Magic: The Gathering and the art of World Building

If you’ve never played the popular trading card game Magic: The Gathering, then this blog entry might sound like gibberish to you. Magic: The Gathering is a quasi-role playing game where you and your opponent play as dueling wizards, with the cards representing the spells you fling at one another. But that’s just the broad explanation of the game.
The story behind it is that each player is a powerful mage with the ability to travel to different worlds, each with its own culture and identity, and the spells are things the player has learned or picked up from observing life on that world. There have been alien worlds made entirely of metal, Scandanavian/Norse themed worlds encased in ice and snow, Japanese-themed worlds full of Spirits, samurai and ninjas, Greek mythology-themed worlds, classic horror-themed worlds, and as of this writing they are exploring a Mongolian-styled world where everyone is at war all of the time. Fascinating stuff.
Of course, now the question is “what the heck does all of this have to do with writing a story?”
The answer? “Everything.”
The thing that sets MTG apart from every other board/card game is the extensive amount of worldbuilding that goes into every set of cards. Through the cards, as well as the tie in e-books, website articles and videogames, you get immersed in a given world that has its own ecosystem, its own bestiary, its own heroes and legends, and its own struggle. And if you’re a story buff, it’s easy to get drawn in and really feel like you are a part of this world.
That is the feeling every writer of fiction should strive for in his or her stories. You want your settings to be living, breathing extensions of your story because it adds more weight and believability to your characters. In fact, some of the greatest stories in fantasy and science fiction were just about the central character exploring his or her world, with hijinks ensuing. (Pratchett’s The Color of Magic and Asimov’s Prelude To Foundation come to mind). This is where the whole “City is a character” motif comes from, and BTW my buddy Anne Mallory does an excellent job of it in her steamy historical romances.
I thought I’d take a novel approach to said worldbuilding utilizing my passion for MTG. As an excersize for a competition to get a design internship at Wizards of the Coast (makers of Dungeons and Dragons, Duel Masters, and you guessed it, Magic The Gathering), I was given the task of creating an entire set of Magic The Gathering cards, along with the world those cards were set in. there were specific problems I had to solve to flesh out my world, which really stretched my creative muscles. So for this exercise, I decided to use a world I had been planning on telling a high fantasy epic on: a world so ravaged by constant wars, cataclysms and tragedy that it had collectively given up its will to live. (I wrote a few short stories from that world you can read here). The themes was failure, despair and extinction, with a ragtag band of heroes and former villains fighting to give their world a reason to live, against a mammoth monstrosity poised to destroy them all…and the people actually welcoming the ahnniallation.
Through this exercise I was able to really flesh out my world and give it its identity, to add layers of myth and lore and create backstories I could explore endlessly if I so chose. I created unique creatures and events specific to my world, and new mysteries, like why are the Goblins, Elves, and Merfolk that are fantasy staples are only found via ancient ruins in my world.
I didn’t win the contest (made it to the second round though). But I enjoyed the exercise so much I continued developing my set of Magic cards long after the contest ended, adding new wrinkles and twists. I used as a guide some of the articles written by MTG head of R&D Mark Rosewater which cover the process of designing a set of cards (fascinating stuff. You can read the articles here). As a result, I have a nice toybox to play in if I ever decide to really delve into this world and write that fantasy epic. (I started to, but I got into a heated argument with my content editor/Godsister about it because a bunch of the tropes were uncannily similar to a story she was writing. Long story short: she accused me of plagiarism, but I would never consciously copy anybody’s material – least of all a loved one’s, without their permission. So instead of losing a friend I shelved the story. Now if I want to go into this world, I’ll have to choose another entry point).
I’ve shifted focus, though. And now I’m looking at an old story idea I was working on in college with a few buddies of mine. We were looking at doing an epic high fantasy adventure set in a world similar to feudal China, and loosely based on the legends of Shaolin and Wu-Tang (and yes, inspired by the rap group). But if I’m going to effectively tell this story, I need to create a believable world.
See where I’m going with this?
Whether I actually start writing the story or not, I think it would be an interesting exercise to see if I can build this world the same way I build the other one. I wouldn’t involve any big creatures, but it would be nice to know if there are any in this world. Also, I’d have to do some more research into feudal China and Shaolin mythology to make sure stuff was reasonably accurate – it doesn’t have to be an exact match to the stuff you see in kung-fu movies, but it has to be close enough for you to recognize the source material. Also there’s the little issue of writing believable kung-fu action when kung-fu works best as a visual. I think that’s the biggest hurdle. But hey, I was able to effectively write video game action, so I think it’s a challenge worth undertaking.
In any case, if you are having any struggles with worldbuilding, I strongly recommend giving this a try. And while you’re at it, give the game itself a try. MTG has been my hobby for almost 20 years, and I think you’ll like it too.