Norin the Wary from Time Spiral and Saltskitter from Future Sight have incredibly similar designs that we haven't seen anywhere else in Magic. Do you know if those designs being in the same block was a coincidence, or is there a story there?Thanks Mark!

I designed both, so there’s a chance they’re subconsciously connected. Norin the Wary was a top-down design to match the character. Saltskitter was just me making something that felt weird.

This is one of those questions that might be impossible to answer. Other than power level, why is one set's draft environment more fun than another set's? Take MH3, which I've enjoyed more than OTJ, which I liked more than MKM (although I enjoyed both). I think this is a common sentiment. Did MH3 get more time or resources than the other two? Is it just luck of the draw in a "sometimes they hit, sometimes, they don't" way? When an MKM is going out the door, do y'all know it's not quite as fun?

Modern Horizon sets are of a higher complexity, and have a strong nostalgia element, so appeal strongly to players that enjoy that. We learned from Time Spiral block that it’s a minority, so it’s not something we do in premier sets, but a great choice for a supplemental one.We ship every set with the goal of it being as fun as possible, knowing that different sets will appeal more to different players. We just try to mix it up, so everyone gets sets that maximize their enjoyment.

"The rise of Commander and the importance of larger formats has shifted how we think about complexity."Is this explained in more detail anywhere? MtG as a whole seems much more complex now. Timespiral is one of my favorite sets, but the complaint about it was that it was too complex, had too many mechanics. Now we have mechanics that are so complex they can't be explained on a card (ring tempts,initiative), more things to track (poison,energy,day/night) and new cards with varying format legality

There were more mechanics in Time Spiral block than existed in Magic before Time Spiral block. Another way to look at it is the difference between the complexity of a Modern Horizons set and a premier set. Yes, the average premier set is higher than they once were, but nowhere close to Time Spiral block.

In Hindsight, do you think printing the "no mana cost" cards from Time Spiral were a mistake? Why were these not simply given expensive mana costs instead?

I do not consider it a mistake.

Follow up on another question-marks topic. Could non randomized products that have exclusive cards (like commander pre-cons) get their own rarity? Like maybe the purple used on the time-shifted reprints got in Time Spiral.

Being that there are cards and formats that care, we want cards to have actual rarities.

Will you ever finish the Holy Nimbus vertical cycle? We got the common in Legends and the uncommon in Time Spiral, but are still waiting for the rare/mythic.

It might be a while as the cards can cause the game to draw.

Everyone is out here talking about old frame printings of modern cards, but as someone with no particular affinity for the old frames, I'd like to point out that there are still a bunch of Modern-legal cards with no modern frame printing (i.e., cards on the Time Spiral bonus sheet with no subsequent reprintings). Is this list ever looked at by Wizards as something to clean up?

It is. The vast majority of the cards that see play in Modern should eventually get reprinted in a modern frame.

Hi Mark,Cashing in my Birthday Trivia to find out more about my favourite cycle of lands; The Time Spiral Storage Lands. What can you tell me about them?

The Time Spiral storage lands were an attempt to give players access to colored mana, but at a rate that was slower than traditional dual land. That allows us to let it enter the battlefield untapped. We did try vanishing lands before that (aka dual lands that enter the battlefield untapped but only stick around for three turns), but they didn’t play well.Happy Birthday!

So I adored the time spiral bonus sheet adding cards into that standard environment (and therefore other formats, like Lord of Atlantis). How likely can we get a special sheet and have the cards legal in the format again?

Unlikely, as we like to use the bonus sheet to get desired reprints into the set. A required Standard legality would significantly limit our reprint options.

If you hadn't been using the 3-set block structure at the time, which set of the Time Spiral block would you choose to have been made instead of all three?

Probably Time Spiral. It stands the most alone.