my name is blue

If half of Magic isn’t going to be Magic anymore. Why not take the remaining 3 sets a year we get, forgo the shallow paper thin, one off world building, and do blocks and fleshed out stories again? If I’m being forced into interacting with UB in competitive magic, I would at least like a good story from the non-UB sets.

The reason blocks went away isn’t some nefarious plot. Players enjoyed them less as they proceeded. The first set would do the best, in all the metrics we measure, and then each subsequent set would do worse, again in every metric we measure, going down over time.

Having each set be its own thing has been significantly better received. We do it because it makes more players happy.

In addition, the risk of blocks is much higher. If you miss, you miss not once but three times. Imagine if this whole year had been the Murders at Karlov Manor block.

“But just do the better set as the block.” We don’t know which one that is. Every set we make we have high expectations for. It’s not until we start doing previews that we get a sense of crowd reaction.