Last week I started sharing the transfer document which Fracture of realityThe Vision Design team gave the Set Design team. The first part talks about the objectives of the defined and matched cards. The second part covers the adjustment of Fracture of reality.
Hexhaven
Another important way to play with the simulation theme was to choose a setting that fit the theme strongly and in a way that most players would understand. After exploring different options, we settled on Hexhaven, an alternate version of Strixhaven. Instead of enemy-colored colleges with a general university vibe, Hexhaven has allied-colored colleges with a military school vibe. Because “Yachting,” the previous set, takes place in Strixhaven, the audience will be familiar with it. The enemy versus ally contrast is strong (and meets a common audience request). To create a certain continuity with “Yachting”, each college kept one color and shifted the second to make it a combination of allied colors. (The bold color is the constant between multiverses.)
- Lorehold, the red-white the history university becomes Forehold, the white-blue history college.
- Quellerix, the green oneblue school of mathematics, becomes Théorix, the blue-black mathematics university.
- Silverquill, the white-black language school, becomes Stingerquill, the black-red language college.
- Prismari, the bluered art school, becomes Melodari, the red-green art school.
- Witherbloom, the black-Green school of sciences, becomes Everbloom, the Green-White scientific college.
Four options were available to us. I’ll use Silverquill as an example. In Strixhaven, it’s the white-black college. We could keep white and add blue, keep white and add green, keep black and add blue, or keep black and add red. But once we made the decision for one college, it would force our hand on the other four colleges. So here are the four options we had:
First option
- Silverquill: White-black becomes white-blue.
- Prismari: Blue-red becomes blue-black.
- Witherbloom: Black-green becomes black-red.
- Lorehold: Red-white becomes red-green.
- Quandrix: Green-blue becomes green-white.
Second option
- Silverquill: White-black becomes green-white.
- Prismari: Blue-red becomes white-blue.
- Witherbloom: Black-green becomes blue-black.
- Lorehold: Red-white becomes black-red.
- Quandrix: Green-blue becomes red-green.
Third option
- Silverquill: White-black becomes blue-black.
- Prismari: Blue-red becomes black-red.
- Witherbloom: Black-green becomes red-green.
- Lorehold: Red-white becomes green-white.
- Quandrix: Green-blue becomes white-blue.
Option four
- Silverquill: White-black becomes black-red.
- Prismari: Blue-red becomes red-green.
- Witherbloom: Black-green becomes green-white.
- Lorehold: Red-white becomes white-blue.
- Quandrix: Green-blue becomes blue-black.
There were a few colleges that felt like they needed a certain color, Quandrix needed blue and Witherbloom needed green. Fortunately, these two changes worked together. This eliminated options one and two. We looked at each of the colleges and which pairing we thought was best. Option four seemed slightly better than option three, so we went with it.
Two of Hexhaven’s five names remained, Theorix and Stingerquill. “Forehold” became Fatehold, “Melodari” became Konstrari, and “Everbloom” became Vigorbloom.
Unlike “Yachting”, colleges play a lesser role in “Ziplining”. The set is not a faction based around colleges. Rather, colleges serve as a flavor for allied-color draft archetypes. To reinforce this and highlight the military feel of Hexhaven, each college does not create its own “mascot” creature token. Instead, the five colleges create a colorless 2/2 Cadet token. Different colleges will interact with Cadet tokens in different ways.
Everbloom Planetologist
2W
Witchcraft
Create a 2/2 colorless Cadet creature token, then put a number of +1/+1 counters on it equal to the amount of life you gained this turn.
It became Germinate Recruits. Instead of adding X +1/+1 counters to a creature token, Germinate Recruits creates X creature tokens. The contribution of X, winner of life, remained the same. The spell has also been changed from a ritual to an instant.
Augmented patrol
2B
Witchcraft
The targeted opponent discards two cards. If they discard fewer than two cards this way, create a 2/2 colorless Cadet creature token.
The “discard two” effect has become Echoverse Garruk’s ultimate and is in no way related to cadets.
Squad Leader
3R
Creature: Human and Soldier
3/2
Trample
CARDNAME gets +1/+0 for each cadet you control.
Whenever you attack, create a 2/2 colorless Cadet creature token that is tapped and attacking.
While Fracture of reality includes the wizard tokens named Cadet, it has no typical effects specifically for cadets.
Another way to create continuity between Strixhaven and Hexhaven is to reuse two of the mechanics from Yachting in Ziplining, but in much smaller quantities. First, magic returns, used primarily as it was in “Yachting”, but only in the three colors that have a “spells matter” theme: blue, black, and red.
Blood Mage
3B
Creature: human and wizard
4/3
Magic — Whenever you cast or copy an instant or sorcery spell, this creature gains lifelink until the end of the turn.
Titanic miracle worker
4RR
Creature: giant and sorcerer
5/7
Trample
Magic — Whenever you cast or copy an instant or sorcery spell, CARDNAME gains +2/+0 until end of turn.
Baral, dishonored authority
1U
Legendary creature: human and wizard
2/1
Magic — Whenever you cast or copy an instant or sorcery spell, the target player grinds two cards.
1U, T, Exile CARDNAME: Return target instant or sorcery spell from your graveyard to your hand.
When this file was submitted by Vision Design, magecraft was still in progress. Secrets of Strixhaven. This scenography team decided to give each college its own mechanics. To do this, they ended up breaking magic into different subsets of mechanisms. Since the last set of Strixhaven had no magic, it seemed odd to use it in Hexhaven, and it was removed.
Second, prepared spells return, but in much more concentrated use. Each college has a prepared spell that appears in a vertical cycle. The spell is a hybrid spell and is the same on every card. Here are the spells at the time of transfer:
Set Design decided to stick with one prepared spell for each college in common and uncommon, but took the liberty of creating unique prepared spells on rare and mythic rare cards. One of the main reasons they did this was to be able to create prepared spells with changing colors (like a red spell).
Prospective research
1 (with you)
Witchcraft
Exile two cards from your graveyard. If you do, create a 2/2 colorless Cadet creature token.
White-blue uses the cemetery as a resource.
Fatehold ended up not caring about the past but about the future, so we abandoned the use of the graveyard. As Surveil interacts with the library, he becomes more successful in expressing his concern for the future. The card always makes a 2/2 creature token.
Theorix Levitation
(u/b)
Witchcraft
Target creature you control gains flying until end of turn.
Blue-Black wants a cheap spell to help him play well with his “spells matter” theme.
Theorix took a completely different direction: worrying about the graveyard (well, “Fatehold” wasn’t).
Stingerquill Address
1(b/r)
Witchcraft
Target creature you control gets +2/+1 and gains haste until end of turn.
Black-red is aggressive and cares about having bigger creatures.
Stingerquill remained the aggro archetype but shifted to directly damaging your opponent rather than buffing creatures.
Melodari Resources
2(r/g)
Witchcraft
Create two Treasure tokens.
Red-green is the archetype of the ramp.
Konstrari remained essentially the same. To facilitate the ramp, Set Design created a new token, the
Everbloom Diagnosis
3(g/w)
Witchcraft
Put two +1/+1 counters on target creature you control. You gain 2 life points.
Green-White cares about both counters and gaining life.
The Vigorbloom spell remained basically the same, it just shrank, only granting a single +1/+1 counter and gaining 1 life. This reduced the mana cost of
In the story, Jace acquired a specific spell from the mystical archives of Strixhaven and brought it to Hexhaven. There, he can cast the spell and crush the Magic Multiverse with its version, but it will take time. A group of heroes from our world have come to stop him. Jace’s illusion army, Hexhaven military students, and the invaders’ doppelgangers attempt to slow the siege and give Jace enough time to cast the spell and carry out his plan. This is how colleges play a role in the larger story of this capstone set of events.
I believe that most of these words remain true.
Jace Resources
The matched sheets represent the doppelgangers and the Hexhaven student cards represent the military school. This leaves the possibility of expressing Jace’s illusion army. The main way we capture it is with a new mechanic called empowering Jace. Keeping with the simulation theme of the expansion, Empower Jace takes the cluster mechanic and refines it. Instead of creating an Army creature token, it creates a
The fact that this is exactly what Jeremy Geist proposed…
Gn entert
