I just wanted to say I really like Thunder Junction and overall like the idea of "showcase sets" as you described in today's article. But for future sets like this I'd definitely prefer either more thought into why characters are there, or if thought was put into it, have that reasoning expressed to the players. Certain characters felt very out of place in the set largely because we know nothing about their motivations, with Olivia Voldaren probably being the biggest offender on that front. Even just a little bit of flavor text like in Ghired's case really helps!

The characters do have motivations. The stories explain many of them, but not all.

Omnath and Niv Mizzet are the only characters to have 4 creature cards representing them, more than any other character. In the hypothetical where you don’t know what’s going to come out soon, who do you think is most likely to be the next character to join that club?

Do any other characters have four copies? And who has three? Off the top of my head - Olivia Voldaren, Crovax, Mirri, Rakdos? Who else?

Hi Mark, do you have any trivia on Olivia Voldaren? Thanks in advance.

Her playtest name was Count Dracula and she won the internal rare poll.

Hello! It's my birthday today, and also my 1 year anniversary of playing Magic, since I got my first deck last year as a gift! Could I request a trivia fact about my favourite card/character, Olivia Voldaren, or one of the other Legendary vampires? (Or a hint on whether we'll be seeing Olivia again in the upcoming Innistrad set?) Thank you and also Happy Hanukkah!

Olivia was created as a top down Count Dracula. She, while still named Count Dracula, won our internal rare poll where we use employees to gauge how cool the rares and mythic rares are. This led to some discussion about how much the name, which the card wasn’t going to have, influenced the vote, and forced us to change our policy to give realistic names to cards before the rare poll.Happy Birthday!

Just as a counterpoint to an earlier comment, I wanted to say that I very much appreciate when Magic does subtle allusions to things rather than heavy-handed direct references. I like the idea that the Magic multiverse is it's own thing.

I like that we have Olivia Voldaren and not Count Dracula.

What is the likelihood that a legendary character introduced in a set will get a planeswalker card during a return to that set or even appear randomly as a planeswalker on a world? I would love to see Olivia voldaren as a walker.

It’s not super likely, but it’s happened.

"I’m getting more requests for second version of known legendary creatures than requests for characters we’ve heard of but don’t have a card yet." That makes sense. Most people who played during Innistrad at least vaguely remember Thalia or Olivia Voldaren. Only the people who follow the story in some capacity remember, say, Ludevic. I hope that doesn't mean you guys will forego cards representing unrepresented characters.

We plan on doing both. I was just trying to get people to understand that there was more demand for one than the other.

Hi! Tomorrow is my seventeenth birthday, so could you share some trivia about one of my favorite legendary creatures, Olivia Voldaren?

In design, Olivia Volaren was Count Dracula and she won the internal rare poll. Mark Gottlieb really wanted to change her but I liked the design (as it was mine) and refused to change it quoting the rare poll as evidence that it would be popular. Happy Birthday!

Who came up with the name Olivia for Olivia Voldaren? It feels a bit out of place, being a name used in English when just about every other named character in Magic doesn't have that sort of name.

There are many names used on legendary creatures and planeswalkers that pre-exist their use in Magic

Is it a coincidence that "Olivia Voldaren" anagrams to "Overdo A Villain"?

There are no coincidences. : )