In an interview several months ago on brainburst.com, Mark Rosewater intimated that further surprises are on the way about 8th edition. His exact words were:

”This was a chance to do something special. There are more surprises that we have yet to reveal, but we are trying to make this a fun year. 8th Edition is the centerpiece for the whole thing.”

This revelation went largely unnoticed among the magic playing populace, and for two key reasons. First, most were still recovering from the shock of the new card designs to pay attention to detail, and secondly that no one really reads Brainburst anymore anyways.

However, in our eternal vigilance to provide readers with the very best in rumors, libel, incessant whining, MiseTings took note of this new factoid and went to work to discover what in fact these future surprises are.

Our search yielded immediate results, as it was quickly discovered through a leak at Hasbro's printing division (who have been printing the new 8th edition cards) that the card face is only half the story for the new look of magic.

Apparently, Richard Garfield, in addition to his pet peeve about the size of Power/Toughness indicators, was always rather miffed at how boring the card BACK looked.

In addition, there was a great deal of confusion at Hasbro as to the name Magic: The Gathering. What gathering? After all, Magic Online had already assured that no gathering (or indeed human interaction of any kind) needed to take place to play magic. The name just wasn't catchy or meaningful enough.

Luckily, WotC R&D saw an opportunity to integrate these changes with other changes in design philosophy. The result was the following template for card backs:



This logic behind this was perhaps best expressed by Aaron Forsythe, editor of MagicTheGathering.com, a site dedicated to the best in delivery of bad news and spin doctoring:

”When we got a few weeks into 'You make the card' and 'Selecting 8th Edition',we realized that magic players were a lot dumber than we had originally assumed, and we have since been working hard to bring the game down to their level. This 'dumbing down' had occured once before with 6th edition rules, but apparently things were still too complicated.”

As a result of this realization, many changes had been made:

- Eigth edition card faces were designed to be 'easier to read.'

- Damage will be referred to as Owwie from 8th edition on.

- Game and Match losses have been deemed too harsh a penalty, and will be replaced this summer with 'time outs.'

- Legions 'Fat Packs' include a version of 'Hooked on Phonics' as opposed to the more traditional inclusion of a novel.

- Casting costs were scaled up universally by 2, giving players several turns to figure out what to do before they actually have to do it.

- It is rumored that WotC are also trying to help beginning players with playing and trading by including a card evaluation by a known player in place of the more traditional flavor text. This is based on a card scan that appeared on ebay. The scan has been removed, but the card was apparently called "Wrath of Jebus", a 2W sorcery with the effect "Remove all creatures from the game". Apparently, in place of clever flavor text, the card had the following text in italics at the bottom:

"Joshua Claytor rates this card: 2.5 for limited, 1.5 for constructed."

In addition, Hasbro executives are reported to be pleased that now magic cards can now be foiled on both sides, making them by far the prettiest darn collectible cards you can buy.

Because of the new card backs, new rules changes will also be coming into effect at the release of 8th edition:

-Opaque sleeves are to be mandatory (this is partly because otherwise legal cards would be marked, and partly because some people are still too dumb to use opaque sleeves on their own).

-Players will have to reveal card backs of all cards when they leave play or the stack and at the end of games to verify that they are not proxies. Violation of this rule will result in a 5 minute 'time out'.

In an unrelated story, Hasbro announced this week a hostile takeover of Ultra-Pro Inc.

Discuss this article in the Magic: the Gathering Forums!

In an interview several months ago on brainburst.com, Mark Rosewater intimated that further surprises are on the way about 8th edition. His exact words were:

”This was a chance to do something special. There are more surprises that we have yet to reveal, but we are trying to make this a fun year. 8th Edition is the centerpiece for the whole thing.”

This revelation went largely unnoticed among the magic playing populace, and for two key reasons. First, most were still recovering from the shock of the new card designs to pay attention to detail, and secondly that no one really reads Brainburst anymore anyways.

However, in our eternal vigilance to provide readers with the very best in rumors, libel, incessant whining, MiseTings took note of this new factoid and went to work to discover what in fact these future surprises are.

Our search yielded immediate results, as it was quickly discovered through a leak at Hasbro's printing division (who have been printing the new 8th edition cards) that the card face is only half the story for the new look of magic.

Apparently, Richard Garfield, in addition to his pet peeve about the size of Power/Toughness indicators, was always rather miffed at how boring the card BACK looked.

In addition, there was a great deal of confusion at Hasbro as to the name Magic: The Gathering. What gathering? After all, Magic Online had already assured that no gathering (or indeed human interaction of any kind) needed to take place to play magic. The name just wasn't catchy or meaningful enough.

Luckily, WotC R&D saw an opportunity to integrate these changes with other changes in design philosophy. The result was the following template for card backs:



This logic behind this was perhaps best expressed by Aaron Forsythe, editor of MagicTheGathering.com, a site dedicated to the best in delivery of bad news and spin doctoring:

”When we got a few weeks into 'You make the card' and 'Selecting 8th Edition',we realized that magic players were a lot dumber than we had originally assumed, and we have since been working hard to bring the game down to their level. This 'dumbing down' had occured once before with 6th edition rules, but apparently things were still too complicated.”

As a result of this realization, many changes had been made:

- Eigth edition card faces were designed to be 'easier to read.'

- Damage will be referred to as Owwie from 8th edition on.

- Game and Match losses have been deemed too harsh a penalty, and will be replaced this summer with 'time outs.'

- Legions 'Fat Packs' include a version of 'Hooked on Phonics' as opposed to the more traditional inclusion of a novel.

- Casting costs were scaled up universally by 2, giving players several turns to figure out what to do before they actually have to do it.

- It is rumored that WotC are also trying to help beginning players with playing and trading by including a card evaluation by a known player in place of the more traditional flavor text. This is based on a card scan that appeared on ebay. The scan has been removed, but the card was apparently called "Wrath of Jebus", a 2W sorcery with the effect "Remove all creatures from the game". Apparently, in place of clever flavor text, the card had the following text in italics at the bottom:

"Joshua Claytor rates this card: 2.5 for limited, 1.5 for constructed."

In addition, Hasbro executives are reported to be pleased that now magic cards can now be foiled on both sides, making them by far the prettiest darn collectible cards you can buy.

Because of the new card backs, new rules changes will also be coming into effect at the release of 8th edition:

-Opaque sleeves are to be mandatory (this is partly because otherwise legal cards would be marked, and partly because some people are still too dumb to use opaque sleeves on their own).

-Players will have to reveal card backs of all cards when they leave play or the stack and at the end of games to verify that they are not proxies. Violation of this rule will result in a 5 minute 'time out'.

In an unrelated story, Hasbro announced this week a hostile takeover of Ultra-Pro Inc.

Discuss this article in the Magic: the Gathering Forums!