My Revised Color Pie
Lately, I’ve been getting into Magic: The Gathering , and as any Magic player (and designer) will tell you, the most interesting and foundational characteristic of the game is its color pie. The five-way relationship between red, blue, green, black and white mana is the centerpiece upon which all decks and Planes are built. Magic has inspired countless other card games, and the color pie is always something developers are quick to mimic, whether it be the Civilizations of Duel Masters or the five factions of Eternal . However, the color pie in Magic itself is also far from perfect. In this essay, I wanted to put forth a new project, my Revised Color Pie (RCP). Note that this is not merely a reinterpretation of the color pie, but a wholesale reimagining of it, complete with new mechanics and, yes, new colors. Magic is by and large a game that is designed bottom-up, meaning the mechanics are created before the flavor is. However, my fascination with Magic began because of its flavor