Wizards of the Coast is planning to tell an original story within the Marvel universe for its upcoming Universes Beyond set, Darkhold Destiny, marking a departure from previous crossover expansions that recreated existing characters as Magic: The Gathering cards.
The announcement came as Polygon spoke with the Darkhold Destiny team ahead of the set’s reveal at New York Comic Con 2026. According to the report, this marks what appears to be the most ambitious Universes Beyond release yet, aiming to bridge a gap between crossover sets and Magic’s homegrown multiverse stories.
An original story with an original character
The key difference from previous Universes Beyond sets is that Wizards of the Coast will use Darkhold Destiny to tell an original narrative set within the Marvel sandbox. The story centers on supervillains Hela and Dormammu acquiring the Darkhold and using it to unleash chaos across the Marvel multiverse.
To save their worlds, a team of heroes including Thor, Doctor Strange, Scarlet Witch and other magic-focused characters will fight back against the forces of evil.
In-multiverse Magic sets typically tell complex stories that play out over multiple years and culminate in epic event sets. Universes Beyond has more commonly functioned as a showcase for what another intellectual property would look like as Magic cards, rather than using those cards to tell an original story set within another universe.
Wizards says the idea emerged naturally over time. The team initially saved certain Marvel characters that felt aligned with the core Magic vibe for something special before realizing it could become more than a set of witches, wizards, zombies and elder gods—it could be an original story. According to Polygon, Marvel encouraged Wizards to go further with the world and its characters than originally planned.
To support the release, Marvel will publish a comic telling the same story as the cards.
While mapping out the narrative, Wizards realized they needed a type of character that did not yet exist in the Marvel universe. They pitched five ideas for original superheroes, and Marvel selected one, which aligned with something the comics publisher had already been looking to develop internally.
Wizards is not revealing the new character but expressed hope it would eventually appear in other Marvel stories. Magic’s head designer Mark Rosewater pointed to DC’s Harley Quinn as a similar example—a character created outside the comics for Batman: The Animated Series before becoming a key player in the broader DC universe.
“That’s a staple of how comics work. They work with different partners and the good ideas sort of make their way in.”
Mark Rosewater, Magic: The Gathering head designer
An expert-level Draft
A recurring issue with Universes Beyond has been smaller set sizes, sometimes due to the limited scope of the intellectual property being adapted. This leads to less interesting gameplay in Limited formats like Draft and Sealed, where players build decks on the spot from a pool of random cards.
That will not be an issue with Darkhold Destiny. Rosewater told Polygon that the set supports strategies for all 10 two-color combinations, which has not been typical across Universes Beyond sets.
Aaron Forsyth, Magic’s senior vice president of design and creative, said the set will feel like an expert-level release.
“It may be the most complex Universes Beyond set we’ve made because we knew that it was very aimed at Magic players. We think this is in their wheelhouse, so we wanted to pull out all the stops with artifacts, enchantments, and sorceries. It’s not just wall-to-wall legendary creatures fighting each other.”
Aaron Forsyth, Magic: The Gathering senior vice president of design and creative
The future of Universes Beyond
Wizards cannot reveal much about how this development will affect future Universes Beyond sets. Because the company works on each set years in advance to navigate complex partnerships, the impact may not be visible for some time.
Still, Rosewater said the experience has left the team eager to do something similar with future crossovers.
“Now that we’ve done it once, at least it’s an idea that we now have. We’d have to find the right partner, but doing anything the first time just makes the second time more likely.”
Mark Rosewater, Magic: The Gathering head designer
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