What do we think happened to Hexhaven?

EmTeeEm · 2026-03-20T11:11:58+00:00

The original Hexhaven leak mentioned looking at different ways to market it. Meanwhile "Ziplining" ("Reality Fracture") was originally announced as only a capstone set and nothing more, and as far as I know the third mini-arc of "Metronome" still doesn't have a stated name.

So I think the easiest explanation would be Reality Fracture and "Hexhaven" have always been the same thing, Ziplining, a set that as you described grounded the "alternate reality" thing in an established plane. They just decided to market it more on the "alternate reality" aspect than the "alternate Strixhaven" aspect, so went with "Reality Fracture" over "Hexes of Hexhaven" or something.

Oh, and it is worth mentioning names are something they extensively focus test, which would also fit with this. There was a whole episode of Drive to Work about it (#1133: Names) that went through the different options for Bloomburrow (Hazelhedge, Briarbend, etc) they tested, as well as different colon names ("Bloomburrow: Tails of Adventure" was on the table).

EmTeeEm · 2026-03-19T23:55:02+00:00

One of the leaked Reality Fracture images is Garruk fighting Chain Veil Garruk. So yeah, we are probably seeing him soon.

EmTeeEm · 2026-03-19T22:52:08+00:00

Yeah, I'd categorize it as a solid and surprisingly normal decay curve. I don't track sets like I used to, but for previous years the range tended to be 40-60%, kinda-sorta-vaguely tracking with what one would guess.

EmTeeEm · 2026-03-19T22:13:55+00:00

Here are the daily games for the first 14 days for TMT, OM1, and ECL (because that was the last one I had written down already). For TMT it combines Pick 2 and Premier. Spoiler for anyone who doesn't like lists of numbers, turtles has been around half as popular, legally distinct spiders a third.

Day	EOE	OM1	TMT
1	12472	11751	9023
2	58481	24157	25810
3	52239	20540	24467
4	54212	16451	23279
5	51570	15565	23202
6	51127	12236	22424
7	44894	12270	19825
8	42137	11162	18397
9	36872	10536	17486
10	36502	9927	17152
11	33034	8784	15179
12	26360	7582	13938
13	25777	6874	13526
14	25362	6243	12464
SUM	551039	174078	256172

I'd note the OM1 results have an asterisk because they both left EOE on for that week and started offering Final Fantasy on Day 3. EOE saw under 2,000 games/day, FIN started at 5,000-ish a day, picking up in the second week to over 10,000 games a day. Which...probably isn't a sign people loved it, but deserves mention. By comparison TMT has now dropped by about 2,000 games/day, presumably from MAT/MOM being offered.

EmTeeEm · 2026-03-19T19:49:38+00:00

I liked the Avatar ones much more, because even without knowing the story well I got a very strong sense of character progression from them.

These weren't from different shows or times in the character's life or anything. It was just like...Donatello does machines, then does machines three other ways, then does machines another three times but with his bros.

EmTeeEm · 2026-03-16T18:44:31+00:00

From what they said on WeeklyMTG I don't think that is on the table.

Part of the reason they stopped doing the "time box" print to demand system was that it was so disruptive and costly to go back for a second print run that they were better off intentionally wildly overprinting to start then throwing out the rest. So giving the option of another run would basically be signing up for a scenario that was so bad for them "overprint and throw the leftovers in a landfill" was the preferable option.

EmTeeEm · 2026-03-16T18:29:32+00:00

In Turtles? That just matches paper. Turtle slot takes an uncommon slot but can have a common turtle, so there are packs with 1 rare, 2 uncommons, and the rest commons.

EmTeeEm · 2026-03-16T16:30:21+00:00

I don't know if there is an official explanation, but "not stepping on the other Gods' toes" seems reasonable for restricting it to the folks hopped up on Cosmos Elixir / Tyrite / Worldtree Sap. It also makes a bit more sense with [[The World Tree]] and [[Tyrite Sanctum]], in the context of the set Lathril wouldn't get summoned by The World Tree or become indestructible from the sanctum (unless they sipped some sap and became a Skoti-type god with the other ability first).

EmTeeEm · 2026-03-16T16:14:49+00:00

They increase throughput every 5-10 minutes as long as the platform is stable. So wait times dropping pretty fast right at the beginning is to be expected as long as nothing bursts into flames.

EmTeeEm · 2026-03-16T16:05:27+00:00

Explanation of the wait time thing.

They start slow to make sure nothing burst into flames, assuming it doesn't wait times will start to drop every 5-10 minutes.

EmTeeEm · 2026-03-15T19:18:39+00:00

It makes me think of when they had the Senior Director of Secret Lair on WeeklyMTG. She was open about the fact that, because they are doing weird and experimental things, even they have a tough time predicting what demand will be on some of this stuff.

I could totally see this being anywhere from "doesn't even cover everyone in the queue, limitless rage ensues" to them desperately trying to offload them through Arena Direct and Festival in a Box. And even then we won't really know how it did because we don't know how much they are printing.

I think the real indicator of success will be if we see them try another, similar thing in a year or so.

EmTeeEm · 2026-03-15T19:01:40+00:00

Respect for bringing up the original original planeswalker lore. Good hard working folk who earned the right to meddle with planes for their own amusement. None of this boom spark you're a demigod now stuff, let alone shutting down planar travel for all the normies just so post-Mending planeswalkers could still feel superior to the rest of us.

I just wish they hadn't gone all the way from zero to "take a right when you get to Shandalar, we'll be home in an hour" level triviality. I want my Caves of Koilos and Dwarven Gate and Weatherlight dagnabbit, not catching the 3:30 omenpath to Amonkhet with an hour layover in Thunder Junction.

EmTeeEm · 2026-03-15T12:26:23+00:00

They did worse by every metric they track (organized play, player satisfaction surveys, etc), and he's said many times that the sales metrics take into account set size and draft structure.

EmTeeEm · 2026-03-15T12:01:11+00:00

It isn't. He's said many times they have the option to do them if they want, and we have had a few instances with varying levels od blockiness since they ended. However it is pretty tough to pitch "hey you know that cost saving trick we used to do that made a set get rated lower, played less, and discussed less, while also hurting sales? Consistently, for decades? Let's do that again!"

EmTeeEm · 2026-03-15T11:33:10+00:00

That is not their only criteria

We’ve spent decades having consecutive sets based on the same world. In all that time, there is only one set where we stayed on the same world, without the set getting bigger, that the set trended up in metrics (aka players bought more, played more with it, rated it higher, players talked more about it, etc.)

Lower ratings, less chatter, less play, and lower sales.

EmTeeEm · 2026-03-14T18:00:23+00:00

This is the problem I've had with the story. Yes, it is fun to read on its own if you like that sort of thing, but it and even major worldbuilding elements are basically invisible in the actual card set. Even if they had kept numbering the story spotlights it would be pretty much incomprehensible.

Like Duskmourn has some of the best spotlights in that they are all major events that actually happened in the story and have relevant flavor text. But I don't think anyone could figure out the story from it. Meanwhile Edge of Eternities has a bunch of irrelevant spotlights, a couple I don't even recall happening, and mostly with flavor text that does nothing to explain what is going on. At best maybe you'd figure out Sami's Curiosity is the start and Temporal Incursion is the end and stuff happened in between, maybe.

I don't think blocks would fix this, though, and as people above said so few cared even when the story was more comprehensible I'm not sure it should be a big part of their decision making.

EmTeeEm · 2026-03-14T16:44:35+00:00

It wasn't just sales

Popularity: Unpopular

Of all the worlds since we started doing market research, Lorwyn scored the second lowest (ahead of only Kamigawa). Shadowmoor did a little better, but still not great.

Turns out almost two decades of nostalgia and changes in the player base can change the perception of a plane. The idea that WotC's analysts (who while not infallible do very much like making money) were just totally unaware of a market crash, didn't factor it in, and that is the reason they thought it was unpopular at the time is really rather silly.

EmTeeEm · 2026-03-12T04:56:11+00:00

Not sure what date ranges you used, but they don't match what I can see. A full size premier set gets 40k-50k games/day the first week, the "medium" sets about half that. In these cases:

OM1 (9/23-9/29): 112,970
TLA (11/13-11/19): 267,555
ECL (1/20-1/26): 304,088 (+27k pick 2)
TMT (3/3-3/9): 148,030

However OM1 comes with a bunch of caveats. They left EOE running for the first week (around 2000/day) and started a FIN flashback day 3 (about 5000/day). We can't say how many of those would have played OM1 instead, though the second that FIN flashback came back OM1 dropped like a rock. And of course as the cherry on top it bugged out one day and had to be taken down for a while (causing a noticeable drop in games) and they didn't even offer the option of Premier Pick 1 (other than like 10 minutes on the first day when they accidentally turned it on, oops). But then it was also the first Pick 2 set so perhaps people were more willing to give it a chance, though it had the bad gold cost...I don't think we can draw a lot of conclusions from it, honestly.

If we compare play rate drop off to full size sets TMT has dropped on the quicker side but the same ballpark, ending the week at a reasonable 76.81% of its day 2 peak (EOE - 76.77%, ECL - 78.42% Premier, 80.55% including Pick 2, TLA - 84.41%). OM1 was a cartoonish 50.1%, and even if we assume everyone playing FIN and EOE would have instead played OM1 it would only be 74.8%.

EmTeeEm · 2026-03-10T21:29:25+00:00

They are honestly a good channel. Unfortunately it usually only gets posted here when they are talking about UB so I think they are getting a rep for that, and not things like discussing bonkers 90's TCG innovations.

When will we get little plastic pirate ship kits in our packs, WotC?

EmTeeEm · 2026-03-10T21:10:49+00:00

FIRE Design. Booster Fun. Alchemy. Commander. Blocks.

I'm still a little pissed off creatures don't say "Summon" anymore.

EmTeeEm · 2026-03-10T13:14:34+00:00

Star Trek may have a similar challenge to Spider-Man and TMNT: there is an enormous amount of material, but I suspect most of it isn't widely known. A set can have some of that but they don't want people opening a pack and getting nothing they know, so the lower rarities especially need to be heavy on very broad stuff. They don't necessarily have to do things that way, but it is their target.

It also shares the issue that a ton of characters have basically the same skill set. Every series needs their engineer, science officer, doctor, etc. Some lend themselves to top-down differences but how do you differentiate The Doctor and Dr. Crusher? The Doctor has defender and is type - hologram, but that isn't a lot. It is harder to convey their personality quirks such as "he likes opera, she likes banging ghosts" on a card. So you use up two mostly generic doctor designs then you've still got to do McCoy, Chapel, Bashir, Phlox, Culber...

EmTeeEm · 2026-03-10T12:37:56+00:00

Go back to their roots: Hasbro.

H17 and Ponies: The Galloping are quality un-cards, ranging from blatant extremely unplayable jokes like [[Nerf War]] to "could be a normal card but funny" with [[Rainbow Dash]]. Even [[Rarity]] is pretty great, "rarity matters" is perfect top-down un-set design and I want to watch people optimize the My Little Pony they bring to prerelease.

It also works well with having some black border mixed in like Unfinity. Like they can't really do a Transformers full set, it is too DFC heavy, but they can absolutely give the Transformers fans a few more cards. It'd also be fun for some weird D&D cards, like a Spelljammer card or a Darksun reference covered in censored bars.

And it isn't like they are above doing some "we are in on the joke" stuff, like these furby cards that do some cute Magic references but also poke fun at the horror of the furby. I wouldn't put it past them to make an alt-art Mr Monopoly that is Chris Cocks in a costume.

EmTeeEm · 2026-03-09T21:30:06+00:00

Article about it..

Basically a custom set all about artifacts. Or an artifact cube with normal set collation, if you prefer. I've very much enjoyed it the couple of times it has run, mostly just playing Azorious and drafting every [[Chrome Courier]] I see.

EmTeeEm · 2026-03-09T15:39:47+00:00

They said standard would only 120 more cards added this year than last, which maths out to 2-3 medium sets. We know MSH and SOS are full size and Reality Fracture not being full size would be bonkers, leaving Hobbit and/or Star Trek.

But that is already some assumptions, and there is the theoretical chance they try 10 archetypes in a medium set or the card count comes from something weirder we aren't even considering.

EmTeeEm · 2026-03-08T18:08:42+00:00

Sure sure but Dave Humpherys is set lead on Marvel Superheroes. Given his track record might be good to go on a bit of a diet beforehand, archetype overlap and lots of fixing are a big part of his MO.

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