The Modern Era of Top-Down Design 

I just want to say, thank you for your patience while I took my break from RU-vid. This is a topic I have been wanting to talk about for a while now and I hope you enjoyed it!

2 universes beyond sets per year is crazy… I remember when people would just homebrew custom magic cards based on their favorite characters from a game/movie/show and now it’s just back to back official products of those same things. 5 or 6 years ago if someone showed up to a game with a stranger things character or something like Optimus Prime or Captain America or whatever, it was a cool little homemade magic card you hoped wasn’t too busted or a custom art proxy or something, now we have 2 of those things already real and they’ve confirmed a marvel crossover…

All im getting from this video is that return to Lorwynn is gonna make me sad.

"Magic brought me in because of its originality of ideas and strong gameplay. But when what it becomes is just a mirror rather than a new concept, then perhaps a focus on Top-Down can pull us away from what made us fall in love with this game in the first place." Excellent closing lines. Excellent video. I fear for Magics future. I knew something was up when it became easier and more common to forget the names of sets in favor of their elevator pitch labels. "The fairy tale set," "the werewolf set," "the art deco set."

First things first: I didn't realize you were gone for two whole months because I've been binging your past videos to get story ideas. Felt like there was always a new idea. Time flies when you're having fun Secondly: I feel like some of the most unique set/planes are bottom up. Take my personal favorite, Alara. Similar to Ravnica, it was designed from the bottom-up to be a faction plane. Since there was no strong starting ground, no established reference, they had to make one (5) plane(s) that all felt mechanically and thematically unique. And they succeded. However, when we return to Alara (AND WE'D BETTER) it can allow for top-down design to flourish, because we know what the plane is like, just like we know what Gothic Horror is, what Greek Mythology is, what Westerns are, we know what Alara is. Familiarity doesn't mean you can't make a new concept Also, personally I feel like the two set block was the best way to go. Set one introduces the setting and main players and a bit of the story, and after you've gotten to really understand the plane the second set really ramps up the story. That was a big change but honestly a great one. Great video as always Dice!

I understand the struggle to make “new tools.” A friend and I spent the past 4 years designing our own custom set and making something unique, fair, and fun was definitely the most difficult part. Since we went mechanics first rather than flavor, we had nothing to lean back on. In the end, though, I believe we did some pretty stellar work with a very fun draft environment.

I see your point about questioning “where else can magic go mechanically?” but I’m hoping there will be another set that twists the boundaries of what we expect in a color combo mechanically. I think strixhaven was the most recent set in my mind that executed this well. Where we can explore what were sideline synergies and make them the main synergy.

As the song goes: top-down, bottom-up, that's the way we like to...design.

Let's remember that Arabian Nights, Fallen Empires, Homelands, & Kamigawa were top-down sets. Not exactly a ringing endorsement for the style. That being said Lorwyn, Innistrad, & Theros weren't bad at all & they were top-down sets.

Comfort is a trap, it makes sets so lame because they play it too safe. Every set is basically just universes beyond.

Good choice of topic. I've felt like Thunder Junction and Markov Manor have *really* pushed top-down design to their limit. These are sets that feel like they struggled to find good mechanics that fit the theme: We want players to be able to commit crimes. Right, so, what do we want to be a crime? If Thunder Junction had been more of a bottom-up set, they may have been able to realise that "targeting things is a crime" doesn't make sense and the idea of "commiting a crime" might just not be mechanically suitable at all. But on the other hand, some universes beyonds sets have genuinely had fantastic top-down design. Doctor Who especially did a great job of making a lot of cards feel mechanically and thematically harmonious, and for cards that couldn't be given specific resonance, was still able to tap well into larger set themes like "time" and "history" to give them mechanics that feel appropriate within the context of the set. And I think Doctor Who actually did have a surprise element - what got me interested in it was being surprised by all of the ideas they managed to include in interesting ways. In a way it was meeting expectations, but I was surprised by how well they managed to meet them. And I think that the Kamigawa problem is really going to ramp up in the future. Rosewater said Kamigawa failed because the audience that was familiar enough with Japanese folklore to get Kamigawa was too small - well, I wonder how large the audience that really gets things like Bloomborough is going to be. Just as a result of chance, I happen to not have watched any Western movies, so I didn't get Thunder Junction. And I've not watched anything like Bloomborough, so I'm not going to get that. And I don't like modern horror, so I'm probably not going to like Duskmourn. And I've not watched any car racing stuff, so I'm not going to get 'Racing World'. I'm wondering when we're going to get a top down set that I *do* get - and how many other people aren't getting one or more of these niche top-down themes. Which makes me wonder actually, whether universes beyond has kind of become necessary for MTG's top-down designers. The way we engage with media today is a lot less "genre-based" than 20 or 30 years ago. Now we're engaging more with franchises, and those franchises can even be cross-genre without feeling like proper entries into those genres. I think people are becoming more familiar with the tropes and references of individual franchises than with the tropes and references of broad genres, so for top-down sets to have the proper appeal, they're starting to need to be more franchise-based - The "Marvel" set is probably going to be much easier to engage with for most players than an MTG-themed "Superheros" set, with all new characters just referencing the tropes of the superhero genre.

Outstanding video and a great explainer for a really useful concept to understand in game design. Appreciate the example of how missing a pillar of top-down design communication theory can make it fall apart. Really helped put into words feelings I have about universes beyond.

One thing I think is interesting is how top down design is teally good at creating new unique mechanical gameplay, but bottom up is really good at creating unique and fun story and flavor. I will say, the complexity of card design these days I think may also be a result, or at least related to, the increase in top down design.

As someone who designs almost purely from the top down. I didn't even see some of the flaws until i saw this video. But here is my take. While flavour first is something i will always see as best. Much like any story there does need to be shifts, changes and new themes. As you said, surprises in what can be told. If you ask me, I think WOTC is leaning too much into comfort. Maybe learning the wrong lesson from Kamigawa and not trying anything new. For fear of new things lead to a failed set.

Fun video. I think the best example of resonance is just the basic color design. Each color is filled with creatures and concepts that reflects it's core identity. Stuff like mountain goats living in the mountains and skeletons being associated with evil and death. The early sets were all basically built top down (or more likely from the middle). It would be interesting to identify where the switch to bottom up became prevalent. Was it in tempest? I remember the game changing A LOT around that time. It's also very interesting to see them identify Kamigawa as their first top down set. IMO we're at a point in the games life where top down design makes sense. The rise of commander, and the vast catalogue of cards. A lot of commander players like strongly themed cards. In addition the sheer volume of cards available means that you're often choosing between 5 or 6 almost identical options. Good points throughout.

Great video! I’ve always heard the developers talk about “bottom up” sets but, as a new player, I haven’t seen any of them before. I couldn’t imagine any recent set that wasn’t a top down, theme first kind of set. And now I know why. Because they just simply haven’t done one in a while.

I have to strongly disagree that MtG has done it all see it all so just accept the Universes Beyond era. (I know that's not what you actually said but here I go anyways.) There are plently of mechanics and interesting designs out there for MtG to explore. Your Archplanes/4 Planes idea would be a solid 5 block by itself. It's a super intriguing concept and I'm pissed it'll never be given any official recognition, let alone be implemented. Is it a difficult and risky idea? Yeah and that's exactly why Wizards needs to do it. Wizards needs to take more risks in general, including shaking off the chains of Hasbro and their bean counters.

Thing is: The flavour centered top-down approach requires a good flavour and story to be based around, otherwise it becomes an ecclectic and dissonant mix of cards that won't come together to form a greater whole. Outlaws of Thunder Junction ist such an odd thing that the top down approach just leads to a bad self-parody of serious magic. Magic has relied heavily on top down design for a decade now, but the best storyline still is that of Urza and Mishra from the 90s. The worlbuilding of Theros feels oddly thin. Amonkhet is just lazy. Greece and Egypt are such rich themes and those sets did not come close to doing anything interesting with it. This is where I disagree with MaRo's assessment of Kamigawa: I have no clue about Japanese culture, but a Magic set is allowed to contain the unknown. I was captivated by the mystery of Kamigawa and I think the world building of Kamigawa is much stronger than it would have been had it just been a collection of American cliches of Japanese culture.

How can a game and especially mtg be exciting and present new surprising ideas when it's based on resonance? And the answer is very simple and we already have examples of that in Pop culture. To illustrate it lets talk of one of, if not the most beloved Pokemon Fan Game ... maybe ever. Pokemon Infinite Fusion. Most of us are familiar with Pokemon. You collect/befriend little creatures, that we let battle each other. We know the basic mechanics of there being types and such. The difference is just how deep our understanding of Pokemon is. But no matter from what entrypoint you look at Pokemon Infinite Fusion, it's fascinating. You get everythjing you expect from Pokemon, but always get something on top of that. From the simpelest point of just being curious how a mixture of Pikachu and Charizard may look like to combing Stats, Abilities, moves and types to make something more powerfully than before and need to strategize around that. It brings joy and challenges to every aspect of Pokemon no matter how deep your into the material. How can that be adopted into mtg? Do I want mtg to focus on meld? While I would like the idea of a set focused on meld would be great, the basic idea of carrying fusion over to mtg is way simpler and a bit more abstract. We had sets like Theros focusing on Greek Mythology or Ixalon focusing on Pirate tales. Implementing Fusion takes this one step further. Instead of focusing on one idea, you focus on two ideas and see how they interact. Fuse the idea of a Waterworld with the idea of an mechanical plane for example. We know examples of what each on it's own might look like, but we don't know what the plane would look like exactly. Everybody has their own ideas, but if executed correctly we would get what the mtg design team is going for even if it is drastically different from what we would have envisioned those two concepts being combined. We get something surprising, that is at the same time familiar. Mixing and matching has been in mtgs from the very beginning. Planeswalker walking to different Planes was a first light example of that. How does the character from this plane interact and function on this other plane? The wrong step would be to fuse Planes together like what would the combination of Theros and Ravnica look like. Combining Planes would result in a very unified thing, which is antithetical to what magic is. The universe shoulkd be vast and multifaceted. Create new planes, that don't embody one single ide, but take from multiple sources and combine them in new and fascinating ways to make the Multiverse even more colorfull than it already is.

You voiced the thoughts and concerns I had about new mtg sets. 😊

I do have this kind of impression of wotc (hasbro) 'cashing out' Making more product with less effort for higher prices and top down just lends itself to that better. That being said it gives me hope one day the effects of this will push the company to feel pressured into the ultimate hail mary: ADD PURPLE

Thank you for accurately describing the fatigue I’ve felt and seen in others these past few years. I love this game so much, as it has helped me create some of my closest friendships. A feeling I’ve had these past few sets (especially thunder junction) is a lack of depth compared to when I first played.

Love how much Strixhaven is showcased in the video as while it is one of the more underrated set, it is extremely relevant to this topic. STX being a bottom up set while still have such a good top down flavor that people assume it’s top down was truly remarkable

MH1-2-3 are the bottom-up sets. The common and uncommon are there for the draft evironment with strong themes on pairs, shards and wedges. Also they are Time Spiral block with the fat trimmed. With power creep, you could call them power bottom-up.

In terms of top down design in recent sets, I genuinely believe the Doctor Who one was an amazing example of both flavor and actual mechanical design. The set itself for the most part, while designed top down for flavor, mechanically feels bottom up. The decks and their new cards greatly expanded upon and inovated preexisting concepts in a unique, fun, and interesting way. Each decks (asside from the villain one) put emphasis on not just flavor but greatly expanding off of a preexisting mechanic. You have a deck with new cards dedicated to the mechanics of casting from exile, a deck centered around expanding on the historic cqrd mechanic, and (most significantly) a deck expanding immensely upon the the fairly forgotten suspend mechanic. The time counter cards in particular have opened up very creative and unique ways to play around with suspend as a mechanic that simply did not exist before. It feels like something out of a bottom up set despite the clearly heavy top down flavor of many cards. These decks suceeded immensely in balancing both sides of design incredibly well, and the fact its from universes beyond is kinda crazy.

Glad to have you back. Always a joy of my day to see your videos

Something that really ought to be said is a lot of the older more beloved top down sets are also bottom up sets! Innistrad begins as gothic horror then expands into a graveyard set. Theros begins as a Greek myth set then expands into an enchantment set. A major issue with a lot of the new top down sets is they aren’t mechanically cohesive. They’re just collections of mechanics that grope at the set theme. This is obvious when looking at Murders at Karlov Manor.

Awesome, a fresh video! I have seen several discussions of top-down and bottom-up design in writing and tabletop RPG mechanics. On forums, not so much RU-vid. So this is another strong entry, a useful tool for any artist.

You're exactly right in that there is no more real "surprise"... However, I've seen snippets of different spins on that concept. An example I think of is Captain N'ghathrod. Mill isn't necessarily good in Commander, but as an alternate wincon? As another resource? Sure. With the Fallout decks, they all had their archetypes, but they all seemed to have something of a Voltron subtheme present, and I think *that's* where we need to go - It's less about the individual card, and more about the synergies with other cards, new and old. I love finding new homes for old goodies. I love the idea of taking the bones of a several-years-old deck and breathing new life in to it with a grip of new cards that reimagine the deck.

I feel like bottom up is where magic really shines and is the most "magic". And tbh more topdown is probably why sets arent blocks anymore, as topdown sets to me atleast feels waaay less impactful after the first one. Sure, its awesome to see more if you really like it is funky. Now, when your spending a year exploring all the ways artifacts can be used in each color, while giving hate and such is a lot more interesting than the 13th zombie.

I don't think ill ever stop loving Magic the gathering. My father started me in 2010 with Return to Ravnica and i have been absolutely hooked ever since. And i agree, pretty much everything has been done by now. They need inspiration to boost of of to create new ideas. And i love all of my cards, i believe all of my cards have value because many, many years down the line, ill still have those cards and ill always be able to play with them. The art, the concepts, everything about magic the gathering I love.

MTG is PURELY Lucky* that their top down / bottom up actually physically matches the card face. Rosewater couldn't have used that metaphor when describing the actual card with practically any other example of these design philosophies, and I find that hilarious. It really is a force of nature, huh.

You always make killer video essays.

There is room for both. Recently in Mark Rosewater's podcast episode about 3 color pairs and specifically wedges, he talked about the restriction they had to make for takir that they had to center the color trio's in one of the allied colors and how next time they would want to do it with enemy colors. Strixhaven was also one of those weird sets that seems top down but was also made with the idea of enemy color factions that should play very differently than their Ravnican counterpart.

I wonder if the Universes Beyond sets can really work in the future. Like, the first one were really successful but they were also the most likely to succeed. Off course MtG players will be excited for D&D, LotR or Doctor Who. But what can come next ?

Amazing video! I really hope that we still keep getting a lot of original MTG stories

As with all things: Varity is the spice of life! Neither design mythos is better than the other, If there is too much top-down, we'll long for new ideas. too much bottom-up, and we'll dream about what-ifs. Be Creative, but also its fun to play pretend too.

Such a pleasure to watch a new video, Dice :) you've been missed. I absolutely love how Rosewater designs with resonance in mind - and I must say, up until 15mins ago, I'd die on the hill that top down design is the best. But you did introduce me to a couple of new ideas, I must ponder upon this. I just with Hasbro would burn 🥲

This video essay was outstanding! Going into this, I was totally set on top down, but you've really helped me appreciate the original charm that mtg has lost by abandoning top up design.

I think MTG can make successful top down designs because it’s bottom up designs are extremely polished,balanced and understood. people will generally criticize cards losing that “Comfort” factor when mechanics don’t also translate into the cards theme. This comes from the modern expectation of design. magic has pushed its complexity so hard it can succeed where another tcg may not. You need to understand how your game works mechanically to consider a top down design.

I think you're right that the single block per plane really hurts bottom up design since you just don't have enough space to really explore a world and help players know about it. Ikoria is a really good example of this, I can't say most players really understand all of how the world works beyond big monsters. And even top down doesn't quite work if the world works differently than expected or pulls from lore that people outside certain circles aren't familiar with, such as with Kaldheim. But also I think there's potentially another reason we're seeing so much top down out of nowhere all at once, and that's because these sets are likely easier to design and able to be published with fewer man hours. When a lot of the work is done for you by concepts already existing in the public conciousness, then all you have to do is figure out cards to match and send it off. And with Hasboro putting more and more demands on Wizards to ship more products and more sets and to do it with fewer employees, you have to cut corners wherever you can. Bottom up takes more time and work, and it's time they just don't have.

It's interesting because the thing you point out that rosewater criticized kamigawa for is the reason I love the old block and NEO felt really flat to me. Most of the contemporary pop culture notes of Japan do nothing for me. I live in Tokyo and the only reason I have to go to Akiba is because of tokyoMTG - meanwhile I'll travel across the country to visit a shrine. Above all this stuff is so personal: my second favourite set is Lorwynn and that's because I'm Cornish so I GET the what they're going for.

This is a great video, a lot of food for thought about what MTG has become these last years

Really interesting video, personnally i'm more a Yu gi oh player than a MTG one, and the top-down vs bottom-up problem is something that we have too. But the issue with both are quite different. Yu gi oh working more on "archetypes" than sets, but the same concept can be applied as well. But instead of lacking surprise and relying too much on comfort, Top-Down design in y gi oh struggles more on a practical way... they often sucks a lot. For exemple, one of the recent Top Down archetype we had was Ashened. Thoses are really stylish card that are references of Darksouls games. The mechanics of the cards revolve around a big dragon to kill and the city who were burned by this dragon. That's a super cool design, but it doesn't keep up with the rest of the game. On the other hand, we have bottom up cards who explore more and more absurd combo, allowing more and more powerfull deck. Tearlament and Kashtira are 2 really good archetype, created for exploiting brokens mechanics (mill for tearlaments, et banishment (exile) for kashitra). So to sum up, a flaw of Top-Down design is that it's harder to make a meta relevant card.

This perfectly articulates my problems with modern magic. Great video.

Fantastic work, best I've heard from you in a while. I feel like I have a better grasp of the concept now. I agree with the difficulty of bottom up development, but I thought of the upcoming return to Tarkir, we'll inherently have top down aspects there but as with the original visit and Ravnica, the tribes/guilds provide an opportunity to meld the two creative philosophies into one. They tried this a bit with new Capenna, but they leaned too far into the tropes and made it more of a gimmick than a part of the design space. I think caring less about checking all the boxes and allowing the natural mechanical flavor of the mechanics of the cards doing the guidance with these objectives in mind is the way to go.

Gamedesign is pretty awesome because you can tackle problems from different angles. I define Top-down more generally as solving something beginning with overall feel vs starting with the details and asking how those could make sense thematically. It's like plot or scenes first in storytelling. It's very creative because neither of the two is more important than the other, so you can start anywhere and pretty much wing it from there. Trust your gut and all.

I've struggled with following through on my creative writing projects for a long time. I'm currently working on a world that I'm building using MtG colors and such, but I've been struggling on how to actually follow through on it. Thanks to this video, I have a better idea on how to use both methods to approach my story. For Top-Down, I can use the idea of a Fantasy Apocalypse (think Fallout in a world of magic) to build resonance between interesting ideas to get to a story about finding one's place in a world of survivors working with and against each other. For Bottom-Up, I can use a focus on +/- effects and counters and anti-GW stuff to get into how people of the world use what they can to protect themselves and hurt others, ruining their chances for creating stable communities. There's much more to the world before and after this particular in-world period I'm thinking of (Arrow, I'm talking about Manto here), but I think it's good to actually follow through on something for once.

13:35 Strixhaven excluded, I hope! 😂

I honestly prefer top down design as a fellow lover of the color pie, In new sets I always want to see how colors manifest in different environments and I think mechanics should be fun but reflect the lore. Bottom up feels to to me like how some cartoons get their plot decided by the toy company

Some bottom-up ideas off the cuff: exile zone matters, blinking/ETB matters, death matters, mana value matters, battles matter…

Though I like top-down design in general, my issue with a lot of the more modern offerings is that they lack the "surprise" pillar. Older top-down sets, like original Innistrad and Theros, worked because they felt like they were their own worlds, ones which happened to be inspired by a real-world source. They looked at the atmosphere built by those sources and created something of their own to match, with the occasional Civilised Scholar or Rescue From the Underworld for spice. New top-down worlds, on the other hand, feel like little more than a shallow collection of references, like the top-down design is more about reminding us of other things that exist, rather than building something of their own. They're not "Magic's unique spin on X", they're "Straight up X, but with the Magic logo stamped on it".

Universes Beyond Lord of the Rings worked so well because 1. doing a Lord of the Rings themed set feels like a proper homage to the fantasy genre and 2. Tolkien's world that fits right in with the themes and aesthetic of Magic. It's just hard to imagine Jurassic Park existing in the Magic the Gathering universe. Even if the mechanics of the cards make logical sense, there's just something dissonant (and admittedly funny) about having your goblin get killed by a flying Ian Malcom. One advantage of bottom up set design is that it'll never have this issue; you design a card that you need mechanically, and then create an idea for flavor that will fit the set and Magic as a whole. Of course, top down design can give us some of our most flavorful and interesting cards that make the game feel like more than X's and O's. But even a 100% mechanically flavorful Stranger Things card is still going to feel "off" in the broader context of the game.

Great video

I kind of like bottom up themed cards over top to bottom. It feels like they actually put work into the cards. And it feels more creative from a story/lore perspective. Whereas top to bottom almost feels lazy in a way. Just taking preexisting things and calling it a day. Especially with all the dreaded universes beyond crap they keep throwing out.

More and more, I feel like that big list of tropes and themes that the design team puts on the whiteboard is kind of becoming the heart of top-down sets, rather than a jumping off point to realize a new interpretation of familiar ground. Cards feel like they're created as a wink to the audience first, and a window into another world second. Any interesting and unique concepts get diluted when they're mixed in with as many references as possible. The move away from blocks definitely doesn't help, since the designers have so many fewer cards to cover both the new and the familiar with. If someone told me that the original Theros block had overall more cards that were direct references or tropes than Thunder Junction, I'd probabky believe them, but it doesn't feel that way because those were spread out across three entire sets. Ironically, I actually think Universes Beyond leads to *more* interesting top-down design. Because the connection to established and familiar ideas is made overt and explicit, the challenge becomes less "how can we wink at the audience" and more "how can we properly invoke these specific elements?"

I typically do top down, and always seem to struggle doing that, and they almost always lead to being boring in comparison to my top down cards. But now that I've seen this it kinda explains why that. I'm thinking maybe doing bottom up may be worth looking into more and maybe trying a little mix of both.

In my humble opinion, the main issue is what kind of new, and by new I mean very new mechanics could be solid enough to be the backbone of a new MTG set? I know everyone hated it but mutate was IMO a great concept and a very bottom to top one in the world of Ikoria, same thing for Adventures in Throne of Eldraine or the way they approached Zendikar Rising. Pathways, DFCs, not only they are IMO mechanically one of best ideas in the entire life of magic, but they also suit that very changing universe extremely well. And yeah as someone who drafted/ played a lot of constructed games during 2020-2021 I know Mutate and the OP adventures cards lead to many issues- Escape slaps BTW, certainly not my Kroxa fan take- why am I coughing so hard suddenly?- . But my last point is that, just because you chose to immerse the player into a very specific or even somewhat specific world, your mechanics should not necessarily surprise like no one. Even if you managed to get a great limited set like Thunder Junction. Let's have some hope for Bloomburrow. So glad to see you back sir, cheers

Battles were such a cool idea of a card with so much room for potential in the mini race for counters or forcing bad plays from your opponent, but even in Standard their only ever used for their front face then aptly forgotten about or blinked with no regard for the face down. Craft with ____ was another 2 faced system which hardly ever sees the 2nd side. It was a brilliant idea to have slow-burn value engines (like flashback) that provided advantages, then forced interaction through high-mana exchanges and won trough grind and card advantage. Turns out the best way to print artefact synergy is just have one that prints win cons for 3 mana. Descend had extremely steep requirements that couldn't be reasonably achieved in any low power format. Kellan the Kid would've been an objectively more interesting card in WoE, Innestrad or Kaldheim MoM praetors feel so weak for no reason. Their not even that bad they just FEEL bad. The Dominus cards feel way better to play and they still feel ass (Tekuthal is pre good tho). The fact that Craft and Prototype weren't expanded more on is a genuine tragedy. Proliferate should and can be far more interesting than poison counters. No Rango references in Thunder Junction. Like who tf wouldn't play Rattlesnake Jake (or a reference like card). That's all i really got.

Honestly, not a great fan of the current direction of the game, in both set design and the ever increasing power creep. On the design, the latest sets feel shallow, too much focused on the flavor. And then there's the cards that keep stronger and stronger. The new cards being, most often than not, better versions of existing cards, make the previous ones irrelevant. For example: Force of Will, a powerful counterspell that could save you even when you ran out of mana, it was strong but unique. Now we have so many new free counterspells that I don't even how many of them are out there at this point. My guess is that this is due to the increase of popularity of the Commander format. Because it's a non-rotating format, players feel less urgency to invest in new cards that come out from Standard. But if you print better versions of Commander staples, then players will feel more inclined in buying those, because otherwise, they will be left behind within their game groups. I don't see this panorama changing any time soon. As long the Commander format leads sales, there's no reason for Wizards to change its strategy. But it will probably reach a point, where the same problems that plagued Standard, the need to keep up with an ever changing format, will start affecting Commander. Maybe then, we'll see some change.

As a lore junkie, I find top down to be a worthwhile dive into a set But as a jank deck brewerer, bottom down really brings out the synergies...

I don't think top-down is bad at creating surprises personally. The surprise comes from "oh how are they going to translate THIS thing into a MtG set?" Like, I'm looking forward to the Final Fantasy set and I'm really interested to see what they're going to do with Summons and summoners like Yuna. From my understanding they are supposed to cover the whole series, which is pretty crazy considering it's a series with 16 mainline games with an ungodly number of spin-offs. You could make most of the creatures in the set just your party members and main villains. How are they going to handle that? There's just a ton interesting questions in that realm and it seems they've been actually doing more creative stuff mechanically the more they are being pushed into some of these set mechanics, like the various stuff they did with the Doctor Who set. I also think that the top down design is a bit of a misnomer in some cases. Like, if Bloomhaven, or whatever the upcoming set is called, is literally just "it's an animal world!" That is an extremely broad idea to be working from compared to something like Wildwest set where there are very strong associations. Moreover, I think MtG has mechanically just explored a metric crap ton of ideas so it's very hard to just sort of throw an idea out there and have enough meat on the bones for it to sustain a set by itself. Even then, I just think it makes a lot of sense to generally take a top down approach while supplementing with bottom up. For instance, it's very easy to take a bottom up approach on random cards or just as a matter of principle. For instance, recently there was a video where Gavin was discussing giving Blue access to Vigilance as a keyword as a way to help their creature combat, especially in limited. This is something that was a broader idea they wanted to institute for the game as a whole which has just now been implemented. So, they were able to fit this in on blue creatures where they felt it was appropriate. I think we see a lot of bottom up design on Rares and Mythics too. Planeswalkers only very, very rarely feature set mechanics in any form. Even when they do, it makes sense and builds on their identity moreso than them being pigeon holed into a set. I'd say half or more of the rares and mythics in OTJ (just at a glance) feel like top-down designs while the others feel like bottom up designs. I'd even go so far as to say that there are such strong design conventions in Magic, that it's pretty easy to predict a lot of the types of effects we will see in a set and/or what type of permanent they will be on. A black 2 mana creature that's a 1/1 which forces an opponent to discard on ETB. Some O-ring/Pacifism variant. Maybe both if we are feeling spicey! A 3-mana artifact that taps for mana and has some nod to a set mechanic. Even if the origins of particular mechanics, like Plot or Crimes, are rooted in that set's setting, where you take those things and how they are shaped through development and playtesting are often design focused more so than flavor focused. Like, I'm pretty sure at some point Plot let you exile the card face down considering the nature of what you're doing, but for whatever reason they felt it was too much of a mental tax and instead decided it should be face up. Even then, some of my favorite cards in the set are the top down ones, like The Gitrog, Ravenous Ride. Like I love the last time we saw Gitrog, he was being ridden by Thalia and now he's a mount that mechanically eats the creature that is saddling him. Is Thalia okay?! lol

Several comments seem to be touching on this, but I do wonder about which sets may be top-down in presentation, but still bottom-up in design. That is to say, new sets are increasingly marketed to us as flavor-first products (Cowboys! Murder Mystery! Cyberpunk Ninjas!), but I'm hesitant to wave that off as evidence they didn't start with a mechanics focus for at least some of them. I think the themes in recent years have become more tropey to the point of caricature, and that there's a general shift to IP-first products -- both in Universes Beyond sets and with their own characters popping up on every plane in Avengers parody crossovers. Some of these, like March of Machines, certainly have all the hallmarks of top-down design. "What if [established character] was TRANSFORMED into a phyrexian?"... "What if [established character] and [established character] teamed up? How can we mash up each of their mechanical identities?" These feel like they have little mechanical underpinning to them, and as someone who's only played the game for a few years and isn't invested in those characters, I found that entire set to be a big whiff for me. When all the big-name characters returned in cowboy hats, my eyes glazed over again, but even then, I can't help but feel there's an alternative explanation: As cards in these sets are being designed, Hasbro or WotC or someone is mandating that, wherever possible, they should be printing the same rotating cast of heroes and villains to Strengthen the Brand or whatever. So, I imagine even bottom-up cards are more likely to be viewed through the lens of "What is this card similar to? Is there an existing character I could slap on here?" which in turn makes them feel like top-down cards at a glance. Looking at the most recent set, Modern Horizons III feels like a very tight combination of core mechanics, with lots of overlapping interactions (Proliferating in an energy or +1/+1 counters shell, tons of Eldrazi Spawn tokens to support colorless ramp but also sac strategies, etc.)... but it also feels like a big dumb nostalgia grab full of pun-infused references to old cards! I genuinely couldn't tell you which came first, but my gut says the set began with a mechanics focus on bolstering some old archetypes/mechnanics back into competitive relevance, and then slapping coats of nostalgia paint on it as they went. Thought-provoking video, and forgive the rambling. I've always found top-down/bottom-up discussions to be most fascinating when the line is blurred between the two. If it isn't obvious which came first, that points to success of designers to meet ludo- and -narrative in the middle, which as you said, is one of this game's historic strengths.

i got into mtg almost exactly a year ago, a major help in doing that was rhystic stydies video on phyrexia...

"We have rhystic study at home" Jk i lovd this video

I really want WOTC to start polishing some of these tools, make them evergreen like Cycling could be in every set.

What music did you use for the video? I really like some of them

I am wondering if you can do a mostly top down design but with a card or two of bottom up design when needed. It was a wild thought. It is a bit a curiosity to me.

I have a slight caveat about top-down design, comfort and surprise: yes, what you say holds true in most sets, but only because most top-down sets are, in a way, subversions. They are "X but in Magic", they aren't standalone. They rely so much on resonance because because the comparison with the expected is meant to be a core part of the appeal. They could totally do a top-down set that doesn't rely on that, that introduces us to a brand new world with no clear parallels, with its own brand new worldbuilding that doesn't rely on gimmicks. Why don't they do that? Because it takes more time, both to create the sets and to introduce the players to the worlds. They are also not as easy to market because they can't be as easily summarised. Their current business model simply doesn't allow for original top-down design, only referential top-down.

Top down design is good so more card do things that make sense for whats being presented. The problem is how we've gone from a fair 2 for 2/2 bear to that might have haste or trample to a 2 drop that can utterly warp the game around itself.

If a card game has all decks with the same cards in it. A top-down approach could be exclusively used. The design of choice for frame, icon, and text placement could, then be changed for each deck. This is a departure from TCG design, because the mechanics vary to much. If the arrangement of this information varies to much from deck to deck. It will become more difficult for players to think of which card in their deck it represents. The consistency of the frame, icon, and text placement draw their eyes to familiar places on those cards.

thank you for this video. we could talk all day of what sets are top-down and what sets are bottom-up, but at the end of the day... mtg main sets are dangerously approaching un-sets, there's way too many goofy cards, way too many jokes... i get that not everything has to be dark and grim like the phyrexian war sets, but designing entire new planes around gimmicky and wacky concepts is a bit too much imho

It feels like the game is evolving, mabye for better mabye not but it's changing. I feel like now it's good there expanding their player base I hope in a few years after the universe beyond sets bring in more players we can come back to the bottom up desgin again. Magics entering a new cycle

I never knew that top-down and bottom-up literally refer to card topology. I thought it was some kind of hierarchical allusion.

Top-down design relying on established ideas and comfort among the players can also lead to creative laziness. For me, the best example or worst offender in this regard (depending on one's perception) is the recent takeover of Universes Beyond, which is essentially turn forcing a usually entirely disconnected property into the framework MtG cards and call it a day when it comes to create a cohesive in-game universe (regardless of the degree of success of those sets). UB that by its own nature, while it is an easy way to cater to the fandoms of those IP, may also alienate players unfamiliar with those non-MtG series, to whom the contextless MCU-like reference ("Look! There's X! We know you like X!") cannot speak.

What tires me most is the frequency and the amount of cards. I mean, I had fun with LotR and D&D sets because I'm a fan of both, and generally don't really care too much about the "quality" of a set because there's always something fun and new. But I just can't keep up with it anymore. Why not just release one big set a year and supplement it with some smaller themed expansions that (re)introduce unique mechanics? That used to work.

The state of magic design is crazy. I am not sure if top down is the problem as much as the reasons for it. I think either is suitable, but both can be screwed up big time

To me, top design is more interesting up front but loses interest over time. Bottom up is the opposite, it’s less interesting until you play it more and start to appreciate the design qualities from playing. Top down will get people to buys sets up front but will encourage fatigue over time, this is why I think Magic is so bipolar with player interest now. You have a real fast cycle of player fatigue, when the only thing interesting about the set is the flavor.

I liked the analysis. However, I think there a group of bottom up sets being ignored. The Modern Horizons sets. MH3 builds the White, Black, and Green archetypes around modified. Bringing the Adapt mechanic into Black and adding offensive Bestow cards with Trickster's Elk. Bottom up has a strong bastion of support in Modern Horizons. Additionally, Modern Horizons 2 was the best selling set prior to Lord of the Rings so I think Wizards should be able to see bottom up sells as well.

For some strange reason I wanted to hear the end of that Gordon Ramsey joke. A small detail in the production I know. But please let us hear the punchline

I like some of the ideas of top down sets. However I think their are not creating new planes, expanding it, just doing the most obvious and going to the next. Capenna, Kaldheim and Strix Haven could have so much more.

But heres a question; what is the flavor in service of? The story feels like they just randomly drop whatever magic characters in it nowadays, instead of building around what the characters would actually do. The stories feel like they are playing with dolls, and the sets feel no different due to it.

Sosuke was my first ever MTG Deck back in Saviors, so Kamigawa will always have a special place in my heart. I was practically born a weeb with a Shonen jump volume already in my hand, so every single one of the tropes they leveraged from Shinto myth have stuck with me for my entire life. Mark thinks they could've made Kamigawa better: I don't think they could've. It's already perfect, and we wouldn't have gotten the cyberpunk glory of a set we had with Neon Dynasty without it. The next time we go to Kamigawa, I can't even imagine how amazing it will be.

I have been wanting to start my on youtube channel where I do soli role playing using a lot of the story telling stuff of mtg. I was just going to let it be a kind of fanfiction with stuff like the color pie and realms of my own. I say that because mtg made more than a card game. Theur archetypes are pure psychology somehow. Plus their world building cannot just apply to rpg or games n general but story. It can be used to actually aid a writer. If expanded upon it could be good role play. Also build characters and worlds. Heck it can make actual places to visit. Not just natural but cities. Yeah they started out making a card game. It may be and can be so much more in the realm of fiction and else where.

If you're gonna look at Universes Beyond and not just look at standard sets, I feel like you can't leave out Modern Horizons which is *extremely* bottom up in its approach.

Universe beyond gordon ramsie would just have an effect of exiling anyone the ef from his kitchen.

How is Strixhaven "bottom-up" when it feels and looks like a generic Harry Potter set? :^) My favorite sets are Shards of Alara, Khans of Tarkir, Shadowmoor, and Ixalan. I loved the entirety of the Alara, Lorwyn, Ixalan series, whereas I feel that Dragons of Tarkir ruined Tarkir... Spice8Rack has a perfect video about it. I would assume Alara and Tarkir are bottom-up as their mechanics are super cool, and I've never seen anything like their artwork and worldbuilding... despite Tarkir being very much orientalism at face-value it doesn't seem to have any real-world connotations? Orientalism being a fantasy itself. Hmm and Naya has a few Mayan-esc motifs... But I would say Lorwyn and Ixalan are very much top-down, as they are obviously analogies to European fairy-tales and the Spanish conquest of South America and fantasies about El-Dorado? I guess I'm kinda struggling to tell the difference between top-down and bottom-up to really have an opinion on which is better... but I strongly dislike Universes Beyond, even if I love something like Lord of the Rings I do not want LotR in my Magic game, I would rather have some form of original parody than another IP much like Innistrad.

As a newer person to magic, I'm honestly not understanding why people complain about top-down and universes beyond. Seeing a mtg interpretation of a piece of media is honestly more interesting than an original plane. Kamigawa, or Doctor Who is infinitely more interesting than ravnica

It's true. Bottom up design is a lot of work. And you don't have a guarantee of returns. But don't worry, there's a way to do less work and exploit people's preferences and... still not guarantee returns.

I encourage you all: *PROXY BOI SUMMER*

My problem with modern top down design is that its no longer top down design. The flavour on most cards don't actually make any sense when you look at the rules text. A card like Loan Shark should have you or your opponent pay something or loan something right? Why does the Slickshot Vault-Buster have 4 toughness, vigilance and gets more powerful when you commit crime when the flavour is that of a explovie specialist that plants explosives and runs away with the loot? Why does a Gold Pan makes the creature stronger? Now look at mostly any card from original Innistrad and the flavour and rules text just makes sense.

MaRo seems to have an extremely shallow understanding of what good "top-down" design is. Or maybe of what good flavor is. The most important thing is not meeting the audience where they are with all the disparate references to pop culture. The most important thing is to have non-contradictory flavor. Give the audience the ability to explore and attach themselves to the lore - as much as they are willing to themselves. Deep and non-contradictory flavor. WotC fails at this again and again in recent years, because they set their priorities wrong. Btw, Kamigawa was pretty flavorful, I disagree with Mark (and probably you) again here. The new Kamigawa is much more quirky than the old one.

I don’t like hasbro Edit: and I would say they are generally equally good, but it is fun to have both

Desin-ging noodles

I love how magic has moved away from mechanical sets.

They are using top down design the way old theaters used masks. They used certain mask for certain things. To convey info quickly. Just for a different reason.

In my opinion, the flavour of the set falls apart when the comfort factor of the audience is set too high, and the imagined average person for this is factor has too narrow or limited scope for imaginative or creative ideas. The original Kamigawa block was a failure because their audience couldn't relate as closely to it? I bounced hard off Wilds of Eldraine because it was a neo-Disney, fairy tale schlock, now with new and improved Kellan. A return to Lorwyn for more Fae and unsettling faerie tale design works better for MTG. Even Thrones of Eldraine wasn't as saccharine in the portrayals of well know genre tropes.

There's nothing I dislike more than listening to rosewater's voice.. though that glitch transition noise is also kind of annoying. Otherwise, good video.

I could see the elder scrolls being a good set in magic

I’m pretty sure I came up with the term top down design and then Wizards R&D started using it.