0009_MTGECL_Main: Champion of the Clachan
0353_MTGECL_ExtendRM: Champion of the Clachan
0095_MTGECL_Main: Champion of the Weird
0360_MTGECL_ExtendRM: Champion of the Weird
The solution to the problem was to expand where the cards (aptly named Champions in Lorwyn Eclipsed) took the creature card from. Instead of only working with creatures on the battlefield, the new version also works if the creature is in your hand. We were able to do this by using the behold keyword action from Tarkir: Dragonstorm. We ended up doing this on a cycle of rare cards and chose not to create a new keyword.
Lastly, we added +1/+1 counters to the Lorwyn side. We wanted to lean into the setting’s duality and felt that Lorwyn having +1/+1 counters and Shadowmoor having -1/-1 counters played into their themes and represented their mirroring. Normally, we only have one core counter type (usually +1/+1 counters) per set, so deviating from that was a big deal. Our idea was to provide punch-out counters in Play Boosters, and we expected the intermixing of the counters to use up a certain amount of the set’s complexity.
Shadowmoor
We knew we were going to have a colors-matter theme, which hybrid mana would play a role in supporting (although at a much lower as-fan than in Shadowmoor). We spent a lot of time looking at various executions of the theme from Shadowmoor and Eventide. The other theme we decided to include was a -1/-1 counter theme. We felt it was one of the most iconic parts of the Shadowmoor mini-block, and we hadn’t used -1/-1 counters in a while, so it felt like it was time for -them to return.
We played around with several Shadowmoor mechanics. A few of them, like persist, wither, and conspire, show up in the set on a small number cards. But overall, we ended up exploring some new mechanics. Blight was a favorite for -1/-1 counters of those we designed. It involves an extra cost where you put some number of -1/-1 counters on creatures you control. The original version required the creature you blighted to have a toughness greater than or equal to the number of counters you put on it, but that restriction was removed to simplify the cards.
The other mechanic we liked was called “rainbow.” It would become the ability word vivid from the finished set. It was a mechanic we’d talked about for years, but we hadn’t had a colors-matter set to put it in. “Rainbow” counted the number of colors from among permanents you had in play to set a variable number for an effect. It was originally inspired by Invasion’s domain mechanic. The version we used during vision design worked like Zendikar Rising’s party mechanic, where any one card could only count toward one number. For example, if you controlled a mono-blue and a five-color permanent, your “rainbow” (or vivid) count would be two. You would count the blue card as blue and could count the five-color card as any color, but only as one of that color. Like blight, vivid was later simplified to lower its complexity.
A Different Approach
For the half-Lorwyn, half-Shadowmoor approach, we had five ally-color archetypes that were flavored as Lorwyn and five enemy-color archetypes that were flavored as Shadowmoor. Conceptually, this sounded great. That is, until we tried to execute it. The first challenge involved the typal themes. We wanted to stay true to Lorwyn. Okay, Merfolk were white and blue, Faeries were blue and black, Goblins were black and red, and Kithkin were green and white. Those were all good. What about red and green? It had to be Elementals. The flamekin, specifically, were only in red, but the other colors had their own Elementals. But that left out Elves, which are a pretty popular creature type. Elves were green and white in Shadowmoor, but the Lorwyn ones were famously black and green.
On the Shadowmoor side, we found we were having problems with the “rainbow” mechanic. We enjoyed how the mechanic played, but while it clearly matched the colors-matter theme of Shadowmoor, it felt emotionally more like a Lorwyn mechanic. A spectrum of colors had more of a bright, optimistic feel to it.
And there was an additional problem. By isolating everything into either the Lorwyn or Shadowmoor side, we weren’t playing in the space where we intermingled elements of both. Part of returning to a plane requires playing in new design spaces. Lorwyn and Shadowmoor co-existing was the new thing to interact with thematically.
That led us to make a major change to the file. What if instead of a setting where Lorwyn and Shadowmoor were at odds, we had a setting where they mingled? Yes, there would still be some conflicts between them, but the structure of the set didn’t have to divide evenly. We could have Lorwyn elements, Shadowmoor elements, and some elements that mixed the two aspects. The Creative team had created areas that were neutral areas between the two sides, so there was a justification for why Lorwyn mechanics would interact with Shadowmoor mechanics.
This resulted in a few big structural changes. First, the set didn’t have to be half and half. Each element could take up as much room as it needed. More on this soon. Second, we didn’t have to tie the ally colors to Lorwyn and the enemy colors to Shadowmoor. That allowed us to better reflect the creature themes we wanted:
- White-blue: Merfolk
- Black-red: Goblins
- Green-white: Kithkin
- Blue-red: Elementals
- Black-green: Elves
This allowed us to get the Elves and portray them in the two colors people associate with them in Lorwyn. The Elementals also felt more at home in blue and red, as those are the two colors that normally represent the four elements. As you will see soon, Faeries is still available as a theme but less focused as a typal archetype.
Another issue with the half-and-half approach was that the newer mechanics tended to fall on the Shadowmoor side, but we wanted Lorwyn to have a bigger impact (it is in the name Lorwyn Eclipsed, after all). This change allowed us to let the five typal archetypes take up a bit more room in the file. For example, while all ten archetypes have an uncommon hybrid card, only the five typal themes get a multicolor signpost.
The next change that came about as we moved away from the half-and-half approach was less of a need for mirroring. Mixing +1/+1 counters and -1/-1 counters was confusing. When you saw a creature with counters on it, you didn’t know how big it was. There’s a reason we don’t normally mix counters, and playtesting the set reminded us why. In the end, the Set Design team decided that -1/-1 counters were more crucial to the set structure. They enjoyed how blight played, and it made including persist and wither cameos easier. Shadowmoor was also famously the first Limited environment built around -1/-1 counters, while +1/+1 counters are the default and show up in most sets.
The Set Design team would also simplify blight and vivid. Blight could now go on any creature. There wasn’t a restriction on the toughness of the creature being blighted. If you want to blight 3 onto a 1/1 creature, that was okay. Vivid started just counting the number of colors rather than making you pick what color each permanent represented.
The other five archetypes all have themes built around mechanical elements of the set. Red-green and green-blue lean into vivid, with red-green being a midrange strategy. It focuses on a wave of attacking creatures, using vivid effects as a way to supercharge the creatures and get over the finish line to victory. Green-blue, in contrast, is more of a ramp strategy using powerful vivid rewards and expensive spells in the late game.
White-black and red-white lean into blight. White-black uses -1/-1 counters as a resource to create a well-oiled machine of value. You put -1/-1 counters on your creatures and remove them to accrue advantage. Red-white takes big creatures that enter with a lot of -1/-1 counters and removes the counters to turn them into giant threats and clear the path to attack.
Blue-black is themed around trickery and playing cards on the opponent’s turn. It makes use of flash creatures, mostly Faeries, and instants. We knew there were a lot of fans of Faeries, so we wanted to make an archetype where they played an important role.
The Cards Have Two Faces
The last element of the set I want to talk about are the double-faced cards. When I first pitched the idea of returning to Lorwyn-Shadowmoor to the Arc Planning team, I brought up that double-faced cards (DFCs) seemed ideal for this plane. The original Lorwyn and Shadowmoor block didn’t have them because Magic hadn’t started using them yet (that would happen in Innistrad a few years later). But if there ever was a Magic setting that played into the duality of transformation, Lorwyn-Shadowmoor was that setting.
The idea from the very beginning was that one face would represent the Lorwyn version of the creature and the other face would represent the Shadowmoor side of the creature. As I explained above, creatures that moved around the plane would change as they entered areas under the influence of Lorwyn or Shadowmoor, so the flavor was spot on.
When I was first thinking about the set, I questioned how many double-faced cards we could have. What if every card was double-faced? Well, that contradicted the feeling we were going for. The world wasn’t always one or the other. Also, tracking just one or two double-faced cards requires attention. Tracking the whole board? That felt like madness. While overdoing themes was a signature of the Lorwyn and Shadowmoor block, that wasn’t something we felt needed to return. We started with where Innistrad had ended up, one DFC per booster pack (i.e., an as-fan of one).
We quickly realized there was another problem to tackle. We didn’t want one side to be stronger than the other. Much of Innistrad’s transformation took weak Humans and turned them into powerful monsters. The cards were just better from a gameplay sense when they were transformed. Modal double-faced cards didn’t make sense here because the ability to change back and forth was core to the setting’s concept. This meant we needed designs where each face was of roughly equal value.
We tried several different designs. The ones I found the most interesting were cards that kind of functioned like the phasing mechanic from Mirage, where the creature would just go back and forth each turn. On odd turns the card was the Lorwyn side, and on even turns it was the Shadowmoor side. This design formula did a lot to simplify things. Because the cards transformed on their own, you didn’t have to spend any brainpower figuring out when you had to switch them. But they really lacked any sense of agency. The creatures of Lorwyn-Shadowmoor do have a say on what side they exist in.
That led us to the current designs where the creatures have a cost you can pay to turn themselves back and forth. To help encourage this, many of them trigger when they are transformed. This design limitation, plus the experience of playtesting with the DFCs, led to us cutting them way down in as-fan. We ended up with seven DFCs, a cycle of rares and two mythic rares (one with an Elemental God on each face and a double-faced planeswalker, Oko). They show up a little for splash, but they aren’t a defining element of Limited play.
A Lorwyn-ing Combination
And that brings us to the end of our design story for Lorwyn Eclipsed. As always, I’m eager for your thoughts, be it on today’s column, on Lorwyn Eclipsed, or on any of the elements I talked about today. You can email me or contact me through social media (Bluesky, Tumblr, Instagram, TikTok, and Twitter).
Join me next week to check out the vision design handoff document for Lorwyn Eclipsed.
Until then, may you have as much fun playing Lorwyn Eclipsed as we had making it.
