Summary:
Themes for the Future
- Innovation for the Future and Honoring the Past
- Creating Something for Everyone
- Commitment to Magic Lore and Story
2023
Coming August 10th - Secret Lair Commander Deck: Angels
Wilds of Eldraine is the first set of the "Omenpath Arc", the start of a 3-year storyline culminating in 2026.
Jurassic World UB coming with next Ixalan set, like Transformers with BRO.
Additional LTR holiday release coming in November
MTG Arena
- Anniversary events upcoming in September
- Better duplicate protection to be introduced in WOE
- New achievement system to be added
- SOI last remastered set "for a while", but full Khans of Tarkir set to be added by the end of the year.
2024
- Akin to Dominaria Remastered along with retro frames
Murders at Karlov Manor (Q1 standard set)
- Top down murder mystery set based in Ravnica
- Not a "normal" Ravnica set - not focused on guilds
- Focused on solving mysteries
- Comes with Ravnica: Clue Edition, a multiplayer Magic experience
Fallout UB Commander Decks
- Themes set to represent factions from the world
- Coming March 2024
Outlaws of Thunder Junction (Q2 standard set)
- Brand new plane featuring multiple villains from across the multiverse
- Introducing double-face cards to MH in a complex drafting format
- Coming to Arena, available to draft and play at launch.
Arena additions
- Pioneer masters- Draftable set intended to make Arena "Tournament Pioneer" complete
- Integration of local FNM play into Arena (stuff like XP on your account)
- Introducing "Beyond Boosters" - a new kind of booster unique to the setting, featuring new cards and reprints
Bloomburrow (Q3 standard set)
- Start of the "Dragon Storm" story arc
- No humanoids. Only anthropomorphized animals (mice, rats, frogs, birds, etc) at their normal sizes - but with magic and weapons
Duskmourn: House of Horror (Q3(?) standard set)
- Top down modern (70s/80s) horror set
- Brand new world set inside one giant mansion
2025
(very loose info on sets in development)
Innistrad Remasterd
- "Death Race" set taking place across three different worlds via the Omenpaths
- Two worlds from premiere sets with no "return". Third world seen on cards but never visited in a premiere set
- A return to Tarkir
- A blending of Khans of Tarkir and Dragons of Tarkir
- Tentpole release like LTR
- Will encompass each main FF release all the way up to FFXVI
- Will be available on Arena
General Arena plans
- Better new player experience
- Improving collectibility and personalization
- Figuring out 3+ players on Arena
- Start of unnamed story arc (codenamed 'Metronome')
- Set in outer space as a top down "Space Opera"
Codename Wrestling
- A return to Lorwyn
2026
(extremely loose concepts. Still in vision design)
Codename Yachting
- Return to Arcavios
Codename Zipline
- "Capstone Event Set" for the previous arcs (like March of the Machine and War of the Spark)
What a disappointing year… it’s so sad to see magic just become an advertising platform for other franchises. Maybe bloomburrow will be interesting, as it’s the only original thought in the line-up?
I dunno, aside from the UB stuff, everything seems pretty interesting to me. I'm a bit wary of the murder mystery set, but I'm not gonna judge anything without knowing more.
And Magic has been "MTG set in X theme" for a long time now. If that's your bar, I'm not sure what you have to enjoy about the game, tbh. Heck, even Bloomburrow is parallel to Redwall, and I don't see that as a bad thing, imo.
Everyone is different I guess. The modern era of MTG is clearly popular among some types of players, they are making record profit. However success measured by ‘packs sold’, and success measured by ‘unique and interesting game” are two different things, despite what WotC execs say.
My lament I guess is that magic used to be a game which wasn’t afraid of creating new and interesting creative ideas, and making them uniquely their own. While there is still an element of that in some sets, they are taking a back seat to the current stale design model of “A trope + B gimmick”. It just feels lazy and inspired, and who wants to play a game that is now just a platform for pop culture references?
Like I said, though, Magic's been that way for a long time now. What's the last set you would say provided a "unique and interesting game"? Shards of Alara? Maybe not even that. I just don't really see the point in dismissing these upcoming sets for something that's been true of every Magic set for the last 15 years at least.
Era 1 - Magic makes its own worlds and story with unique characters, cosmology, and design (eg Urza, lorwyn, mirrodin, etc).
Era 2 - Magic starts riffing off of extended fantasy and legends with more direct references, but still a flavour of distinct and unique personality (eg theros, amonkhet, innistrad, etc).
Era 3 - Magic literally just shills other IP now. Jim Hopper can get in a tardis to fight gandalf. An original, unique, creative universe takes a backseat to direct rip-offs.
Have problems with the UB stuff if you want, but that doesn't have anything to do with the upcoming standard sets that afawk are no different than any other set. Dismissing everything because you are hungup on one isolated thing doesn't make any sense.
Not trying to yuck your yum, just pointing out a trend in the enshitification of magic, which you asked me to justify. I feel the current design trends of WotC trying “have their cake and eat it too” with increasing frequency of UB blended premier sets leads to a convergence which makes premier sets less exciting, less unique, and less fun. But each to their own, if you like the modern design, have fun!
I'm not asking you to justify anything - I'm saying you're wrong. UB hasn't changed premier sets like you're claiming. They are largely the same as any other set released in the last 15+ years, as much as any IP can be the "same" over a decade of development. It is your choice to let your dissatisfaction with UB color your opinion of other Magic product.
And I don't have a "yum" here. These upcoming sets might suck, or they might be amazing. We have no idea based on what's been revealed so far. My only intent here is to push back against this needless negativity based on nothing but personal hangups. I'm not going to claim Magic is perfect. I have issues with UB as well. But having such a negative kneejerk reaction to an announcement so sparse on actual information is just going to turn this community into a toxic hole, which wouldn't be good for anybody.
There aren't any UB premier sets. There never have been and none of have been announced.
For all intents and purposes, LotR is essentially a premier set. It had a pre-release, its draftable, it has multiple booster styles, it replaced the launch slot which would otherwise have been a premier set… we’re just splitting hairs now. The fact it’s not standard legal really doesn’t mean anything anymore.
But Standard legal is literally the definition of a Premier Set. They literally just changed the name of "Standard Set" to "Premier Set" its the same concept. Now as standard becomes less popular standard legality becomes less important and we are starting to see "supplemental" sets be treated with major focus, but in a world where MH2 and LOTR are the two best selling sets I think that shift was inevitable.
They used to call them "Standard Sets" but they stopped because I think they thought that sent the message they were only for standard players. I do agree "Standard legal sets" is more accurate, though it is a mouth full.
Redwall, Guardians of Gahoole, Warrior Cats, Secrets of Nimh, An American Tale, Zootopia Rango...
The "Talking Animal setting" has been done a bunch. Which is fine. There hasn't been a single "original" set concept in magic. Even the most out there settings like Mercadia or Phyrexia are made by mixing other pre existing tropes and concepts. Same as all art.
Weren't the old Urza sets such a disaster for magic they almost killed the game and got R&D threatened with being fired?