• In a few sentences, what is the premise of Sands of Vikaar?

"Sands of Vikaar is a premier set chronicling the titular Vikaar, Junkyard of the Multiverse, a plane of dust and sand where scavengers war over the relics of an ancient civilization, featuring the usual suite of novel mechanics and aimed at constructed formats. Between malevolent forces to which you're a pest and fellow opportunists to which you're a rival, the hardy natives and eager omenpath-venturers which populate the plane have their work cut out for them. Companion stories illustrate the origin story of demon conscript Kajiwara Ai caught up in the machinations of the ruthless Benefactor and her hired Legion as they journey below the sands to uncover the heart of this ancient plane."

• Where would you say Sands of Vikaar is in the development process?

"It's a few steps after the "first draft" stage, as it were. Every slot is filled and many are iterated on, but I've yet to take a step back after Field Test and really take a hard look at some of the archetype pain points, most of which are likely to require rebuilding a good few cards to solve. Still, it's a lot farther than any other project I've worked on, and I'm looking forward to ironing out the kinks and taking the lessons forward!"

• What inspired you to begin creating Sands of Vikaar?

"I've always wanted to make a proper set ever since I picked up custom magic as a hobby. I've had a couple false starts before Vikaar—first, the overambitious metafictional plane of Talekeep, second the time loop set of Catalex, but Vikaar was the first to get past finished commons. The set was born in a chat between me and my friend Silver, discussing ways we could collaborate—Silver mentioned the idea of a "junkyard plane", where the character Kajiwara Ai sparked, and from there the ideas started to flow. I brought in my genre inspirations from hard fantasy and sci-fi—to me, the thing that's always compelled me most about fiction is the idiosyncrasies of the worldbuilding, the alien magics and settings that draw one into their world. Brandon Sanderson is a particular inspiration for tone to me personally."

• Sands of Vikaar was recently a part of the Field Test event on the MSE server, an event that specializes in taking polished sets and tuning them for a constructed environment. How has Vikaar's cameo in the event impacted the set as a whole, and what are your mechanical goals for the set moving forward?

"Field test has opened my eyes to a lot of things. One mechanic in Vikaar's first draft was LCI's Discover—don't laugh, I was a naïve young designer back then!—but the more overtly silly elements of that mechanic quickly made themselves apparent, and it's now been replaced by the more-interesting (in my view) Resurgence. More pointedly, it's put the set under a lot of stress, both in clearly-overtuned individual cards and archetypes built on fundamental misconceptions."

• The post-apocalyptic wasteland is a beloved staple aesthetic in the custom magic space. How have you managed to adapt this aesthetic to meet your set's unique flavor and worldbuilding?

"The biggest standout of Vikaar versus other wasteland sets is the ancient civilization of the Alloyed Host and their oldsteel remnants. There are plenty of sets marked by a dormant ancient civilization, and plenty where scavengers struggle to survive in a brutal world, but not as many marry the two aspects. Much of the sentience in Vikaar is in steel beneath it, and the struggle to claim those ancient materials and retrofit them for the conflicts of the moment is the driving force in Vikaar's setting. You'll see plenty of scavengers outfitted in high-end cybernetics and plenty more looking to acquire them, and plenty of being.

The desolate nature of the plane is also underscored by a Magic-themed twist on the irradiated desolation that many dystopias feature—here, ancient plane-spanning power grids that once served as mere utility to the Alloyed Host have rusted and ruptured through, spewing rotten mana that mutates and poisons any who approach without sufficient precaution. Under this influence, the wildlife of the plane have grown into violent, canny creatures that leave the dense Sanctuary jungles even more deadly than the lifeless sands."

• What is your favorite card in Sands of Vikaar?

"That's a hard one. I think my current favorite card didn't exist until the Resurgence mechanic came along halfway through Field Test. A modal reanimation spell with later-game utility, it plays strongly to the small-reanimation themes I personally like while also offering extremely powerful upsides in more traditional reanimation strategies. I had a lot of fun with this design."

• Would you like to give any special thanks to anyone on this server for their help?

"Oh, where to begin? For partnership in the initial ideation and a huge number of card designs, Silver, for sure. Everyone who participated in Field Test was invaluable in providing huge amounts of data for getting the set to where it is today—and a special shoutout to Pipsqueak for organizing that. I'd also like to thank Littlelaw for the consistent feedback as I developed the set and for the questions about the lore—those were a lot of fun to answer. And of course, thanks to the noble souls administrating the Custom Magic server and the Custom Magazine—without y'all's efforts, I shudder to imagine where we'd be."