Lightnews — Scholar-powered news

LightNews

Jeremy Geist

@jeremygeist.bsky.social

120 followers 54 following 50 posts

Designer on Magic: the Gathering. Credits include Bloomburrow, Duskmourn, Foundations, Edge of Eternities, and Lorwyn Eclipsed. I phase in every ~2 months to post a bunch of design stuff and then phase out again

Posts Media Videos Starter Packs

Pinned

Jeremy Geist @jeremygeist.bsky.social · Jan 30

Hey everyone! Using feed-based social media is bad for my health so don't expect me to show up often, but when I do it'll be to offer design insights into sets I worked on (and the occasional dumb joke I can't resist posting). #wotcstaff

Reposted by Jeremy Geist

Matt Tabak @wotcmatt.bsky.social · 5d

Thanks to @moxserra.bsky.social, @megansmith13.bsky.social, @melissadetora.bsky.social, and @jeremygeist.bsky.social for Time Walking with me today and to @aryawrites.bsky.social for setting the whole thing up. Follow them and learn more about Trans Lifeline, the cause we were supporting, below.

Magic: The Gathering @magic.wizards.com · 8d

Support the cause by donating to our direct fundraising page here: tilt.fyi/Jr23vhNVE6

Want to learn more about Trans Lifeline? Visit their official website here: translifeline.org

Jeremy Geist @jeremygeist.bsky.social · 6d

I'm raising money with some fellow designers to support Trans Lifeline! If you have a burning design question you want answered, check out our stream and make a donation! tiltify.com/@hogpog-98/w...

Tiltify - Made for Fundraisers

We give you the tools to engage with your donors and raise more for your charity

Jeremy Geist @jeremygeist.bsky.social · 12d

Check out this article by @coreyjbowen.bsky.social about designing Spider-Man's Pick-2 draft! There's tons of stuff to learn about our design process and SPM's set structure! #wotcstaff magic.wizards.com/en/news/feat...

Magic: The Gathering® | Marvel's Spider-Man and Pick-Two Draft

What do you get when you combine a brand-new draft format with a universe of Spider-Heroes? For Corey Bowen, you get an exciting challenge for a draft designer.

magic.wizards.com

Jeremy Geist @jeremygeist.bsky.social · 13d

There's some really cool mechanics and individual cards coming next year and I can't wait to see what you think about them!

Jeremy Geist @jeremygeist.bsky.social · 13d

The 2026 sets getting announced means it's time for me to brag about the sets I worked on! #wotcstaff

🧚 LORWYN ECLIPSED: Vision, Set
🦸 MARVEL SUPER HEROES: Exploratory, Vision (Strong Second)
⁉️ REALITY FRACTURE: Exploratory, Vision (Strong Second), Set
🖖 STAR TREK: Exploratory, Vision, Set

Jeremy Geist @jeremygeist.bsky.social · Aug 30

We eventually settled for singling out warped cards in the text of the void effect, which is wordy and inelegant but allowed both mechanics to follow whatever timings they want. Void also went from caring about creatures and artifacts to any nonland permanent at some point

Jeremy Geist @jeremygeist.bsky.social · Aug 30

However, warped cards leave the battlefield at the beginning of your end step, which means that end-step void effects won't see them, which is both frustrating and unintuitive. We tried making warp cards exile at the end of your combat, but that made the timing a lot more annoying for that mechanic

Jeremy Geist @jeremygeist.bsky.social · Aug 30

Being able to access void effects on your end step is an important design tool for this kind of mechanic – it allows players to play the card whenever they want on their turn and in general makes keeping track of effects easier

Jeremy Geist @jeremygeist.bsky.social · Aug 30

...that said, while void never changed substantially, there was certainly a lot of debate over the small details. Void's biggest issue was its coexistence with warp, which ostensibly synergized with it but had weird timing issues

Jeremy Geist @jeremygeist.bsky.social · Aug 30

1. Andrew Brown, the set lead, recommended we use a morbid variant. It playtested well. THE END

Jeremy Geist @jeremygeist.bsky.social · Aug 30

My final thread on #MTGEternities is about void! Void has a very lengthy development history, and I hope I have time to capture it all! #wotcstaff

Jeremy Geist @jeremygeist.bsky.social · Aug 10

Oh yeah you finally reminded me to show you this video

Jeremy Geist @jeremygeist.bsky.social · Aug 8

If there's one thing I like doing it's coming up with names for design concepts 🫡

Jeremy Geist @jeremygeist.bsky.social · Aug 7

I am so happy Kill-Ship deals 10 damage instead of destroying, those little touches are important

Jeremy Geist @jeremygeist.bsky.social · Aug 7

I was the only big anime fan on the team, and though I have seen part of Outlaw Star, for some reason the only space opera anime I could think of at the time was Legend of the Galactic Heroes

Jeremy Geist @jeremygeist.bsky.social · Aug 7

Can you put *NSYNC on the deck box and sleeves please

Jeremy Geist @jeremygeist.bsky.social · Aug 7

Unending Whisper, Colossal Plow, Wash Away immediately come to mind as cool stuff you can do in the format

Jeremy Geist @jeremygeist.bsky.social · Aug 7

Warp is also a highly textured mechanic – it works with effects that care about things entering or leaving the battlefield, "cast from exile" synergies, station, flicker effects, checking for high power or mana value, and so on. A perfect mechanic to center an entire set around!

Jeremy Geist @jeremygeist.bsky.social · Aug 7

My most recent Magic design fixation is on "textured mechanics" – mechanics that have a lot of small facets that you can make other cards synergize with. Manifest Dread in DSK is a good example – it enabled graveyard, power-2, and face down decks that all looked pretty different from each other

The Magic: the Gathering card "Manifest Dread".

The Magic: the Gathering card "Hand That Feeds".

The Magic: the Gathering card "Splitskin Doll".

The Magic: the Gathering card "Oblivious Bookworm".

Jeremy Geist @jeremygeist.bsky.social · Aug 7

I'm really happy with how many ways we could figure out to make warp useful without giving the creature haste. Some of my favorites are All-Fates Stalker becoming a flicker effect if you warp it and Bygone Colossus inviting you to find stuff to do with it (its nickname in the pit was "Combo Golem")

The Magic: the Gathering card "All-Fates Stalker".

The Magic: the Gathering card "Bygone Colossus".

Jeremy Geist @jeremygeist.bsky.social · Aug 7

Abro refined the mechanic into the version of Warp you see in the final version of EOE. It immediately proved super fun to play and we kept it in roughly the same version through the rest of design (though there was some discussion around its interaction with void – I'll get into that later)

Jeremy Geist @jeremygeist.bsky.social · Aug 7

Playtesting swiftly proved that the Towershell mechanic meant that a creature either could get infinite ETB triggers without repercussion or made it impossible for you to maintain a board presence. However, it did pique the interest of Andrew Brown, the eventual set design lead

Jeremy Geist @jeremygeist.bsky.social · Aug 7

I felt that Towershell's ability expressed the concept of a creature vanishing into hyperspace/warp speed and then arriving again next turn. There was only one problem: The mechanic was bad

Jeremy Geist @jeremygeist.bsky.social · Aug 7

The mechanic I submitted was based on...Meandering Towershell.

The Magic: the Gathering card "Meandering Towershell".

Jeremy Geist @jeremygeist.bsky.social · Aug 7

Warp's genesis was in early design explorations. The exile zone, flavor-wise, has been treated as the weirdo zone connected with the Blind Eternities, so for one homework assignment, everyone tried to design new mechanics that interacted with the exile zone in some way