A Journey Through the Multiverse of Magic: The Gathering
From the techno-feudal streets of Kamigawa to the shattered realms of Alara, let's take a look at some of the most important planes that exist in the Multiverse of perhaps the most popular trading card game of all time – Magic: The Gathering.
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The cultural tapestries of magic, tech and mythology
These planes offer unique forms of planar civilisation and metaphysics.
Alara
In the beginning Alara was a single huge plane that was ruptured violently by an ancient Planeswalker who drained its mana. This was The Sundering. It broke into five distinct Shards, each flowing with three colours of mana dictating their cultures.
Bant (White/Green/Blue)
This is an orderly kingdom focusing on structure and oaths.
Esper (Blue/White/Black)
A calculated hegemony obsessed with replacing organic matter with Eherium, a magical metal.
Grixis (Black/Red/Blue)
A hellscape dominated by necromancy and undeath.
Jund (Red/Green/Black)
A primordial volcanic wasteland that is ruled by the law of the hunt.
Naya (Green/White/Red)
A lush tropical paradise that is dominated by both gargantuan creatures and primal life.
In the Conflux the shards violently crashed back together, choreographed by Nicol Bolas, to feed on the surge of five-colour mana that occurred.
Theros
Taking its influence from classical Greek and Roman mythology, Theros’s gods are Nyxborn beings crafted by the collective belief and devotion of the mortals. They live in Nyx, a starfield above the mortal world. This spiritual structure permits belief to spontaneously disrupt or generate divinity, as seen with ascension to godhood of Planeswalker Xenagos.
Kaladesh
Kaladesh offers an optimistic, ornate, technologically driven aesthetic, labelled Aetherpunk. This is defined by plenty of Aether, a magical element used for technology and complex automatons. The conflict centres of the ruling Consulate, holds a tight control over Aether distribution, and the Renegades’ fight for technological freedom. Kaladesh gave the components for Tezzeret’s Planar Bridge, something Bolas later used for transporting the Eternals across the Multiverse.
Kamigawa
Kamigawa transitioned from feudal Japan and the Kami War into the Neo Dynasty, a successful mix of tradition and high technology. Targeted by Jin-Gitaxias, the Phyrexian Praetor, the plane united its Kami magic and advanced cybernetics to repel the invasion successfully, although the peaceful Moonfolk Planeswalker Tamiyo was unfortunately devastated.
Kaldheim
Inspired by Norse mythology, Kaldheim is made up of Ten Realms, all connected via the World Tree. These realms collide cyclically in cataclysmic events – Doomskar - permitting travel and warfare between the different tribes. This model is a naturally multi-planar cosmos offering a conceptual forerunner to the chaotic appearance of the Omenpaths across the whole Multiverse.
Frontier and political arenas
These worlds offer settings that are perfect for specific narrative conflicts. They often highlight localised dangers or political intrigue.
Eldraine (The shifting fable)
Built upon the duality of both the noble Courts and the chaotic Wilds, this plane takes a look at the dark underside that exists around fairy tales. Following the Phyrexian invasion, Eldraine found themselves facing the Wicked Slumber, a localised enchantment crisis.
Ixalan (primal empire and hidden treasure)
Characterised by Dinosaurs and by a clash of four cultures: Sun Empire, Pirates, Dusk Legion Vampires and River Heralds Merfolk. Ixalan hid the Immortal Sun, an artifact that was vital to the schemes of Bolas which made it impossible for Planeswalkers to leave the plane. The recovery post-invasion has resulted in the discovery of deep, ancient underground realms located below the golden city of Orazca.
Fiora (the high city of intrigue)
A plane that takes its inspiration from Renaissance Italy, where the ideologies of political intrigue and espionage dominate over magical conflict on a large scale. The story of Fiora centres on its capital, Paliano, and the assassination of the spirit-king Brago who was killed by the Planeswalker Kaya.
Arcavios (Strixhaven) (the scholarly realm)
Arcavios is dedicated to the study of magic and is the scholarly realm where you will find Strixhaven University. The university was founded by five Elder Dragons and serves as a repository of all magical knowledge.
Additional worlds of note
There are also a number of other worlds of note. Segovia is notable for its miniature scale; it is roughly one-hundredth of the size of Dominaria. Wildfire as the name suggests is a plane of fire, and also djinni and efreeti, which link it to Dominaria. Ulgrotha is a much older plane and was once part of The Shard. It was isolated following the original Sylex detonation.
The tapestry of scars and survival
The Multiverse is now a far more dangerous and interconnected place than ever before. The Mending ensured that Planeswalkers were mortal, and the Omenpaths made their worlds more vulnerable. Previously, planes enjoyed safety as a result of their geographic isolation; now, with the opening of permanent portals this means that the creatures and cultures of Innistrad or Eldraine can move outward, and this creates an unstable cross-planar ecosystem.
The very survival of this scarred, interconnected, and volatile structure now depends far less on any singular heroic figure and more on the collective adaptability and resilience of all the individual worlds themselves. The future of Magic: The Gathering is no longer simply about the heroes who move across the worlds, but about those worlds and how they can stand on their own.
