic has since its beginning changed and adapted. And it’s always pushing into new territory because that’s what it means to change and adapt. That doesn’t mean every person is going to agree with everything we do. It’s fine to not like something, but please be aware that for each player who felt we went too far, there are many others excited by what we’re doing.My point when I say “we do poor at consistency” is that there’s no definitive dividing point. There’s not a clear line in the sand where this side “is Magic” and this side “isn’t Magic”. That line varies person to person. The reason we have 27,000+ cards is so that each person can focus on “what Magic is” for themselves.

If or when: desert basic lands and deserts creating a special "sand" or "desert theme" mana the way snow lands do... or I guess that would make desert a super type...
...If or when desert as a super type?

If on deserts becoming a supertype.

Changing exert to stun counters would be a large change since it stops working with untap effects and being able to use those, such as Vizier of Tumbling Sands, is an intended feature of the mechanic. Same is true of persist/undying using finality. It is a feature, not a bug, that you can sac a persist/undying creature twice, reanimate it, then do it twice more. Also, changing old effects to use scry or surveil was largely a buff and these changes would be nerfs which generally upsets players.

Fine points.

The two word creature type discussion of time lord makes me think of hazezon tamar. The card makes "sand warriors" and exiles all "sand warriors" when it leaves. It does this by exiling all creatures with the type "sand" and "warrior" leading to some unintuitive rulings, like it will exile all creatures with all creature types (or exile a players board with Shields of Velis Vel). In my mind the card is clearly meant to exile the tokens it made. I get that magic has a bunch of weird rules interactions but this seems like something that can be "fixed" easily. I'm not saying it should be changed but what is your opinion? Do you like it the way it is now or would you go back and make it so it exiles only the tokens he makes?

The two word technology was created to solve a specific issue in Doctor Who. We’re not using it to redo cards from the past. It gets confusing quickly if used too often.

FYI, in regards to the half-haste ask, Thousand-Year Elixir states, "You may activate abilities of creatures you control as though those creatures had haste."

FYI

Hazezon, Shaper of Sands seems fun, but doesn't seem to have much desert support. I noticed Desert was errata'd to the desert subtype, but other Arabian Nights lands like Oasis, City of Brass and other "desert" lands from the set(according on the story) weren't. We've seen recent errata for creature types like Dinosaurs and Phyrexians to expand support. Any chance we can see some errata to some lands to support the relatively obscure Desert mechanic?

I’m skeptical that we’ll do that.

So if exchanging life totals is just that, does that make the white cards that do it (axis of morality and reverse the sands) bends or full on breaks?

More bend than break.

May I request more cards that refer to other cards by name, like Renowned Weaponsmith and Sift Through Sands?

You may.

Why can't "catching up" in terms of cards be in white's slice of the color pie (like Sandstone Oracle)? It still would keep white from getting ahead of opponents in terms of cards, and seems like it would work in 1v1 more similar to current white draw while helping more in commander. And the flavor of having equal resources fits too : )

It would be too effective in a white weenie deck that purposefully uses up resources quickly.

Do you think sand can/will ever become a supertype similar to snow?

I am skeptical.