Editing Magic: The Gathering (section)

===The Two-Block Paradigm===
This system officially started in Battle for Zendikar. How to deal with the 3rd set in a block had long been a thorn in the side of Magic R&D. To fix this they decided to simply stop making 3 set blocks. Core sets would no longer be released and a Block would consist of 2 sets. Usually the first set would be large and the second set small. There would be 2 blocks per year (those years being October-September). Of course, draft structure will be different as well.  
	 
Also there is a big shift in story telling. The creative team actually knows what is going to happen quite a bit in advance (compared to before this shift) which, should provide us benefits like better foreshadowing and less [[Retcon|retcons.]] Each set contains five official (although in practice, probably more unofficial) cards that show events in the story deemed important. The official ones are called "spotlight cards" and can be identified by the planeswalker symbol watermark. The story will be across multiple platforms such as cards in the set, Uncharted Realms, Duels of the Planeswalkers, ect... Each block is still on a different plane than the blocks surrounding it, which of course means the creative team is building an average of 2 worlds per year (arguably less so in the cases when returning to a mtg world we've been to before). (Consider that the people who made [[Avatar]] spent five years building that one setting. This can't [[Not as planned|possibly end badly]].)[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vTpv4ZGZ8K8][https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DEWQ019LvYw][http://magic.wizards.com/en/articles/archive/mm/metamorphosis]. 

There have been some growing pains and because WotC works so far in advance, it takes a while before we get the benefits of the lessons learned applying to Magic players (unless the lesson is to ban cards, in which case, if WotC is correct, Magic players as a whole are getting the better of 2 bad options). So don't be surprised if Standard for the next few sets will suck [http://magic.wizards.com/en/articles/archive/latest-developments/standard-2017-01-13] (as defined by it being bad, or it being okay, but only because WotC banned some cards, hurting players that bought a playset of those cards).

As if to make it hurt more, lately there has been tons of mistakes being made including but not limited to: 

* Not testing whether a set with Dual Lands and lands that can search for them will lead to four color decks (breaking the point of having you chose between so many colors) 
* Shorting (then increasing) the time a set rotates out, which has Battle for Zendikar be still in rotation for much more then it should have been in, while having the set after be taken out for a much shorter time.
* Having to ban four cards in short succession, not because of how generally overpowered they were like the bans of old, but instead because they never printed any good answers to them.
* Missing an infinite combo, which dominated standard until it was banned.

Most of the story thus-far involves [[The Gatewatch]], a group a Planeswalkers who have taken [http://magiccards.info/query?q=oath+of+t%3A%22legendary+enchantment%22&v=scan&s=cname oaths] to keep the multiverse safe from existential threats. Nobody likes them and they got pimp slapped by Nicol Bolas.