Welcome back, Loreseekers! Believe it or not, it's been five years since I wrote Magic Story 100: Where to Start, and I felt it was time for a major update. First, I've learned that a bit more brevity goes a long way to not scaring away new fans, and second, things have just changed a lot! Let's dive in!

Where to Start?

Brainstorm by Daarken

Magic has thirty years of history to wade through, and I strongly recommend against trying to start from the very beginning. While the most recent Phyrexian Invasion story arc may have referenced stories from twenty years ago, it was not necessary to have read those stories to understand what was happening.

There are several answers to the basic question of where to start, and it largely depends on how much time you want to invest at the beginning. The simplest answer is to start with the current story! After March of the Machine, Magic has a big new status quo, and the best place to start is to simply dive in with Wilds of Eldraine, which at the time of writing will be out in a couple months. While the events of the latest story arc are important, you'll be getting in on the ground floor of the next arc, and learning about characters as you go. You can always go back and read more of the characters' histories if and when you want to, and the current web fiction model (while not perfect) does make it relatively easy to find and engage with the story.

When you're ready to dive in, the Magic Story Archive is the best place to go to find more modern stories. The most recent story is featured there, and almost every relevant story of the last decade can be found by scrolling down to the 'Story Archive' and jumping back to 2014's Khans of Tarkir. The biggest glaring omission is Project Lightning Bug, which is a critical story that somehow isn't tied into 2015's Battle for Zendikar section.

A Brief History of Magic Story

Magic: The Gathering - The Visual Guide Cover Art by Kieran Yanner

At this point, I have to plug the fact that, I wrote a whole book on Magic Lore that is an excellent place to start in Magic: The Gathering - The Visual Guide! If you're interested in Magic Story at all, it's an excellent place to start.

The earliest era of Magic Story is known to fans as the Pre-Revision Era. It featured novels from Harper Prism that were only loosely related to the card sets, and a comic line from Armada Comics that served as the main story until their cancellation in 1996. Outside of very rare instances, these stories are not relevant and I would not recommend trying to track them down unless you're really dedicated. The metaphysics of Magic were a little more loose back then, and the term 'revision' referred to a tightening of the lore that happened after this period (including a few novels that replaced the comic version of the same stories).

Next is the Pre-Mending Era, which consisted primarily of a series of novels that ran from Tempest in 1997 through Eventide in 2008. These novels are where a lot of 'classic' Magic story was told, from the years-long Weatherlight saga (featuring Urza and the Phyrexians) to the mostly stand-alone trilogies of Mirrodin, Kamigawa, and Ravnica. This era ended with the Mending, which depowered planeswalkers from their god-like abilities to simply being extraordinary mages. It also made non-planeswalker travel between planes impossible.

I summarize the Pre-Revision and Pre-Mending eras in my article Magic Story: Elder Dragons to the Mending.

The Post-Mending Era followed with 2008's Shards of Alara. The novel line was trimmed down to a single novel a year for the current card set story, and another novel featuring the new planeswalker characters in a story not associated with any card set. There was also a series of webcomics that ran for several years focusing on the origins of many of the characters and their ongoing stories. These ran until 2011 when both the web comics and the novels were canceled. Afterward, the story jumped around mediums for a time. 2011's Innistrad featured story summary articles, while 2012's Return to Ravnica and 2013's Theros both featured short e-novellas. Uncharted Realms, a web fiction series, ran for several years but wasn't used to tell the main story until 2014's Khans of Tarkir.

After Tarkir, the title of Uncharted Realms became Magic Story, and web fiction became the primary avenue for Magic's story. Since that time, there have been two major story arcs: The Gatewatch Saga, and the Phyrexian Saga.

The Gatewatch Saga ran from 2015's Magic Origins through 2019's War of the Spark. It followed a core group of planeswalkers as they banded together to fight threats like the Eldrazi and Nicol Bolas, and largely featured the same recurring cast from story to story. It culminated in the two War of the Spark novels. 2019's Throne of Eldraine returned to the e-novella format, although 2020's Theros: Beyond Death's novella was canceled, another one was released for 2020's Ikoria: Lair of the Behemoths.

I summarize the Post-Mending Era up until this point in my article Magic Story: Alara through War of the Spark.

Magic Story returned to the web fiction format with 2020's Zendikar Rising, although The Phyrexian Saga didn't begin properly until the following set, 2021's Kaldheim. These stories followed the Gatewatch adjusting to life after War of the Spark and largely drifting apart until the discovery of the Phyrexian threat pulls the cast back together, culminating in 2023's March of the Machine.

The Boom! Comics ran during the same time period as the Phyrexian Saga, featuring an alternate continuity following the events of War of the Spark, which happened slightly differently in the comics. These stories, while not canon to Magic Story, are excellent character pieces and a lot of fun. The final issues will be coming out in 2023.

It's not clear yet (well, to you) where the story is going in the wake of March of the Machine, which features a metaphysical shake-up the likes of which hasn't been seen since the Mending. Most planeswalker have been desparked in a mysterious event following the Phyrexian Invasion, and the scars from the Invasion have opened Omenpaths between planes, mysterious portals that anyone can use to travel.

What's Next?

Art by Magali Villeneuve

I mentioned before there are several possible 'hop on' points for Magic's Story. If you want to do more than just start fresh with Wilds of Eldraine, here's my advice. If you only want to read the most recent story arc, I'd recommend going to the Magic Story Archive and going back to 2020's Zendikar Rising, and moving forward from there. Zendikar Rising was the return to web fiction, and features pretty much the same creative team that will be featured through the rest of the arc, as well as the upcoming story arcs. If you want to trim it down a little, you could get away with reading Kaldheim and then jumping forward to Kamigawa: Neon Dynasty and reading from there, but you'll miss some important characters and dynamics that'll matter later in the arc.

If you want to go back even farther, rewind to 2015's Magic Origins and read from there. Magic Origins was written as a sort-of soft reboot for the modern story, featuring origin stories for the core Gatewatch characters. From 2015 to 2018 the web fiction is largely serialized, so you'll want to keep reading up until Core Set 2019's Chronicle of Bolas. After that, you can read The Gathering Storm, which was in essence an entire prequel novel to War of the Spark that was released strangely. Finally, you can read War of the Spark: Ravnica, but I don't recommend reading the follow-up novel, Forsaken. After War of the Spark, you can skip forward to 2020's Zendikar Rising. There are a couple novellas in-between, but they're not critical to understanding what's happening. Although the Theros: Beyond Death Story Summary is important.

The vast majority of the current crop of Vorthos, Magic's lore fans, started with Magic Origins and the Gatewatch era. Going back farther becomes much more difficult beyond this point. If you want to dive in further, check out my Magic Story Resources Thread on Reddit!