Where Does the Idea for a Magic Card Come From? | Magic: The Gathering Thunder Junction MTG 

this was really beautiful.

“Can a player have flying?” “No.” Form of the Dragon: “Am I a joke to you?”

Interviewer: Where does the idea for a Magic card come from? Future MTG Designer: *drops a huge tome entitled "The Life of Gavin"*

This went from a fun niche magic interest video to a must-watch for creatives and people looking for a spark of inspiration so subtlely, but so beautifully. Masterfully done.

big shoutout to your mom cutting out those homebrew cards

I would like to start a petition to get Najeela's name officially changed to "Najeela, the Nice Casual Warrior Commander (Oops)"

Gavin you gotta stop making me cry! The story about getting Josh's card idea into a set just got me right in the heart. But there are a lot of cool stories here! Also the way this is edited together is really neat!

A SEA fan/player here, I'm stoked for a Filipino set and not just that, a SEA inspired set would definitely be great. We have a whole throve of mythologies and folklores that have been left untapped/untouched by many games out there.

Make more videos like this! It gets the community involved through featuring them and it also provides niche and interesting behind the scenes trivia! As a player it is always fun to see the thought process that went into the creation of the cards, from commons to mythics

This video is one of the best. Love the structure, the storytelling, the poetry reference, even the sneaky Tom cameo. Inspirational video Gavin. Thanks for sharing.

Oh wow the office has CHANGED! Of course it has, I haven't seen it since 2001, but the concept art room looks like where there was once the full globe of Dominaria during the war with all the attack lines and marching arrows surrounding it. On top of all the insights into design and inspiration, it was also a blast to see the high tower in Reton, love it!

The C17 Cat deck is one of my favorite releases ever, and the "real cat" energy of Hungry Lynx and Qasali Slingers are a big reason why. Thanks for that, and thanks for signing my Mirri Weatherlight Captain that commands one of my favorite decks to this day.

man, this is a very Graham Starkian video =)

I could cry right now

It's an honour to have been included in this video, especially having my British accent introduce one of our greatest creative exports, but mainly as this was such a moving tribute to creativity overall.

I really love this video, it's always amazing to hear how the stories and experiences of people influence the cards we play with. Keep up the good work Gavin.

hi! 12 more of these, please, thanks ! 👍

I'm really glad to be able to hear the story about Retrofitter Foundry. Commander 2018 was my introduction to the format and I chose the Izzet Artifact deck because my other friends had already chosen the other 3. Whenever I had played Standard I only ever used Azorius or Esper and I'd never really played Artifacts apart from the UB Affinity intro deck I had learnt how to play with in Mirrodin. After a little while I decided turning the deck into UR tokens would be more my speed, but Retrofitter Foundry is still an awesome card in the deck to this day.

“So I made Najeela. Oops” 😂 Awesome videos as always Gavin

I really enjoyed this video. Would love more of them. It's great to hear about where all those cards came from. First I wanted to critic the repetition of the question, but in the end it made beautiful sense for why it was always asked. Thank you for the video, Gavin

This was an incredible retelling

I have never played magic in my life (i do play a lot of other TGC's), but this popped up on my feed. this was really cool to see where inspiration comes from. thank you

It is hilarious how many busted card you made, but I am glad to see you embrace it instead of hiding it. I am surprised with you being a Ninja fan and your age we never got the old internet meme of pirates vs ninjas as a gag.

Interesting question, why aren't you allowed to look at fan made cards? Is it a liability thing where people may claim copyright infringement?

Gavin, you made Serene Remembrance??? Okay, so, I have a story to tell about that card. When I was in high school, during the Fall of 2013, I had a classmate who was really into Magic. He and his friend would play and one day he asked if I would be interested. I hesitated, but eventually I gave it a try. I wasn't very good, but I fell in love with the game. So, when my birthday came around, my friend asked me what kind colors I wanted to play. I choose Black and Green (because I played Wizard101 and those colors made me think of my favorite schools: Death and Life). He made me a Black/Green Deathtouch deck as a birthday gift. I don't have the deck anymore, but I distinctly remember Serene Remembrance being among the cards he included. The art of the card lives rent free in my mind and I have good memories whenever I think of the card. 10 years later, I'm still involved with Magic (and sorry if that made you feel a little old lol). Magic is an important part of my life and I don't go a day without thinking about it. Thank you so much for getting that card to print and being a reason I'm still involved today! And thank you for the video, too! It was great to hear how magic cards get made : )

This is an amazing video. Loved every minute of it. Thank you for putting that all together and sharing those stories with us. So interesting!

Such an interesting video, really shows how inspiration can come from anywhere or anyone. It's always great getting that insight on the design process. I love the stories behind all of the cards, and it just shows how passionate you are with these endearing memories about the game

*points at screen* LOOK GARY THERE I AM! This video was rad as heck, I love hearing design stories like this and it goes to show really just how much love and care goes into this game we love!

this was such a beautiful video! please never stop making these! (:

Such a beautiful, fun video. Thank you for sharing!

I really enjoyed this. Thanks Gavin. Great editing

Its never to late to errata yurikos command ninjutsu 😉

Really liked this episode. Well done ❤

Loved this video! Felt really poetic, as appropriate to the ending 💜

Love the video ❤. Then again you put out so much good in the world. Love you man! Thanks for all that you do.

This is amazing. I'd say it was the best video you made yet, but your tribute to Sheldon gives it a run for its money. The last little bit is timeless. Thank you for sharing.

This video is legitimately breathtaking

This is a really great video and I’d love more like this!

Beautiful. Thank you, Gavin

Beautiful stuff Gavin. Thank you

Thanks Gavin, that was amazing!

Thank you Gavin. That was absolutely lovely.

First this is amazing and thank you. To the staff both past and present of wizards and the community that has made the events and local store truly magical through my life I thank you, love and laughter in your lives and cheers friends

RU-vid download this automatically before my flight to Philippines.This was not what I was expecting but this was awesome!!!

Gavin, you forgot your closing phrase, but may your inspiration and love for the game never end. You got this!

Thank you, beautiful, great video, I think a lot together with my friends that there are many types of abilities and effects that deserve a card to make them unique enough to make a commander deck with them, like Bruvac does for the deck mill, like a legendary creature like Guile, to help counter spell decks, or a legendary creature like Possibility Storm, for the type of deck that I really love, a Chaos deck, especially if it were mono red, even in red I would like to have one legendary creature that improves the top exile cards, perhaps by placing counters on them, so that you can only play them on your turn, all of this would be wonderful to do and I would love to see one or more of these cards in the future.

The video i needed that i didn't know i needed! Well done!!! What about you asking other designer about where the idea of great or impactful cards they designed came from!

Casual Najeela? I just threw up in my mouth a little bit... Ha, seriously though, I've tried my hand at designing cards. I fully understand how "Oops" happens sometimes. I've been playing for 23 years, I've learned to take the good with the bad and the overly good... Thank you, Gavin and everybody else behind the scenes!

I run Serene Remembrance in my Codie deck to let me recast the 0-cost spells! Cool to know that it was designed by young Gavin!

Wonderful vid. Great vibe.

I really love New Blood; text-changing effects are some of my favorite kinds of weirdness in Magic.

The video was amazing, the ending was beautiful

A video about the testing process would be cool. I’m really curious if there’s enough testing going on since there’s been a lot of “oopsie” moments and powercreep spikes over the past few years

Unfortunately Geode Golem doesn't work with my favorite expensive commander: Phage. Love Stinging Study and Cloudkill though.

This is great. Spent my lunch enthralled.

Just made me fetch a River of Tears 😭 that was beautiful

Beautiful video, thank you Have a nice day

Incredible video/podcast Gavin! Can we get more reveal ramp but in other colors? Reveal ramp feels more red or blue then green by the way

I've always toyed around with designing magic cards in my notes app but never thought about making little physical cards out of them... I might do that. Thanks for the idea Gavin

This was truly special 🥰

I was playing magic and didn’t get a good result… so I made a card on the spot and won- Gavin Norris.

One of my favorite things to do is make custom cards that feel authentic to MTG. Most of my ideas come from fictional characters outside of Magic. One of my favorite ideas was a mono colored cycle of commanders inspired by companions. They had eminence, but the eminence ability was a negative ability that hated on what those colors were "strongest" at but would get a strong effect when the commander is on board. For example: [Liantis, Ancient Vitality] {4}{W}{W}{W} Eminence Whenever a creature with power 2 or less enters the battlefield under your control, if Liantis, Ancient Vitality is in the command zone or on the battlefield, that creature loses all abilities. Vigilance Creatures you control can block an additional creature each combat and get +0/+1 for each creature they're blocking. Whenever a creature you control dies, if it was dealt damage by an opponent's creature, put that card onto the battlefield tapped, under your control. 4/5 This was one of my earliest cards though. I've learned so much with every card I created. I've reeled in the essay-like text boxes and have found some personal design philosophies I like to stick by unless it makes sense not to. My biggest dream is to work as a designer for MTG. In the meantime, I'll continue to make my customs :))

Beautiful message 🙂

This was wonderful!

Hopefully one day this will get read I miss nomads. We haven't seen the nomad type in a pretty long time. They didn't really have anything that clicked with them anyhow, but your citys blessing at machu pichu made me think of minimalism permanents. Reward having very little on board, +blah for not having any artifacts or the whole tribe gets vigitouch for owning less than 10 permanents. As a nomad with very little representation in modern magic, Id love it.

This was so cool! Can we have a Magic origins story next? Like about richard garfield and the whole story?

Another incredible video!!

Will there EVER be a good Werewolf-mechanic? Like give me a Commander that transforms and has amazing werewolf art and skip the transforming over and over for like 20 creatures every turn. Mechanics like daybound/nightbound are absolte trash in commander and it is just a fantasy archtype that is somewhat locked away!

How do you answer a question that is too complex to answer? Enter: this video. Well done ❤

Wonderful video, truly interesting insight on how and why magic cards look the way they do. Thanks for everything Gavin! Same for the rest of the Wotc staff

its funny to see the inspirations coming from all around the world and theres people like me who will live and die wanting a chance to create like that and never do anything remotely near that. Its tough to grow up...

Gavin really is a treasure (give us bant merfolk commander)

Might be off topic, but the original idea of magic cards was likely inspired in part by Wiz War that had a ton of interesting spell cards, but it was technically a board game

Hey my unshaven cringe question got in! Great video, lots of cool anecdotes

Great video you’re awesome for the community

Used everybody lives with my 2nd doctor deck made everyone draw their entire library then forced the entire table to draw at the same time on the next person's turn. Such a fun group hug build.

Now I think of it, it would be really nice (?) to see precon that the them is either annoy other opponent or chaos theme lol

Amazing!!

Great video! I have a really quick question: where does the idea for a Magic card come from?

Loved this video

Great video!

How did Merchant of the Vale // Haggle get made? There are not a lot of red instants / sorceries that do card selection at a mana value of 1, and this one gets a lot of play from me despite not being a cantrip!

This video is going to have lots of people like me tear up something fierce

This is such a wholesome video.

I would like to see cards with a bluff mechanic, something that makes me think a little like poker. something like "when this creature attacks, you can bet what type of card you have in your hand, when you do this, your opponent must say whether or not you are telling the truth, if the opponent fails to guess, your creature gets +1/+1 until end of turn, if your opponent guesses, your creature gets -1/-1 until end of turn."

I think next time you do an episode like this, maybe you can also bring in a couple other Designers to bring in one of their tales?

omg loony! what a surprise ^_^

Hi! I'd also like to voice that Filipino myths and legends would make for excellent flavor for Magic! Some of the monsters ans stories are the wildest things you could ever read about!

I just saw myself in there hahaha 😂😂😂

Basically, anywhere. Anywhere is the answer here. Lol. I do like a lot of these cards. There are some great stories here.

omg such a perfect video

IMO "All will be One" should have been like "Whenever a non-Phyrexian Creature dies, Incubate X where X is that Creatures Power". And then probably WUBRG.

I wish one of his Co workers would causually bring up Ooze kinderd support.

When mommy card met daddy card they fell deeply in love and became close. Very close - without wearing any sleeves for protection. And that’s how you were born.

I can understand Nejeela not turning out as intended by forgetting to have a shut-off valve of "Whenever a non-token Warrior attacks..." and "Activate this ability... and only once per turn." But how exactly did Yuriko not play out as intended? Did you expect Commander ninjutsu to also scale with Commander tax? Did you not expect people to play this with Eldrazi n topdeck manipulation?

Now i know if I ever meet Gavin to get Serene Remembrance signed by him.

Since I started playing Magic, I’ve found myself thinking up card ideas. I find the game design so compelling… and I wonder what I could do with it. What advice would you give about wanting to game design?

Great vídeo even If there was no kithkin

*Can you please stop making these incredible touching videos without warning or notice?!* I'm deeply moved and was totally unprepared for these emotions right now! Love it. Thank you for sharing your experiences!

Can we just have tons of Otters…maybe Otter tribal in BloomBurrow 😅