Quick Hits

• A "What Went Wrong" podcast series is coming. Asked for an "autopsy" of mechanics that went too far — the asker's big three being Storm, Dredge, and Companion — Mark Rosewater confirmed he's launching a new podcast series by that very name.
• Middle-earth is carrying the market. MTGStocks' Weekly Winners reports The Hobbit's cards — Treasure strategies especially — climbing across the board, with Draftsim's spike report agreeing that "Middle-earth is still doing most of the heavy lifting" a week after release.
• The Hobbit Limited verdict is in: black is overpowered and the format is aggressive, per Draftsim's Ultimate Guide to The Hobbit Draft — "the secret is out." Plan your pods accordingly.
• Narset is officially Magic's most prominent neurodivergent character, per Rosewater — who tacked on a tease: "but I have some theories." (Source)
• Purple mana trivia: R&D's playtest basic land subtype was City, Inquest Magazine's version was Cave, and the six-color experiment never got far enough to design an actual mana symbol. (Source)

Commander Corner

• Commander Clash asks the important questions this week: what if your entire Commander deck could only be lands? Season 20, Episode 14 finds out.
• Draftsim reopens the case file on Lurrus of the Dream-Den — calling Companions "arguably a failed experiment" that simply ended up too good — and ranks the five commanders that best break Magic's best Companion.
• It's list season at Draftsim: all 19 Bear Commanders ranked (Ayula, Queen Among Bears front and center) and all 17 Monkey cards ranked, Kibo, Uktabi Prince included.
• Bad news for WUBG dragon typal hopefuls: a red-less legendary dragon is a "tall ask" because Dragons are red's iconic creature, says Rosewater.
• The subreddit help desk is busy: a one-month player wants a Rakdos Grenzo goblins list, another is building a first deck around Belch, Loafing Pest on Arena, and an Edge of Eternities precon owner (World Shaper, Counter Intelligence) is shopping for the next deck. Rules corner: one Toph pilot asks whether Terrasymbiosis triggers off Earthbend strand them over hand size.
• EDHREC's Community Corner spotlights WozzlebugMTG and the Rhystic Buddies crew.

Competitive Scene

• MTGGoldfish's Much Abrew asks whether Belladonna Took — with help from Hop to It and The Last Ronin's Technique — can make aggo tokens a real archetype in The Hobbit Standard. (Yes, they test it.)
• Pauper grind: Joe Dyer's Power of Pauper digs into Jeskai Ephemerate — flicker value, "Dreams in Ephemerate" style.
• Rotation radar: with Duskmourn leaving Standard later this year, a dwarf tribal pilot is already scouting replacements for the Chainsaw.
• Brew thread of the day: a Tai Wakeen, Perfect Shot + Zirda cycle-burn list is taking opinions.

Limited & Draft

• Unfinity redemption arc: asked about the set, Rosewater says he "personally really enjoy[s] how it drafts" — and that hidden complexity makes it redraftable. A fair excuse to break it back out.
• A player stuck going 1-3 on Arena despite "solid decks" posted their 17Lands draft log for public diagnosis — worth a skim if your trophy rate has gone cold.
• Draftsim refreshed its Ultimate Guide to Limited on MTG Arena — evergreen reading for queue navigation and event selection.

Finance & Market

• Draftsim's weekly price spike report corroborates the MTGStocks numbers: The Hobbit is doing the heavy lifting one week in. Treasure pieces are the ones to watch.
• Possible reprint pipeline: asked whether the Mystical Archive alt-arts could get English-language reprints (a few arrived via Secret Lair this year), Rosewater says "It's possible."
• One Redditor is crowd-sourcing a birthday "big purchase" spread beyond a single collector booster — a decent pulse-check on what players think is worth the money right now.

Design & Lore

• More on the big story: the "What Went Wrong" series grew out of a question citing Rosewater's line about doing "a lot more big picture design these days, and less individual card design." His answer: "I'm sure I'll get there." Storm and Dredge truthers, your moment may be coming.
• Lore fans, take heart: character death is not a design constraint. "Dying hasn't stopped us designing cards for characters."
• A return to Eldraine could bring back the mono-colored courts — Rosewater's answer to the question is simply "Possibly."
• On another Time Spiral-style bonus sheet flowing through Standard: "There's always a chance, but it makes the bonus sheet pretty hard to do."
• Aetherdrift design trivia: start-your-engines cards and max-speed payoffs were deliberately kept on the same cards, because R&D likes cards that care about new qualities to be self-contained.
• Type-line trivia: if 'legendary' were ever replaced by a rules-free marker supertype, Rosewater would "definitely make it a shorter word".
• Flavor archeology: a rewatch of the 2003 Haunted Mansion spotted cards on the son's wall — the thread is on the case.