Welcome back, lore fans! Today I'm talking about something personal, my hobby turned side gig over the last five years: articles like this one! Next month will be my five year anniversary of my first published Magic lore article. I began keeping track of just how much I've written about Magic a couple years ago, and was surprised to find I'd written the equivalent of several novels worth of content about Magic - and that wasn't including the years of writing I did on my blog. It's a nostalgic time, as I began writing articles about Magic in advance of Battle for Zendikar to help fill a knowledge gap from the original Zendikar. Now that we're about to return to Zendikar again, let's talk about what led me to writing and how my work has evolved over time.

The Saga Begins

No sure I'd love to read the *checks notes* dozens of books required to understand Time Spiral.

Jhoira of the Ghitu by Kev Walker

When I got back into Magic in 2007, the Time Spiral block (and Magic story fans in general) put me off the story. Forums (an internet relic that was like Tik Tok, but for words) were full of fans angry about the "Bradywalkers", the derisive term for the significantly depowered planeswalkers in the wake of Time Spiral's story. Time Spiral's story was so hopelessly self-referential that it was incredibly difficult for a new fan to get into, and so I resolved not to bother. A couple years later, Magic story had undergone a kind of soft reboot. The story was accessible again, and so I began picking it up casually but ultimately not getting much more into it... until my favorite casual reading, the Star Wars Expanded Universe novels, disappeared with the Disney acquisition in 2013.

That same year, I made a terrible decision. I became a forum moderator (kind of like what streaming sites like Twitch do now, but in slower motion). I had become a regular on what, at the time, was one of the larger Magic forums, MTG Salvation. My soon-to-be wife was in Medical School in another state, and I had plenty of free time to kill. Sometime later, there was an open Storyline moderator position, and I had become a full blown Vorthos, so I jumped in (I actually loved it, because I was a glutton for punishment).

As a quick aside, If I banned you or gave you an infraction over the years... well you probably deserved it. But I certainly don't care or remember anything about it, and I'm friends today with a lot of people who exasperated me as a moderator.

Exhaustion by Paolo Parente

As a storyline mod, I noticed a lot of the 'stickies' (forum threads with useful resources) were years out-of-date. They had last been maintained by Berend Boer, who moved on to his own personal - and excellent - site, Multiverse In Review. I happened to be there just at the right time (this will become a theme), as the online storyline community began to grow, thanks in large part to a switch in emphasis to weekly serialized fiction. After Magic Origins in 2015, we had a rather large group of newer fans heading into Battle for Zendikar who hadn't been around for Zendikar the first time through.

Together with fellow moderator Kaburi, we were struck by the number of posts (on our site and elsewhere) asking for digest versions of the original Zendikar story. MTG Salvation had the ability to publish articles (but there wasn't much in the way of regular content), so over the summer of 2015 Kaburi and I began work on our first article.

Archive Trap

Archive Trap by Jason Felix

The title of the series we chose was Archive Trap: The Vorthos Guide to Magic: the Gathering. We landed on the card Archive Trap because it was both a card from Zendikar (the set we were talking about) and depicted someone getting buried beneath a mountain of books. It felt appropriate. The original intent was to create an almanac-style guide that was more useful than simply directing people to the wiki. We divided the information into character bios, geography and politics, and story summaries. Our first article landed around 15,000 words (we were a bit ambitious), so we split it into three slightly more manageable chunks for publication. You might have noted that as time goes on, my article length has gotten more manageable.

The first article came out in September 2015 and did excellent numbers for the time. After the first article I started writing Archive Trap mostly solo. At first, I picked topics that interested me, but it became clear quickly that planning out timely topics made the greatest impact. My son was born a few months later and I found that reading and writing on my phone was one of the few activities I could do while holding him, so I became more prolific. As time went on, I experimented with the formula a bit, including publishing a few theory pieces at the now-defunct Card Confidants website. All told, I wrote around 200,000 words (the equivalent of two novels) under the Archive Trap banner at MTGS (some of which I published there later, to complete the 'set', as it were).

In 2016, about a year or so into writing, I grew discontent with just writing Archive Trap and only engaging the storyline forum community. I was generally tired of "Jacetus League" takes (the community today has generally selective amnesia about the first few years of reactions to the Gatewatch) and was looking for a community that didn't skew quite so negative. So, roughly around Eldritch Moon's release, I created my aforementioned blog and began engaging with other lore creators on Twitter and Tumblr. I made friends with Cary Thomas Barkett and Loreley Weisel, and together we created a writers group of sorts. Cary and Loreley helped me level up my writing and we each gave one another a place to bounce around ideas, help each other do research, and generally do fun Vorthos things. One of those ideas was a long-germinating theory I had regarding a certain corvid-aligned person.

The Raven Man

Raven Man artwork by Chris Rahn

Up until Who Is The Raven Man in 2017, my article numbers had been pretty good for a smaller creator. I had become a global mod and eventually an admin for MTGS, but still a small-time content creator (and... that hasn't really changed, lol). When I finally published my Raven Man piece (after over a year of writing and tinkering), it did astronomically well. Medium-size Magic Youtuber numbers well (again, for the time). I was shocked to find myself followed by a number of Wizards of the Coast staff, something I'm sure they've regretted ever since.

It was also the point where I realized I was pouring so much of myself into these articles that it was silly that I wasn't looking to get compensated for them. With the encouragement of my wife (something she'll never let me forget), I started seeking out a good (paying) fit for my future articles. I would love to say I got offers from all over, but the reality is not a lot of outlets are on the lookout for lore content. There were two that paid and wanted me, and I went with the longest history just a few months after dropping the Raven Man piece.

Gathering Magic... I mean Coolstuffinc

If you're a lore fan, it's pretty easy to see why I picked Coolstuffinc, or what was then still known as Gathering Magic. Most retailer-based article sites dallied with lore articles every couple years only to inevitably drop them (unceremoniously, I might add). Gathering Magic had a long history of publishing lore content from a variety of writers, including friends of mine, so I made the jump. With that jump came a branding change. As much as I loved cute article names and screen names, the fact that most people didn't realize that the lore writer "Jay" from Twitter, MTGS, and Tumblr was the same person was an issue. I started going by my real name on Twitter and Gathering Magic.

At the same time, my time was no longer occupied taking care of a baby, as my toddler had finally gotten on a regular sleep schedule. I suddenly had a lot more time in the evenings, and so Cary, Loreley, and I tried our hand at recording a few test episodes for a potential podcast at near the end of Rivals of Ixalan in 2018.

The Vorthos Cast

The Vorthos Cast Playmat art by Dios Revoredo

The Loregofys is a pretty clever name, right? They had started in 2017 and had a fair size audience and an irreverent approach to covering story material. There was no way we were going to be as clever as that name, so we decided to go with the straightforward "The Vorthos Cast" title. Our three test episodes were sealed in a darksteel vault, and we started fresh with Dominaria. There was a massive hunger for Dominaria lore from the huge number of Magic fans who had never played a set based on Dominaria. Much like Battle for Zendikar, we were in the right place at the right time. Thanks to the Dominaria leak, we even got a preview card fairly early on. Had the situation been different, or we started just a smidge too late, we wouldn't have caught on quite as well as we have.

After only six months of podcasting, two big life changes hit me at the same time. First, my wife's fellowship required us to move out-of-state. Second, I got a message asking if I'd like to work on Magic's Story.

Loremaster or... er... Continuity Consultant

There are a lot of people at Wizards of the Coast. I can't say I have anything but the smallest inkling of their hierarchy and workflow. What I do know is that anything coming out of WotC was part of a lot more complex process than you probably think. I initially contracted on a project by project basis to work with the relatively new Franchise Team, which eventually turned into retainer agreement and ongoing gig ever since. There is, legitimately, not a lot I can say about my work as a continuity consultant if WotC staff haven't already made the statement.

My 'title' was originally loremaster, but I thought that generally sounded a little silly. My main career has been in public health emergency management, and I'd like something that sounded a little more like an actual profession, so we went with Continuity Consultant.

My work for WotC has typically been as a consulting editor (NOT a copy editor, as my work can attest that isn't my thing) on stories or doing background research and summaries as requested. Most of the time as a consultant, I'm just suggesting changes. What those changes I've suggested were and which ones were incorporated are covered under NDA, and not something I'm going to talk about publicly for a variety of reasons. Not the least of which is that I don't have a full picture of every project I work on, from who else was involved to why certain decisions were made. There are a lot more steps to creating a story than "hire author, author turns in story, story gets published" and I'm generally only there for the last bit. The notable exception comes out this October...

Legends: A Visual History

Legends: A Visual History Cover Art by Tyler Jacobson

In early 2019, I was approached by publisher Abrams ComicArts to write Legends: A Visual History, at the recommendation of the Franchise Team. As the author, my experience and what I can say about the project changes significantly from my consultant work. Wizards had already put out Rise of the Gatewatch: A Visual History, but needed an outside author to write the follow-up and help guide the art selection. They knew they wanted it to be about the Legendary Creatures of Magic, so as someone who had spent four years trying to make lore accessible, I made a good fit.

I'll talk more about the process of writing Legends when it finally comes out later this year. It was delayed, like so many things, by COVID-19 (otherwise it would have come out last month). All I'll say about it for now is that if you enjoy my lore articles, you'll probably enjoy the book. Just keep in mind the target audience is a little less knowledgeable and enfranchised than my readers here. I also got to put Krenko, Mob Boss and Niv-Mizzet, the Firemind with the Weatherlight on the cover of an official Magic book, so I'm pretty happy... even if I had to attend a CommandFest last year and was unable to tell anyone I had literally written the book on Legends. I plan to be obnoxious about it when (or if...?) we have events again.

Note: The art book was written in early 2019 and does contain some artwork from controversial artists that Wizards of the Coast no longer works with for various reasons. Much like the card sets, the time frames involved did not allow for swapping out the art after a certain point last year.

Tips for Content Creators

In my five years writing about Magic's Story, I've learned a lot. Some of it I brought with me from my other career (who knew skills editing disaster plans would be applicable to editing fiction?), while many things I learned along the way. If you're interested in writing about Magic's Story, or just Magic in general, here are some things I learned. Note that these aren't going to be true for everyone, and the reality (as my first 'point' discusses) is that different people are going to have different paths to success.

Accounting for Luck and Privilege

No, really. There's an element of luck involved here that is worth acknowledging, whether it be privilege or being in the right place at the right time (as I noted above, that was frequently). I was perfectly positioned for the consultant job at just the right time. That was it. There's nothing special about me other than I just happened to have the right visibility, the right content, the right availability at exactly the right time. It would be insulting to all the great Vorthos I've known over the years to say otherwise. And it would be especially insulting to anyone who isn't as privileged as I am to say it was skill and smarts alone that got me here. It wasn't. I've been lucky.

So, with that out of the way, let's talk about other things I've learned.

Engage With Your Peers

I can't tell you how many times over the last five years I've seen lore writers appear from the aether and then disappear back into it without engaging the wider community. If you're going to be putting out content, make sure that people know who you are. Nothing, however, will beat having a small group of friends to bounce ideas off of. Find someone else just starting out or around your 'size', so to speak, and help each other out. I try to give a signal boost to newer creators whenever I come across them, and I know many others who do the same.

Keep in mind, though, that I don't have time to consume very much of other people's content, so it helps if I know who you are. If you're looking to put yourself out there, engage the community online.

Be Sustainable

The first thing I learned, in every venture, is that I needed to pace myself a better. There's a surge of creative energy early on, which can quickly turn into burnout for a variety of reasons. Don't use up all your good ideas at once, and don't use up all that creative energy in a short time span. Especially because, early on, you're not going to have much recognition. Slow and steady wins over quick burns.

Be Timely, Be Topical

This one can be hard, but a simple truth is that Magic players want to consume content related to what sets are out right now. As much I'd love to post articles about whatever I want, the stuff that is going to get people's attention takes advantage of the Magic hype cycle. Ride that wave, you'll still have plenty of time to talk about other stuff.

Get Out There, But Get Paid ASAP

Getting yourself out there is important, but don't be like me and create for nothing unless you really love doing it. If your content is good enough to be published, it's good enough to get paid for. Which brings me to the next point.

You Have To Love It for It

Even if you're getting paid, creating content is work. I've really enjoyed writing about Magic for half a decade, but it wasn't always fun or rewarding. It frequently sucked. And I spent a couple years with no hope of 'breaking in' so to speak. Make sure whatever niche you pick is something you enjoy.

Manage Your Expectations

Don't put unnecessary pressures on yourself to reach a certain size audience or be famous or anything like that. Don't compare yourself to other creators. If you love it, people will see that and come to you. Maybe not in the numbers you hoped for, but you'll be appreciated regardless.

That's it for today folks. Join me again next week as I talk about that very online Vorthos community and hopefully point you to new voices (and give some people well deserved boosts).