Conspiracy Comes To Magic: The Gathering

On June 6th, a set designed completely around the draft format and multiplayer conflict comes to Magic: The Gathering. Conspiracy will bring completely new elements to the game, and even though you won’t be able to play with it on Magic: The Gathering Online, it’s a great incentive to conspire with some friends at the kitchen table.

If you’re not familiar with the concept, players essentially open up fresh packs and pass cards around to make the best decks they can with the tools available - It’s a great way to break out of other environments where players may be playing similar constructed decks. We asked designer Shawn Main a few questions about the new set.

How did the idea for Conspiracy come about?

Long before arriving at Wizards of the Coast, I had a very social gaming group that loved multiplayer and loved drafting. After the Great Designer Search 2 brought me to Renton, I started sharing my Planechase drafting variant around the office. It struck a chord with a lot people, so I went to Aaron Forsythe and asked, “Is there something here?”

Are the cards in Conspiracy legal in other formats? Some of the cards seem like they won’t or can’t work outside the confines of a draft environment.

The vast majority of the cards in Conspiracy can be played in Vintage, Legacy, Commander, (and on kitchen tables), but Conspiracy’s big twist is that each booster contains one card that cares about the fact that you’re drafting (in place of the normal basic land). The ones with the card type conspiracy need to be drafted to work and thus aren’t legal in other formats. But they’re fun additions to cubes!

Can we expect more special sets based around Limited mechanics in the future?

If Conspiracy strikes a chord with players, it’ll definitely be something we look at doing again.

Why no Magic: The Gathering Online?

Conspiracy plays in such wildly new territory that we weren’t able to implement it in the current draft system. The good news is that many of the new cards will be available in the Vintage Masters online-only release alongside cards like Black Lotus and Ancestral Recall.

What are your top 3 Conspiracy cards?

Marchesa, the Black Rose – Marchesa embodies so much of the world of Conspiracy. From the card concept: “Marchesa is [an]… assassin, not the kind that comes through the window for her prey, the kind that is invited in.” She’s dangerous, backstabbing, political – the perfect Conspiracy player. As a card, she’s an enticing Commander, luring you to topple monarchs and find ways to combo her reanimation ability.

Dack Fayden – The Greatest Thief in the Multiverse. We’ve never previously made a Planeswalker card that wouldn’t go into Standard and it opened us up to make a card that might touch older formats like Vintage and Legacy.

Worldknit – Many Conspiracy cards challenge you to evaluate your draft and build your deck in completely new ways. Worldknit instead makes it easy – first pick the card and you’ve freed yourself to take the best card every time. And your deck building is as simple as adding 30 lands and shuffling.