The team at Magic: The Gathering didn't think crafting an entirely original Marvel character was on the cards, but it's funny how collaborations work sometimes. As it turns out, the newest Universes Beyond set 'Darkhold Destiny' was the perfect place for a new character to be born, and one that Marvel had been trying to make on their own, but couldn't quite figure out.
While there is an extensive roster of Marvel characters that play in the dark magic space this new expansion is set in, principal game designer Dillon Deveney kept searching for the right character.
"I kept running into this narrative hole," he says. "This creative space where I kept coming back to this one thing. I was like, 'Maybe this character could be what I'm looking for.' And then I tried and I was like, 'That's not right.' And then I tried another character and then I felt like I was just forcing them into something. I was like, 'I'd rather just make the coolest card for you because you already have such a bespoke thing.' But mechanically, creatively, we need this thing that seemingly doesn't exist."
Darkhold Destiny is Magic's third Marvel crossover, and it revolves around the supernatural as well as teamups with "a pantheon of gods." It's available to pre-order now at Amazon with four Commander decks, the usual Play/Collector Boosters, two Scene Boxes, various bundles, and a Draft Night set.
It becomes tricky when you're balancing mechanics and a narrative throughline in the best card games. Even though Marvel heroes have an incredibly broad range of powers, a card can only have so many abilities without breaking everything.
"From a card design standpoint, really what you want to figure out is what's the coolest thing about the character," says head designer Mark Rosewater. "Because you don't get to do infinite things. Like good card design is really about one major thing."
So with this problem in mind the team went and pitched the problem to Marvel, in hopes that they would accept this vision for a brand new character in the Marvel universe. Deveney tells me "I pitched it to them all and was like, 'Hey, here's kind of the thing we need to solve for. This is a potential solution we had. We were curious if you would be open to this.' And then the Marvel team was like 'You know, we've been trying to figure out a character that's kind of like this for a while. We aren't really satisfied. We haven't found anything that really kind of makes sense. We would love to do this. We can help each other out.'"
Of course, heroes aren't always born overnight. So after a lot of ideation, the team felt like they had some solid pitches to bring to Marvel.
"The final character you see is like one of a hundred things we potentially talked about. We came up with five pitches that we brought back to the official pitch," says Deveney.
The back and forth from Marvel on the entirety of the Darkhold Destiny set felt like a "Yes, and situation," Deveny tells me – constantly bringing ideas to the table and Marvel giving the team the flexibility to adapt these characters to Magic, rather than taking what's already there.
Rosewater mentions that "I think early on we were a little afraid to change them at all. But what we really learned is, no, what they want is to adapt it to what you're doing. You know, make the best Magic version of our Marvel characters, much like the MCU or the cartoon. Every single version of Marvel isn't identical. They sort of make it their own. And that's been the big lesson, is letting us sort of make it more our own."
A massive piece to this puzzle comes from the artwork of each character. Marvel heroes have iconic features and changing them too much might lose the qualities intrinsic to their design. That's the space art director Meredith Mulroney plays around in.
"One of the greatest compliments they [Marvel] said was, 'You are so thoughtful about how you create characters.' Like, that's how we do it in Magic. We really spend that much time going through the details, are people going to relate to this this way because it's something special that you give the world? This character will be somebody's favorite and everybody has a favorite character out there, whatever they read, whatever they watch, and you're giving a new favorite to someone in the world."
While many parts were malleable, there would be some notes from Marvel on certain hard lines. Deveney points out that "they would give us notes of like, 'Hey, it's important that the wings on Thor's helmet be like this so his silhouette is like this kind of strong, but the cape, yeah, do whatever you want with the cape and stuff like that."
It's easy to get lost in years and years of Marvel lore. Especially when the team is a massive fan of the properties. Striking the balance of having lifetime histories with Marvel while also making it approachable for new fans is a tall order.
"The age-old guidance is that every comic book is someone's very first comic book. I think that's also true for magic. Every set is someone's first Magic set. So we're never trying to design something that completely alienates you if you've never played before," says Deveney. He goes on to say that "if you know stuff, you'll definitely go, 'Oh, wow.' It's enhancing it, but it is not restrictive."
Magic The Gathering's Darkhold Destiny set launches on April 9, 2027. There are still plenty of cards to be revealed, including the brand new wholly original Magic: The Gathering Marvel character themselves.
If this has you in the mood for all things spooky, horror RPG Vaesen gets "epic" new campaign just in time for Halloween - or see our guide to the best Halloween board games. As for all things Magic, we're currently preparing for this year's Black Friday MTG deals.
- See the latest offers on Darkhold Destiny at Amazon
