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Mark Rosewater | |
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| Born | May 25, 1967 |
| Occupation | Head designer for Magic: The Gathering |
Mark Rosewater (born May 25, 1967) [1] is the head designer for Magic: The Gathering , a position he has held since 2003.
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Mark Rosewater | |
|---|---|
| | |
| Born | May 25, 1967 |
| Occupation | Head designer for Magic: The Gathering |
Mark Rosewater (born May 25, 1967) [1] is the head designer for Magic: The Gathering , a position he has held since 2003.
Rosewater grew up in Pepper Pike, Ohio. In his youth, he worked as a professional magician. [2] Rosewater has described his young self as a "social outcast" whose intelligence and small size led to bullying, and he never naturally lost his baby teeth, which had to be surgically removed. [3] Despite these difficulties, he became a successful high school student at Orange High School [4] with numerous scholarship offers. [5] [6] He attended Boston University, where he earned a Bachelor of Science in Communication. [7]
After graduating, Rosewater started his career in television as a runner. [8] He then found work as a writer. Before 1994 he was on the writing staff of Roseanne . [9] [10] He is credited for two Roseanne episodes: "Vegas, Vegas" and "Take My Bike, Please", both aired in 1991. [11] He considered his time in Hollywood a "roller coaster ride." [12] While working as a freelance writer he took a job at a game store in order to have some social contacts. Working there he first found out about Magic: The Gathering from a customer. [13]
Since 1995, Rosewater has worked for Wizards of the Coast, the company which makes Magic: The Gathering. He wrote puzzles based on Magic cards and other articles for The Duelist , the Wizards of the Coast magazine promoting and covering Magic. [14] [10] In 1996 Magic: The Puzzling was published, a collection of 25 puzzles written for The Duelist. [15] Since 1996 Rosewater has worked for Wizards of the Coast as a designer of Magic cards. Rosewater has designed at least one card for every Magic expansion since Alliances . While working for Wizards of the Coast, he wrote columns called “Insider Trading” for the magazines The Duelist, Topdeck , and The Sideboard which gave an inside look at Magic design. [16]
Rosewater has been the lead designer for Tempest , Urza’s Destiny , Odyssey , Mirrodin , Fifth Dawn , Ravnica: City of Guilds , Future Sight , Shadowmoor , Eventide , Zendikar , Scars of Mirrodin , Innistrad , Dark Ascension , Gatecrash , Theros , Khans of Tarkir , Battle for Zendikar , Kaladesh , Amonkhet , Ixalan , Unstable, Dominaria, Guilds of Ravnica , Ravnica Allegiance , War of the Spark , Throne of Eldraine , Unsanctioned , Ikoria: Lair of Behemoths , Zendikar Rising, Strixhaven: School of Mages , Innistrad: Crimson Vow, Kamigawa: Neon Dynasty, Unfinity, Phyrexia: All Will Be One, March of the Machine, The Lost Caverns of Ixalan, and Murders at Karlov Manor. He was also the sole designer of Unglued ; [17] in it he combined his career as a magic card designer with his previous career as a comedy writer. Picking up on the comic note of the "un"-sets, he judged the Unglued pre-release wearing a chicken suit and the Unhinged pre-release wearing a donkey suit. [18] He also wrote flavor text in various sets including Mirage and Tempest. [19]
Rosewater advocated for Pro Tournament (organized, competitive Magic play with significant cash prizes) for years, including the important idea of having feature matches at professional events. Feature matches are chosen at Pro Tournaments to be highlighted for spectators and web coverage because the players or the decks involved are well known or thought to be of greater interest. He is notable for his quick ascent to the head of Magic the Gathering as well as his personable demeanor.
Since 2002, Rosewater has a weekly column called "Making Magic" on magicthegathering.com, the official site of Wizards of the Coast. In these columns, much like in his previous "Insider Trader"-columns he gives an inside look on how Magic cards are created. [16] He has written on many controversial subjects, such as why Wizards of the Coast makes "bad rares". [20] [21] Other key subjects of his columns include Wizards of the Coast's "psychographic" profiles of players called "Timmy/Tammy", "Johnny/Jenny", "Vorthos", and "Spike" [22] [23] [24] [25] [10] and the color wheel. [26] [27] [28] [29] [30] [31] [32] [33] He often writes his articles in off-the-wall or unusual styles. For instance in one column he took the perspective of the Magic card "Welding Jar", [34] in another he wrote from the perspective of the mechanic "splice". [35] One article, which even had the subject "Mark Rosewater Admits He’s %#@$ Insane!" was written like a bulletin board on one of his columns. [36] Many articles also touch upon his personal life. [13] Rosewater claims he reads every email sent to him and has written several mailbag columns in which he responds to praise and criticism alike. [37] [38]
In December 2003, he became Magic's lead designer, later called head designer. [39] [10] Before that he was senior head designer. As head designer Rosewater has written a "State of Design" column every year. In it he reviews the Magic design of the previous year and given plans for future Magic designs. His most important contribution as a head designer is the institution of block design. [40]
Rosewater's nickname is Maro. This came about because the old email system of Wizards of the Coast had a feature that could complete names based on the letters typed, and Bill Rose realized that maro was the shortest unique combination of letters needed to compose a message. In the Mirage expansion of the card game, a creature card named "Maro" named after him was included; Rosewater claims that it is his favorite Magic card. Look at Me, I'm the DCI is his second favorite card. He made the art of this card himself, for which he was paid a $1.00 check, which he never cashed. He is also known for his podcast, Drive to Work, where he talks in depth about various disjointed subjects, usually by himself. [12] Rosewater considers his personality to align with that ascribed to blue-red in the game itself, [41] and the player profile of "Johnny". [13]
Rosewater is married to Lora Rosewater. They have three children: a daughter Rachel (born 2000) and twins Adam and Sarah (born 2004). [42] As a hobby Rosewater likes "stereotypically geeky things", such as comics, television, games and writing. For instance he owns a collection of action figures of comic book characters. He was once trapped inside Fred Astaire's estate. [43]
Magic: The Gathering is a tabletop and digital collectible card game created by Richard Garfield. Released in 1993 by Wizards of the Coast, Magic was the first trading card game and had approximately fifty million players as of February 2023. Over twenty billion Magic cards were produced in the period from 2008 to 2016, during which time it grew in popularity. As of the 2022 fiscal year, Magic generates over $1 billion in revenue annually.
Richard Channing Garfield is an American mathematician, inventor and game designer. Garfield created Magic: The Gathering, which is considered to be the first collectible card game (CCG). Magic debuted in 1993 and its success spawned many imitations.
The Multiverse is the shared fictional universe depicted on Magic: The Gathering cards, novels, comics, and other supplemental products. Though Magic is a strategy game, an intricate storyline underlies the cards released in each expansion. On the cards, elements of this multiverse are shown in the card art and through quotations and descriptions on the bottom of most cards. Novels and anthologies published by HarperPrism and Wizards of the Coast (WOTC), and the comic books published by Armada Comics expand upon the settings and characters hinted at on the cards. WOTC also publishes a weekly story in the Magic Fiction column, previously known as Official Magic Fiction and Uncharted Realms.
Magic: The Gathering Limited Edition is the first Magic: The Gathering card set. It premiered in a limited release at Origins Game Fair in 1993, with a general release that August. The initial print run of 2.6 million cards sold out quickly, and a new printing run was released in October 1993. These two runs are known as Limited Edition Alpha and Limited Edition Beta, or just Alpha and Beta for short. Although Alpha and Beta are referred to as different sets by some, officially they are the same set; Wizards of the Coast had expected that people wouldn't necessarily be able to tell the two press runs apart. Beta fixed a number of misprints and errors on cards. The printer accidentally used different corner rounding dies for the second run, resulting in Alpha cards being noticeably distinct in shape and appearance from Beta cards and all subsequent cards. The Beta printing also included a revised rulebook with a number of clarifications, although creator Richard Garfield's short fiction "Worzel's Tale" was removed to make room. The print run of Beta is given as 7.3 million or 7.8 million depending on the source. Despite the set's print run being about three times as big as Alpha's, Beta sold out as quickly as its predecessor.
The collectible card game Magic: The Gathering published seven expansion sets from 1993–1995, and one compilation set. These sets contained new cards that "expanded" on the base sets of Magic with their own mechanical theme and setting; these new cards could be played on their own, or mixed in with decks created from cards in the base sets. With Magic's runaway success, many of the printings of these early sets were too small to satisfy the rapidly growing fanbase. Cards from them became rare, hard to find, and expensive. It was not until Fallen Empires and Homelands that Wizards of the Coast was able to print enough cards to meet demand; additionally, Wizards of the Coast published Chronicles, a reprint set that helped fix many of the scarcity issues with the earliest sets.
Ice Age is a block of three expansion sets in Magic: The Gathering, consisting of the Ice Age, Alliances and Coldsnap sets. It is also the titular first set in the block. The Ice Age set is the eleventh set and the sixth expansion set, previewed at the Canadian Card and Comics Spectacular in early June 1995, and released later that month. Set in the years from 450 to 2934 AR, the set describes a world set in perpetual winter due to the events in Antiquities. Ice Age was followed up June 1996 with Alliances, the fourteenth Magic: The Gathering set and eighth expansion set.; and on July 21, 2006 with Coldsnap. The time period between Alliances and Coldsnap was the longest period of time between the beginning and the completion of a full block in Magic. Originally, the set Homelands, released in October 1995, was the second set in the Ice Age block, but following the release of Coldsnap, Homelands was removed from the block in favor of Coldsnap.
Mirage was the first official block structure in Magic: The Gathering. This new block structure consisted of three expansion sets and would continue for nearly two decades, finally ending with Khans of Tarkir in 2014. The new block structure also set up the precedent that the first set in the block also became the name for the entire block. Mirage block consisted of three sets: Mirage, Visions and Weatherlight.
James Wyatt is a game designer and a former United Methodist minister. He works for Wizards of the Coast, where he has designed supplements and adventures for the Dungeons & Dragons (D&D) roleplaying game. He is the author of sci-fi and fantasy novels, including Forgotten Realms books, and the 4th edition Dungeon Master's Guide.
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The collectible card game Magic: The Gathering has released compilation sets, reprint sets, and box sets over its history. These are distinct from core sets and expansion sets, the most heavily marketed sources of new cards. With the exception of Chronicles, reprint sets generally do not affect tournament legality in supported formats; for example, cards reprinted in the Modern Masters reprint set, while legal for tournament play, did not necessarily cause the card to be included in the "Standard" environment.
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Shadowmoor is a Magic: The Gathering block consisting of the expansion sets Shadowmoor and Eventide. The block was originally conceived as a single set that was to be released as the third in the Lorwyn block, but it was ultimately released as a semi-independent two-set block. Shadowmoor was linked thematically to Lorwyn, and the four sets comprising the two blocks rotated through official tournament formats together.
The Zendikar block is a Magic: The Gathering block consisting of the sets Zendikar, Worldwake, Rise of the Eldrazi. The eponymous setting is a vast, untamed wilderness, whose few bastions of civilization exist primarily for outfitting treasure-seeking expeditions to distant locales. Colossal ancient octahedral stones called "hedrons" float in the sky. A phenomenon known as "the Roil" causes frequent geological upheaval as it sweeps across the land. Unlike the previous two blocks, there is no multicolored theme. Instead, the themes Zendikar and Worldwake revolve around lands, and a theme of an adventure or quest. Rise of the Eldrazi, while part of the Zendikar block creatively and for the sake of constructed tournament rules, is unique mechanically and is designed to be drafted on its own. Drafts in the Zendikar block are either ZEN-ZEN-WWK or ROE-ROE-ROE.
Tom LaPille is a former Magic: The Gathering developer at Wizards of the Coast. He led the development on Magic 2012, Dark Ascension, and Masters Edition III, Modern Masters 2015, and Eternal Masters. He also wrote the Dailymtg.com Development column Latest Developments for nearly four years. Mark Rosewater considers him part of the fifth generation of Magic designers.
Gavin Verhey is a Principal Magic: The Gathering Designer at Wizards of the Coast. He has been a member of numerous Magic set Design and Development teams since joining in 2011, including Aether Revolt, Conspiracy, Conspiracy: Take the Crown, Fate Reforged Gatecrash, From the Vault: Angels, From the Vault: Annihilation, From the Vault: Twenty, Ixalan, Kaladesh, Modern Masters 2017, Oath of the Gatewatch, and Shadows Over Innistrad, in addition to being the lead designer of Archenemy: Nicol Bolas, Commander 2017, and Battlebond. He also currently writes the weekly column Beyond the Basics on the official Magic website. Mark Rosewater considers him part of the fifth generation of Magic designers.
The Alara block is a Magic: The Gathering expert-level expansion block, consisting of the expansion sets Shards of Alara, Conflux and Alara Reborn. The Alara block focuses on multicolored cards, in particular cards with three or more colors.
Mike Elliott is a Seattle-based board game, card game and mobile game designer whose titles include Magic: The Gathering, Thunderstone, and Battle Spirits Trading Card Game. Magic head designer Mark Rosewater called him "one of the most prolific Magic designers in the history of the game." He was inducted into the Academy of Adventure Gaming Arts & Design Hall of Fame at the 2017 Origins Game Fair.
Zendikar Rising is the 85th Magic: The Gathering expansion and is not part of a block. It is set on the plane of Zendikar. It was released on September 25, 2020. The sets development codename is "Diving", and its expansion code is ZNR.
