Magic: The Gathering core sets, 1993–2007

Printing of Revised began in early April 1994 and continued until April 1995, when Fourth Edition was announced. It is estimated that about 500 million cards of the set were produced, which fully eliminated the distribution problems of earlier sets.[11] The cards of Revised were still widely available even well into 1996.

The cards of Revised like the cards of the preceding Unlimited Edition all had white borders, no expansion symbol, and the artist credit at the bottom left. However, the cards were far paler than their Unlimited counterparts, and the three-dimensional beveling of the cards was cropped out. The omission of the bevel in the card frame was an error.[12] This gave the cards an appearance that was widely criticized as "washed out" and even unprofessional. The beveling was returned in 4th Edition, and the colors were much more vibrant in that set. The large print run meant that Revised basic lands were so numerous and common that it was uncommon to find any other lands in decks until several years later.

The collation of the cards made it possible for a basic land card to appear in the common and uncommon slots of a pack. This was intentional; the land cards were printed on the common and uncommon print sheets. Basic lands would get their own full print sheets in 4th Edition, making Revised the last tournament-legal set until Seventh Edition in which basic lands could be found in booster packs. Basic lands returned as a card slot in the Shards of Alara block of 2008.

Revised was the first base edition of the game to be sold in multiple languages. Black bordered, limited editions were produced in French, German, and Italian. Unlimited, white bordered editions in the same languages were produced after the limited editions had sold out.

One card-printing error of note appeared on the card Serendib Efreet. This blue creature card was misprinted with a green border and a picture of another card, Ifh-Bíff Efreet. The name, mana cost and rules text were all correct, though.[13][14] The Revised version is now the most common due to the limited print run of the original, intended versions.

The card Disintegrate was missing the clause "and cannot be regenerated".[13]

The card Onulet incorrectly listed the artist as Kerstin Kaman instead of Anson Maddocks.[13]

The printing of Revised cleared up a number of problems with the Limited Edition and Unlimited Edition rules. Two changes had a large effect on game play. First, the rule that "multiple effects resolve simultaneously unless a conflict arises" was changed to "effects always resolve last-in-first-out". The concept was later refined and then referred to as the "stack", an idea taken from computer programing's stack. Second, the rule for Protection from was changed from "the creature is unaffected by X" to the more precise "the creature cannot be blocked by X creatures, be the target of X spells or abilities, or be enchanted by X enchantments; and all damage dealt to this creature by X sources is reduced to zero".

The most visually obvious of Revised's changes was the elimination of the Mono/Poly/Continuous qualifiers to artifacts. With the advent of the game's first tap symbol (a "T" turned forty-five degrees clockwise in a light gray circle), the qualifiers used to differentiate when and how often an artifact could be used were no longer needed. Artifacts that were previously classified as Mono artifacts were given the new tap symbol, while Poly and Continuous artifacts were simply re-templated without the tap symbol.

The Summer Magic print run of Revised Edition were printed in the summer of 1994.[15] This print run intended to fix some of the errors with Revised, including the washed-out color, but had problems of its own. The colors were considered too dark and the artist credited for Plateau stayed uncorrected as well as the artist credited for Serendib Efreet, although the Efreet had received its original color and art again. A new misprint occurred with the green card Hurricane; the so-called "blue Hurricane" is one of the rarest and most sought-after cards in the entirety of Magic because of its misprint with a blue border.[16] On the secondary market it sells for thousands of dollars. The print run was recalled and destroyed; however, about 40 booster boxes that were shipped to England and Tennessee survived. No more than 11 or 12 of each rare exists.[17]

This print run is known primarily for its extremely scarce and valuable cards and packs. Cards are distinguished by dark coloring and a 1994 copyright date displayed at the bottom, along with the artist credit. Booster packs look identical to normal Revised Edition packs, and as such, telling them apart is impossible without opening them. No starter decks were made.

Twenty Revised cards were originally in the Arabian Nights expansion, and another nineteen were originally in the Antiquities expansion. Thirty-five cards that were in Unlimited were not in Revised, including the Power Nine. A few of the cards that were removed from the base set reappeared in later sets, such as Icy Manipulator, which would be reprinted in Ice Age. A few others would be reprinted in Eighth Edition to celebrate the game's 10th anniversary. Cards removed were generally thought to either be confusing, or to have power level issues.

Notable cards include:

• The Dual Lands: Tundra, Underground Sea, Badlands, Taiga, Savannah, Scrubland, Bayou, Tropical Island, Volcanic Island and Plateau. These lands provide two colors of mana with the benefit of possessing two basic land types, an uncommon trait on non-basic lands. All future dual lands would be printed with restrictions. They are now a defining part of the Legacy and Vintage formats, due in particular to their ability to be searched for by the various Fetchlands released many years later.[18] While many cards were removed from Revised for power reasons, the original dual lands were retained.
• Demonic Tutor – The original and most powerful "tutor" card ever printed. This card is restricted in Vintage and banned in Legacy. All future tutors were printed with restrictions or made more expensive like Odyssey's Diabolic Tutor.
• Serendib Efreet - This blue card was printed with the wrong art and a green card frame, making it the most commonly seen misprint.
• Sol Ring – While all of the zero-casting cost mana artifacts were removed from Revised, Sol Ring remained with its single casting cost. Its mana acceleration has caused it to be restricted in Vintage and banned in Legacy.

Fourth Edition included the beveled border missing from the previous core set, Revised. The colors were also much more saturated than in Revised. This set was also the first core set to include a Wizards of the Coast copyright notice at the bottom of the card, in addition to the standard illustration credit.

Booster packs, for the first time in a core set, came in packs with cropped card art on the packaging. Up to this point, Alpha, Beta, Unlimited, and Revised all had a common-looking booster pack packaging. The cards Brass Man, Hurloon Minotaur, Mana Vault, Mesa Pegasus, and Spirit Link were shown on the booster packs. Starter packs were also improved, with mana symbols replacing the simple colored dots present on the card back. Finally, an overall red-brown theme was given to the packaging, which would persist for Fifth Edition before changing to green in 6th Edition.

Starter decks in this set included an additional rare, bringing the total to three. However, the starter decks contained fewer uncommons, going down to nine from the previous thirteen. Booster Packs included one rare, three uncommons, and eleven commons. Fourth Edition was the first set to offload its land printings to a dedicated land sheet. This freed up room on the other card sheets to include more spells. As a result, booster packs could now be produced without any lands, which Wizards decided to do. Fourth Edition lands were only available in starter decks. The change was mostly seen as a positive, since by this time lands were ubiquitous and players were unhappy to find a land in place of a "real" card.

Fourth Edition introduced the modern turned arrow tapped symbol, replacing the rotated "T" that had been introduced in Revised,[21]^: 87 as a universal tap symbol to include on cards in all language editions of the game.[22]^: 11 This symbol was first used in an expansion with Ice Age, which was released in the summer. Current cards still use the turned arrow, albeit with a slightly different illustration.

Like the previous core set and all core sets since, several cards were removed and new ones were added from Fourth Edition. Among those cards removed were those that had attracted controversy from those outside the game. Most of the cards whose art depicted nude or near-nude humanoid forms (including Earthbind and Guardian Angel) were excised, as were many that had overtly religious themes (including Resurrection and Demonic Hordes), though one demon, Lord of the Pit, remained. One card, Unholy Strength had its artwork altered to remove a flaming inverted pentagram in the background (as compared to this). Also removed were the original ten "dual lands" (one for each pair of Magic's five colors). With the ability to tap for one mana of either of two colors, they were deemed too powerful. A number of other cards would also be pruned from the set for being too powerful, but some (such as Clone) would appear in future sets.

Wizards has used Cartamundi as their card printer since Alpha. For some undocumented reason, during the production of 4th Edition, the company experimented with using other vendors. Some cards were printed by the United States Playing Card Corporation, and had a thicker stock along with a glossy overcoat on the back. While these cards were not intended to be released, some starter packs were leaked out into public circulation. The cards do not glow under blacklight, unlike normal cards, and did not have the normal dot design on the back.

• Balance – This card can act as a Wrath of God, Armageddon, and Mind Twist all at once if played at the right time. It was one of the few extremely powerful cards left in the 4th Edition. Even after its restriction, it was still able to warp tournament formats.[23]
• Strip Mine – While most of the cards deemed too powerful were removed from 4th Edition, this one was actually added in. Strip Mine was originally from Antiquities but had not been included in Revised. Tournament play quickly showed that Strip Mine was too powerful and it was eventually restricted to one per deck in Standard and Vintage. Today it is banned in Legacy. Over time, Wizards of the Coast has come to downplay land destruction as an element of the game and Strip Mine has not been reprinted since in a regular set in part due to this policy.

The release of Sixth Edition brought a new version of the rules.[25]^: 42 Notable changes included:

• The "batch" system of spell resolution was replaced with the "stack" system in Sixth Edition. Previously, spells resolved in complicated batches, in which a player could only respond to the spells in the batch. Also, once a batch began to resolve, no more spells could be played until the entire batch of spells resolved. This was replaced with the stack system (much like a computer stack), in which spells could be added regardless of what was on it.[25]^: 43 Also, spells resolve one at a time in the stack, utilizing the "last in first out" system.
• The new stack system removed the "timing" aspect of spells. Therefore, the interrupt spell type was removed as being redundant. All spells that were interrupts (generally counterspells) became instants.
• Before Sixth Edition, spells and abilities that produced mana were known as mana sources and couldn't be countered. In Sixth Edition, mana source spells (such as Dark Ritual) became instants, which could be countered just like other instants. (Mana source abilities, on the other hand, became "mana abilities"; these didn't use the stack and still could not be countered.)
• Triggered abilities were clarified. Under the old system, these confused many players who didn't know how (or when) to respond to them. With the "timing" aspect removed in Sixth Edition, it became clearer just when a player could play a spell to combat a triggered ability.
• The "damage-prevention step" was removed. Now, when a spell deals damage, it deals it immediately on resolution, rather than waiting for damage prevention.[25]^: 42 The difference lies in when a player can play damage prevention: Previously, a player would play it after the damage spell resolves. After the rule change, the player had to play it before the damage spell resolves.
• Artifacts also received a rule change. Before the change, an artifact "shut off" or stopped working while it was tapped, unless it was an artifact creature. After, an artifact remains active while tapped. This was to bring artifacts more in line with other cards. Some artifacts (like Howling Mine and Static Orb) retained the "shut off" aspect, which necessitated explicitly printing that they only worked while untapped.
• Combat was restructured. Each step of combat was clearly demarcated, and each step had opportunities for players to play spells.
• Combat damage from creatures was also put on the stack where spells and abilities would normally go. In this way, combat damage could be responded to before the damage is actually dealt. This allowed (among other things) creatures in combat to be sacrificed for effects and still deal damage as though they were still in play. This change would later be reversed in the rule changes introduced with the Magic 2010 core set.
• One of the loss conditions was changed. Before the change, a player that lost all of their life didn't lose the game immediately; if they were able to raise their life to at least 1 before the end of the current phase, they lived. Under 6th Edition rules, a player loses the game as soon as a player has priority once their life total is zero or less.[25]^: 42 This brought that loss condition in line with the other loss condition specified by the rules; a player being forced to draw a card when he or she has an empty library has always been an immediate loss.
• Originally, spells that summoned creatures were called summon spells; they were not used to represent creatures unless the creature in question had been successfully summoned and was in play. However, a few cards like Raise Dead had been incorrectly referring to summon spells as "creatures" or "creature spells" for a long time regardless of their location. Rather than correct the wording on these cards, WotC decided to abolish summon spells entirely and replace them with the functionally equivalent "creature spell"
• Originally, if two cards had the same ability, that ability would be expressed the same way on both cards. Starting in 6E, lands would no longer have their abilities written out. Instead, a giant mana symbol appeared in the text box. However, cards that had the exact same ability as a basic land, such as Llanowar Elves, would still have the ability written out.
• Banding was discontinued

Some of these changes were well-received, but the combination of all of the changes proved to be extremely controversial and divisive, and was compared to the Portal set and rules. The state of the game prior to these changes was often referred to as "real Magic" by people who hated the changes, a fact that Wizards of the coast eventually acknowledged on the "Old Fogey" card from the Unhinged expansion.